The Fury (1978 film)

For other uses, see Fury.

The Fury
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Brian De Palma
Produced by	Frank Yablans
Written by	Novel & screenplay: John Farris
Starring	Kirk Douglas John Cassavetes Carrie Snodgress Charles Durning Amy Irving Rutanya Alda Andrew Stevens
Music by	John Williams
Cinematography	Richard H. Kline
Editing by	Paul Hirsch
Studio	Yablans Presentations
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date(s)	March 10, 1978
Running time	118 min.
Language	English
Budget	$5.5 million
Box office	$24,000,000

The Fury is a 1978 supernatural thriller film directed by Brian De Palma. The film was written by John Farris based on his novel of the same name. It starred Kirk Douglas, John Cassavetes, Carrie Snodgress, Amy Irving, Charles Durning and Andrew Stevens. The music was composed by Academy Award-winner John Williams, performed by the London Symphony Orchestra and was highly praised by critic Pauline Kael, who called it "as elegant and delicately varied a score as any horror film has ever had".

Storyline

The plot combines elements of horror and the spy thriller. A teenage girl, Gillian Bellaver (Amy Irving) discovers that she possesses psychic powers, including telekinesis and extra-sensory perception, but that other people suffer bleeding if they touch her. She volunteers to attend the Paragon Clinic, whose director, Dr. James McKeever (Charles Durning), works for a shady intelligence operative named Ben Childress (John Cassavetes). Childress has betrayed his friend Peter Sandza (Kirk Douglas) and is using Sandza's psychic son Robin (Andrew Stevens) in research into the weapons potential of psychics.

Meanwhile Peter, who survived Childress' set-up, is searching for his son; with Gillian's help and that of his girlfriend Hester (Carrie Snodgress) he tracks Robin down, but Childress' ruthless experiments have damaged the young man's mind and rendered him a soulless psychopath, and he and Peter both die within minutes of their reunion. As he dies, Robin has some form of psychic contact with Gillian. When Childress tries to persuade Gillian to accept his "help", she finally accepts her talent and kills him to avenge Peter's and Robin's deaths by exploding him from the inside out.

Principal cast

Character	Actor
Peter Sandza	Kirk Douglas
Ben Childress	John Cassavetes
Hester	Carrie Snodgress
Dr. Jim McKeever	Charles Durning
Gillian Bellaver	Amy Irving
Dr. Susan Charles	Fiona Lewis
Robin Sandza	Andrew Stevens
Dr. Ellen Lindstrom	Carol Rossen
Kristen	Rutanya Alda
Katharine Bellaver	Joyce Easton
Raymond Dunwoodie	William Finley
Vivian Nuckells	Jane Lambert
Blackfish	Sam Laws
Robertson	J. Patrick McNamara
Mrs. Callahan	Alice Nunn
La Rue	Melody Thomas Scott
Cheryl	Hilary Thompson
Lander	Patrick Billingsley
Greene	J.P. Bumstead

Production

• Parts of this feature were filmed at Old Chicago of Bolingbrook, Illinois; a now defunct amusement park.
• The scene in which Kirk Douglas escapes the agents at the hotel were filmed at the now defunct Plymouth Hotel, the same hotel and room were used in the 1980 film The Blues Brothers.

Special effects

In order to realistically show Cassavetes exploding at the climax, Cassavetes stood on the set convulsing and bleeding until a lamp falls down creating split-second white flash on the screen. Then a quick edit is done replacing Cassavetes with a lifesized rigged dummy exploding shot at several different angles.^{[citation needed]}

Future stars

• The film features early performances by Dennis Franz (in his debut), Daryl Hannah and Laura Innes. Franz plays a cop driving a car hijacked by Douglas' character and gets about ten minutes of screen time and numerous lines. Hannah plays a student at a school attended by Irving's character and gets about five minutes of screen time and almost no lines.^{[citation needed]}
• James Belushi appears as an extra, his appearance becoming a topic many years later on David Letterman's show when he was a guest.^{[citation needed]}

External links

• The Fury at the Internet Movie Database
• The Fury at AllRovi
• The Fury (1978 film) at the TCM Movie Database
• The Fury at Rotten Tomatoes