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Equinox

Equinox

Equinox (1970)

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Four young people find an ancient cursed book in the woods and are attacked by a horde of demons - more than a decade before The Evil Dead (1981).

Around 1967, a business major at Pasadena City College raised about $6,500 and made a monster movie with his friends in the canyons outside town. They animated the creatures themselves, frame by frame, working out of a makeshift garage studio.

That film became EQUINOX (1970). Producer Jack H. Harris, the man behind The Blob, bought it, hired an editor named Jack Woods to shoot extra footage and add a sinister park ranger, and released it. Made for about the cost of a used car, it grossed over $800,000.

The kid who raised the money and led the effort was Dennis Muren, who would go on to win nine Academy Awards and to build the creatures of Star Wars, E.T., Terminator 2, and Jurassic Park.

Sam Raimi maintains that he had not seen Equinox before making The Evil Dead. To be fair, there's only so much a group of young filmmakers can do with pocket money and demons in the woods.

Physical Media

DVDCriterion CollectionUPC 037429195420

a member added 9/25/2026

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About the Film

Occult Barrier Between Good and Evil

Directed By
Jack Woods, Dennis Muren
Runtime
82 minutes
Released
October 1, 1970
Certification
PG
Country
United States of America
Starring
Edward Connell, Barbara Hewitt, Jack Woods, Frank Bonner, Robin Christopher
More Credits
Genres
Adventure, Horror
Language
English
Origin
US
Studios
Tonylyn Productions Inc.
Written By
Jack Woods, Mark Thomas McGee
Produced By
Jack H. Harris
Cinematography
Mike Hoover
Music
Jaime Mendoza-Nava
Also Starring
James Phillips, Fritz Leiber Jr., Patrick Burke, Sharon Gray, Louis Clayton
Budget
$8,000
Box Office
$850,000

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      1. Michael McDonough A) you’re not as much of an addict as you think . . B) you weren’t around in 1971 when it was profiled in Famous Monsters and released on a double bill in theaters with Night of the Living Dead. Mr Raimi certainly was . . .

    3. Al Magliochetti I finally heard from Tom Sullivan about this and he knows that Raimi “borrowed” from the plot line of Equinox. But he made a pretty entertaining film himself.

      Heck, maybe every film should follow the Equinox-formula! Lol!

      1. Jeff Farley . . . I just find it hysterically ironic since the only reason Raimi got noticed in the first place was because Stephen King was spotted leaving a screening of Evil Dead in Cannes when Creepshow was being promoted, and when pressed for a quote, King replied that it was “ferociously original” . . so, yeah . .not so much . . 🙂

    4. Al Magliochetti Jumping in here to say “Dance Macabre” has been an inspiration for me since reading Issues 18 & 19 of Cinemagic, back in the day! not afraid to list my influences…

    1. Cary Allen Wilson I’m the same. I recall seeing the awesome poster. I’m not sure if I saw an ad for it playing at a Drive-In or not. I know it didn’t play at our local theater, and I was too young to drive. So, I never got to see it when it was first released. But later as a teen, I saw an ad for a Super 8 Black and White reel of it. And I bought that. It was silent. But it made me want to see it even more. Many years later I saw it available on DVD and I bought it. I still watch it from time to time.

      1. Tom Applegate I was about 8 the Summer it came out. My sister & an early BF took me to the Drive-In down the street from us. I was thrilled! It was one of the highlights of a fun & memorable Summer.

  3. This played the local drive-ins (usually as a B feature) well into the late 70s. Incredible no-budget film . A few years ago someone had a Flickr set of photos they took of the shooting locations many of which are still very recognizable

  10. This film is a great example of how to create the perfect ending for a horror film. I love how it comes full circle and implies what will happen next while letting your imagination fill in the blanks.

    1. Stephen Kundrat Quite Lovecraftian in nature, right to the very end.

      Lovecraft’s idea of a “happy ending” generally was the the protagonist was able to commit suicide before the demonic beings “from beyond” snatched him body and soul into some hellish alien dimension.

    2. Stephen Kundrat Mark McGee had told me that when the original shoots footage came back, they realized that they didn’t have enough to cover a feature so the wraparound was added later, taking inspiration from Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

  15. The film was originally financed by Dennis Muren’s grandfather, Louis Clayton (who also portrayed the hermit in the cave) for $6500.00 in 1965 as Dennis’ college fund, but after convincing Clayton that he would enroll in Business classes in Pasadena City College, he was given the money to finance the film. In today’s economy, that amount is now the equivalent of $67,511.00.

