 Cute li'l Carol Kane has often been drawn to peculiar or horrific films & roles, & one of my favorite films with her is The Mafu Cage (1978), a strange & unjustly neglected film which has also been known by the alternate names Deviance, Don't Ring the Doorbell & My Sister My Love.
Kane plays Cissy, a spoiled psychotic beauty whose sister (Lee Grant) tries to keep nutty Cissy in check.
Cissy with childish weirdness transforms their home into a jungle, dances around the house to African music played too loud, wears African clothing, keeps a pet monkey, & protects religiously her late father's collection of phallic objects.
Cissy also has erotic desires for her sister, but lucky world if incest fantasies had been her only point of deviance.
Cissy develops a fetish for killing monkeys, who she always names Mafu. She throws a temper tantrum & slits her wrists when it looks like the monkey she beat to death is not going to be promptly replaced by another. She swears she won't kill the next one & not only gets her way, she actually scores an orangutan, names it Mafu, & quite obviously it's fate is not going to be long life & happiness.
It's only a matter of time before Cissy begins to think of the lecherous men who desire her or her sister as the next pet Mafu.
The Last Detail's dourly beautiful harlot scarsely seems the obvious choice for a psycho killer role, but she played one of the great ones.
copyright © by Paghat the Ratgirl
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