Cameron's Closet
Encyclopedia
Cameron's Closet, also known as Cameron's Terror, is a 1988 American horror film
. The film was directed by Armand Mastroianni
and stars Scott Curtis
, Cotter Smith
, Mel Harris
, Tab Hunter
, Kim Lankford
, Gary Hudson
and William Lustig
.
) is an introverted, solitary boy with telekinetic and telepathic abilities who lives with his father, Owen Lansing (Tab Hunter
), a research scientist. Owen has subjected Cameron to intense psychological testing from a young age in an effort to unbury the hidden powers of the human mind. During a series of mysterious and bizarre circumstances in their rural house one night, Owen is decapitated by a machete
, yet the authorities can find no evidence of foul play
and rule it out as an accidental death believing he simply fell on it. Cameron goes to live with his mother Dory Lansing (Kim Lankford
) and her obnoxious actor boyfriend Bob Froelich (Gary Hudson
) in Los Angeles
. Both Dory and Bob are unaware of Cameron's paranormal
abilities.
Sergeant Sam Taliaferro (Cotter Smith
) of the Homicide Division
of the LAPD
has sleeping trouble and a recurring nightmare which is affecting his work. Taliaferro's partner, Detective
Pete Groom (Leigh McCloskey
) complains about Taliaferro's frequent bouts of absent-mindedness in the line of duty caused his lack of sleep, and so Taliaferro is ordered to go see a psychiatrist
who works with the department, Dr. Nora Haley (Mel Harris
). When Bob Froelich is horrifically murdered in Cameron's room, having been thrown out of the second-floor window with his eyes burnt out of the sockets, Sam Taliaferro, Pete Groom and Nora Haley are put on the case. As they investigate the perplexing case, Taliaferro befriends Cameron and realizes that deaths are occurring always around the boy, and that his nightmares seem to be linked to the boy. Under her counselling sessions Nora Haley also realizes that the boy has paranormal abilities, even being able to foresee future events
. It also becomes apparent to Taliaferro that whatever Cameron concentrates on hard enough or focuses on is manifesting itself into reality
.
Cameron plays an imaginative game with a figurine
his father gave to him he calls the "Deceptor", actually an ancient figure of a Mayan
demonic entity
said to be terrible beyond description in Owen Lansing's texts. Cameron's imagination makes the creature real and it takes up residence in Cameron's bedroom closet. Soon, numerous inexplicable and gruesome deaths are occurring around the closet in Cameron's room, and people who have already died seem to be mysteriously reappearing in an undead
state. Bob Froelich is horrifyingly resurrected in Cameron's closet and murders Detective Pete Groom when he looks inside the closet.
Taliaferro and Haley seek out Owen Lansing's assistant, Professor Ben Majors (Chuck McCann
) at his home in the woods, where they learn the truth about Cameron. Taliaferro is stalked through the woods by Pete Groom's ghost, who warns him that the evil is "out of the closet now." The demons soon wish to destroy Cameron, thus severing their link to limbo
and sealing them within reality and in our world. Majors kidnaps Cameron and takes him back to Cameron's house where Majors is then murdered by the demon, his blood boiling in his veins. Only Sam Taliaferro and Nora Haley are able to protect Cameron. Cameron goes back to his room to face the demon in the closet once and for all and attempt to send it back to the lowest regions of Hell
before Cameron loses his powers to it.
, who had previously written both the trilogy of novels and the film adaptations of the acclaimed The Howling
.
The special effects of Cameron's Closet were done by Carlo Rambaldi
, who had previously designed the eponymous character in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
(1982) and the mechanical head-effects for the creature in Alien
(1979), for both of which had earned Rambaldi an Oscar. Rambaldi also worked on Profondo Rosso (Deep Red)
(1975), King Kong
(1976), Close Encounters of the Third Kind
(1977), Dune
(1984), and King Kong Lives
(1986).
Cult horror film
director William Lustig
has a cameo in the film as a pornographic film director being booked by the police.
in the United States
by SVS Films in January 1989. The film was released later that same year on VHS
by Sony Video
.
The film was released on DVD
by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
in 2004. It has since gone out of print
.
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...
