Blue Sunshine (1977)

A bizarre series of murders begins in Los Angeles, where people start going bald and then become homicidal maniacs. But could the blame rest on a particularly dangerous form of LSD called Blue Sunshine the murderers took ten years before?

Director:

Jeff Lieberman

Writer:

Jeff Lieberman

Stars:

Zalman King, Deborah Winters, Mark Goddard

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Zalman King	...	Jerry Zipkin
Deborah Winters	...	Alicia Sweeney
Mark Goddard	...	Edward Flemming
Robert Walden	...	David Blume
Charles Siebert	...	Detective Clay
Ann Cooper	...	Wendy Flemming
Ray Young	...	Wayne Mulligan
Alice Ghostley	...	O'Malley's Neighbor
Stefan Gierasch	...	Lt. Jennings
Richard Crystal	...	Frannie Scott
Bill Adler	...	Ralphie
Barbara Quinn	...	Stephanie
Adriana Shaw	...	Barbara O'Malley
Bill Sorrells	...	Ritchie Grazzo
Jeffrey Druce	...	Junkie (as Jeffry Druce)

Storyline

At a party, someone goes insane and murders three women. Falsely accused of the brutal killings, Jerry is on the run. More bizarre killings continue with alarming frequency all over town. Trying to clear his name, Jerry discovers the shocking truth...people are losing their hair and turning into violent psychopaths and the connection may be some LSD all the murderers took a decade before.

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Plot Keywords:

lsd | political campaign | election campaign | politician | murder | 

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Taglines:

Did you ever hear the words Blue sunshine? Try to remember...your life may depend on it

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Genres:

Horror | Thriller

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

12 May 1978 (USA)

Also Known As:

Adistaktoi dolofonoi

Filming Locations:

Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$550,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Ellanby Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

94 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Director Lieberman stated that upon the film's completion, two major TV networks expressed interest in purchasing the film as a "movie of the week," an idea that initially seemed highly appealing, as the amount being offered was twice of the film's budget. However, after seeing the list of edits required-- and realizing that agreeing to them would result in a film only an hour long-- Lieberman decided to hold out for a theatrical release.

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Goofs

The voice dubbing for Stephanie's kids often doesn't match the footage.

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Quotes

Barbara O'Malley: No! Johnny, no! No more chocolate pudding! I made that for your father, now stop it!

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Crazy Credits

'Blue Sunshine' [soundtrack] performed by the Humane Society for the Preservation of Good Music

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Alternate Versions

Many DVD releases were sourced from the old Vestron video release containing the theatrical version, but the 2006 DVD by Synapse Films was sourced from an uncut 35mm print provided by Jeff Lieberman, because the original negative was missing. In 2015, Lieberman finally located the original camera negative for the film at a warehouse in Los Angeles. Distribupix is currently scanning and remastering the film in a fully-loaded special edition Blu-Ray.

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Connections

Featured in Paging Dr. Blume with Robert Walden (2016)

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Soundtracks

The Music of Love
Lyrics by Carolyn Leigh
Composed and Performed by Diane Leslie

User Reviews

Worth A Look for Genre Fans but Flawed

A number of people are inexplicably losing their hair, becoming overly sensitive to loud noises, making googly eyes, and most significantly becoming violently aggressive. The film takes a number of threads based around this and gradually ties them together--all of the affected parties turn out to have a common link. The focus becomes Jerry Zipkin's (Zalman King) investigation and solving of the mystery.

This is a fairly pedestrian 1970s suspense/horror film, made more interesting by some of the bizarre, murderous behavior and the eventual explanation of the behavior. There is a slight sheen of camp that one might think is unintentional, but there are clues that director Jeff Lieberman intended the campy aspects, such as the cutaway to the defaced poster of politician Edward Fleming accompanied by a comic-sounding horn/siren blast, and more obvious elements like the Streisand and Sinatra puppets. Still, the camp factor may have increased as we've become removed from this film's era.

The strongest horror material occurs in the very beginning of the film, after which it turns into a fairly effective suspense vehicle, although at times it has a more generic made-for-television feel. The biggest problem, unfortunately, arrives with the ending, which seems rushed and less than climactic, not to mention a very peculiar bit about how to handle a gun, and also leaves quite a few threads dangling (an attempt is made to tie them up slightly with some "here's what happened" text right before the credits). For me, the horror material was the most effective, so things went slightly downhill from the beginning, but the film was just goofy enough to retain my interest, and it held an 8 rating until the climax, which was poor enough for me to subtract a whopping two points. Unfortunately, such a misstep in the ending is much more difficult to surmount than a similar misstep in the middle of a film. A 6 out of 10 from me.