Death Weekend
A 1976 Canadian horror film about a home invasion.
Death Weekend is a 1976 horror film directed and written by William Fruet, with Brenda Vaccaro, Don Stroud, and Chuck Shamata in the lead roles. The story takes place in rural Ontario and centers on a model and her boyfriend who, after a road rage incident, are hunted by three violent criminals at a secluded lake house. The plot was loosely inspired by an actual home invasion in Canada. The movie was a Canadian production, and half of its $500,000 budget came from the Canadian Film Development Corporation. Ivan Reitman produced the film, his second production credit following David Cronenberg's *Shivers* (1975).
Quick Facts
- Director
- William Fruet
- Producer
- Ivan Reitman
- Starring
- Brenda Vaccaro / Don Stroud / Chuck Shamata
- Cinematography
- Robert Saad
- Editing
- Debra Karen / Jean LaFleur
- Studio
- DAL Productions Ltd. / Canadian Film Development Corporation / Famous Players / Quadrant Films Ltd.
- Distributor
- Cinépix Film Properties
- Released
- 17 September 1976 · Canada
- Language
- English
- Gross
- $550,000 (Canada)
Facts from the source article.
Lore & Background
Death Weekend premiered in Ontario on September 17, 1976, before opening in Quebec on October 8, 1976. In the United States, the film was distributed in 1977 by American International Pictures under the alternate title The House by the Lake. The film was shot from October 27 to November 28, 1975, on location in Maple, Ontario, and at Seneca College and Toronto International Film Studios in Kleinburg. It was originally titled Thanksgiving and Do Or Die during production.
Reader's Guide
Death Weekend received largely unfavorable reviews from Canadian film critics, with many citing its perceived lack of Canadian-centered themes and an attempt at appealing to the international market. Critics such as Michael Walsh of The Province described the film as 'exploitative' and a 'mindless shocker,' while Gerald Pratley criticized it as 'a shoddy tale of rape and violence.' Despite this, film writer Rob Craig cites Death Weekend as a 'historically missing link' in a series of horror and rape and revenge films of the 1970s, identifying it as a precursor to I Spit on Your Grave (1978). The Film Society of Lincoln Center noted it as a progenitor of films such as The Strangers (2008) and, in its pitting of class versus class, Michael Haneke's Funny Games (1997). The film grossed $550,000 at the Canadian box office.
Did You Know?
- Death Weekend was loosely based on a real home invasion case in Canada involving a dentist after a traffic altercation.
- The film was produced by Ivan Reitman, his second production credit after David Cronenberg's Shivers (1975).
- In the United Kingdom, VHS editions of the film were seized under the Obscene Publications Act 1959 during the video nasty panic.
- The film was released in Sweden on August 17, 1990, at the Rigoletto cinema in Stockholm.
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