The Devil’s Rain premiered in New York on 7 August 1975. It premiered in Los Angeles the following week. It must have gone into wide release soon after, considering the cast it had. Leslie Halliwell called it an exploitation film but I don’t think that’s right. Yes, it’s horror. And they shot in Mexico. But Robert Fuest directed it after his successes with The Abominable Dr Phibes and Dr Phibes Rises Again. And it featured an experienced, professional crew.
Of course, Louis Peraino (as James V Cullen) produced the film. As such, Bryanston Distributing Company distributed it. You may know of it for distributing films like Flesh for Frankenstein, Dark Star, and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Of course, Chain Saw was beset by all kinds of distribution problems. They ended up screwing over most of the cast and crew.
Oh, Bryanston was also a porn distributor. In fact, they first distributed Deep Throat. Two things about that. First, porn of that time had a certain cachet and producers at least thought they were doing something more than just sex on film. Second, they also messed up the distribution of that film too — but that was mostly due to organized crime and maybe we shouldn’t blame Bryanston.
I like The Devil’s Rain a lot. But even I will admit that it is one of those films with a beginning, muddle, and end. But what an end! I fear that many people stop watching before it gets really good. The middle is a bit slow. In my capsule review, I wrote, “The first 20 minutes are quite good. The next 40 minutes are hard going. And the last 20 minutes make it all worthwhile…”
You can watch a good print of The Devil’s Rain for free right now on YouTube.
The Devil’s Rain (1975) poster via Wikipedia under Fair Use.
