God Told Me To

The movies of Larry Cohen always present some level of amusement for me, and 1976's GOD TOLD ME TO is no different.  But as with most of them, the tone seems confused, as if several disparate elements just don't gel.  Here, we have what begins as a standard police procedural that morphs into a supernatural thriller.  Along the way, some fairly heavy drama is thrown into the mix.  This is a horror film.  Meanwhile, I think the movie is meant also to be humorous.  It's as Cohen threw every wild idea he could imagine into a cauldron and stirred, violently.  That notion alone would be OK, but then he plays this story fairly straight, even dryly, leading to some slow stretches and even boredom.

NYPD detective Peter Nicholas (Tony Lo Bianco) has his hands full more than usual - a series of otherwise normal individuals (including a cop) begin killing people for no apparent reason.  When he questions them as to why they would even murder their own young children, the answer is always "God told me to."   As a fiercely devoted Catholic who sneaks away from his girlfriend to attend early morning Mass, this is both fascinating and troubling.  We gradually learn that Peter is not your average joe, with according information provided by his estranged wife Martha (Sandy Dennis) that sounds like something out of another, almost more A-list kind of drama.  This scene, while interesting, really does stop the movie cold, though I appreciate the efforts of Cohen at creating an in-depth characterization.

But yes, that also may be necessary to interlock with Peter's journey to learn not only more about who "God" is, but also himself.  There is more similarity there than I'm willing to spoil, invisible audience; suffice it to say that Peter will go checking on the birth records of one Bernard Phillips (a creepy Richard Lynch, usually seen in a harsh yellow glow) as well as himself, with rather outrageous revelations.  That wasn't necessarily a pun, there.  Somehow, a flying saucer is part of the explanation.  This movie gets mightily strange at times. On a perhaps not unrelated note, Andy Kaufman (in his film debut), plays the murderous police officer.

The best thing about GOD TOLD ME TO for me was the excellent of  New York City locations.  DP Paul Glickman does fine work. I read that Cohen didn't have permits to shoot in the subway and during the St. Patrick's Day Parade, which gives his movie a bit more cache, I suppose.  The storyline is a real potpourri of cops, religious cultists, and even Harlem drug dealers/pimps, but it only worked sporadically.  Cohen directs quite well, but I didn't find the movie scary in the slightest, if that was even his intention.