Wedged between Premature Burial and Tales of Terror, Corman’s The
Intruder is a gothic horror story of a different order. This harrowing film offers an unflinching look at race relations just as desegregation is spreading through the South. In his radiant white suit, Adam Cramer (William Shatner) projects the big-hearted nature of a preacher, though he has come to Caxton, Missouri to spread not goodwill but unrest. Shatner’s deceptively genial demagogue—who prods the KKK to torch a church in “niggertown” and viciously assault the editor of the local newspaper—doesn’t thrive on racist ideology, but on the pleasure to be had from manipulating the mob. Steve Seid
Written by Charles Beaumont, based on his novel. Photographed by Taylor Byars and Haskell Wexler. With William Shatner, Frank Maxwell, Beverly Lunsford,
Robert Emhardt. (80 mins, B&W, 35mm, From Academy Film Archive, permission Criterion Pictures)
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