Peopletoys (1974) User Reviews

Editing errors times a thousand

[Zeegrade · 4/10 · 19 September 2009]

Five little evil bastards escape a van crash that most assuredly would have killed them had they been normal children. After a little wandering the five find themselves at a remote chalet where three couples and a mentally challenged handyman (try figuring that one out) are spending time in yelling at each other and getting drunk. Sounds like most of my Christmas'. Soon the incompetent adults are dispatched by the little tykes deathtraps that never seem to fail followed by an annoying Pop Goes the Weasel score. Aren't you scared yet? Watch for the catfight when at the end Lovely's robe is only partially open then the next glimpse it is wide open exposing the only things worthy of notice in this film.

What a disaster of a movie! It's not without promise but this could have been done so much better. The editing is so poorly done that it is hard to know who certain people are in the film such as the mystery man that emerges from the van wreck. Was it a clown car for chrissakes? This is rated R and yet the death scenes make me wonder if the director decided to pull back on the gore. The five plus minute slo-mo black and white death scene is so painful to watch it defies belief that the director would stoop to this to extend the runtime. Leif Garrett's hairstyle changes inexplicably from a goofy wig to shoulder length from one scene to another. The children refer to a character twice that is no where to be found such as when David kills Harvey and blames it on this mystery "Greg". How can you be so lax? On top of that the murders are so lame that only an idiot would fall for them and yet this chalet is packed with idiots. One scene in particular has two of the kids drown Lovely in the tub while dropping Piranna fish in. The fact that these kids are exposed to the large breasted Carolyn Stellar to begin with is a little disturbing but the scene is followed with all the "devils" dragging her naked body through the snow. One more juicy tidbit is Carolyn Stellar is the real life mother of Leif Garrett and Dawn Lyn who plays Moe. One of the writers is John Durren who plays Ralph the retarded handyman (I wonder if he wrote this channeling his character?) who in a very cringe inducing scene is sexually harassed by Lovely. I would recommend seeing this once with a bunch of friends and adult libations just to laugh at the sheer silliness of this movie. Aren't "peopletoys" marital aide products?

Like all Cult Films.../// spoilers

[BloodTheTelepathicDog · 5/10 · 16 July 2008]

... there are reasons to love this film and reasons to hate it. Killer kids make for a splendid horror ingredient - most horror films use kids as characters placed in peril and not as the mischievous, cunning weasels that most are. That being said, this cult film, shows the kids gleefully killing adults by a number of methods - even by use of piranhas. However, like most cult films, there are moments that are handled quite unprofessionally. This film is great display of incompetence on the editors part. Although this film is set over the course of a couple days, there is no continuity, time frame wise. At one point in the film the sun is shining while moments later it is dark. The next scene, sun shining after darkness, makes the viewer feel as if we've been introduced to a new day, but we haven't. Also, the scene where Joan McCall sits beside her boyfriend on the kitchen floor is a classic display of editing ineptitude. While she is sitting next to her boyfriend, her father is killed outside, in a barn, but Joan is shown the entire time of her father's killing in the kitchen yet somehow knows that her father is dead without setting foot outside. There are things like this that don't entirely ruin the viewing experience to show you why this is of cult status.

VIOLENCE: $$$$ (You will get your money's worth! The kids are quite resourceful when it comes to killing folks. We have a fatal car accident, a hanging, a beating with the employ of various items found in a barn, a burning, a slit throat, a spear impalement and death by piranha. You won't be letdown in the violence and gore departments - if that is your thing).

STORY: $$ (The story is really quite weak. Five troubled kids survive a car accident and venture off to a secluded estate operated by the Naziesque Papa Doc (Gene Evans). With there innocent appearance, they weasel their way into the house and begin to systematically kill the residents).

NUDITY: $$$ (There is a love scene with Joan McCall and her boyfriend Rick - who shows quite a bit of man backside. Leif Garret's mother Carolyn Steller has a catfight with McCall in which her robe opens giving the viewer gratuitous nudity. We also get another look at M. Steller when she is the recipient of the piranha infested bathtub).

ACTING: $$$ (Nothing Oscar-worthy here by any means, but there are a few shining lights. The kids are led by Tierre Turner, who does a marvelous job as a military obsessed tot only being out-shined by Leif Garret's future drag-queen character. The three girl really didn't do that great of a job as the two boys clearly outshine them. The adults are led by Dukes Of Hazzard's Sorrell Booke, who plays Papa Doc's adviser, trying to get a promotion but unable to confront Papa Doc about the issue. Carolyn Steller is brilliant as the manipulating Lovely - she fits her name perfectly too).