. The film was directed by Armand Mastroianni
Armand Mastroianni
Armand Mastroianni is an American film director. He is the father of Paul Mastroianni who is also pursuing a career in filmmaking. Armand Mastroianni's directorial debut was the 1980 horror film He Knows You're Alone which was also the screen debut of actor Tom Hanks...
and stars Scott Curtis
Scott Curtis
Scott Curtis is an American actor and musician.-Career:As a former child actor, he is known for his role as Brandon Capwell on the daytime television series Santa Barbara. He also had a regular role on Aaron's Way, amongst other shows. In 1988 Curtis had the lead role in the horror film Cameron's...
, Cotter Smith
Cotter Smith
Cotter Smith is an American stage, film, and television actor.-Biography:He was born Joseph Cotter Smith in Washington, D.C., the son of Madeline and John Lewis Smith, Jr., who was a federal judge...
, Mel Harris
Mel Harris
Mel Harris is an American actress.-Personal life:Harris was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, the daughter to Mary Michael "Mike", a high school science teacher, and Warren Harris, a university football coach...
, Tab Hunter
Tab Hunter
Tab Hunter is an American actor, singer, former teen idol and author who has starred in over forty major films.-Background:...
, Kim Lankford
Kim Lankford
Kim Lankford is an American actress and businesswoman.-Personal life:She is an ex-girlfriend of Warren Zevon. Kim Lankford has never been married or had any children.-Acting career:...
, Gary Hudson
Gary Hudson
Gary Hudson has been involved in private spaceflight development for over 25 years.Hudson is best known as the founder of Rotary Rocket Company, which in spending ~$30 Million attempted to build a unique single stage to orbit launch vehicle known as the Roton...
and William Lustig
William Lustig
William Lustig , also known as Bill Lustig, is an American film director and producer who has worked primarily in the horror film genre.-Movie career:...
.
Plot
10-year-old Cameron Lansing (Scott CurtisScott Curtis
Scott Curtis is an American actor and musician.-Career:As a former child actor, he is known for his role as Brandon Capwell on the daytime television series Santa Barbara. He also had a regular role on Aaron's Way, amongst other shows. In 1988 Curtis had the lead role in the horror film Cameron's...
) is an introverted, solitary boy with telekinetic and telepathic abilities who lives with his father, Owen Lansing (Tab Hunter
Tab Hunter
Tab Hunter is an American actor, singer, former teen idol and author who has starred in over forty major films.-Background:...
), a research scientist. Owen has subjected Cameron to intense psychological testing from a young age in an effort to unbury the hidden powers of the human mind. During a series of mysterious and bizarre circumstances in their rural house one night, Owen is decapitated by a machete
Machete
The machete is a large cleaver-like cutting tool. The blade is typically long and usually under thick. In the English language, an equivalent term is matchet, though it is less commonly known...
, yet the authorities can find no evidence of foul play
Crime
Crime is the breach of rules or laws for which some governing authority can ultimately prescribe a conviction...
and rule it out as an accidental death believing he simply fell on it. Cameron goes to live with his mother Dory Lansing (Kim Lankford
Kim Lankford
Kim Lankford is an American actress and businesswoman.-Personal life:She is an ex-girlfriend of Warren Zevon. Kim Lankford has never been married or had any children.-Acting career:...
) and her obnoxious actor boyfriend Bob Froelich (Gary Hudson
Gary Hudson
Gary Hudson has been involved in private spaceflight development for over 25 years.Hudson is best known as the founder of Rotary Rocket Company, which in spending ~$30 Million attempted to build a unique single stage to orbit launch vehicle known as the Roton...
) in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
. Both Dory and Bob are unaware of Cameron's paranormal
Paranormal
Paranormal is a general term that designates experiences that lie outside "the range of normal experience or scientific explanation" or that indicates phenomena understood to be outside of science's current ability to explain or measure...
abilities.
Sergeant Sam Taliaferro (Cotter Smith
Cotter Smith
Cotter Smith is an American stage, film, and television actor.-Biography:He was born Joseph Cotter Smith in Washington, D.C., the son of Madeline and John Lewis Smith, Jr., who was a federal judge...
