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Old Pete Jensen (Ed Nelson) was never really well-liked in the village he lives in, and since there've always been odd stories about him, it's only fitting he should have died in a weird ritual that involved him slitting his wrist and a freshly slaughtered goat. Enter his nephew and only living relative Nick Richards (Ed Nelson), who enters town picking up the old man's belongings, and who's actually quite a charming young man, so makes friends easily, including Nell (Jean Allison), daughter of Doc Lucas (Edgar Buchanan), the only physican in town, and Nick takes a definite liking to. So much so that once at old Pete's shack, he performs a ritual - and wouldn't you know it, suddenly Nell's boyfriend David (Richard Crane) is brutally attacked by his own dog who almost tears off his face, and it's more luck than anything else that David manages to shoot the dog dead before the dog can kill him. This scars David both physicall and mentally, but at least not financially, as Nick offers to run David's gas station while he's recuperating. A plastic surgeon is called in for David from the next town over, but he crashes his car into a cow lying on the street and is killed instantly.

Nick invites the town drunk Papers (Byron Foulger) over to his shack and turns into old pete right before his eyes - which shocks Papers to such a degree to pretty much blindly run away ... and be trampled to death by a horse. All these animal-related attacks and deaths puzzle local Sheriff Fuller (Spencer Carlisle) and Doc Lucas, and they soon figure newcomer Nick must have something to do with them, but how they can't really tell. And all the while Nick's already planning the ultimate demise of David, to make his move on Nell ...

Ok, if you think about it in much detail, this film doesn't make all that much sense, especially since Nick's powers are unclear, as in the beginning he seems to only possess animals while towards the finale he actually turns into them and can be harmed in his animal form - which is clearly not the case when David shoots his dog dead in self defense. Also, there's absolutely no reason for Nick to reveal his secret to Papers, giving that he kills him soon afterwards.

That all asides though, The Devil's Partner is a quite effective horror movie, one that develops in a slowburn manner around a well-structured (if not well-written) mystery, invariably chooses atmosphere and tension over jump scares - even if it gets gruesome at all the right moments -, and its somewhat eerie score sure helps to create a properly creepy mood. It might not be a perfect movie by quite a bit, but fans of  vintage horror sure will find a lot to like about this movie.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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