THE STRANGLER - Victor Buono (1964)

There's probably nothing much stranger than a strangler in The Dungeon for a Saturday night Special! I searched our blog, and it's pretty amazing how many titles there are with the word 'Strangler' in them, and these are just the ones we've done! I'm sure there's more! So here you go.....starting in 1946, STRANGLER OF THE SWAMP, then in 1958 - THE HAUNTED STRANGLER, 1963 - TEENAGE STRANGLER & STRANGLER OF BLACKMOOR CASTLE, 1965 - SANTO vs. EL ESTRANGULADOR, and the 1966 sequel SANTO VS. EL SPECTRO DEL ESTRANGULADOR, 1972 - THE NIGHT OF THE STRANGLER, 1976 - ASTRAL FACTOR aka INVISIBLE STRANGLER, and in 1979 - THE HOLLYWOOD STRANGLER MEETS THE SKID ROW SLASHER!!!

Victor Buono is a hero in The Dungeon, but I don't believe "The Strangler" is his finest hour! Number one, I don't really appreciate movies where instead of trying to figure out who the depraved killer is, you already know who he is, and the movie is about just when will he finally get caught! It's just kind of anti-climactic in my humble opinion! They were just trying to turn things inside out and I get it, but I just don't dig it!

There's a lot of peepin' and a hidin' going on!

He's a strangler! So, now what are they gonna do about it?

 Meet "The Strangler" Leo Kroll!! He's a creep of utmost proportion!

 He's got a drawer full of busted up dolls!

 His records are filthy, and I'm sure most of them are not even put back in the cover!
For the record, Martin (The Queen Of Outer Space, The Hypnotic Eye, The Crawling Hand) Skiles does a fine job of putting together a swingin' soundtrack; These days I'm just too lazy to put a sound clip together, but I would if somebody really wanted it!

 He smokes at work!

 And in his free time he likes to hang out at the "Fun Palace" throwing rings, and winning more of those cheapass dolls!

 Nice portrait of Victor!!

 Damn! I might even strangle someone if it meant I could have those two pinball machines!

The basic problem is that Leo is a Mama's boy, but he don't like his Mama, so it creates a bit of internal friction that Leo has to find an outlet for, aka killing women left and right! Ellen Corby in the wheelchair is his Mom! Ellen has a whopping 266 credits that include being 'The Queen of the Artichokes' in "Bedlam," and an uncredited nurse in "Mighty Joe Young!" She was in "Macabre," and "Visit To A Small Planet," AND, she was Eshter Walton in 142 episodes of "The Waltons!"

 Leo is truly pissed because his Mom told him that without this nurse, she would be dead! And since he wants nothing more than to see her dead, it really hit a sore spot!

 When you're so comfortable with whatever you're doing right or wrong, seemingly you can even pass a lie detector test after viciously killing multiple times! It just shows what a great actor Victor Buono really was! Too bad nobody ever cast Victor Buono and Bruno Vesota in a movie together as brothers or something, maybe Father and son, they were 16 years apart. That would have been too cool! Bruno Buono, Buono Bruno! Try saying that ten times in a row real fast, and if you can, take three shots of good tequila and try it again!

 Now this is what cops looked like in 1964!

 Somehow all the victims manage to strip down to bra and panties, or bra and slip before being attacked!

 This would be pretty unsettling if you really didn't have a clue this guy was waiting for you after you got out of the shower!

Victor Buono, what a guy! He was King Tut for 10 episodes of "Batman" in the 60's, and he was the nefarious foe Tung-Tze of Matt Helm in "The Silencers" besides a host of other things, but seemingly his heart could not carry all that weight around and he died from a heart attack at the age of 43, but the fittest man on the planet, Bruce Lee died at the age of 32 from the same thing, so maybe his size doesn't matter at all, and he just got an early call!

SPLAT!!!