An odd mix of crude sexual innuendos and underlying gender anxieties, this largely forgettable "thriller" never manages to conjure a plot as interesting as its relentless subtext of confusion and anger towards the 70s rapidly changing sexual mores. Three female age groups are represented by a gaggle of broadly drawn characters: a precocious tween tease played by Maureen McCormick (channeling the inner slut we all suspected resided in Marcia Brady), a couple of recent college grads out for an all-around frisky time and an aging mother (Babara Feldon, wondering how she ended on this island and film set) confused by the new roles acceptable to women.
In a fantasy narrative of male wish fulfillment, a playboy (complete with shades and a handy bottle of bubbly) becomes stranded on a jungle island with the above-mentioned group and spends 90 minutes fending off their amorous/pathologically needy/psychotically immature advances, as well as those of a hostile group of native islanders. Both seem to represent the same danger level, and thus the viewer is plunged into a quagmire of both sexist and racist melodrama.
Deadly dull, A Vacation in Hell has little to recommend other than the camp spectacle of a drunken song and dance routine by a very randy Ms McCormick.
THE STRANGE AND DEADLY OCCURRENCE (1974) Dir: John Llewellyn Moxey
Mystery thrillers disguised as horror films are often great disappointments with their final act reveal of "natural explanations" for supernatural events cheapening the previous 70 minutes. This ABC Movie of the Week however has enough goofy charm to survive the less-than-terrifying climax and denouement (although it veers closer to Scooby Doo territory than even most similar films - much of the final plot element revolves around buried treasure!) and coolly coasts by on the earnest performances of Robert Stack and Vera Miles. Before its end, The Strange and Deadly Occurrence serves up quaint chills through a haunted ranch house, a moaning midnight specter, a shady prison doctor, a shadow-lurking killer and even a mild poltergeist.
As so often with 70s TV movies, much of the fascination and interest lies in the decade's ambivalence to the nuclear family and traditional gender roles. By 1974 TV audiences were wide open and listening to criticisms of the myth of the perfect 50s home, and this questioning of established institutions often took the filmic form of paranormal threats to the family unit. Robert Stack as the protective patriarch proves ineffectual at safeguarding his family, while his seemingly idyllic marriage to wife Vera Miles - and purchase of a "dream home" in the canyons north of LA - also take a beating when confronted with bumps in the SoCal night. Furthermore Daddy's Little Girl (played with bizarre, almost pantomime affectations by doe-eyed Margaret Willock) seems to be in need of psychiatric treatment when she goes borderline catatonic after being attacked by a moving coat stand.
Of course it all ends with a laugh and family group hug.