    The film was conceived originally to sell to a Los Angeles television station for their horror programming but they were unaware of how the stations purchased the films in packages from distributors. It took 2 years to complete and at that point in 1967, with no takers, Dennis began to use the film as his effects reel to gain work in town. Dennis also had the film copyrighted.

    It was in 1968 that Dennis made an appointment with Jack Harris who immediately saw potential in the film and purchased the property outright for $8000.00, allowing Muren to pay off the debts from the original production titled The Equinox: A Journey into the Supernatural.

    Harris then hired Jack Woods & Mike Hoover to begin to rework the feature, now retitled Equinox and in 1969, the film was shot and then Harris had the footage assembled and hired a number of additional vendors like Glen Glenn Sound & The Howard A. Anderson Company (who provided additional optical effects shot by Ralph Rodine). There is only approximately 1/3 of the original film in the theatrical release allowing Woods the writer/director credit.

    Harris told me in 1978 that he had invested over $100,000.00 in the production. That included not only the reworked film, but also the extensive P&A campaign. Harris told me that it was a good investment. Brock DeShane’s essay in the Criterion release puts the budget at $150,000.00.

      1. Jeff Farley I met Forry twice – once in the 90s at Frank Darabont’s “Halfway to 70” party, and once when a friend and I showed up unannounced at his house (2004-ish?). He graciously gave us a tour of the Ackermansion and it was the fulfillment of a childhood dream.

      2. Anywhere But Hollywood I have over 40 pages of notes on the film. Chris Endicott, Brock DeShane & I kid each other about being “Equinerds”. Lol!

        Thanks to knowing Forry Ackerman back in the 1970’s, he introduced me to Jim Danforth who lived close to me and from there, I began finding Dave Allen, Dennis Muren & Mark McGee in my local phone book and began to call them weekly and amazingly, they would chat with me! By that time, I had already worked on Kingdom of the Spiders when I was 14.

        Dennis informed me in 1978 also that he was moving to San Rafael to work on The Empire Strikes Back and he invited me over to his house where he was having a yearly Equinox party where he and the cast/crew plus industry friends would come to view Dennis’ personal 16mm copy of the original version. That was where I first saw it and that night, I met the then monikered Frank Bonner who became a good friend and began to invite my family & I as his guests for the tapings of WKRP in Cincinnati.

        I also found Jack Harris and he gave me not only a ton of info, but also some promotional material for the film.

        Thanks to that film, I found a focus that carried me through to today where now I have nearly a half-century in the special effects industry. I told Jack in 1978 one of my goals was to work on a film he produced and ten years later I was on the creature effects crew of The Blob.

    4. Jeff Farley At 1:19:34 Dennis Muren talks about an unpublished book he wrote: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCoMU6pePK4&t=551s I wonder if he goes into the production of “Equinox” in it? I hope he decides to release it as he says basically no one would want to read it it! I think he is a very humble man and has basically no ego after all his awards and I just wonder why “Equinox” is his only Feature Film too? I guess he loved collaborating and I’m finding all his work and triumphs in his career very fascinating! 🙂

      1. Brian Brookshire Mark Thomas McGee does write about the production in his revised edition of You Won’t Believe Your Eyes.

        The image is a page from the book where he mentions the first time we met. He always ribbed me about my fascination with the film and its production, considering there is so much misinformation about it.

        That day, we went down to Hollywood to some of the bookstores and collectors shops where I found some stills from Equinox and showed them to him.

        He then says, “With all of the good films out there, why Equinox?” and then he produces a still of Pam Grier and says, “This is what you should be paying attention to!”. Lol!

        We went up to Bronson Cave and he showed me where they shot the scenes there as well as taking me up the road a bit to the location of the stairway from Invasion of the Body Snatchers and then back to his place where he screened the behind-the-scenes and blooper footage from the Equinox production as well as Zorgon, the H-Bomb Beast from Hell. His wife made us dinner and then we watched his 16mm copy of Rear Window to show me what a “good film” was.

      2. Jeff Farley I’m familiar with Mark from following Fred Olen Ray’s films he wrote and will check out his books too! He’s just being self-effacing I guess because “Equinox” to me is very well-written! Just look at all the interest there is in this thread!! Sounds like a great day going over film history…I lived in Hollywood and not a day went by that I learned or saw something originally featured in a movie or T.V. show…what is the saying: Even better than the real thing!?