) of the Homicide Division
Homicide
Homicide refers to the act of a human killing another human. Murder, for example, is a type of homicide. It can also describe a person who has committed such an act, though this use is rare in modern English...
of the LAPD
Los Angeles Police Department
The Los Angeles Police Department is the police department of the city of Los Angeles, California. With just under 10,000 officers and more than 3,000 civilian staff, covering an area of with a population of more than 4.1 million people, it is the third largest local law enforcement agency in...
has sleeping trouble and a recurring nightmare which is affecting his work. Taliaferro's partner, Detective
Detective
A detective is an investigator, either a member of a police agency or a private person. The latter may be known as private investigators or "private eyes"...
Pete Groom (Leigh McCloskey
Leigh McCloskey
Leigh Joseph McCloskey is an American film and television actor.-Career:McCloskey was classically trained as an actor at the Juilliard School in Lincoln Center, New York. As an actor, he is perhaps most widely known for his role as Mitch Cooper on the CBS soap opera Dallas...
) complains about Taliaferro's frequent bouts of absent-mindedness in the line of duty caused his lack of sleep, and so Taliaferro is ordered to go see a psychiatrist
Psychiatrist
A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
who works with the department, Dr. Nora Haley (Mel Harris
Mel Harris
Mel Harris is an American actress.-Personal life:Harris was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, the daughter to Mary Michael "Mike", a high school science teacher, and Warren Harris, a university football coach...
). When Bob Froelich is horrifically murdered in Cameron's room, having been thrown out of the second-floor window with his eyes burnt out of the sockets, Sam Taliaferro, Pete Groom and Nora Haley are put on the case. As they investigate the perplexing case, Taliaferro befriends Cameron and realizes that deaths are occurring always around the boy, and that his nightmares seem to be linked to the boy. Under her counselling sessions Nora Haley also realizes that the boy has paranormal abilities, even being able to foresee future events
Precognition
In parapsychology, precognition , also called future sight, and second sight, is a type of extrasensory perception that would involve the acquisition or effect of future information that cannot be deduced from presently available and normally acquired sense-based information or laws of physics...
. It also becomes apparent to Taliaferro that whatever Cameron concentrates on hard enough or focuses on is manifesting itself into reality
Conjuration
Conjuration is used in many video games, mainly RPGs, where it is usually referred to as summoning.* A notable example is the Final Fantasy franchise which incorporates summoning of monsters to fight alongside the characters....
.
Cameron plays an imaginative game with a figurine
Figurine
A figurine is a statuette that represents a human, deity or animal. Figurines may be realistic or iconic, depending on the skill and intention of the creator. The earliest were made of stone or clay...
his father gave to him he calls the "Deceptor", actually an ancient figure of a Mayan
Maya civilization
The Maya is a Mesoamerican civilization, noted for the only known fully developed written language of the pre-Columbian Americas, as well as for its art, architecture, and mathematical and astronomical systems. Initially established during the Pre-Classic period The Maya is a Mesoamerican...
demonic entity
Demon
call - 1347 531 7769 for more infoIn Ancient Near Eastern religions as well as in the Abrahamic traditions, including ancient and medieval Christian demonology, a demon is considered an "unclean spirit" which may cause demonic possession, to be addressed with an act of exorcism...
said to be terrible beyond description in Owen Lansing's texts. Cameron's imagination makes the creature real and it takes up residence in Cameron's bedroom closet. Soon, numerous inexplicable and gruesome deaths are occurring around the closet in Cameron's room, and people who have already died seem to be mysteriously reappearing in an undead
Undead
Undead is a collective name for fictional, mythological, or legendary beings that are deceased and yet behave as if alive. Undead may be incorporeal, such as ghosts, or corporeal, such as vampires and zombies...
state. Bob Froelich is horrifyingly resurrected in Cameron's closet and murders Detective Pete Groom when he looks inside the closet.
Taliaferro and Haley seek out Owen Lansing's assistant, Professor Ben Majors (Chuck McCann
Chuck McCann
Chuck McCann is a film actor, television actor, stage actor, and a voice actor from Brooklyn, New York.-Early career:...
