The Only Safe Place: Steel and Lace

When her court case is overturned due to lack of evidence, Gaily Morton (Clare Wren) sees no safety for her future. Daniel Emerson (Michael Cerveris) and his cronies Oscar (Paul Lieber), Norman (Brian Backer), Tobby (Scott Burkholder), and Craig (John J. York) sexually assaulted her and walked; they are powerful men, and she knows they will come for her eventually. The only safe place to escape to, it seems, is the arms of death and so she throws herself off a tall building. However, her genius scientist/engineer brother Albert Morton (Bruce Davison) refuses to let her fade or let her tormentors escape justice. It takes him five years, but Gaily comes back, better, stronger, faster, and equipped with a plethora of killing knowhow and toys. Those guys might be satisfied, convinced they’ve escaped prosecution and are nigh-untouchable, but she will show them they are still quite touchable.

However, Alison (Stacy Haiduk), a sketch artist from the courtroom case, recognizes the clues and the ties binding the victims together. Working with her ex-boyo Detective Dunn (David Naughton), she tries to piece together the clues to identify the killer. However, when an accidental homicide strikes a little close to home, she puts all her attention in taking the killer down before more innocent lives are lost along with the guilty ones. Former effects man Ernest Farino got a chance to kick off a career in directing with the science fiction thriller, Steel and Lace (1991).

I’m not sure if the original writer of the picture, Joseph Dougherty was actively thinking about crossing I Spit On Your Grave (1978) with The Terminator (1984) or Robocop (1987), but the final film that derives from that initial screenplay certainly works if pitched in that way. The script Dougherty wrote, known in its spec script days as Lady Lazarus, was extensively revised, rewritten, and developed along with Dave Edison before turning into the film. However, the core story is pretty much the same. Rapists get off on a technicality, and they are then destroyed by an android reincarnation of the woman they wronged.

When this film hit my radar during the Black Friday announcements from Vinegar Syndrome, I had zero recollection of it. However, as the story unfolded before my eyes it did so with the vague recollection that I’d seen it on cable TV back in the early nineties. It’s a quickly made film, low on the budget side, but it has some creative kills, some intentional laughs, and a level of craft both on the acting side as well as the filmmaking side, which is nothing but pleasantly surprising. When I saw it back in the day, I can recall thinking it was a fun but forgettable flick. Seeing it now, it still holds up to the entertaining half of that premise.

Regular readers may recall my dislike for the rape-revenge cycle of flicks. They are a little too much for me, a little too eager to titillate about material that should never be titillating. There are examples that escape the mold, of course. I was rather surprised with how well Revenge (2017) worked, for example. Here, I was expecting something a little more meanspirited or sleazy. There’s certainly a male view aspect to the look of the picture—plenty of nightlife scenes feature cameras that follow women wearing tight, clubbing outfits—but the movie is nowhere as sleazy as I was expecting when it hit my to be watched stack. I for one am grateful for that.

The acting is solid. David Naughton is funny and charming. Stacy Haiduk is clever and adorable, believable as an unofficial investigator—an artistic Nancy Drew. Bruce Davison is one of those actors I can always watch, and here he delivers several touching, heartbreaking scenes as well as ones where I want to grab his character by the ears and shake until he gets his head out of his ass—the sign of a good actor, straddling the sympathy and irritation divide. David L. Lander shows up in a bit part as Schumann the coroner, wearing SmartGuy^tm glasses, and he’s a riot, ably holding his own in every scene he appears in (if not stealing them outright).

Clare Wren does a bang up job playing two related but different characters. What we see of Gaily the human being is minimal, a damaged woman who is carrying a lot of pain. She does not need lines to show us this, posture and body language speak volumes. When she is Gaily v2.0, she plays things much more coldly, mechanically, very computerlike. Her line delivery is moderated, her blinking slows down to a much more mechanical level (which makes intercuts with a fake robot head near the midpoint of the more all the more believable). She gets to deliver some touching lines that feel inspired by the replicants from Blade Runner (1982), but easily makes them her own, asking about the person she was, the friends she might have had, the future that waits for her … The performance is layered, and a good one.

Michael Cerveris plays an irredeemable motherfucker who deserves to die, and the inevitable end is made all the more effective for his ability to invest so much sleaze and evil into such a character. Some might call it one note, and they would not be wrong. Emerson is a bad guy who has no patience or need for ethics, remorse, loyalty, etc. He will buy an old man’s home (at a cut price!) and then order him out within twelve hours. He’s the kind of guy who gets off on assaulting a woman and then gets off on all charges and then toasts his good fortune in the back of his limo. Cerveris plays the role with a sinister smile, impeccable attention to the way such a character moves, and with easy of line delivery. We get the sense he is a bundle of energy, but we also know he is never overwhelmed. He’s too rich for that shit.

There are some terrific effects used for kills in the movie, including a whirling drill press device and a decapitation gag that looks remarkably cool. The Sota F/X team did a bang up job on this stuff, making the science fiction elements work alongside the slasher-type kill sequences. There’s a terrific scene involving cuts between an actress and a prosthetic robot head that works because of the attention paid to details (like slowly blinking eyes).

Director Ernest Farino kicked off his career with visual effects and some special effects work with a variety of productions throughout the eighties, including work on Galaxy of Terror (1981), John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982), Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone (1983), Dreamscape (1984), The Terminator, and more. He got some second unit directorial work under his belt on productions like Lady in White (1988) and episodes of From Earth to the Moon (1998). Steel and Lace was his first effort as a director, and it shows a good sense for the role. Acting and effects work are both well done.

Writer Joseph Dougherty has gone on to bigger and better things, of course, with an Emmy for Thirtysomething (1987-1991). However, I adore his genre projects. The same year Steel and Lace came out, he was also responsible for scripting duties on the wonderful Cast a Deadly Spell (1991) and its sequel Witch Hunt (1994), both of which are films that needs to be on Blu-ray, already. Hell of a writer, that guy is. Kooky, quirky, and just plain enjoyable.

Vinegar Syndrome’s Blu-ray edition of Steel and Lace includes a 2K scan and restoration with two different aspect ratios (the original 1.33:1 made for video and a 1.78:1 that was part of the rage for widescreen televisions later on), a director commentary, as well as a lengthy making of documentary with lots of participation from both the acting and filmmaking side of the thing.

Steel and Lace ain’t a high art movie, but it’s a well crafted revenge picture with some imaginative scenes, a mix of horror, humor, and heart, and some solid performances. The writing is enjoyable, and the look of the picture is good. I’m glad I caught up with this one again. It deserves a better place in my memory than it has received.

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Steel and Lace is available in VHS, Blu-ray, and streaming editions.

Next week, we check out Dolemite (1975). It is available in DVD/Blu-ray combo and streaming editions.

Writing for “The One Safe Place: Steel and Lace” is copyright © 2022 by Daniel R. Robichaud.

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