"This one doesn't want to be born." So goes the doctor trying to deliver Joan Collins' spawn in this 1975 failure from Hammer Studios. Over a funky soundtrack, the birthing continues under the credits.
Director Peter Sasdy did The Lonely Lady (1983), which is brilliantly awful, but he also did a few good films, notably Taste The Blood Of Dracula (1969) -- which also starred Ralph Bates -- and Countess Dracula (1971) with the late Ingrid Pitt, as well as Hands of the Ripper (1971) which -- regrettably -- I still haven't seen.
Maybe The Devil Within Her (1975) had a good script at one time and we shouldn't blame director Sasdy too much?
It doesn't help that Ralph Bates has an Italian accent in this film. The early scenes with the floppy haired Bates don't portend a good film. And Joan isn't exactly the world's best actress either.
The film was released under other titles -- Sharon's Baby and I Don't Want To Be Born -- and that's never a good sign either. Still, the film succeeds with some nice location work early on that makes up for Bates' accent and the score's matching Olive Garden-worthy musical cues.
Brit stage legend Eileen Atkins arrives as Bates' sister -- a nun -- and the overacting really heats up. Frankly, there's nothing worse than two good British actors working so hard at playing foreign -- think Larry Olivier in Dracula (1979).
Caroline Murno shows up as Joan's friend and I'd swear that she was dubbed. Maybe it's the lack of speaking roles Caroline had in that era - she was usually eye candy or a cavegirl -- but her voice just sounds odd here; maybe it's the accents she drifts into -- Cockney at one point.
This film is a treasure trove of overacting and bad accents, as you can tell.
The lengthy flashback to Joan's previous career as a dancing girl is just hysterical. As the middle-aged Joan dances like Mrs. Roper-dressed-as-a-gypsy, Hercules (!) the dwarf leers at her from off-stage.
To its credit, the film knows that Joan was still a babe at this point in her career and she looks a whole lot better in lingerie than she did in that gypsy dress.
When the dwarf gropes the lingerie-clad Joan in her dressing room, the narration takes on the style of a Penthouse Forum letter and you just can't take any of this seriously.
After Joan bangs the seedy doorman instead of that little fellow, the still-horny dwarf curses her, going so far as to say that she's going to have the Devil's baby.
That is one hard-up midget!
Sister Albana (Eileen Atkins) does the sign of the cross over the baby back in the present, after that flashback, and the kid cries. Soon the infant is biting the priest at the christening. Well, I think he bit the priest; the action is so badly staged that it's just a mix of actors struggling with something off-camera and cuts to Joan's worried face.
Donald Pleasence brings his usual emotionless acting style to the proceedings as the doctor in London who tries to diagnose the devil-child.
Normally Pleasence is the sign of a bad time at the cinema but, frankly, his low-key demeanor is the only plus in this mess.
Neither smart enough to be camp, nor trashy enough to be totally cheap and exploitative, The Devil Within Her (1975) is just a near-total failure.
Joan goes out for a night on the town -- that was quick; how old is that baby? -- and, as expected, the baby is left in a darkened house with the babysitter who's sure to meet her doom from that kid. Jill the sitter (Janet Key from Dracula A.D. 1972 also with Caroline Munro) is found by the couple with her head in the tub as she tries to bathe the baby. Somehow the gal was trying to give the kid a bath and she nearly drowned. It doesn't help that Joan's flat is perpetually a bit dark -- power shortages in 1975 London?
The scene where the baby pushes Janet Key into the water during a stroll in the park recalls that "Bionic Baby" bit from "The Benny Hill Show" with shots of the baby squinting and an obviously non-baby-sized arm reaching up to push the unfortunate actress to her watery doom. It's just nonsense and, unfortunately, the film is only one-third of the way through.
Joan spots Hercules coming out of a London stripclub so she investigates. Translation: an excuse for some nudity, Hammer-style. Joan runs into Tommy (John Steiner), the sleazeball she slept with in that flashback.
Atkins and Pleasence as nun and doctor have a badly scripted science vs. religion debate in the style of The Exorcist (1973) as the baby's parents plan a vacation away from the baby. Good idea.
Meanwhile, Joan has the stripclub greaseball come to her house to see the baby, the baby slaps the guy, and so on.
Nothing in this film makes much sense and the characters' reactions don't quite jibe with what they supposedly believe. I mean, they hardly seem like parents who think that there's something wrong with their kid, never mind that Joan thinks that the baby is the spawn of the devil.
The love scene between the 42-year-old Collins and the 35-year-old Bates is more laughable than erotic, though I guess the brief shot of the topless Collins was a big deal in 1975 before she tarted it up in Aflie Darling (1976), The Stud (1978), and The Bitch (1979).
During a badly staged scene, Ralph Bates hangs himself outside of the baby's room and his body slides neatly into the basement or sewer, it's hard to tell, as the David Gilmour-like guitar whines on the soundtrack. I guess we're supposed to think the baby did it but the sequence remains more confusing than terrifying.
Joan slumbers on, little aware that that trip to Italy with her studly husband is now off.
I suppose that I'm making this sound more enjoyable than it is. Make no mistake: The Devil Within Her (1975) is campy fun for about an hour but those last 30 minutes are just tedious.
Ineptly filmed, poorly lit, ridiculously staged, ludicrously scored, and implausible even in the strange world of this film's plot, the story finally just disintegrates. This is a mess and one can't help but wonder if anyone in front of or behind the camera had a clue what they were doing.
You can almost feel someone writing the script as the scenes are being shot. The last section is just that bad.
There's even that tired device -- the dream sequence -- during the film's final section. Joan's fevered nightmare adds nothing to the proceedings and is just obvious and labored.
It's not a good sign that as the principal characters die off, Joan Collins calls Mandy the dancing girl (Caroline Munro) for advice on what to do.
Check out The Devil Within Her (1975) for some cheap fun but don't expect much. Maybe do a crossword puzzle during the second half.
You won't miss much.
