USA UP ALL NIGHT: Echoes (1982)

EDITOR’S NOTE: Echoes was on USA Up All Night on March 30, 1990.

Michael Durant (Richard Alfieri) has always dreamed of a man who is trying to kill him. Spoiler: It’s his twin brother who died in the womb. Now, that man wants to possess him, which mostly means that he gets mean to his girlfriend Christine (Nathalie Nell).

That said, this movie is quite interesting because it presents a supernatural idea, but treats dream possession as if it were a fact of life, and everyone just moves on. It’s also the last movie for Gale Sondergaard, Mercedes McCambridge (who played Pazuzu), and Ruth Roman, who plays Michael’s mom.

It’s nearly an Alfieri vanity project, as he co-wrote it with Richard J. Anthony and sings one of the songs on the soundtrack. It’s directed by Arthur Allan Seidelman, who also directed Alfieri’s script for Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks. I know him from his first movie, Hercules in New York. He also directed I Think I’m Having a BabyStrange Voices, the Cannon movie Rescue Me as well as several movies that Alfieri acting in, such as MacbethChildren of Rage, an episode of Magnum P.I. by the title “I Never Wanted to Go to Paris, Anyway” and a Trapper John, M.D. episode titled “In the Eyes of the Beholder.” In fact, the only film Alfieri acted in that Seidelman didn’t direct was In Search of Historic Jesus.

You’ll probably hate the protagonist, as he’s a jerk to everyone even before he gets possessed. I wanted this to be better because it has the right idea. It just isn’t great.

You can watch this on YouTube.

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