American Gothic

Yvonne DeCarlo's death a few days ago brings to mind her varied career. She may be best known for playing Lily on the comic-horror TV series "The Munsters", but in the movie "American Gothic", she went for straight horror. The movie portrays some young people flying out over the Puget Sound - on either a sunny or overcast day; the setting kept changing - and having to land on an island when their plane conks out. The island turns out to be inhabited by a family. Ma (DeCarlo) and Pa (Rod Steiger) are practically Amish, their daughter Fanny looks only a little younger, and sons Woody (Michael J. Pollard) and Teddy don't do much. But this family isn't what they seem. Every member seems like s/he has some nasty plans, and the outsiders had better not trespass.

There were some pretty gross scenes here, but I liked how they played everything out. Especially what Cynthia did at the end. I couldn't have predicted that even if I'd tried! So, it's mostly your average slasher flick, but still quite enjoyable. I wonder what Grant Wood would have thought had he known that the name of his famous painting would one day get used for this sort of movie.