"We'll Get Some New Toys Soon"

[BaronBl00d · 6/10 · 3 October 2010]

This film is at times disturbing and well-shot and at others abysmally absurd and full of continuity issues. For its low budget - though it does have a cast with Sorrell Booke and Gene Evans and some other actors and actresses that have gone on to lucrative Hollywood careers(Leif Garrett comes to mind)- Devil Times Five has that creepy seventies horror film vibe going for it that makes it a treat to watch despite its many shortcomings. A group of mentally "acute" deadly child patients (5 of them) are freed when their van going to the mental institute crashes. They walk through the frozen, snow-covered wilderness with no food and little clothing yet fear not the winter chill. Soon they reach a very nice winter residence of one Papa Doc, his wife, his daughter and her boyfriend who works for Papa Doc,, the mentally slow caretaker, and Harvey Beckman who also works for Papa Doc with his drunken wife Ruth. Harvey Beckman apparently is a doctor at a sanatorium - one of the best - but he cannot see anything wrong when these children show up. He is so trustworthy that he turns his back on one with an ax. How did that work out for you Doc? Anyway, Beckman is played nicely by pre-Boss Hogg Sorrell Booke. The children soon invade the home and kill all of its inhabitants in a myriad of ways: death by drowning and piranha bites(yes, piranhas in this winter wonderland), death by being doused with flames and lit up like a Christmas tree, death bu a sharp branch impaling one from a kid on a swing, death by bear traps, death by hanging some guy looking at a generator but never showing us how that was even remotely possible, and finally death by a lance to the throat from a window closed mind you - a perfect throw through glass and all by a thirteen year old(or so). The first murder scene is done in a grainy, slow motion, black and white way which looks ludicrous and I had no idea what was going on. The rest of the murders are done at least in color though some suffer from the slow motion used again. Apparently there were two directors for this film and that leads to all kinds of continuity problems. That being said, the acting and atmosphere of this film are quite chilling. Unfortunately, some of these flaws seriously take away from the film for I found myself laughing at certain scenes for their idiocy. The kids are pretty decent performers and the older actors do nicely. The gals are attractive and Carolyn Stellar playing Lovely who likes anything with pants disrobes a couple times. She is the real life mother of two of the child actors - Leif Garrett and Dawn Lynn(who you may remember as Jodie Harper Douglas on My Three Sons - I knew I had seen her somewhere before!). I am sure it must be quite a treat when the three sit down and watch this movie together. All in all this is better than you might expect.

Disturbing.

[luvtiger · 16 July 2001]

I found this movie disturbing. Young girl putting a piranha in a woman's bathtub, while the others hold her down. The sheer frustration of the triumph of evil over good. The hopelessness of fighting an evil that outsmarts you every turn, with no weapons either. I had to stay up a while after seeing this movie. I just found it disturbing.

Awful Times Five

[anxietyresister · 2/10 · 25 January 2006]

What's with all the alternate names? In England this film is known as 'Tantrums', but that isn't even listed on the IMDb. Did the backers decide to change the title every time it flopped in a different country in a vain effort to cover their tracks? Seeing how bad it is, it wouldn't surprise me..

A hotel. Snowy wilderness. 6 dumb adults. Five psychotic kids. Oh, the poor dears are stuck in the cold! Let's give them a place to stay! However, this is the worse decision they could have possibly made. For these budding young Charlie Mansons are murderous killers, and they leave no prisoners in their wake. The grown-ups end up, in no particular order: boiled in bathtubs, axed in the back, slit through the throat and yep, you guessed it.. hung from the rafters.

In an effort to stave off criticism of child exploitation, actual exposure of gore is kept to a minimum. Unfortunately, this makes the editing distinctly choppy, and ruins any potential excitement generated by these scenes. It doesn't help that the victims are so clueless they might as well sign their own death warrants. I cannot recall a film in living memory where the deceased were so stupid. Also, what was with the oft-repeated playground-style background music? If this was supposed to heighten the suspense, I'm sorry.. the incessant noise is just distracting and annoying. Combine that with dismal acting and the pointless slow-motion camera-work, and you have yourself a real waste of time. Watch Bloody Birthday instead.. a movie with a similar plot but 10x better execution. 2/10

The only way this could be Devil times five is if "devil" means 17 minutes

[vegeta3986 · 1/10 · 6 August 2009]

Now i don't like to use juvenile terms when i review a movie, but honestly. i hated this movie. hated hated hated this movie. I know that's a childish thing to say (no pun intended) but there's no better word. This movie was stupid.

Allrighty, i might as well tell you WHY. So let's jump into Movie number 22 on our Chilling Classics 50 movie pack.

