Ruby

About a year after Brian DE palma's;Carrie,A low budget independent horror film came out called ruby(aka;blood ruby)starring Carrie co-star piper Laurie,who ill always know as Cathrine Martel of twin peaks. this was made by dimension pictures,who also gave us kingdom of the spiders with bill shatner.its a creepy little flick about a gangsters moll(Laurie)who runs a drive in theater,with her gangster associates. who gunned down her lover.well you can probably imagine the rest. well ruby's daughter(played by janit Baldwin)gets possessed by the ghost of Niki(ruby's dead lover)and bodies start piling up.Stuart Whitman plays ruby's new lover,who was one of the gunners,but does'nt seem like the type.anyway its sort of exorcist meets JD's revenge. with creepy music and sound effects.also starring;roger Davis from TV's dark shadows.and there's an interesting movie playing at ruby's drive -in.the 1958 classic;attack of the 50 foot woman,starring Allison Hayes. Curtis Harrington directed this little gem from 1977.harringtom who also directed the 1961 night tide with a young Dennis hopper,kudos to piper Laurie who i think played the part of ruby so well.and beautiful big eyed janit Baldwin(who was in gator bait with the late Claudia Jennings)as ruby's mute possessed daughter.awesome movie,check it out. 8 out of 10.recommended

The heyday of the mob. Being an entertainer of that time was always the fuss. But when people go legit, it's always going to be good. For "Ruby", it's not that way. Ruby Claire(Piper Laurie) is a gun-moll who is pregnant watches in horror when her mobster boyfriend gets gunned down by his own crew. Years later, Ruby owns a drive-in movie and some of the former members of the mob work with her. Her daughter Leslie(Janit Baldwin) is 16 and mute, lives with her. One by one, members of the mob suddenly died. The spirit of the slain boyfriend seeks revenge on the crew. So he uses the daughter as a vessel for vengeance. This movie is like a cross between "Carrie" and "The Exorcist". Only tamer. The cast of the movie are great. The special effects was spot on. Enjoyable to say the least. 2 out of 5 stars

I really wanted to like this film. I loved the director's earlier "Night Tides" movie which I saw at a special screening in the '90s somewhere in Hollywood. Many critics have praised this film and I heard it was a minor hit when it came out so I was looking forward to it. That said, this is not an easy movie to like. I think part of the problem lies in the forced attempt at creating the '50s setting. In larger budgeted films where you can use a studio back lot or hire tons of top-notch art directors, set dressers, expensive costumers, etc., that type of recreation can work (although sometimes it does do not) but in this case it seemed like they were trying to too hard to set it in the '50s -- it seemed off. My wife walked by while I was watching it, didn't know anything about this movie and said, "it looks like a '70s movie." Why would she say this? Something about it is off, the haircuts seem a little bit too shaggy and some of the costumes aren't quite right. It was a coup to get all the period cars though, gotta give credit where credit is due. Anyway, getting to the story. This is also kinda weird. We're supposed to believe that a nightclub singer whose beloved boyfriend was killed by his mobster friends right in front of her eyes would hire the same mobsters to help her run a drive-in after they are paroled from prison? And she's even sleeping with one of them? I don't think so. Had a hard time buying that. Piper Laurie as said singer is also shown in flashbacks from 17 years ago and instead of getting a different actress (one who might be 30 pounds lighter) they simply change her hair do. I'm not buying it. The acting is hit and miss. Piper is one-note shrill. Stuart Whitman as her retired mobster boyfriend is pretty good. The guy playing the parapsychologist (or whatever he was - somehow he doubled as the prison doctor, from what the dialogue inferred) seemed like something out of another movie entirely. The best acting goes to the weirdo possessed daughter who gets to be in the movie's few effective scenes when she babbles in a man's voice. Maybe if the film included more of these "Exorcist"-inspired scenes it would have worked better. The laughable ending with Piper fighting a plastic skeleton in the water is mind-numbingly awful. Even worse is the "Laura" rip-off end song which is just bad.

Despite its reception, which seems to have been quite negative from what I have read, Ruby made an absolutely huge profit at the box office. Made for $600,000 it went on to rake in $16million. That's serious commercial success for sure. But it appears to have been one of those movies which made big waves on initial release but then kind of fell off the radar immediately afterwards. In 1935 a man is gunned down by his fellow gangsters. Sixteen years later his wife, now the mother to a disturbing mute girl, runs a drive-in theatre that specialises in horror movies. She employs all the men responsible for the earlier murder and soon they all start winding up dead, victims of a mysterious supernatural entity. It soon transpires that the young daughter is possessed by her dead father's spirit and he's out for some serious pay-back. This one was directed by Curtis Harrington who was responsible for the subtle off-kilter chiller Night Tide (1961) which featured a young Dennis Hopper in an unusually restrained role. Ruby is a decidedly more standard horror offering combining elements of a trio of big-hitting horror hits of the day including Carrie (1976) with Piper Laurie as a demented mother, The Exorcist (1973) with the spider-walking possessed young girl and The Omen (1976) with its series of elaborate death scenes - victims are impaled high up on cinema screens, choked to death on film reels, hung from trees and left bloodied in...a Coke machine. It's a combination that basically works though, with enough incidents occurring to ensure it's never a boring watch. I think its possession movie element is the one that works best though, with Janit Baldwin perfectly cast in the role of the demented daughter. With her saucer eyes and creepy smile she is genuinely unsettling and the scenes with her possessed by her father are actually kind of scary. Perhaps if the various death scenes had been executed with a little more verve and detail, the film would be better but the weird killings still do add a further macabre detail to the overall whole never-the-less. The drive-in setting is actually a pretty good one and gives the film a bit of distinct character and I did enjoy the interspersing of the featured film Attack of the 50 Foot Woman into things even if it was a movie released seven years after events depicted on screen were supposed to be happening - ah, the trifling details film-makers could so easily get away with in the days before the internet! Anyway, events do dovetail to an ending which was a little odd. I don't think the general idea of it was especially bad – quite decent in actual fact – but it was just far, far too abrupt. All-in-all though, this forgotten box-office smash is actually well worth seeking out if you like 70's horror movies, it's a little ropey in places for sure but it does have a bit of atmosphere, originality and legitimately scary moments.

