The Love-Thrill Murders (1971)

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It's time to get into the sleazy Grindhouse cinema of the 1970's with a film that was
originally slapped with an X-rating by the MPAA before being re-edited down to an accepted
R-rating and that still as of today has not received a decent DVD release.
I am Torstein from Cinema Terror and this is my review of The Love-Thrill Murders, also
known as Sweet Savior.
Talking about the plot for this film is very easy as there hardly is any plot to be found
in The Love-Thrill Murders.
We first meet a Manson family inspired group of hippies who are enjoying their life by
doing drugs, having sex, playing music and the occassionally satanic ritual.
Their leader, Moon, has gotten the gang invited to a party with some upper class rich people.
The party goes on well with fun drinking games like saying dirty words, before it eventually
turn into a drugged fueled orgy.
What the rich people do not know though, is that Moon has other motivs than just having
fun...
What occurs after the orgy at what lengths are Moon willing to go for kicks?
You'll have to watch The Love-Thrill Murders to find out.
When you count up all the films of the early 70's that are based on the Charles Manson
saga, you get a glimpse of just how big of a media craze the entire thing was.
Some of the films that are based on Manson are trying to tell the true story, well true
according to the media at the time, while others just used the idea of it to make a
cheap exploitation film with naked hippies and lots of drugs.
The Love-Thrill Murders falls in the later category as this is just a sexploitation with
little attempts or fucks given to give any realistic portrayal of the characters.
This is only done for one purpose, and that's to make some cheap bucks.
That's not being negative though as there are plenty of great films that came out from
this Grindhouse era with the same intent.
And the idea of a hippie cult going mad is a great concept for a movie and there is a
lot you can do with that.
The Love-Thrill Murders doesn't try to do anything with the story at all though.
The only way you can really enjoy The Love-Thrill Murders is if you have a fascination with
the early 70's grindhouse aesthetic or just ridiculous dialogue.
The film has both in that it looks and feel authentic and you can't help but wonder how
cool this film could have been if there had been more effort put into it.
The dialogue is just laughable and could have made the film become a fun so bad its good
type of film if it had played up the humour a bit more.
The leading character Moon is played by Troy Donahue and he had quite an interesting story
before venturing into this film.
He became a teen idol in the 50's and 60's after breaking out in the 1959 romantic drama
A Summer Place but fell into a hard place in the late 60's, having to file for bankruptcy
and losing his home in 1968, later blaming the downfall on out of control alcohol and
drug abuse.
This does explain how he ended up in this film.
I would not be surprised if he, and the rest, was high for most of the shoot.
I wish I could say that he stood out as Moon and was able to show how he was the biggest
star in the cast, but nah.
He came off one dimentional and did not manage to give a strong potrayal of what a charismatic
cult leader should be.
The rest of the characters doesn't really stand that much out from one another.
We do start to follow a young girl who have just been added to the gang and how she is
at first reluctant to play a part in the sexual acts.
There is also a weirdo who are either slightly retarded, probably due to frying his brain
on drugs.
He is tricked into a sexual encounter with a transgender in what I am going to guess
was an attempt at being shocking and or comedic?
I should mention that there is some nice 70's music in this film, courtesy of Gilbert Slavin
and Jeff Barry.
If this is the kind of chill music you enjoy, then you should be satisfied by the quality
of it present in
the movie.
As mentioned, this film originally got an x-rating before being cut down to an r.
I actually think this would have been better with x-rated scenes in it.
There's nothing else going on than the orgy anyway, so might as well go all the way.
The violence first starts to arrive in the last ten fifteen minutes and by that point
you've waited too long for something to happen and lost interest.
As an adult feature, this would also have stood out and would probably have been remembered
more today 45+ years later.
After some short theatrical runs without making much of a mark, the film found its way to
home video in 1986 on a VHS by the legendary Vestron home video company.
Nearly ten years later it was released on VHS again by none other than Troma and there
was actually a connection between the film and the head of Troma, Lloyd Kaufman as he
does show up in a quick uncredited cameo in the film.
For some reason though, it seems like it hasn't been able to make the jump over to DVD or
BluRay.
And since it's not on Troma's video on demand service either, and by the way, make sure
you check out Troma Now as its a great service to support, I am going to guess that the rights
have expired or something like that as it makes little sense to me that this hasn't
been on a better format yet.
There is supposed to be a DVD out from a German company called Great Movies, but I am not
sure if that counts.
A good home for this movie would definitely be the Code Red library, so hopefully it gets
out some day as even if its not a good film, it does capture its time in some way and deserves
to be preserved.
The Love-Thrill Murders are not a great forgotten film, but it does have its place for hardcore
fans of Grindhouse and exploitation cinema.
The film has the aesthetic and some nice songs and ladies in it, but will not be worth the
time for those who are not into these sorts of films.
Even if I am giving this a low score, I am still happy that this film exist and that
I've now seen it.
The Love-Thrill Murders gets a 2 out of 5.
This is a hard to find film, but I am sure it has its fans out there.
Have you seen it?
What other unknown Grindhouse films of the 70's do you think more people should check
out?
If you want to check out a great film from the same time period, then give my review
of The Mack a chance.
A like lets me know that I should keep digging up movies from the early 70's, so make sure
you do that if you liked this video.
Hope you enjoyed it and hope I see you again on Cinema Terror.
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The Love-Thrill Murders (1971) - Movie Review

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