Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more
 

The Driller Killer (1979)

Director: Abel Ferrara

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Reno, a painter, is driven to distraction by financial troubles, the punk band rehearsing next door, and the city squalor he sees all around him. Picking up a power tool, he vents his fury on the homeless, bit by bit. Ferrara's first film coincided with John Sayles' Return of the Secaucus Seven at the onset of the American indie scene - though, like nearly all Ferrara's work, this feels more at home on the exploitation fringe than the art-house circuit. (There's even a gratuitous lesbian shower scene.) Notorious in Britain as one of the much-cited, little-seen 'video nasties' that ushered in the censorious Video Recordings Act of 1984, this reappeared in 1999 in a version six minutes longer than previously (though still shorn of its goriest moments), basking in the retrospective glow of such hard-won auteurist credibility as Ferrara has mustered. The very first image sees Laine (aka Ferrara) approaching an altar, for all the world like Harvey Keitel in Bad Lieutenant. We even get glimpses of Ferrara's own paintings on the walls. Take out the killings, and you're left with an anguished (even somewhat boring) stab at urban ennui, heavily influenced by Repulsion and Taxi Driver.

Author: TCh 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide

  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields


Cast & crew

Director: Abel Ferrara

Cast: Jimmy Laine Abel Ferrara, Carolyn Marz, Harry Schultz, Baybi Day, Richard Howorth full cast

Genre(s): Horror

Duration: 85 mins


Features

Making a name for himself

Making a name for himself

Sin Nombre's Cary Joji Fukunaga learned his lessons well.

To the letter

Forty years later, Costa-Gavras's Z still brims with fury.

Mind over matter

David Cronenberg reflects on a most bizarre body: his own corpus of work.

Fool's gold

Can an Oscar win lead to a cursed career? Here are five stories of postaward professional meltdowns.

We are the championed

Terrorists and teens abound in this year's "Film Comment Selects."

A history of violence

Matteo Garrone's kaleidoscopic Gomorrah wallops you with Italy's crime crisis.

True romantic

James Gray exchanges urban amorality for amour in Two Lovers.

Playing in the dark

MoMA salutes pianist Stuart Oderman's 50 years as the one-man sound of silents.

Junk bonds

Cast and crew recall the making of the classic NYC drug drama The Panic in Needle Park.