So it starts off with these little annoying kids who climb out of a bus that crashed apparently unharmed. It seems that they just escaped from a crazy house and they are just.... it isn't really clear what their motive it, they're just doing stuff. On the other side of the plot though an old guy who isn't much of a family man has a get together for the rest of his family. They all kind of yell at each other the whole time, so it really isn't that good of a reunion. Or then again, it's like EVERY reunion. Now it said on my DVD sleeve that these people were mafia. I don't know, they never mentioned it, and if this old guy were the head of a mafia you'd think he'd have guards or something, but you know what? i seriously question ever aspect of this movie anyway.

So these kids show up and start killing off people one by one. And everyone thinks it's suicides. Because they're idiots. And then they lose their guns. because they're idiots. Then they start getting killed off one by one... because, well something tells me you could figure out why.

I am going to spoil the ending here for one specific reason. So you know what happens and you have no cause or reason to see this movie. EVER. The only guy left's girlfriend gets killed by the kids, so he goes out to get his revenge. FINALLY! oh. wait. then he falls in some bear traps and dies..... God i hate this movie.

Look. There's something people who make movies need to understand. Just because you have a child in a movie, that does not make them invincible. If a child/ group of children are killers, it does not mean that they can get away scott free and that we think that would be chilling or a role reversal. No. IT'S STUPID. it doesn't frighten or disturb you, it INCREDIBLY ANNOYS YOU. if that was their attempt, then great job, but something tells me they're not that smart to think of something like that. If you have 5 main evil kids, AT LEAST 2 have to die if you're going to make some live. you CANNOT have all of them live. That is BEYOND retarded. Now i know that sort of thing in the role reversal is terrible like Jason Voorehees pretty much won't ever be seen killing a kid, but on the other hand, if 5 kids are slaughtering everybody around them, i think they need to pull out the punches and start lopping off some annoying kid heads.

Now i normally don't review in this way, but this movie made me angry at it. So much so that if it were not part of a collection, and "passenger of bali" (which is also on the same disc) not being somewhat entertaining, i would have thrown this stupid thing out.

Devil times five gets 1 terrible EVERYTHING out of 10.

Those Darned Kids!

[Hitchcoc · 3/10 · 8 January 2007]

OK. Talk about your opportunities. You are one of five mini-psychopaths. Your bus crashes, you find yourself at a house, and in it are some of the most non-salvageable people on the face of the earth. One of them even has a tank of piranhas. Then the fun starts as the people are massacred by these little stinkers. Each has his or her own little thing they do. It's interesting they never have turned on each other. They are really something, using the people's bodies as playthings to have tea parties and such. They are very skilled in weaponry. The interesting thing is that the combined IQ of the whole household wouldn't raise the level of intelligence a point. It's a marriage made in heaven. These little squirts have big plans and awfully clever methods (a mechanical engineer would be proud). It's all quite a trip. Next time you answer the door and a little child is there, throw them in a snowbank. Just kidding.

Psycho kids create gory death scenes

[The_Void · 7/10 · 9 December 2008]

Devil Times Five is basically your basic seventies horror flick about a bunch of people in an isolated location being terrorised by psychos; except this one has a twist, and that twist comes in the form of the psychos themselves being young children. The most famous film to use the idea of psychotic children is probably the 1960 classic Village of the Damned; but it has been done many times since. Devil Times Five is perhaps something of an oddity within the genre as it doesn't particularly focus on the idea of the children being psychos, but instead puts its focus on the sleazy adult characters and gory death scenes. The plot focuses on a group of people staying at a snowbound lodge. Meanwhile, a bus carrying a group of psychotic children slips off the road; allowing the kids to escape. After taking out their guardian, the kids descend on the lodge where they are taken in by the people staying there. Shortly thereafter, the adults start turning up dead...

The film is a real piece of seventies grindhouse with the main focus being on the sleazy atmosphere. Immediately we are shown that not all of the main characters are angels and it sets things up nicely. Often horror films involving kids will be toned down a little; but that's not the case here either. The kids themselves are vicious enough and that is complimented nicely by a grisly set of death scenes that include things such as a woman in a bath being eaten by piranhas, someone being set alight and a vast assortment of mêlée weapons being put to good use. The snow setting provides a good location for the action to take place as it provides a good atmosphere of isolation to ensure we're always aware that the central characters are in trouble. It does have to be said that the film can't really be taken seriously; it's not particularly well written or acted and the story has no depth whatsoever - but it's not important anyway for a seventies horror flick and the film does provide ninety minutes that are worth seeing.

