Poor Albert and Little Annie (1972)

What a waste of my time!!!

A different way of telling a story

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

It seems like I Dismember Mama as become the standard release title for this one, originally Poor Albert and Little Annie. It really shouldn't have been renamed, as no one gets dismembered and there isn't even any gore (unless you count a split second stabbing), so anyone who hit this one at a drive in or grabbed a VHS copy expecting gruesome goods would have been severely disappointed. The original name is pretty suitable though, there's an Albert and an Annie, and the Annie is little. I wouldn't call Albert poor though, he seemed like a pretty run of the mill ass hole psycho to me. Still, the title suggests strange drama and strange drama makes up a considerable portion of the film, so it works. The titular Albert is a misogynist mama's boy creep who got institutionalised for attempting to off said mama, but breaks out in order to finish the deed. Along the way he befriends the young daughter of his mothers maid and they have a happy day out. Which is where things get weird and the film scotches its previously decent efforts at being a grimy little exploiter. The first third is pretty promising, attempted rape and strangulation, hateful and arrogant chatter and then a rather disconcerting episode of naked torment followed by murder. But when Albert meets Annie it all shifts, there's some suspense but only in vague currents through overall dullness, their dynamic is somewhat interesting and ambiguous but young Gerri Reischl is a tedious cute young girl and events are utterly prosaic and cheesy. Zooey Hall is decent as Albert though, aloof and malign with a definite sense of threat to him, he carries things as best he can but its difficult when substantial portions of the film are so uneventful, only perking up for a fairly intense closing ten minutes or so. Mostly the score is more exitable than the film, tense strings, saccharine romance and a fair amount of brash and brassy jazz moments, its good fun to boogie along to even when not much interesting is happening. The direction is stolid and other performances tend to be quite weak, but there's enough low key unease for things to be just about passable, and an interesting palpable air of misogyny. Not only is good time given over to Alberts unpleasant blather the portrayal of women in the film does little to contradict him, I'm sure the effect wasn't especially intentional but its notable nonetheless and gives the film a creepier feel than it might otherwise. Altogether this won't do much for anyone other than the more thoroughoing of early 70's trash enthusiasts but if you're the kind of person that just has to see it, its worthy enough. 5/10.

Rich kid Albert (Zooey Hall) is in an institute. We meet him at the beginning of the film trying to rape a nurse before he is apprehended. His doctor tells his mother that he is a lost cause and must be moved to a hospital for the insane. While being taunted by one of the male nurses there, Albert tricks him into watching one of the 'films' he's made, and ends up killing him and escaping. He arrives at his mother's house to kill her - he sees her as a whore who is not 'pure' enough. He instead comes across her housekeeper, who he taunts and kills. Yet when he meets her 11 year-old daughter Annie (Geri Reischi), they form a bond and Albert takes her away. For once he has met a girl who is pure and innocent, but the only problem are his violent sexual urges.The original name for this film was Poor Albert and Little Annie, which is a much more apt title for a film that is relatively unexploitative and character-driven. While they are scenes of violence, they are brief and contain very little blood or gore. The film concentrates more on the relationship between Albert and Annie, and the creepy fascination Albert has with her. Albert is clearly a misogynist, viewing every woman as filth who have lost their purity. Annie is sweet and innocent, and so Albert begins a strange love affair with her. He understands his urges are wrong, but he goes with it all the same.As interesting as I'm making the film out to be, you have to remember that this is a 70's grindhouse film marketed under the name of I Dismember Mama and was usually shown in a double bill with The Blood Spattered Bride (1972). This generally means that although the idea is certainly quite interesting, the execution is bad. Whereas the low- budget works in it's favour - the film has a grime to it that creates a feeling of sleaze - the film is peppered with long sections where nothing at all happens. The 80 minute running time feels much longer than it actually is, and although Hall in the lead is generally quite effective as the rich-boy psychopath, he cannot save the film from being a meandering missed opportunity.www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com

~Spoiler~I Dismember Mama-I had to buy it because of the title alone. That was my mistake. This is by the numbers exploitation. The box claims that it's "a killing spree more brutal than any ever seen in the annals of filmmaking." That is a bit exaggerated. Poor Albert (and his theme song) only kills three people, and his mother is not one of them. He never even attempts to kill his mother. This is a stupid and dull movie. Avoid at all costs.

Zooey Hall, I've not seen him in any other role but, boy, was he perfect for the part of Albert. He certainly is a creepy-lookin' fellow. No wonder he's credited as playing "Joanie's Weird Boyfriend" on a Happy Days episode.I Dismember Mama is an irksome film with laughable music throughout, even for the period. The scenes where Albert is chasing Annie has accompanying music that sounds like something from the old Adam West "Batman" TV-series. It ruins the climatic scenes. Summed up, there's not much to see, well . . . some '70s nudity.