In the woefully mistitled Too Scared to Scream, residents of the fancy-schmancy apartment building The Royal Arms in New York City start turning up stabbed to death. Investigating are the grizzled Lt. DiNardo (Nightkill’s Mike Connors, who also produced) and his ineffectual, incompetent young partner (Fatal Attraction’s Anne Archer in a feather-duster hairdo), with a near-invisible sideline assist by a token minority (Leon Isaac Kennedy, Hollywood Vice Squad).
Suspicion quickly falls on the Arms’ odd doorman (Ian McShane, John Wick) who takes his job so seriously that he quotes Shakespeare in everyday conversation and refuses all sexual overtures from the elderly widow upstairs (Play It as It Lays’ Ruth Ford, in her final role). He also lives with his wheelchair-bound mute mother (six-time Tarzan mate Maureen O’Sullivan) and delivers intellectual insults: “You, sir, are a vulgar, feverish little clod.”
While that setup and its marketing materials promise a slasher film, Too Scared to Scream isn’t. Instead, it’s a mystery. More specifically, it’s an old-fashioned police procedural — the kind likely to feature (and does!) an unfazed medical examiner smoking a stogie while handling disembodied limbs. The only film directed by The French Connection villain Tony Lo Bianco, it’s light on true suspense, but likable enough, as it’s fun to watch DiNardo go through the motions of feet-on-the-streets detective work, to witness Archer ridiculously disco-dance in her living room, and to see McShane marinate his mama’s-boy part with more panache than it deserves on paper.
Incidentally, if not ironically, it’s written by Neal Barbera and Glenn Leopold, the duo behind The Prowler, one of the more notorious slashers. That they didn’t give Too Scared the same bloody treatment is a shame only in the sense that the mask on the poster never appears. Lo Bianco compensates with a terrific cast that includes Jaws mayor Murray Hamilton, Home Alone dad John Heard, Creepshow bitch Carrie Nye and a couple of naked ladies more than willing to let his camera leer. —Rod Lott
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