Interesting but not successful

[preppy-3 · 3/10 · 1 March 2014]

This takes place in the dead of winter. Five kids from a mental institution are being transported somewhere else. The van transporting them crashes but they all survive. They make their way to a resort hotel nearby that is closed for the season. Staying there however is a gangster and his assorted employees and family. They take in the kids not realizing that these children are capable of murder.

Bizarre little horror story. This was independently made on a very low budget. Unfortunately it shows. The script is OK but more interested in drama than horror. The murders themselves are pretty bloodless and (worst of all) not even remotely scary. The first one is shot in black and white AND in slow motion! Comes off looking stupid and boring at the same time (quite a feat). The acting varies. All the kids are terrible especially a VERY young Leif Garrett (who--for some reason--is a cross-dresser). The adults are OK. All in all this has an interesting premise but doesn't have the funding to carry it out.

Creepy Kids in the Hall!

[Coventry · 7/10 · 12 July 2006]

Over the years, many writers as well as filmmakers discovered that seemly innocent and cherubic looking children make extra-creepy horror villains! Demonic kids almost form an entire sub genre of horror by themselves! There usually is an explanation for their abnormal and murderous behavior, though. Either it's the influence of a satanic cult ("Children of the Corn"), a nuclear meltdown ("The Children of Ravensbeck"), a temporary blackout caused by a comet ("Village of the Damned") or even an ordinary solar eclipse on the day of their birth ("Bloody Birthday"). The youthful maniacs in this film have no real excuse for what they do. They were just born evil. And when their bus to the mental institute crashes down atop some snowy mountains, they become youthful maniacs AT LARGE! They make it to a holiday resort where some wannabe godfather Corleone runs his crime syndicate and they start killing all the residents. "Devil Times Five" is not a very good movie, but that's mainly due to a lack of budget and a shortage of talented cast & crew members. There's very little going on in the first hour, apart from a spectacular bus crash and THE longest murder of an institute employee (filmed in slow-motion). When approaching the last third of the film, the creepy moments and gory murders begin to follow each other at fast pace and the atmosphere really gets morbid. The adults are all pitiful and uninteresting characters but the five kids have quite interesting backgrounds. The oldest girl pretends to be a young convent sister, another girl is obsessed with fire and the funny black kid constantly acts like he's in the army. Their incontrollable urge to slaughter unknown people is a bit difficult to believe at times, but overall these young actors do a terrific job. "Devil Times Five" is recommended 70's exploitation, with a fairly high cult-value and several unforgettable murder scenes (piranhas in the bathtub!!)

Crap and not even entertaining crap!

[planktonrules · 2/10 · 22 September 2014]

This film has a cheap made for TV look about it, but with a few gratuitous nude scenes and violence, you can pretty much bet this wasn't shown on 1970s television!

The film begins with a van careening off the road in the middle of winter in the Big Bear region. It's very cold and very snowy but somehow some of the folks in the vehicle survived a crash that SHOULD have killed everyone, as the van rolled about a dozen times...yet these kids are unhurt. The five freakish kids trek through the woods until they find a mansion filled with misfit jerks. The jerks take in the kids--not realizing they are all residents of an institution for the criminally insane!!! Eventually, the kids get bored and butcher everyone.

So is this mayhem any good? No. My biggest complaint is how annoying the characters are. You don't like any of them and the kids are even more annoying than their stupid victims. You just want them all to shut up....and the music that accompanies all this doesn't help any. Instead of creating chills, I just wanted them all to go away! Whiny, annoying psycho brats, occasionally stupid murders (the piranhas were especially bad), very little in the way of plot and no real suspense--this film just seemed like a waste of time and didn't live up to the great title of the movie.

Not bad, actually! [Probable Spoilers]

[Steve_Nyland · 8/10 · 21 June 2004]

I finally got a chance to watch an old rental tape of this we found the other night and was actually quite pleased with the results. A bus on it's way to a state mental hospital for children crashes, the driver killed and the five insane kids inside escape to take refuge in a nearby resort hotel, closed for the season and occupied by a sort of local crime boss called Papa Doc [played by country/western singer Gene Evans, who I still remember doing something like football commentary for one of the networks as a kid] and his entourage of hangers on, gophers and Sorrel Brooke [later Boss Hogg of DUKES OF HAZZARD fame] as his pathetic, balding son. The women are all oversexed or drunken harlots, and there is some sort of macho powerplay going on amongst the men, until all of a sudden these five kids appear in the living room after beating the doctor who was with them to death in an extended slow-motion sequence was actually pretty darn creepy.

