1978 Australian film
Patrick is a 1978 Australian horror film directed by Richard Franklin and written by Everett De Roche. It is the pivotal movie of respected Australian director Richard Franklin's career.[2]
Plot summary
Patrick (Robert Thompson) lies in a coma in a Melbourne private hospital. He had murdered his mother and her lover three years ago by electrocuting them in the bath. Patrick, who has psychokinetic powers, falls in love with Kathy (Susan Penhaligon), the new nurse at the hospital, communicating with her via an electric typewriter. Patrick also uses his psychokinetic powers to control the men in Kathy's life and to defend himself against the hospital's bitter Matron Cassidy (Julia Blake) who plots to murder him.[3]
Production
This was the second script Everett de Roche had ever written, following Long Weeked (1978). It had been around for a number of years before Richard Franklin became attached. The two men had both worked for Crawford Productions although not together until then. De Roche says when Franklin became involved the script was "a rambling 250 pages" and Franklin taught him the elements of drama and suspense. He says the final scene of Patrick leaping out of his bed was inspired by trip to a carnival Franklin had made where a man in a gorilla suit burst out into the audience, causing everyone to scream. They then started working backwards from this scene. [4]
Franklin brought in Antony I. Ginnane who raised finance. The Australian Film Commission and Victorian Film Corporation contributed about half the budget, with the rest obtained privately.[5]
British film actor Susan Penhaligon was imported to play the lead, which Ginnane thought helped secure the film a sale in Britain. [6]
I'd done Eskimo Nell in the Australian idiom, and... my [American] friends didn't understand it. So I thought, well, I'll go to the other extreme and have everybody speaking Queen's English. And so I had everybody doing, not so much English accents as just speaking Queen's English.[7]
Robert Helpmann broke his back during filming trying to lift up Robert Thompson in one scene.[7]
Reception
The movie was considered a disappointment at the Australian box office but was highly successful internationally, selling to over 30 countries and performing well in the US.[1][6]
The film was nominated in three categories, including Best Film, at the 1978 AFI Awards. Franklin also won the Best Director prize at the prestigious Sitges Fantasy Film Festival in Spain.[8]
The Encyclopedia of Fantasy notes the similarity between the movie's plot and that of the novel Tetrasomy Two by "Oscar Rossiter" (non de plume of Dr. Vernon H.Skeels (1918-2007) )[9].
In Italy, the film was rescored by Goblin.
Richard Franklin says he would refer to this film as "my first film. Even though there were one and a half films before it."[7]
Remake
In February 2010, it was announced that Mark Hartley would direct a remake of the movie,[10] with Antony I Ginnane as producer.[11] It will be Hartley's first dramatic feature.[12]
Sequel
An unauthorised sequel made in Italy with Italian actors was titled Patrick Still Lives and released in 1980.
Quentin Tarantino is a fan of the movie and borrowed from Patrick for a scene in Kill Bill where the bride is in her coma and spits on the orderly, mimicking Patrick. He relates the story in Mark Hartley's documentary Not Quite Hollywood.
Films directed by Richard Franklin
