ALL SCI-FI

[Pow]

The Night Strangler is a 90-minute television movie that first aired on ABC on January 16, 1973 and is a sequel to The Night Stalker television movie from January 11, 1972.

Reporter Carl Kolchak arrives in Seattle, Washington and is hired his former editor Tony Vincenzo as a reporter.

Kolchak is assigned to a series of mysterious murders of young women. During his investigation Kolchak discovers that similar murders have occurred every twenty-one years since 1889 and over a period of eighteen days.

[Pow]

Review of The Night Strangler from the site: The Stalking Moon.

The second Kolchak movie is basically just as good as The Night Stalker . . . in fact, in many ways it is the first movie. Excellent script and direction, plus wonderful performances from the inimitable Darren McGavin and Simon Oakland.Their back-and-forth is perfectly timed and so funny.

The only thing that's a little bit of a debit is that the monster this time out is not as frightening as seething vampire Janos Skorzeny (from the first film).

But everything else clicks, from the secret fog-bound Seattle underground lair of the Killer, to Kolchak's snappy narration, to the roster of supporting actors (John Carradine, Scott Brady, Margaret Hamilton, Wally Cox, Al Lewis and the vivacious Jo Anne Pflug), not to mention a great jazzy score by Robert Colbert.

I just wish they had made a bunch more of these as one-off movies and kept the standards of production and writing as high, rather than the fun yet decidedly inferior TV series (which I love, but still . . . it ain't a patch on the two telefilms.

Sidebar: Good review of this television movie.

However, I would disagree that the Killer isn't as scary as vampire Janos Skorzeny from the first TV movie. We did get a better look of Janos in that movie and indeed the makeup was most impressive. We don't get to see the face of Killer in The Night Strangler (and there is a logical reason for that) until the denouement as Kolchak faces off against him in the underground city setting. But when we do, it is a shocking and ghastly scene.

The point the reviewer makes that these productions should have remained as 90-minute TV movies (perhaps a couple a year) is spot-on. Like this reviewer, I'm a fan of the weekly Kolchak series. The series had a handful of strong and eerie episodes in the beginning, but as the series unfolded week after week, the scripting became formulaic, and the monster-of-the-week less impressive. The concept was a decent one, but it worked best as an occasional TV movie a few times a year where more time could be devoted to developing the scripts, as well as the required make-up for any creature involved. It could also have allowed the production to go on different locations for fresh scenery as they did in the two Kolchak movies.

In the end though, I found that I enjoyed this sequel movie every bit as I did the first Kolchak movie. A rare feat when it comes to sequels.

[Bud Brewster]

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Pow, I was very impressed by the fact that your own comments above were just as well written as the review you transcribed! That didn't surprise me, of course — I just wanted you to know that your fine comments were appreciated.

YouTube has a nice version of this movie. Your post piqued my interest, so I started watching it, and it's really well done!

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[WadeVC]

I always enjoyed the Night Stalker TV series...I had no idea they made 2 movies based on it.

Now on the hunt to find and watch them.
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"You look like a pooped out pinwheel."
-Robot Monster

[Bud Brewster]

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Good news, Wade! The second one is on YouTube (see above post), and the first one is right here.

__________________ The Night Stalker (1972)


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Better yet, below are the downloads I just acquired and added to my WeTransfer account. Download them to your computer while they're still available. I don't keep these indefinitely!

For the record, they look surprisingly good!

These would make great features for ASF’s Friday & Saturday Night Chats (<— link) for the upcoming Halloween.

I'll check with the our Chat Group and see what they think of that idea.
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The Night Stalker (1972) — Link is NOW active!

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The Night Strangler (1973) — Link is NOW active!

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)