The kids are an interesting lot; One of them is convinced she is a nun, Leif Garrett thinks he is a big time child movie star [possible in-joke or gifted foresight?], and the leader appears to be the little African American kid who dresses, acts and talks in military lingo, just like a soldier -- He even has a little plastic M-16, which will later be traded for one of the hunting rifles from the walls of the lodge.

Then there is the caretaker, Ralph, who talks to the bunny rabbits he raises, and apparently thinks he is one as well. Ralph is a bit slow on the fastball as it were, and serves as the butt of a series of rather cruel jokes about his size, strength and sexuality, including a scene that sort of left me feeling uncomfortable as he and the little maniac who thinks she is a nun wash dishes and share a "secret". Ahem.

All of this takes place in an utterly drab and unsensational setting, shot in an almost documentary manner and with almost zero character development. The fun sort of doesn't really pick up speed until it is revealed that Evans' Papa Doc actually has an aquarium with live pirhana fish in it [about four, actually] and I had decided that unless we got to see one of the women fed to the pirhana fish whilst stark naked, I was going to ask for my money back.

I'm glad to say that we will be keeping the video, though just how the deadly pirhana fish are used I will keep a secret. The kids start in on the adults slowly, playing mind games and seeming to have nothing better in mind than to mentally and eventually physically torture & kill them one by one -- There are hangings, stabbings, shootings, death by killer pirhana fish, and all of it meted out by the hands of 10 to 14 year olds, to whom it is all just a whopping great time. The film ends with a very chilling shot of the life-sized play set that the kids have fashioned for themselves up in Ralph's apartment room where the alternate title of "People Toys" is fully realized.

DEVIL TIMES FIVE is not without it's problems, most notably these kids ... They don't seem to be affected by the winter climate at all, never seem to get hungry or sleepy or have cold feet in the snow, and are in fact caricatures rather than characters -- as opposed to say the inmates of the asylum from S.F. Brownrigg's DON'T LOOK IN THE BASEMENT, which this film seems in part to have been inspired by [right down to the child-like bohemouth character and the character who acts & talks just like a soldier]. DEVIL TIMES FIVE is an interesting twist on the Asylum Horror genre that can be so much fun, removing the insane inmates from their loony bin and setting them loose in an isolated setting from which the adults have no escape -- The question isn't who will survive, but how will each adult meet their demise, and on that plane this is a doubly chilling exercise in the form, with no hope of any kind of a "happy" ending, unless your sympathies lie with the kids.

All in all I found it to be grand fun on a very sick level that films just can't seem to descend to these days, though there wasn't as much gore and sleaze as I had been hoping for, and several slow motion violence sequences suggested that this may have been a "cut" version, though there was ample nudity and profanity to justify the MPAA R Rating. DEVIL TIMES FIVE is currently Out of Print as a commercial retail home video release, though Incredibly Strange Film Works [www.isfilm.net] has a nice codfree DVD release, and Sinister Cinema has had the film available on both VHS & DVD-R for a few years. VERY interesting ultra low budget 70's Novelty Shocker worth seeking out, though be forewarned that there is no hope in this film, evil triumphs over good, and yes, Leif Garrett eventually went on to release albums of garbage that sold millions of units to 12 - 16 year old girls the world over, which is indeed more horrifying than anything depicted on screen.

*** [out of a possible ****]

An enjoyably kooky 70's killer kids movie

[Red-Barracuda · 7/10 · 7 August 2011]

This is a good little quirky horror-thriller set in a snow-bound area. A family gather in a house for a winter break, while at the same time a bus carrying some kids crashes off the road. Five of the children escape unharmed but it turns out these are seriously disturbed kids and they are soon to come into contact with our friends in the holiday home.

Devil Times Five is a strange little movie. It sometimes gives off the relaxed and warm feel of a 70's TV movie but this is misleading as its subject matter of sociopathic children is not exactly a very cosy theme. This combination of TV-style melodrama with slasher movie subject matter is one of the things that makes for distinctive viewing. It's just a little bizarre. The snowy setting is good too and gives the flick a nice feel. The murders are all varied and occasionally quite inventive such as the bath tub demise replete with piranhas. Admittedly, the first murder is a pretty confusing affair – not only do we have trouble knowing what is going on but it's not even that clear who is even being attacked! But it's still a pleasingly weird scene with slow motion visuals and sound, and through a monochrome lens. Aside from all this, the movie is not above throwing in a totally unnecessary cat fight too. And what could be wrong with that? You could do a lot worse than this one. If you are a sucker for early 70's proto-slashers then this is one that should provide some entertainment.

sick and twisted

[ritzik · 1/10 · 6 January 2007]

My dad took me to see this film when I was 6 (he's a good guy, really). Through my young eyes there was nothing cheesy or unintentionally hilarious about it, just disturbing to the core. A good deal of time is spent establishing the characters before any carnage begins. Enough so that I actually cared about the adults and the children. I was broadsided when the sadistic murdering began. The kills are lengthy and graphic, including a man beaten to death with a hammer (in slow-motion!) and woman's tub ruined by piranhas. As the kids were carrying her bleeding, dead, naked body out into the evening snow I made my dad get us the hell out of there. This movie warped me! Thanks dad!

