Classic Horrors Club

Dead Men Tell No Tales (1971) has a terrific, cinematic opening. In a stunning aerial shot, the camera travels over the sea and zooms in to a beautiful Spanish villa on the shore. Then, in what looks like the same shot, the camera pulls back out as we watch Larry Towers (Christopher George) run outside and hop into a convertible that immediately drives down a winding road.

Back to “normal” TV-movie footage, we witness a little conversation about how the passengers are racing to get to Barcelona. Then we’re surprised when a blowout causes the car to careen over the edge of a cliff and explode in a fireball when it hits ground. The shot itself is a trope; however, the manner in which Larry is thrown from the car before the crash, and the realistic look of the other passengers who remain, is unexpected.

We’re off to an awfully good start, one that cannot be sustained. When Larry arrives in Los Angeles and everyone he encounters believes he’s someone else, a man named Vic Jacobi, Larry begins investigating what the heck is happening. His sudden relationship with Midge Byrnes (Judy Carne) caused me to believe I missed something. One minute, they meet in a bar, the next minute…

…she’s helping him investigate and, while on the run, they become trapped inside a building that’s collapsing around them. Their only hope for escape, even if it’s into the arms of the thugs chasing them, is with none other than Bobby Brady himself, Mike Lookinland, playing Bud Riley. Bud brings them food, but won’t tell his mother about them because she wouldn’t approve of him playing in collapsing buildings.

This section of the film generates suspense, but causes the action we’ve experienced thus far to come to a halt. Then, when they do escape, the finale returns to the tropes with not much interesting about them. Towers’s relationship with Midge is explained, though. They had to fall in love so that she could be captured and Larry would have to rescue her from a boat where she’s bound and gagged in the bedroom.

Dead Men Tell No Tales works as a good mystery, with a cast of characters whose loyalties are always a little fuzzy. For example, Lisa Martin (Patricia Barry) seems to be an ally for Larry, who’s supposedly in Los Angeles to shoot photographs for her travel magazine. Then why does she pick up the phone and call the mysterious man who always has his back to the camera?

Tom Austin (Richard Anderson) is Larry’s friend from Spain, but we see him only in flashbacks that may shed light onto our hero’s increasingly dangerous situation. He’s the most suspicious of all, and you wouldn’t be wrong to think he’s not who he seems. But is he who you think he’ll be? What makes the 75 minutes of Dead Men Tell No Tales a good investment is the surprising twists that you don’t expect.