Review of The Wind

The Wind (1986)
5/10
Our Friend the Wind
2 January 2012
I assume Greek people have a thing for wind… The popular Greek singer Demis Roussos dedicated a worldwide hit to the weather phenomenon entitled "My Friend the Wind" and the Greek writer/director Nico Mastorakis even revolved a full-length thriller on plain ordinary wind. Mastorakis is known by avid cult/horror fanatics because he made "Island of Death" in 1977, which is one of the most notorious and universally banned movies ever. Not because it's the bloodiest or most disturbing film, but mainly because it's full of perversion and depraved imaginations, like someone doing very anti-catholic things with a baby goat. In the mid-80's, Mastorakis emigrated to the United States and directed a handful of less controversial and semi-successful thrillers, like "Blind Date", "The Zero Boys" and the utterly bonkers "Nightmare at Noon". "The Wind" is a rapidly in-between made straight-to-video effort in which Mastorakis takes his protagonists back to his beloved home country Greece for a very conventional and unsurprising, but nevertheless entertaining cat-and-mouse thriller. Meg Foster, with eyes so crystal blue they glow in the dark, stars as the pseudo-eccentric mystery writer Sian Anderson who travels to a remote and extremely isolated Greek coastal town to work on a new novel in solitude. The town is practically abandoned due to the season and there's a constant heavy and ominous wind blowing from the sea. Sian witnesses how the mentally unstable handyman Phil murders her landlord Elias Appleby and buries his corpse in the garden. From then onwards, she finds herself stalked and threatened by the crazed psychopath but there's nowhere or no one to run to. As said, "The Wind" is a very prototypic and forgettable thriller, but it contains a few noteworthy suspense sequences and more than adequate performances from an terrific cast. Meg Foster is amiable as the damsel in distress and Wing Hauser gloriously goes over-the-top again as the sneering psychopath. The supportive cast is impressive as well with names such as David McCallum, Steve Railsbeck and even classic actor Robert Morley. Even though Hauser's character commits his murders with a sharp and over-sized sickle, fans of gory horror flicks might be disappointed as there's very little bloodshed. The pacing of the film is very uneven and the climax sequence is incredibly stupid, yet still I can't bring myself to rate "The Wind" negatively as I wasn't bored for a minute.
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