I just finished watching this movie and I'm not sleeping right now.

[leehome1 · 16 April 2006]

This movie is messed up. If you can get past the first 1/2 hour of cheap gratuitous sex and horrid seventies music this movie will really do a number on your fragile sensibilities. I really had to make sure the front door was securely locked about five minutes ago. Oh my God, it's just wrong. A movie like this would never be made today with all the codes that are in place. It's about as unwatchable as Faces of Death which is not entertainment at all but exploitation at humankind's worst. These kids never crack a smile except when they are bickering with each other over futile nonsense. Whoever said there was a hopeless feeling to this movie is right. This is some creepy stuff.

"Those horror movies really make your hemoglobin congeal, eh?" "Make your blood freeze, Sister Sixto."

[lee_eisenberg · 4/10 · 19 December 2006]

"Devil Times Five" wouldn't really be worth noticing except for a most unusual aspect: it stars Shelley Morrison, aka Sister Sixto on "The Flying Nun" (she apparently also starred on "Will & Grace", but I've never seen that); in fact, one of the characters in this movie is a novice nun (like Sister Bertrille was). Otherwise, the movie is little that we haven't seen before, as some psycho children escape a crashed van in the mountains and make their way to a cabin where they proceed to make mincemeat of the adults. Pretty much all the cast members are so obnoxious - stupid adults and boring children - that I couldn't really tell which side to root for. There's some sex to keep things going, but such scenes can only do so much.

So, Shelley Morrison is really the only reason to watch this movie. You keep expecting her to blurt out some mangled phrase as Sister Sixto did, but no, she spends most of the movie staring. Mostly not worth the time.

Checkmate Harvey Beckman!

[bob_meg · 3/10 · 11 July 2013]

When you see an artifact like this film (call it by any one of its three titles, most of which are splashed on the static title card that is the hallmark of all true grindhouse fare) it reminds you of a sad truth. Namely, the only way a bunch of people with no money could make a film back in the day was to make some schlocky pseudo-horror nonsense filled with blood the color of orange juice and liberal splattering of freeze frames.

I mean, technically, this film sucks. There really isn't any redeeming merit in the story, the acting, the photography...even the sound and editing are hackneyed. it is truly, as others have confirmed, a disaster. But is it scary? Lots of sub-par movies have had a genuine creepiness factor. Unfortunately, today...unless the sight of kids with weapons on screen, assaulting adults, is new to you...the answer is sadly no. The assault on a doctor earlier in the film is so badly set-up, edited, lit, and shot, that its hard to tell what is even happening on the screen (even in supposed "cleaned-up prints"). This makes the extended four minute attack just mind-numbingly tedious. Not sure why this got to some people.

In 1974 that was probably very different. Aside from "Village of the Damned," "Who Would Kill a Child?" et al, kiddie carnage wasn't common place. And given the era...when many parents were in fact becoming afraid of their kids...this movie would have been far more disturbing. The archaic quality of the script really renders it as nothing more than a freak show curiosity, and it does deliver on that count. The cat fight in the beginning of the film is hilarious in its staginess and the ineptness with which its shot --- and this is how these zero budget flicks got financed, remember? You can almost see the plaid leisure suited executive taking the stogie out of his mouth and saying "Ya got two broads in a room together, dontcha? CATFIGHT!" I will give screenwriter John Durren, who plays Ralph one nod, though. In addition to having the energy to inject topicality into the script (it does have a moral indignation that is a tad refreshing compared to anything being written today --- at least it attempts to TAKE a position) he does give us a couple of very unsettling tableaux, mostly in scenes he embodies: Ralph semi-flirts with the young psycho "nun", Leif Garrett (in "BAD SEED to the MAX" mode) cross dresses and flirts with Sorrell Booke, and the femme fatale of the bunch sexually degrades and mocks Ralph, who is obviously disabled.

Pretty daring stuff. A pity that daring couldn't have been laced with a tad more competence. Still, true checking out for a truly BAD (as in Dan Ackroyd's Leonard Pimpf Garnell character on SNL) CINEMA.

