Dear Dead Delilah (John Farris, 1972)

A hit on the Southern drive-in circuit in the early '70s (but a financial failure everywhere else), Dear Dead Delilah is a highly amusing Dixiesploitation tale of decadence, rot, decline, and rivalry within a wealthy plantation family. It's like a slasher movie version of a Tennessee Williams play, and the cast and filmmakers (well, most of them) let you know they're in on the joke without overtly acknowledging they're in on the joke. They don't break the spell. The accents and line deliveries in this movie are a pleasure for the ears, especially the women in the cast, who each provide their own distinctively hilarious blend of honey and poison, Southern-style. I had a great time with it.

A truly bizarre one-off, Delilah is the only movie directed by horror novelist John Farris, whose best-known novel, The Fury, was made into a movie by Brian De Palma in 1978, and the only movie produced by "Cowboy" Jack Clement, a producer at the legendary Sun Studios in Memphis and a singer and songwriter whose songs have been covered by dozens of the biggest names in country and early rock and roll. Clement's Sun Studios colleague Bill Justis provided the film's score. Justis had a rockabilly hit in 1957 with "Raunchy" and was both a solo artist on and the house arranger for Sun Records. He later moved to Nashville and became a successful producer there. Unlike his colleagues, Justis turned Delilah into more than a one-off, composing the scores for future films including Smokey and the Bandit and Hooper.

The talent on camera is also a wild, eclectic mix. Agnes Moorehead makes her final onscreen appearance as Delilah (her last movie was a voice-only role as the goose in the following year's Charlotte's Web), and the rest of the cast includes veteran of many westerns Will Geer, prolific character actor Michael Ansara, Dallas and Dark Shadows regular Dennis Patrick, theater veteran of many Tennessee Williams plays Anne Meacham, soap opera star Robert Gentry, theater director Patricia Carmichael in her only film role, theater actor and Dark Shadows regular Elizabeth Eis in her only film role (though she was also in a Bon Jovi video), and TV and cult movie regular John Marriott. At least half the cast was on at least one episode of Bewitched.

The movie opens with a blast of hillbilly music and a strange flashback scene where a disturbed young Nashville woman named Luddy (Anne Gibbs) has just brutally murdered her mother with an axe. Flash forward 25 years, and a recently released from prison middle-aged Luddy (Carmichael) wanders into a park to watch a group of men play football and draw them in her sketchbook. (The movie makes a big deal out of Luddy's drawings in the early scenes but never goes back to them later.) One of the players, cocky pretty boy Richard (Gentry), accidentally runs into Luddy and briefly knocks her unconscious, but his smoky-voiced wife Ellen (Eis), a nurse, looks her over and thinks she's okay. When Luddy tells Ellen and Richard that she's homeless, Ellen suggests taking her to the plantation so her ex-doctor uncle can examine her.

Richard and Ellen put Luddy in Richard's flashy convertible, and Richard drives recklessly and at high speed to the plantation, regaling the dazed woman with colorful descriptions of how much he hates Ellen's aunt/employer, the wheelchair-bound and ailing head of the Charles family and its dwindling but still substantial wealth, Delilah (Moorehead). Delilah frequently converses with her twenty-years-dead father, who advises her on what moves to make from his stern portrait in her bedroom and his crypt on the plantation grounds, just a few yards past the never-used swimming pool.

Delilah has been left in charge of the Charles plantation and the family money in her father's will, much to the chagrin of her three siblings, two of whom live in the mansion with her, along with Ellen and Richard and the head of the servants, Marshall (John Marriott). The siblings on the property are the aforementioned ex-doctor Alonzo (Patrick), an aging junkie whose medical license was revoked after an underage girl he impregnated died in his care, and Grace (Meacham), an even smokier-voiced world-weary alcoholic who delivers every line with withering sarcasm and a full drink in her hand. She also spends a lot of time with Richard, who, besides two-timing his wife with her, is the drug supplier for Alonzo. The third sibling and the only one to live away from the plantation is Morgan (Ansara), a schmoozy, glad-handing type (and the only one to have lost his Southern accent) facing a possible prison term for embezzlement unless he comes up with the missing funds in a week. Morgan arrives for a family visit with his girlfriend, ditzy Southern belle Buffy (Ruth Baker). Our other major character is the folksy family attorney Roy (Will Geer) decked out in his finest Colonel Sanders attire.

Luddy becomes a servant in the household and forms an instant friendship with Alonzo, who is just as mentally unstable as her. The pair bond over losing their children to the state and share a dream of opening an orphanage (bad idea!). Those plans have to be placed on the backburner when Delilah makes a major announcement at dinner. Her late father has let it be known from the beyond that she only has a few months left to live. This makes little news because Delilah has been announcing her impending demise for years. What does make big news is that Delilah is leaving the plantation and the family fortune to the state, where the property will be turned into a museum. Each sibling will receive $4,000 and a kick in the pants. And there's one more thing. Papa's long-rumored $600,000 horse winnings have been located somewhere on the property after years of existing in speculation and legend. The first sibling to find it gets to keep it. Winner take all, loser receive none. If you guessed that people start to get axe-murdered shortly after this announcement, you guessed wisely, my friend. But who's doing the axing? The convicted axe murderer turned housekeeper is a great suspect (duh), but so is everyone else.

Director Farris is not the greatest visual stylist, which is understandable considering it was his only stint behind the camera. Fortunately, he stays out of his own way and doesn't try to get flashy. He puts his camera on his actors and the spaces they inhabit and lets them go wild. All the actors deliver the hilarious goods, especially Moorehead, Meacham, Eis, and Gentry. There's something so satisfying about amoral wealthy Southerners with smoky voices verbally destroying each other in calm, measured tones. It's one of my favorite things.

Dear Dead Delilah was not well-received by critics or the non-drive-in audience in the early '70s, but they just didn't get it. If you can't meet this film where it lives, I don't entirely trust your judgment and I don't find your sense of humor compatible with mine. We can politely agree to disagree over a mint julep, but a tiny piece of my respect for you will be lost forever. Part of having good taste is having good taste in bad taste, and Dear Dead Delilah is for those who know the difference. Time to wrap this post up. This Southern flower is wilting. Until next time, my trashy friends.