7/10
William Marshall once again plays the title role in Scream Blacula Scream with a nice performance by leading lady Pam Grier
10 February 2012
Having just rewatched Blacula, I've now done the same with Scream Blacula Scream. Once again, William Marshall reprises his character of Prince Mamuwalde who became the feared Blacula. Pam Grier plays Lisa Fortier who becomes the new voodoo priestess after her elderly predecessor dies. The one who thought he should have taken over, Willis Daniels (Richard Lawson), is the one who brings Blacula back to life when he buys a bag of bones from the Ragman (Bernie Hamilton) and performs his own voodoo service. Lynne Moody plays Denny, Willis' girlfriend. Don Mitchell plays Justin Carter, an ex-detective who's with Lisa and who is the one that thinks about the marks on many victims' necks are the work of a vampire which he tells a skeptical Sheriff Harley Dunlap (Michael Conrad). I'll stop there and just say this was almost as effective as Blacula. I did like the way director Bob Kelljan had both the music score and the background music play at the same time at the same volume to provide many chillingly effective scenes. And there was a humorous scene with a couple of pimps (Bob Minor, Al Jones) harassing Mamuwalde that I got a kick out of. So on that note, Scream Blacula Scream gets a recommendation from me. P.S. Many of the supporting cast I cited are probably more well known outside of this movie like Don Mitchell had played Mark Sanger on the TV series "Ironside". Richard Lawson would years later play one of the exorcists whose name is Ryan on Poltergeist. Lynne Moody was the original Jenny Willis on "All in the Family" before Belinda Tolbert replaced her on the spin-off "The Jeffersons". And then there's Michael Conrad who would eventually become Sergeant Phil Esterhaus on "Hill Street Blues" becoming well known for the tagline "Hey, let's be careful out there." And another player, Janee Michelle who played Gloria, is a native of the Seventh Ward of New Orleans which is a two-hour drive from where I now live. Also, she was-in N.O. parlance-a "Creole's Creole".
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