By Erin Free
In this regular column, we drag forgotten made-for-TV movies out of the vault and into the light. This week: the gripping 1973 thriller Terror On The Beach, starring Dennis Weaver, Estelle Parsons, Kristoffer Tabori, and Susan Dey.
The horrific murders carried out by the followers of cult leader Charles Manson in 1969 have cast a long, cinder-black shadow over the world ever since, their notoriety inspiring revulsion, fascination and even a twisted kind of adulation in the years after. A wannabe singer and fame-seeker, the deranged hippy stylings of Charles Manson have also seen him become a major pop cultural figurehead, publicly bewitching edge-walking rockers like Marilyn Manson, Evan Dando, Anton Newcombe, Redd Kross and Guns’n’Roses.
Charles Manson has also been a continuing, unsettling presence in cinema [Click here for a fascinating, in-depth look at the Manson story on screen], even making an ugly incursion into Quentin Tarantino’s epic love-letter-to-cinema Once Upon A Time…In Hollywood. Despite its strict adherence to standards and practices, even US network television of the 1970s copped a visit from Charles Manson in the deeply disturbing form of the two-part 1976 telemovie Helter Skelter. If you happened to wander into the living room while this one was playing on the tube while you were just a kid, well, the scars probably still haven’t healed.
As well as direct pop culture incursions, Charles Manson also snuck in through the proverbial open window and carried out his own narrative “creepy crawls”, serving as a sly, non-stated influence on a host of movies, most notably the 1971 exploitation shocker I Drink Your Blood and the 2011 arthouse chiller Martha Marcy May Marlene. Manson also made his presence felt in the telemovie space, and not just via the aforementioned Helter Skelter. Before that small screen classic, Manson’s evil spirit was clearly present, snaking its way insidiously into another excellent telemovie.
While not even in the same stratosphere of violence and horror as the real-life Charles Manson and his “family”, the 1973 telemovie thriller Terror On The Beach unquestionably uses Manson’s infamously warped, murderous commune as a major influence on its narrative, and particularly in the creation of its villains. The cruel, sadistic “freaks” here certainly lack the bloodthirsty brutality of The Manson Family, but their glee in psychologically torturing a “straight” American family via a dead-eyed mix of intimidation, passive aggression, threat, and eventually pure harassment certainly rings a rusted, grimy bell.
The film opens with the Glynn family – upstanding, morally sound father Neil (Dennis Weaver); traditional housewife Arlene (Estelle Parsons); and late-teen kids Steve (Kristoffer Tabori) and DeeDee (Susan Dey) – heading to a distant, secluded beach for a campervan holiday. Despite appearing to be the perfect American family, cracks in the façade soon appear: Neil disapproves of his son’s aversion to going to college; Steve thinks of his father as a pushover square; and DeeDee is constantly pushing her mother to stand up for herself within the oppressive context of the much-discussed patriarchy.
The fissures in the Glynn family’s firmament threaten to tear open even wider when they are inexplicably menaced by the handsome, charismatic, long-haired Jerry (Scott Hylands) and his “family” of equally funky young men and women. Dressed in ragged, colourful hippy-style gear, and ripping around the nearby beaches in an old fire engine and fleet of dune buggies, Jerry and his crew initially intrude smilingly upon the Glynn family, but slowly, threateningly up the ante until their actions eventually develop into a full-blown campaign of terror. Will the Glynn family fight back in unison, or split apart under Jerry and his crew’s cruel, bizarrely non-defined brand of duress?
A mere four years or so after Charles Manson’s brief but shattering reign of terror, the threat of the greasy, long-haired outsider was still front and centre in the middle American consciousness, and Terror On The Beach plays right into it with wondrously opportunistic aplomb. The inventive script by TV regular Bill Svanoe exploits the primal fear of the family unit under attack from a mysterious outside force, while director and Unsung Auteur Paul Wendkos cannily inverts his sandy, beachside locations to instil a sense of fear, terror and isolation.
The performances are particularly strong, and the familial relationships are well-drawn. Telemovie king Dennis Weaver (Duel, Amber Waves, Rolling Man) is exceptional as Neil Glynn, whose decent, turn-the-other-cheek ethos constantly rankles his far more can-do son, Steve (well played by Kristoffer Tabori, the son of actress Viveca Lindfors and director Don Siegel, and a popular youth actor of the 1970s with films like Journey Through Rosebud). Bonnie & Clyde Oscar winner Estelle Parsons is richly sympathetic in a straightforward role, and “special guest star” Susan Dey takes a nice detour away from The Partridge Family with a plucky performance in far darker material. Oh, and despite salacious internet reports, Dey does not spend “the entire film” in a bikini.
Smiling, smug, threatening Scott Hylands, meanwhile, does a very solid scene-steal as the nasty Jerry, while Michael Christian and Henry Olek are unpleasantly pugnacious as his two lieutenants. Sensibly, none of the actors playing Jerry’s “family” go over the top, all obviously shooting instead for something more chilling and low-key, which effectively wrong-foots the audience, who are never quite sure of how far these bad guys might go in their victimisation of the Glynn family.
A chilling thriller with moments of perfectly calibrated suspense, Terror On The Beach is a highly entertaining and deeply thoughtful riff on the Charles Manson nightmare…pleasingly minus the gore and overt horror, and shaped just right for the telemovie form.
Availability: Terror On The Beach is easy to find online, but it’s in slightly bleary form, though it’s wholly watchable.
If you enjoyed this review, check out our other vintage telemovies Strange Homecoming, The Possessed, Memorial Day, That Certain Summer, Elvis And The Beauty Queen, Scandal In A Small Town, Victims For Victims: The Theresa Saldana Story, The Seduction Of Gina, Blue Murder, The Brotherhood Of Justice, The Wave, The California Kid, The Cracker Factory, Night Terror, Inmates: A Love Story, The Shadow Riders, CHiPs: Roller Disco, Dawn: Portrait Of A Teenage Runaway, Young Love, First Love, Escape From Bogen County, The Death Squad, Hit Lady, Brian’s Song, The Defiant Ones, A Cry For Help, Trilogy Of Terror, Policewoman Centerfold, Smash-Up On Interstate 5, Something Evil, Savage, A Step Out Of Line, The Boy In The Plastic Bubble, The Dirty Dozen: Next Mission, A Very Brady Christmas, The Gladiator, Elvis, The Rat Pack, Silent Victory: The Kitty O’Neil Story, Terror Among Us, The Hanged Man, Hardcase, Charlie’s Angels: Angels In Vegas, Vanishing Point, To Heal A Nation, Fugitive Among Us, To Kill A Cop, Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, Police Story: A Chance To Live, Murder On Flight 502, Moon Of The Wolf, The Secret Night Caller, Cotton Candy, And The Band Played On, Gargoyles, Death Car On The Freeway, Short Walk To Daylight, Trapped, Hotline, Killdozer, The Jericho Mile, Mongo’s Back In Town and Tribes.
