Filmography

Starring

Lauren Schmidt, Laney Simmons, Katie Gainer, Kerianne Steele, Jameson Simmons, Jim Granucci

Synopsis

A follow-up to Simmons's 1990 film Arachnophobia II, The Clock Struck One begins where the first film left off. The film opens with Mildred MacKenzie (Lauren Schmidt) in her kitchen baking a cake. When she discovers she is out of flour, she strides next door to borrow some from friendly neighbor Zelda Szalinski. Before she reaches the door, she comes across the corpse of Annette Smythe, the exterminator, in her car outside. Immediately, she proceeds to try to find Zelda, but there is no answer at the door. In a panic, she runs home to call the Szalinski's opposite next-door neighbors, college students Connie Wilbanks (Katie Gainer) and Carla Piffin (Laney Simmons), who have a key to Zelda's home. The three gain entry and discover the bodies of Laney and Keri Szalinski, but no flour. Carla calls for a paramedic as Connie and Mildred exchange sobs. The three women realize that there is no money to pay funeral expenses, etc., and decide that the Szalinski home must be sold to come up with the money. With that, Mildred returns home to her baking.

Help arrives in the form of paramedic Wolf Blitzer (Jameson Simmons) who assesses the damage and quickly gets a handle on the situation. The college girls are extremely gracious.

Next, we meet Ellen Randix (Delaney Steele) and Vicki Stansworth (Kerianne Steele), two women who are interested in renting the house. Connie and Carla show them around and they decide to go for it. Soon, Ellen and Vicki are moving in, Vicki bringing Victor and Victoria, her pet white mice, along with her.

As Vicki and Ellen spend the first night in their new home, strange things are happening while they sleep. Vicki's mice are visited by spiders reminiscent of the fatal creepy-crawlers we remember so vividly from Arachnophobia II. Upstairs, Ellen is fixing herself a midnight snack, while downstairs, as Vicki sleeps, her mice are breeding at a furious pace, unknown to the human inhabitants of the house.

A few days later, at a housewarming party with the whole neighborhood in attendance, we can see that the mice have indeed begun to take over. Unnoticed by the aloof and inebriated party guests, the mice are crawling all around them. When Ellen retires to the restroom briefly, a gang of the rodents attack her, killing her as she falls to the ground in terror. Vicki, not attending the party, hears Ellen's screams and comes running. Immediately, she sends everyone home and calls for the paramedics, baffled by the sudden appearance of so many mice.

Wolf Blitzer arrives on the scene again and, in a touching scene, requests permission to dissect one of Vicki's mice. Once he does, his suspicions are confirmed. Poisonous spiders that remained in the house were eaten by the mice, which in turn acquired the fatal characteristics of the spiders. Now, he says, Vicki's only choice is to find someone to locate and terminate the rest of the vermin, before another human life is claimed!

Highly recommended exterminator Billy Jo McCoy (Jim Granucci) comes and rids the home of any remaining mice. His services are guaranteed for the lifetime of the structure. Finally, Vicki feels secure in her own home. In the meantime, Connie has had to move away and Carla has decided to move in with Vicki.

While the girls are moving in together, Mildred MacKenzie's young son, Michael (Andrew Schmidt), comes upon an innocent-looking mouse and is killed instantly by its fatal bite. As the girls set down the final boxes, Vicki finds some old photos of a vacation she and Ellen took to Daytona, along with a pearl necklace that was very important to Ellen. She decides to keep the necklace near her always.

A few days later, when Carla goes to check the mail, she is attacked by vicious mice by the mailbox, and dies instantly. When Vicki finds her, she blames herself (as the mouse enthusiast) for both deaths and, shattering the string of pearls across the driveway, puts a pistol to her head and takes her own life.

Production Notes

The Clock Struck One was the first movie I made to have a budget. ("Red Riding Hood" certainly had big-budget production values, but all the nice props and costumes were graciously donated by Ruth, Jim, and Kathy Simmons.) We spent $13 on ten little mice. They were a lot of fun, and only slightly easier to handle than the spiders (fortunately, Kerianne volunteered to take care of the dirty work for me again).

Scheduling was an even larger concern on this project, because Delaney had fallen for a strange Texan punk named David, who was staying nearby on his summer vacation, and requested to have her part cut as short as possible so she could have time to flirt with him. (I was introduced to him as "my lame-ass cousin Jamie.") So Ellen Randix died as quickly as we could possibly manage. (If you've seen the scene where Carla and Connie give Ellen and Vicki a tour of the Szalinski home, you understand the haste we were operating under.)

This movie developed a little in terms of the editing and the setups. Still, there is evidence that any progression in style is coming very slowly (e.g., the aforementioned "Tour Scene" and the quizzically melodramatic dissection scene). Real improvement had not set in, as all the major characters were still dead by the time the closing credits rolled. However, The Clock Struck One has two major advancements.

First, it marks Jim Granucci's film debut, having replaced Chip Mack the skin care salesman as the apple of Kibbie's eye (thankfully, this one was here to stay; he's the best actor this family has ever seen!) Jim even helped us get the police tape for the closing shot of the movie. And secondly, stuntman Andrew Schmidt inaugurated a new logistical era for Simmons Studios by performing his daredevil acts before the camera for the first time. Because he took the risk and performed his stunts himself, I was able to get great shots and enhance the gritty realism of the movie.

Don't ask me why there are five-minute clips from L.A. Story, Misery, and The Brave Little Toaster included in the film. I suppose I just wanted to use the popularity of my film to try to get the word out on these three relative unknowns.

Again, the set was fun - day in and day out. (We even rearranged it!) With the exception of the nervous breakdown Delaney suffered after being covered with mice in her death scene, we were having a great time all the way through. That is incredibly important to me.

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