The movies that make up Arrow Video’s American Horror Project series were made with modest budgets, but the makers of these ‘70s motion pictures were striving for something more than simply churning out another scary flick for the grindhouse and drive-in circuits. The films are all highly imaginative and unique works. The first volume of AHP, which came out in 2016, is outstanding, and volume two is about to be released. Like the first set, the second box contains three movies, and this post highlights our favorite film in the collection.
Dark August (1976) was directed by Martin Goldman, and filmed on location in Stowe, Vermont during the summer of 1975. The film concerns Sal, a middle-aged artist who has left the city behind for country life. One day, he accidentally runs over a young girl with his jeep. Not only is Sal understandably haunted by the incident, he’s also the recipient of a curse, put on him by the bereaved grandfather of the dead girl. Academy Award winner, Kim Hunter, plays Adrianna, a “good witch” who is recruited to try to help Sal.
In addition to the occult horror theme, the film makes good use of its rural setting, incorporating elements of the “city vs. country” subgenre, popularized by the recent box office success of movies like Deliverance (1972) and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974). At its core, Dark August is a psychological film with supernatural elements. It has an appealing visual style, with camera framing and movement a priority. There’s also a focus on pacing and mood, with on-screen bloodletting kept to a minimum. For an exploitation horror film, Dark August is remarkably restrained.
American Horror Project: Volume Two is co-curated by musician and author Stephen Thrower. Since the 1980s, he’s written extensively about unconventional horror films and filmmakers. The books he’s penned include Nightmare USA: The Untold Story of the Exploitation Independents.
Dangerous Minds recently interviewed Stephen Thrower about Dark August and the American Horror Project series.
When did you first see Dark August? What were your initial impressions?
Stephen Thrower: I saw it for the first time in the early 2000s, when I was working on my book Nightmare USA. I liked it for its atmosphere, its unclichéd presentation of the occult, and its subtle buildup of unease, and also for its grasp of the power of environment: the setting of Dark August is palpably real, somewhere lived in and authentic.
What do you think director Martin Goldman was trying to achieve, artistically, with the film?
Stephen Thrower: I think the compositional and textural qualities of the image are quite ‘novelistic,’ the equivalent of creating detailed settings in literary fiction. It seems to me that Goldman was aiming for a character drama with elements of supernatural fiction, almost in a literary sense, like Henry James’ Turn of the Screw or M.R. James’ Casting the Runes. He’s aiming for a very subtle sort of horror film that creeps up on the viewer without undermining the reality of the performances or compromising their naturalism. It’s a study of the corrosive nature of guilt, and at the same time about the equally corrosive nature of revenge.
Much more, after the jump…