The Fool Killer

Back in the spring, TCM ran its second season of Two for One, in which people from the movie industry select a double feature of films they feel are significant to them in some way or another. Both seasons got a rerun in the fall. One of those people was director Joe Dante, whose night is getting a rerun tonight. His first film at 8:00 PM is Night of the Hunter, with the second being a new-to-me film influenced by Night of the Hunter: The Fool Killer, at 10:00 PM.

Edward Albert (Jr.) stars as George Mellish. As the movie opens, were in rural east Tennessee some time not too awfully long after the end of the US Civil War. George lost both of his parents in a way that's not fully made clear and isn't exactly relevant to the plot anyway. Suffice it to say that George is living with foster parents, who treat him badly any time he does anything wrong. Eventually, George has enough of the abuse, so he grabs a go bag and stows away aboard the next train that comes, going west to parts unknown.

Unfortunately, when the train stops to take on water, George hops off, losing his bag when he can't get back on in time. Oops. So George becomes a sort of hobo, until he meets and old guy Jim Jelliman (Henry Hull), nicknamed Dirty Jim because he doesn't keep his house clean. Indeed, Jim calls young George a fool for trying to clean up the place, and then tells George what today we'd call an urban legend, about the so-called "Fool Killer" who stalks the countryside and chops people to death. It's almost enough to get George to run away again.

George continues to go west, with vague thoughts about wanting to become a gold prospector out west and even see the ocean. He meets another drifter, a man who for the longest time won't speak and doesn't seem to want to hear George say anything either. This man eventually reveals that his name is Milo Bogardus (Anthony Perkins). Except that he's not really Milo Bogardus, although we'll call him that because that's the only name the man has now. Apparently Milo fought in the Civil War and suffered some sort of injury that left him with PTSD and amnesia, such that when he was in the hospital recovering nobody knew his name. There was another dying soldier named Milo Bogardus, so they gave our Milo this name once the original Milo died. George seems to look up to Milo, although Milo might not be quite the role model one would like. Milo has no time for the traditional southern Protestantism of the era, so when they happen along a "camp meeting" revival show which George would like to attend, Milo is horrified.

This leads to George and Milo's parting and George's being taken in by a much nicer set of foster parents, the Dodds. But Milo eventually shows up again and is one again disgusted by the change he sees in George, leading to the film's climax.

Joe Dante suggested that The Fool Killer is some sort of tremendously good movie that never got a proper release back in the day which is why it's largely forgotten. (Indeed, the majority of the limited number of IMDb reviews date from the days immediately after the previous TCM showing.) While I'm glad Dante selected this film and gave everybody a chance to see it, I'm sorry to say it's not nearly as good as Dante makes it out to be. It's not bad, but to me it came across as the sort of movie that's trying really hard to be daring when in fact it really isn't. Perkins is given a very unappealing character to play, and I found the revival scene to be particularly badly handled. Still, as I said, I'm glad I got to see this, and will say that anybody else interested should watch and make their own conclusions.