One of those quick-and-dirty kind of killer B's made by small independents to cash in on box office smashes, RUBY tried to ride the coattails of Piper Laurie's Oscar-nominated turn in CARRIE, to which this movie owes more than just a nod of acknowledgment, along with THE EXORCIST and Brian De Palma's own CARRIE follow-up, THE FURY. Laurie collaborates with cult-film favorite Curtis Harrington, (NIGHT TIDE, THE DEAD DON'T DIE) to try and lend credibility to the unique if unsteady story of a faded gun moll, just getting by living at a decrepit drive-in with her teenage daughter (Janit Baldwin, a good candidate for a game of "whatever happened to...?") Seems Mama Ruby had a little more to do with her gangster hubby's demise than she let on, but no worries...Daddy's little girl is going to get to the bottom of things in a way that CARRIE would definitely approve of... This is a tough one to find on late night TV, and tougher still if you're looking for the original Harrington edit, which had been butchered and diluted over the years by different ham-handed distributors and program directors. Not a classic by any means, but for creepshow completists, Laurie is like a female Vincent Price...her performances are worth catching even in the most Gawd-awful dreck. And though RUBY is hardly a gem, it's not quite THAT bad, either.

RUBY is a bizarre amalgamation of incongruous elements taken from different genres that just doesn't work as a whole once they're put together. I haven't seen such a kookily conceived horror film since THE BOOGEYMAN. But unlike that Uli Lommel flick, which actually works in an odd kinda of way, RUBY's disparate elements are totally impossible to mix together to create a satisfying product. Take one part Film Noir flick, one part THE EXORCIST, one part CARRIE and one part DRIVE-IN exploitation flick and what you get is something that's just plain silly. The direction is very old fashioned, which would have worked in the 1960s but not in the gritty 1970s, when the film was released. And why is the title of the film called RUBY, when it should have been LESLIE? What does Ruby the character have anything to do with the horror in the story? If a movie can't get its title right, what hope is there for the rest of the film? RUBY is more of a showcase for Piper Laurie, who's good but for what? Singing (but is that what we're looking for in a horror film)? Or dressing up in vintage clothes (again, the same question...)? Or spouting inane "film noir" dialogue? While watching it, I couldn't help but feel that the production was highjacked by producers (like THE REDEEMER) and the whole thing was altered in order to capitalize on the success of CARRIE and THE EXORCIST, and other horror movies of that period. The end result is embarrassing.

This oddball horror/possession flick was yet another '70's film made in the race to rip-off the super horror hit THE EXORCIST. However, this one is better than most because it was directed by cult favorite Curtis Harrington who pays special attention to plot, character, atmosphere and detail rather than reverting to spinning heads and vomiting pea soup. Furthermore, Piper Laurie(who won an Oscar nomination the previous year for her role in CARRIE) gives a marvellous performance in the title role, and Janit Baldwin is also impressive as Laurie's disturbed young daughter. Roger Davis(of DARK SHADOWS fame) also does well with his role as a psychologist who gets caught up in this eerie tale of the supernatural. BEWARE: Although most video editions of the film run fifteen minutes longer than the version that was originally released to theatres, they slash much of the gore(which wasn't really all that graphic to begin with) and substitute it with dull, pointless footage featuring supporting characters that really have no connection to the plot or action of the film. This version of the film is credited to the pseudonymous Allen Smithee and was apparantly the version that first aired on network television. If you are lucky enough to find the 84-minute version credited to Curtis Harrington, the film's original director, you"ll fare much better.

Ignore the critics this is a very well made bizarre horror film with Piper Laurie a year after Carrie 1976. After her gangster boyfriend is gunned down by gangsters he vows revenge. And then the Finn begins years after while Ruby runs a drive in theater in the 1950s would you believe a showing of the classic b movie attack of the 50 foot woman? This is the perfect drive in movie. Avoid the Congress video tape from years ago it is the tv version with all the gore cut out. The newer dvd release is a big improvement. It may be low budget but it's very well made. Great supporting cast as well Stuart Whitman,Roger Davis, Len Lessor who turned up as Seinfeld's uncle on Seinfeld.creepy soundtrack. Drive in Gold .

After ending a 15-year retirement from films to do Brian De Palma's "Carrie" (in which she was Oscar-nominated), Piper Laurie inexplicably turned up the very next year in this low-rent schlocker directed by Curtis Harrington. Needless to say, she didn't net another nomination. It's an abhorrent concoction about an aging gangster's moll who runs a drive-in movie theater, and Laurie gives a flat, depressed performance. Turns out the gangster's ghost now haunts the drive-in, and he may be responsible for possessing a young girl (Janit Baldwin, forced into imitating Linda Blair). Mixture of scares, satire, comedic elements, and bloody violence makes for one cruddy movie. NO STARS from ****

After a setup that kills her husband, Ruby a gangster wife has to raise her daughter alone, or maybe not. She have her ganglike family to support her. Then people start getting dying around her. Is it ghost, a crazed murderer, or could be; he dead husband seeking revenge.