Nobody will miss those sleazy adults

[Johan_Wondering_on_Waves · 4/10 · 17 January 2015]

This movie isn't too bad however the first hour or so is not really entertaining especially when the adults are interacting with each other. Nothing they actually do or say is anyhow important and doesn't really help the plot nor makes me having any sympathy to them. The only one who was actually nice was Ralph. When the kids get to the cabin things get a little more interesting. The 5 kids all have their special interests (nun, military) but none really worked out in depth. Maybe the director should have put more of an effort to elaborate on the kids instead of wasting screen time on the uninteresting sleazy adults. It's not a movie with great re-watch value. The killings however are creative but not enough to make it pass the test.

Vicious

[glenmatisse · 7/10 · 22 July 2020]

A few scenes go on for too long (that slow-mo beating scene could have been trimmed down a bit, couldn't it?), but all the adult characters are wonderfully unlikable and morally reprehensible which makes it fun to see these kids throw piranhas into their bathtubs and catch them on fire. It's a pretty dark and cynical film, so be sure you're in the right mood before you partake.

Memory from my youth haunts me now

[EricR1970-1 · 3/10 · 7 October 2017]

When I was a kid, probably 7 or 8 years old, I recall seeing the poster for this movie at a theater I was at while watching another movie. Every now and again the memory of that poster would pop into my mind, though I had never seen this flick. So today, I queued it up on Amazon prime, finally, after nearly 40 years. It's bad. Rotten. Really awful. Maybe this was a decent horror flick back in 1974 when it was made, but by modern standards, it's pitiful. It looks like it was filmed with a home video recorder. The dialogue is humdrum. They couldn't decide if they were filming a port or a "children of the corn" type horror flick. And the music is just comical; it's like quirky military movie music. Although, I did get to learn who Leif Garrett was. Man, that guy has had a rough life. Drug additions are a beast. But yeah, don't waste your time with this one.

A gritty yet memorable technical disaster

[drownsoda90 · 6/10 · 14 February 2016]

"Devil Times Five" (also known under a slew of various titles, including "Peopletoys," "The Horrible House on the Hill," and "Tantrums") focuses on a small mountain village where a group of sleazy adults are vacationing. Nearby, a psychiatric facility van transporting five delusional, homicidal children, crashes, unleashing the little terrors. When they seek refuge in the snowy vacation community, a countdown on adult bodies ensues.

Well, well, well—this is a weird one. Clearly shot on a shoestring budget and with a script that delivers little in the way of surprises, "Devil Times Five"'s greatest strength is the dwindling presence of its adult figures, as the demented children clobber, hack, ignite, piranha bath(?) and slash them to the bits. The film evokes a dingy, dreary atmosphere that recalls that of "Don't Go in the Basement" and other '70s horror obscurities, and that may be the singular reason to watch this film; there is something unsettling captured here in the aesthetics and content, which is the case for so many of these films.

On the other hand, the film is a technical disaster in more ways than one. Bizarre editing and offbeat pacing afflict the film's first act; the kitschy seventies aesthetic will seem to override the possibility of any and all horror, but the last half of the film is remarkably grim and borderline nihilistic. The kids themselves all have their own delusional personalities; one carries himself as an Army commander, while another believes himself to be a child star; another even more bizarrely believes herself to be a nun, and dresses accordingly. The children in the film have more personality than their victims, which is an unusual quirk for the genre.

Overall, "Devil Times Five" is a sloppy yet effective film, and one that I'd probably only recommend for grindhouse fans and those who enjoy the grittier side of pre-millennial horror. In spite of its technical shortcomings and mediocre acting, the film does capture a dreary atmosphere which grows progressively darker and darker as the film goes on; there is a definite sick center to the film, an inherent nastiness that comes with children embodying physical evils, and I dare say no film has captured it with such a cynical lens. 6/10.

These Seem Like Such Nice Kids

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 23 May 2011]

Peopletoys finds a bunch of kids who escape from a van transporting them to the kiddie funny farm trekking through the winter snow until they reach a resort that was one time a mental asylum. This seems like a perfect opportunity for these apparently normal kids to start their careers as serial killers.

Among the kids here are Dawn Lyn late of My Three Sons and her brother future teen bubble gum idol Leif Garrett. When you look as androgynous as Garrett it's kind of hard to believe you've got a sociopathic turn of mind. Nevertheless it happens and such folks as Sorrell Booke, Henry Beckmann, Taylor Lacher etc., all fall victim to some fiendishly clever methods of murder.

Peopletoys is your average horror flick with the engendered paranoia brought on by the fact that these angelic looking urchins could not be future Ted Bundys in the making. Those who like these type of films might find this one interesting.

