Tag Archives: Nancy Allen

Blow Out (1981) | Brian De Palma

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John Travolta stars as Jack Terry, a sound effects engineer for cheapie horror exploitation flicks. When a producer deems the victim’s screams and wind effects used in their slasher film as substandard, Jack determines to capture new recordings. While outdoors, his tape captures audio from a nearby car careening off of a bridge and into a river after its tire blows out. Jack jumps to action to save a drowning woman (Nancy Allen) from the vehicle, but the driver dies, later revealed to be the presidential frontrunner, Pennsylvania Governor George McRyan. While listening to the tape, Jack hears a gunshot just before the blowout, suggesting it was no accident. It’s revealed that a photographer in the area (Dennis Franz) captured film of the incident, which Jack synchronizes with his audio, proving an assassin was the cause. The authorities and media want the proof, but an assassin (John Lithgow) seeks to silence Jack’s obsessive quest for truth. Brian De Palma writes and directs this potent political thriller.

Dressed to Kill (1980) | Brian De Palma

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Angie Dickinson stars as Kate Miller, a housewife so unsatisfied sexually that she often finds herself having vivid and wild sexual fantasies, with violent overtones.  She has been seeing a psychiatrist, Dr. Elliott (Michael Caine), about her marital problems, and even makes a pass at him, although nothing comes to pass.  Unable to resist the temptation, Kate has an afternoon fling with a complete stranger, only to end up the victim of a brutal and senseless slaying at the hands of a mysterious figure with a straight-edge razor.  Only one person witnessed the murder, a spunky prostitute named Liz (Nancy Allen), who describes the perpetrator as a blonde woman in sunglasses.  Meanwhile, Dr. Elliott begins receiving phone calls from one of his patients, Bobbi, a pre-op transsexual with homicidal tendencies, and Dr. Elliott’s stolen razor.

Poltergeist III (1988) | Gary Sherman

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Heather O’Rourke and Zelda Rubinstein are the only players from the first two films to cross over into the light of Poltergeist III.  Here, O’Rourke’s character, Carol Anne, seemingly dumped by her parents for reasons unknown, is taken care of by her Aunt Patricia (Nancy Allen), Uncle Bruce (Tom Skerritt), and teenage step-cousin, Donna (Lara Flynn Boyle), living in a high-rise building in Chicago.  Carol Anne has been enrolled in a school for gifted but troubled kids, as her therapist, Dr. Seaton (Richard Fire), thinks that the young girl has the ability to hypnotize people into believing her delusions about seeing ghosts.  Seaton forces Carol Anne to speak about her experiences, which brings to light her involvement with the dreaded Reverend Kane (Nate Davis), and this talk has caused the late Reverend to cross over into trying to get in contact with the girl again.  For some reason, the entire building is chock full of mirrors at every turn, which is convenient to the haunting that emerges, as most of its haunting involved scaring the bejeesus out of the family and their cohorts through reflections in whatever mirrors they happen to be looking at.