Scum of the Earth (1974)

Scum of the Earth (USA, 1974) 90 min color DIR-PROD: S.F. Brownrigg. SCR: Mary Davis, Gene Ross. MUSIC: Robert Farrar. DOP: Robert B. Alcott. CAST: Gene Ross, Ann Stafford, Norma Moore, Camilla Carr, Charlie Dell, Hugh Feagin, Joel Colodner.

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The film opens with its one moment of beauty, a bright panoramic view of a riverside, before the scenario ventures deeper into the woods where the sun doesn’t shine. Helen Fraser (Norma Moore) and her new husband Paul (Joel Colodner) come to a log cabin for a getaway. Paul goes back to his car to retrieve something, and he is killed by an axe murderer. Helen runs through the woods for help, and is intercepted by Odis Pickett (played by Gene Ross, who co-wrote the film with Mary Davis), who is out possum hunting. He lures her to his house to call the authorities. (Of course, after one look at Odis, any viewer would have kept on running.)

There she encounters the rest of his demented brood: his wife Emmy (Ann Stafford), daughter Sarah (Camilla Carr, exhibiting trashy appeal simply by lounging around in a cheap flowery Woolworths dress), and halfwit son Bo (Charlie Dell). Naturally, there is no phone at the Pickett household (one is amazed they even have power), but with one look at the murky outdoor surroundings, Helen reasons that staying here for the night is the better option.

Emmy, who is actually about the same age as Sarah, begins to bond with Helen, telling her of how Odis “won her” because Emmy’s father owed him money, and alludes to how her husband gets when he gets drinking. After consuming jar after jar of moonshine, Otis attempts to assault Helen, only to be fended off by the women. When Odis says that he just wanted to talk “private like”, Sarah retorts “like the ones you’ve been sticking in me since I was 12.”

This melodrama of incest, rape and abuse becomes more intense as people get killed off by this mysterious murderer from the film’s opening. Helen and the Picketts defend themselves from this assailant, yet the killer is also the catalyst for the Pickett clan to unleash their suppressed hatred for each other.

Scum of the Earth is a better film to have watched than to have sat through, which is testament to the strong viewing experience. In hindsight, one wonders if this movie was meant as a black comedy. Brownrigg’s films always have diverting musical scores, with jazz-like or exotic tones. In addition to Robert Farrar’s flute and harpsichord soundtrack, there is a hilarious song from Peyton Park, scored by a jangly guitar and sax: “Death is a family affair / So share it with someone you care”.

Before the scenario gets even more depraved, we witness a long sequence of Pickett Family Values. Odis barks at Bo to fetch him jar after jar of moonshine, and similarly hollers at Sarah to make dinner. Thirty minutes into this movie, dinner still hasn’t been made. This entire sequence, perhaps best described as Edward Albee Meets The Clampetts, is a catalogue of every hicksploitation cliché, from moonshine to mumblings of white slavery. After one murder, the Pickett clan spends the next half-hour of running time by attempting to go to the neighbours to borrow their phone and call the preacher! Samuel Beckett would be proud.

Where Russ Meyer might have made a grotesque Al Capp comic strip out of the same script, the acting here is surprisingly matter-of-fact, making this film too uncomfortably real, despite its outlandishness. Brownrigg’s customary anamorphic close-ups and striking use of foreground compliment the swirling dementia and claustrophobia.

This sordid melodrama climaxes with a hilarious “surprise” (which still seems preposterous, even if you follow the characters’ stories very closely), but makes for a fitting conclusion where Helen becomes a surrogate member of what remains of the dysfunctional family. Brownrigg’s films never wrap up tidily: even after the villain dies, the struggle between good and evil ends (at best) in a draw. Psychologically, evil has forever scarred the protagonists.

Scum of the Earth is less a horror film than outlandish hicksploitation, but has enough mayhem to interest genre fans. While its title is accurate, it was re-released as Poor White Trash II, in one of cinema’s more bizarre attempts to cash in on a hit property, prompting people to think that this was a sequel to the 1957 Peter Graves movie! That’s the exploitation business for you! Poor White Trash II was also the title of the Magnum Entertainment VHS, which to date remains its only (legitimate) home video release. As with Brownrigg’s subsequent Keep My Grave Open, this is long overdue for a DVD or Blu-ray restoration. (UPDATE: Grindhouse Releasing has been teasing a release of this. We’re standing by!)

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Originally published in Volume #1, Issue #22, “Cheap Horror Movies And Why We Love Them”.