The Touch of Satan

Infobox Film
name = The Touch of Satan


caption = Theatrical release poster
director = Tom Laughlin
producer = George E. Carey
writer = James E. McLarty
narrator =
starring = Michael Berry, Emby Mellay
music = Robert O. Ragland
cinematography = Jordan Cronenweth
editing = Dick Elliott
distributor = Futurama International
released = 1971
runtime = 90 min
country = USA
language = English
budget =
preceded_by =
followed_by =
website =
amg_id = 1:50543
imdb_id = 0066476

"The Touch of Satan" is a 1971 horror film. Its director was Tom Laughlin, and it starred Michael Berry and Emby Mellay. It was featured on the television series "Mystery Science Theater 3000".

ynopsis

The movie begins with the murder of a farmer by an elderly insane woman with terribly burned facial features. After stabbing the farmer and accidentally setting his barn on fire, the woman stumbles home to her family. The family, an older couple and a young teenage woman, argue about the best way to handle the situation and make vague references that the elderly woman may have killed people in the past.

The scene then switches to the main character, a young man(Jody) who is on an open-ended car trip across America to find himself and discover whether or not he wishes to follow in his father's footsteps as a lawyer. Jody stops at a small pond to have lunch and meets the teenage girl (Melissa) from the previous scene. They banter briefly and she convinces him to come visit her family on their walnut farm, despite the intense distress this offer causes her parents. The young couple grows increasingly close, despite the frightening presence of the elderly woman and various clues dropped along the way that Melissa is, in fact, a 127-year-old witch and the birth sister of the elderly insane woman.

When the old woman murders a deputy policeman in front of Jody, Melissa confesses that she is a cursed witch and is possessed by Satan. Jody refuses to believe this, so Melissa reveals in a dream-sequence that her sister was burned as a witch by an angry mob of villagers in the 1800s. Melissa was so distressed by the sight of her sister being burned at the stake that she offered her soul to Satan in order to gain the power to save her. Satan agreed and allowed Melissa to save her sister. Melissa was given eternal life and youth as a result of this bargain, but the gift was a curse as she watched her now-insane sister grow old and homicidal. The old woman tries to kill Jody, but Melissa uses her powers to stop her and her sister dies in a fire that she started. Jody eventually believes Melissa and has sex with her, effectively "freeing" her from Satan. Unexpectedly, however, she instantly ages to her "actual" age and Jody must sell his soul to Satan in order to restore Melissa's youth and save her life. The movie ends with the realization that each are bound to Satan and that Melissa's attempt to save herself has only managed to draw Jody into the evil contract as well.

Mystery Science Theater 3000

MST3K lampooned the movie, pointing out the long gaps between dialogue and some of the more inane statements made in the flirting scenes between the young couple. When Melissa says dreamily, "This is where the fish lives," in a romantic scene by the pond, the MST3K robots snap back "This is where my tongue lives," as Jody kisses her passionately. They also point out that the frequent recurrence of the hymn "Amazing Grace" in the film likely depends largely on the song's status as a public domain song, even prompting Tom Servo to sing an impromptu verse to that effect. The episode features several songs by the 'bots, including Tom singing, (to the tune of the Bacharach/David song, "I'll Never Fall in Love Again") "What do you get when you fall from grace? You only get cast into perdition..." during the credits.

Influence on popular culture

* The experimental music project This Is Where the Fish Lives was named for an infamous line in the film.

External links

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