Stepfather II

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Movie
German title Stepfather II
Original title Stepfather II
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1989
length 93 minutes
Age rating FSK 18
Rod
Director Jeff Burr
script John Auerbach
production Jay Benson
music Patrick Moraz
camera John Lindley
cut Pasquale Buba
occupation
chronology

←  Predecessor
The Stepfather

Successor  →
Stepfather III

Stepfather II (alternative title: Stepfather 2: Make Room for Daddy ) is an American psychological thriller from 1989 and the sequel to the film The Stepfather . As in the first part, the role of the psychopathic stepfather was played by Terry O'Quinn . This time it was directed by Jeff Burr and John Auerbach wrote the script.

action

The story continues where it left off in the predecessor The Stepfather : the "stepfather" Jerry Blake was only injured, not killed, by his stepdaughter. Now he's in a sanatorium, where he spends most of his time doing handicrafts. The psychologist Joseph Danvers treats him and begins to trust him. One day Blake takes advantage of this and kills Danvers with a secretly stolen knife. Blake sneaks out of the sanatorium in the uniform of a guard who has also been killed. He murders a business traveler, takes his car and checks into a hotel . Blake not only changes his appearance, but also takes on a new identity: Dr. Gene F. Clifford, family psychologist.

He travels to Palm Meadows where he meets real estate agent Carol Grayland and her son Todd. She rents him a house opposite yours. Clifford learns that her husband recently left her for someone else and begins courting her and her son. When Carol's ex-husband Philip wants to reconcile with her, Clifford kills him and makes his body and car disappear in a junkyard . He makes Carol believe that Philip didn't really want to go back to her and drove away. She then accepts a marriage proposal from Clifford.

Carol's best friend Matty distrusts Clifford. As a postman, she has access to his mail and notices that there is nothing private among them. She warns Carol, but is not taken seriously by her. Then Matty finds an invitation to the class reunion under Clifford's post, only the class was apparently exclusively African-American; Clifford, on the other hand, is white. She asks him about it and threatens to tell Carol if he doesn't do it himself. Clifford agrees. During the night, however, he breaks into Matty and kills her. He forges a suicide note and makes it look like she's committed suicide. He steals a bottle of wine and, whistling a song, escapes through the garden. Sam Watkins, a blind old man and friend of Carol, hears the whistle. Clifford notices this and runs to Carol's house. He gives Carol the wine and claims to have been shopping.

The next day, Carol receives a phone call that Matty has hanged himself. Carol can't explain the suicide. But Clifford says Matty was afraid of being alone after Carol's wedding. Sam Watkins later appears, telling Carol that he heard someone leaving Matty's house last night whistling the song Camptown Races . Carol wants to postpone the wedding because of Matty's death, but Clifford reacts angrily and insists on the marriage.

On the day of the wedding, Carol unwraps a present from Matty's parents in the wedding house. It's a case of the wine Matty got for her birthday. Carol is horrified to discover that it is the same wine Clifford brought her the night Matty died. Then she hears Todd whistling the song Camptown Races . When Carol inquires, Todd says that Clifford taught him. When this arrives, Carol sends her son outside and speaks to her fiancé about the song. Clifford goes into a tantrum and tries to make it clear to her that he is the perfect husband and father. He beats her, but she manages to escape him at first. Clifford locks the rushed Todd in a chamber and follows Carol into the dining room. There Carol sticks a fork in his hand and rams a cake knife into his chest. He pulls it out and wants to kill her with it, but Todd managed to break free and joins them. He knocks the knife out of Clifford's hand with a hammer and strikes again, but then hesitates. Only when Clifford picks up the knife again to stab Todd, Todd gives him a fatal blow in the chest with the hammer. The blood-soaked Carol runs to the already assembled wedding party in the wedding room and collapses there. Her guests stand by her. Meanwhile, Clifford lies dying in the dining room and wants to say "Until death do us part". Before he can finish the sentence, however, he collapses.

Reviews

"As hard as it is primitive psychological thriller."

- Lexicon of international film

"For once a successful sequel."

- TV Movie

DVD-X-rated version

The Marketing Film label released Stepfather II on DVD in the theatrical version with a running time of 93 minutes and in the so-called X-rated version , in which all unused scenes were reinserted. The X-rated version is about five minutes longer than the theatrical version and contains not only additional scenes of violence but also several new action scenes. The X-rated version also lacks two murder scenes, namely the scene in which the stepfather kills a guard when he breaks out of the psychiatric ward and the scene in which he kills a business traveler whose car he steals. The murder of Carol's best friend Matty is completely different in the X-rated version. In the theatrical version, she hears a noise and looks to see if someone is in the house. She is surprised by the stepfather who strangles her with a scarf. In the X-rated version, the stepfather overpowers her from behind when she leans over her gas fireplace and pushes her into it. When he turns on the gas, she suffocates painfully. The X-rated version has not been checked by the FSK . The indexing, which had existed since 1991, was lifted in June 2016.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Stepfather II. In: Lexicon of international films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  2. ↑ Criticism of Stepfather II on tvmovie.de ( memento of the original from April 20, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.tvmovie.de
  3. ↑ Comparison between the theatrical version and the X-rated version of Stepfather II on Schnittberichte.com

Web links