      3. Brian Brookshire One of the last times I saw Mark was when I came in for additional shooting on Star Hunter.

        I agree with you about Equinox. With all of it’s goofy charms, it remains as a standard of what can be accomplished through sheer grit and determination.

  16. Here’s the only surviving book prop of the three made for both versions of the film.

    Dave Allen gave this to me on our first meeting in 1978 and little did I know that less than 20 years later, I’d be in Romania working with him on The Primevals.

  17. This is Lower Arroyo Park in Pasadena, CA where a good portion of the original film was shot.

    I first saw Equinox here in Los Angeles when it opened in March of 1971 and I also caught Dennis Muren & Dave Allen on a local morning news show promoting the film. Dave had the Taurus model & I believe Dennis had the Demon. When Dave explained the principles of stop motion using Taurus as an example, I was floored and knew my life’s work at that moment. The film enormously influenced me. I ended up finding out both versions were shot in the area I grew up in and I became friends with the guys who made it.

    The building in the background was also where my dad’s archery club meetings were held once a month for years. A few years after seeing Equinox, he began bringing us here and I couldn’t have been more bored.

    Little did I know that I was eating my lunches off of the picnic tables used for the Green Giant mixed-scale sets.

  26. Watched it on UHF, intrigued by the title being the same as an early Styx album. Maybe one of the first B movie ‘six degrees of separation’ for me when I recognized Herb Tarlek from WKRP, which was probably airing when I saw it.

  28. There is one sequence in Equinox that appears different than the rest of the film and that is because this scene was shot on Stage 9 at Paramount/Desilu Studios.

    The stage was one of two earmarked for the production of Star Trek.

    What happened was that they were rained out of their final day on location in La Cañada/Flintridge and needing a quick solution, Harris rented the stage to get it in-the-can.

  29. The hospital interiors were shot at the (then) Dale White Studios in Pasadena. White was a performer on The Jack Benny Show and afterwards went into post-production work.

    He provided not only the finishing work on Dennis’ original version but also the interiors of his studio for location work. Jack Harris & Jack Woods also shot their interiors here.

    This pic shows the corner of the hallway where David was gurnied by Norvelle Brooks. In actuality, it was the main space in the building. The “Room with one red wall” was the studios sound booth and that would have been just where the wall ends.

    The building now houses a wine bar. I was speaking with the sister of the owner and we chatted about the possibility of doing a screening there.

  31. The property where the Harris version was shot is in La Cañada/Flintridge and at the time was 2 acres of undeveloped land.

    Now, two mansions occupy the space but the topography is the same.

  32. In the original film, just after the title credits end, the reporter has his watch in frame and pulls his hand down to reveal this stretch of Foothill Blvd. in La Crescenta near the border of Tujunga.

    The restaurant on the left at the time of filming was called Delrod’s Cafe which is seen in the film.

    At the time they were shooting, I was only three to five years old, living about two miles from that spot.

    2. Denise Dumars Leiber’s literary agent was Forrest J Ackerman who was helping the group making The Equinox and he felt that Leiber might have a career as a Vincent Price-type actor and that is how he was cast in the film.

  34. I’d heard about this legendary movie way back. Probably in Famous Monsters circa 1970 or so. But I didn’t see any of it until years later. It is memorable for the vision and budgetary challenges. The plot of evil books and such goes further back than this in films or other media. Just a basic kind of plot.

  35. Somehow, the one time I saw this on TV on Creature Features or Chiller Theater when I was a little kid, I thought it was the coolest movie that I had ever seen. As an adult I bought the special DVD with two versions available. I certainly do not recall ever seeing the incessantly drooling sheriff, which as an adult, seems way too silly.

  39. Very amateurish acting , editing and writing, but the animated creatures were cool

    Hated the shock ending, but the late 60s and 70s were rife with the O Henry shock endings to genre films

    1. Michael Shaw The film makers, while excited during the production, realized when they had a finished cut how bad the film really was. It was no secret to them.

      The original was shot on Dennis’ 16mm Bolex which had a wind-up motor with about a 20 second run. They admitted that they knew nothing about blocking and other technicalities but forged ahead anyway. Dennis’ work was good enough for Jack Harris to tell Jack Woods & Mike Hoover that, “Their footage couldn’t look any better than the original film” as it all had to cut together. Ed Begley Jr. told me that they shot on 16mm also before the final cut negative was blown up to 35mm for the theatrical prints.