) at his home in the woods, where they learn the truth about Cameron. Taliaferro is stalked through the woods by Pete Groom's ghost, who warns him that the evil is "out of the closet now." The demons soon wish to destroy Cameron, thus severing their link to limbo
Limbo
In the theology of the Catholic Church, Limbo is a speculative idea about the afterlife condition of those who die in original sin without being assigned to the Hell of the damned. Limbo is not an official doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church or any other...
and sealing them within reality and in our world. Majors kidnaps Cameron and takes him back to Cameron's house where Majors is then murdered by the demon, his blood boiling in his veins. Only Sam Taliaferro and Nora Haley are able to protect Cameron. Cameron goes back to his room to face the demon in the closet once and for all and attempt to send it back to the lowest regions of Hell
Hell
In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...
before Cameron loses his powers to it.
Production
The screenplay of Cameron's Closet was written by Gary BrandnerGary Brandner
Gary Brandner is an American horror author best known for his werewolf themed trilogy of novels, The Howling. The first book in the series was loosely adapted as a motion picture in 1981...
, who had previously written both the trilogy of novels and the film adaptations of the acclaimed The Howling
The Howling
The Howling is a 1977 horror novel by Gary Brandner. It was the inspiration for the 1981 film The Howling, although the plot of the film was only vaguely similar to that of the book....
.
The special effects of Cameron's Closet were done by Carlo Rambaldi
Carlo Rambaldi
Carlo Rambaldi is an Italian special effects artist who is most famous for designing the title character of the 1982 film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and the mechanical head-effects for the creature in Alien...
, who had previously designed the eponymous character in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial is a 1982 American science fiction film co-produced and directed by Steven Spielberg, written by Melissa Mathison and starring Henry Thomas, Dee Wallace, Robert MacNaughton, Drew Barrymore, and Peter Coyote...
(1982) and the mechanical head-effects for the creature in Alien
Alien (film)
Alien is a 1979 science fiction horror film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm and Yaphet Kotto. The film's title refers to its primary antagonist: a highly aggressive extraterrestrial creature which...
(1979), for both of which had earned Rambaldi an Oscar. Rambaldi also worked on Profondo Rosso (Deep Red)
Deep Red
Profondo Rosso is a 1975 giallo film directed and written by Dario Argento and co-written by Bernardino Zapponi. It was released on March 7, 1975 in Italy and June 11, 1976 in the United States. The film's score was composed and performed by Goblin...
(1975), King Kong
King Kong (1976 film)
King Kong is a 1976 American monster movie produced by Dino De Laurentiis and directed by John Guillermin. It is a remake of the 1933 classic film of the same name, about a giant ape that is captured and imported to New York City for exhibition....
(1976), Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a 1977 science fiction film written and directed by Steven Spielberg. The film stars Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, Bob Balaban, and Cary Guffey...
(1977), Dune
Dune (film)
Dune is a 1984 science fiction film written and directed by David Lynch, based on the 1965 Frank Herbert novel of the same name. The film stars Kyle MacLachlan as Paul Atreides, and includes an ensemble of well-known American and European actors in supporting roles. It was filmed at the Churubusco...
(1984), and King Kong Lives
King Kong Lives
King Kong Lives is a 1986 American monster movie produced by DEG Studios. Directed by John Guillermin and featuring special effects by Carlo Rambaldi, the film starred Linda Hamilton and Brian Kerwin. The film was a belated sequel to King Kong...
(1986).
Cult horror film
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...
director William Lustig
William Lustig
William Lustig , also known as Bill Lustig, is an American film director and producer who has worked primarily in the horror film genre.-Movie career:...
has a cameo in the film as a pornographic film director being booked by the police.
Release
The film was given a limited theatrical releaseLimited release
Limited release is a term in the American motion picture industry for a motion picture that is playing in a select few theaters across the country ....
in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
by SVS Films in January 1989. The film was released later that same year on VHS
VHS
The Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
by Sony Video
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment is the home video distribution arm of Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation. It was established in November 1979 as Columbia Pictures Home Entertainment, releasing 20 titles: The Anderson Tapes, Bell, Book and Candle, Born Free, Breakout,...
.
The film was released on DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment is the home video distribution arm of Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation. It was established in November 1979 as Columbia Pictures Home Entertainment, releasing 20 titles: The Anderson Tapes, Bell, Book and Candle, Born Free, Breakout,...
in 2004. It has since gone out of print
Out of print
Out of print refers to an item, typically a book , but can include any print or visual media or sound recording, that is in the state of no longer being published....
.