VENOM (1981) ¢ ¢ ¢
D: Piers Haggard
Klaus Kinski, Oliver Reed, Nicol Williamson
Sterling Hayden, Sarah Miles, Susan George,
Lance Holcomb, Cornelia Sharpe, Michael Gough
Three bungling criminals - a maid, a chauffeur and an alleged mastermind - kidnap a ten-year-old boy and hold him for ransom. Sadly, one of the many things they've failed to anticipate is the kid's newest pet, a black mamba, which (of course) escapes from its crate and could be lurking anywhere, ready to strike. You can imagine Hitchcock having some fun checking off all the ways a carefully worked-out crime can go wrong, and the movie does an okay job of that, despite an insane conclusion and a few too many shots inside heating ducts from the snake's point of view. It was what's called a troubled shoot. Klaus Kinski and Oliver Reed hated each other, and Tobe Hooper, the original director, quit after clashing with Kinski. Sterling Hayden's last theatrical film.