      This is one of those films where the secondary characters are more well-drawn than the main characters. Frank Boers Jr. was the only member of the main cast who was taking acting classes. Robin Snyder (Christopher in the theatrical release) was a friend of Mark McGee’s and though he championed her, Dennis & Dave had cast Susan Bernard originally as Vicki. Mark felt he was right and eventually he convinced the others to recast the part. It was then that they found out that Bernard’s father was famed celebrity photographer Bruno Bernard and afterwards, Susan was cast in Faster Pussycat, Kill, Kill & General Hospital. Eventually, she became an author.

      The nurse was Frank’s first wife, Sharon Gray. He must have gotten her the part.

      The doctor (Branson in the original and Johansen in the theatrical release) was Patrick Sullivan Burke who was a New York stage actor and his first feature film role was as a leprechaun in Darby O’Gill and the Little People… since Dennis used the “mixed scale” technique for the Green Giant based upon the work done in the Disney film, perhaps that’s why Burke was cast.

      The film makers did have the idea that they could make a film as good as what they were seeing in theaters and television at the time, so they seem to have done just that. The film is about as average as any low budget film at that time.

      When the theatrical version was dubbed, Harris did hire professional voice actors. Jazz radio DJ and Teenage Zombies actor Chuck Niles redubbed the reporter Sloan played by James Phillips while Skip Shimer/Edward Connell’s vocal tracks were done by local newscaster/actor Larry Burrell (who provided the narration for The Creeping Terror). Hanna-Barbera regular, Joan Gerber did the female tracks.

      Pictured: Patrick Burke in an episode of Land of the Giants.

    2. I think constructive criticism is fair but truth be told if said critic has never made or attempted to make a feature film (or even a short film!) before then I take it with for me what that is worth which is very little…..

  45. The scene where the evil preacher or whatever he was would be in their faces doing the “do you think I got a pretty evil mouth” thing always cracked me up!
    Us kids walked around doing that for weeks after seeing the movie.
    People thought we were crazy.
    They might have been right.

  47. This was a shot taken from Dave Allen’s personal scrapbook showing the tabletop setup for the Taurus/Hermit sequence.

    Shot in Dave’s parent’s garage in Santa Ana, CA, this miniature was reworked for the cephalopod sequence utilizing the balsa wood cabin fabricated by David Stipes.

    The background used for both miniatures was a commercially available poster from a chain of stores called Standard Brands which sold paint as well as polyester resin/fiberglass and craft supplies.

  49. In the cave sequence, there is a creature that is only featured as a background prop.

    This is the Wah Chang built puppet from The Black Scorpion. Dave Allen had purchased it at the Project Unlimited auction in 1964 and used it as the hermits meal.

  50. Here’s the doorway that David & Susan pass through before reaching the cemetery. The location is Lower Arroyo Park.

    I had vaguely recalled the place when my dad took us there but only realized it a few years ago and sure enough it still exists to this day.

  54. After Equinox, Robin Snyder (billed as Robin Christopher) went on to become the vocal coach for Fleetwood Mac as Stevie Nicks and her were lifelong friends.

    Two of her songs Rhiannon & Gypsy are written about their friendship.

  56. Article on Frank Bonner’s parachuting accident along with his number from the night we met at Dennis Muren’s house. Frank invited my family and I to quite a few tapings of WKRP as his guests.

  57. The reshot version is more professional and has a more developed storyline, but omits some of the stop-frame animation in the original. Additional shots were added to existing scenes, and the cast are noticeably older in them, which is a bit disconcerting.

    1. Rohan Parkes Both versions of the film were shot over a four year period between 1965-69. It took two years alone to produce and finish the original considering it was much more of a “guerrilla-type” film, whereas the Harris production was affiliated with IATSE.

    1. Bill Shaffer They absolutely did not want to release the film but Jack Harris forced their hand when they wanted to produce The Blob disc.

      If it weren’t for Jack’s love and support of the film, we would have never had this version.

  61. Here’s the two scale stop motion model replicas I’ve done. Both have ball & socket armatures (though I found out later the cephalopod had a wire armature).

    The book is original from the film.

  81. I remembered the ad blitz for this when it first came out but never got to see it. About two or three years ago I finally bought the DVD and watched it. I was very disappointed with all the acting and the actors running around in field for no reason. The stop-motion was the best part of the film but after waiting decades to see it I was not really impressed. I’ll give it a re-watch and see if I feel any different about it.

  82. Saw this in the mid seventies while I was in grade school. It came on late night during a weekend and I remember it being surreal, and having some twisted, psychadelic scenes that truly terrified me at the time.

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