A nicely twisted 70's killer kid horror gem

[Woodyanders · 8/10 · 2 February 2007]

A bus bound for a mental institution containing a quintet of psychologically unbalanced and murderous children runs off the road and goes tumbling down a cliff, killing the driver in the process (this opening scene is quite jarring and splendidly staged). The deadly brats survive the accident and take refuge at a swanky winter resort run by the mean, irascible, browbeating Papa Doc (a deliciously dour Gene Evans, a longtime favorite of Samuel Fuller who was in Sam Peckinpah's last two Westerns "The Ballad of Cable Hogue" and "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid"). Pretty soon the killer kids go on a rampage: they junk the guests' cars, cut the power lines, and begin to violently off Papa Doc's arrogant, decadent, back-stabbing clientèle (a lady gets set ablaze after being drenched with gasoline, another hapless lass has piranha dumped in her bathtub, that sort of ghastly stuff).

This thoroughly sick and therefor most compelling psycho thriller marked the impressive debut of promising horror movie one shot wonder Sean MacGregor, who proved with this creepy, unique and wickedly warped humdinger that he could make one hell of a fright flick (MacGregor's sole other horror picture credit was writing the story for the eerily offbeat rural Devil worship chiller "The Brotherhood of Satan"). The astonishingly brutal scene where the terrible tykes beat their psychiatrist to death with chains, hammers, knives and even a pitchfork attests to this claim; this excruciatingly elongated sequence makes artful and unforgettably potent use of both grainy black and white still photographs and painfully amplified sound effects. The other murder set pieces aren't nearly as ferocious, but since they're perpetuated by smiling, seemingly harmless and innocent kids they still pack a serious wallop just the same -- and all are punctuated with strangely startling freeze frames.

John Durren's barbed, deeply judgmental script possesses a conspicuously angry and borderline hostile sense of moral outrage. There's a deep-seated disgust for the pervasive amorality, hedonism and narcissism that was a true hallmark of the 70's which in turn gives this feature an additional biting resonance. (Durren also acts in the movie as Ralph, a sweet, guileless, retarded handyman who the other adults mercilessly mock and push around.) The cast deserve appraisal as well, with especially solid work from Sorrell Booke (Boss Hog on "The Dukes of Hazzard") as a meek, peevish physician and Joan ("Act of Veangeance," "Grizzly") McCall as the only decent grown-up. 70's teen idol Leif Garrett is surprisingly good as one of the nefarious little rugrats. Odd, often jolting and extremely twisted, this funky little sleeper stands out as one of the best entries in the always worthwhile and enjoyable killer kid horror sub-genre.

A bit boring, but strangely charming and unique

[1965_2005_best · 7/10 · 18 September 2020]

You can tell this movie went into development hell. There's a bunch of plotholes, absurdly slow scenes, and an overall cheap feel. What saves this film in the end is how much the director actually cares about this movie. You can tell he was constantly trying to fix odd stuff throughout the film, but ran out of budget. The film ends up being a pretty unique film, with some of the most unique death scenes imaginable. The cast is fine, considering the fact that most of them aren't actors, though the stunts are fantastic. The effects here are really good, and if you can sit through 6-minutes of slow-motion death-scenes, then I'll recommend this film. Overall, pretty decent film.

Look what you did to my beautiful face!

[begob · 3/10 · 16 August 2020]

After surviving a fatal crash in the snowy wilderness, a gang of kids take shelter in a lodge where a wealthy tyrant is hosting a family get together. But the kids are about to take a lot more ...

A public information film about the dangers of wearing a seatbelt ... OMG! It somehow morphs into a sexploitation slasher with young kids. Actually, this is a terrible movie that pulls its punches, and seems to have gone into production without a real screenplay or any idea about direction or plain story telling.

The characters are simplistic or incoherent, the acting awkward. The music switches from Streets Of San Francisco to elevator tweeness to playful synth to ironic military tattoos. No attempt is made to create atmosphere with the lighting, and it's often unclear whether a scene is day or night, or how much time is passing. The editing is chaotic.

The killing scenes are inept: either confusing or drained of energy by slo-mo - although the piranhas in the bath are unusual. The first killing seems to involve a different actor playing the victim, and the second uses some unexplained device. Also there's an extended three-way soft porn catfight. For no reason and to no purpose.

The only real interest comes from the nun and the boy in the wig, who both inject some weird into this project. In the end, even the director seems to get the hang of it, with the image of a guy turned into a snowman, a funny sequence where another guy gets snapped up by multiple bear traps, like Sideshow Bob stepping on rakes, and the final scene (The Beginning), which bears a touch of Chainsaw. So I mark it up a couple of points for that.

Overall: Starts with a car crash and keeps on crashing.