Deadly Friend
The movie poster for Deadly Friend.
Directed by	Wes Craven
Produced by	Robert L. Crawford Patrick Kelley Robert M. Sherman
Written by	Diana Henstell (novel Friend) Bruce Joel Rubin (screenwriter)
Starring	Matthew Laborteaux Kristy Swanson
Music by	Charles Bernstein
Cinematography	Philip H. Lathop
Editing by	Michael Eliot
Distributed by	Warner Bros. Pictures
Release date(s)	October 10, 1986
Running time	91 min.
Country	United States
Language	English
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Deadly Friend is a 1986 sci-fi/horror movie. The film is based on the novel entitled Friend by Diana Henstell, which was adapted for the screen by Bruce Joel Rubin. Deadly Friend is directed by horror master Wes Craven. Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (500x755, 38 KB) This image is of a film poster, and the copyright for it is most likely owned by either the publisher of the film or the studio which produced the film in question. ... Wesley Earl Craven (born August 2, 1939 in Cleveland, Ohio) is an American film director and writer best known as the creator of many horror films, including the famed Nightmare on Elm Street series featuring the redoubtable Freddy Krueger character. ... Patrick Henry Kelley (October 7, 1867-September 11, 1925) was a politician from the U.S. state of Michigan. ... Bruce Joel Rubin (born March 10, 1943 in Detroit, Michigan in the United States) is a screenwriter best known for the supernatural romance, Ghost for which he won an Oscar. ... Matthew Laborteaux (b. ... Renee Kristen Kristy Swanson (born Kristen Noel Swanson on December 19, 1969 in Mission Viejo, California, USA) is an American actress. ... Warner Bros. ... is the 283rd day of the year (284th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1986 (MCMLXXXVI) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link displays 1986 Gregorian calendar). ... Year 1986 (MCMLXXXVI) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link displays 1986 Gregorian calendar). ... This article is about the literary concept. ... Friend is the title of a 1985 science fiction horror novel by Diana Henstell, about a young man who tries to help a dying friend survive by implanting his robots chip into her, only to find that it turns her into a homicidal terror. ... Bruce Joel Rubin (born March 10, 1943 in Detroit, Michigan in the United States) is a screenwriter best known for the supernatural romance, Ghost for which he won an Oscar. ... Wesley Earl Craven (born August 2, 1939 in Cleveland, Ohio) is an American film director and writer best known as the creator of many horror films, including the famed Nightmare on Elm Street series featuring the redoubtable Freddy Krueger character. ...

Plot summary

Whiz kid Paul Conway and his mother, Jeannie, just moved into a new city and things are great. Paul is studying the neurology and artificial intelligence at the local college, and has built a highly functioning robot named BB. Paul makes some new friends; Tom, and a girl named Samantha who lives next door to the Conways. They have a mean old lady, Elvira Parker, for a neighbor who isn't fond of strangers on her property. On Halloween night as a prank, Paul, Tom and Samantha have BB crack the combination lock on her gate so that one of them can walk up and ring Elvira's doorbell to scare her. Samantha is the one who goes forth to do it and as she rings the doorbell, an alarm sounds and all three take cover beside Elvira's porch. BB reactivates himself and starts coming through the fence and Elvira is wielding her shotgun at him and starts to fire, killing BB.

Samantha struggles with an abusive father, who ultimately beats her so severely that she is left close to death. The doctors tell Paul that she doesn't have long to live, and together Paul and Tom steal Samantha's body. Paul surgically implants BB's AI chip into Samantha's brain. Samantha is activated by BB's remote control and is alive but later on she goes on a homicidal rampage. She kills people that have been mean. Because she has BB's memories, she is out of control.

Taglines: Some people are just better off dead.

If you're not afraid of the unknown...

There's no one alive who'll play with the girl next door.

Grab A Friend before someone in the audience grabs you!

Not all nightmares happen on Elm Street.

• Matthew Laborteaux ... Paul Conway
• Kristy Swanson ... Samantha
• Michael Sharrett ... Tom
• Anne Twomey ... Jeannie Conway
• Richard Marcus ... Harry
• Anne Ramsey ... Elvira Parker
• Lee Paul ... Sergeant Volchek
• Charles Fleischer ... BB (voice)
• Russ Marin ... Dr. Johanson
• Joel Hile ... Deputy

Matthew Laborteaux (b. ... Renee Kristen Kristy Swanson (born Kristen Noel Swanson on December 19, 1969 in Mission Viejo, California, USA) is an American actress. ... Michael Sharrett (b. ... Richard Marcus is actor. ... Anne Ramsey (1 September 1929 - 11 August 1988) was an American actress who is most recognized for two roles: as Mama Fratelli in Steven Spielbergs The Goonies; and as Mrs. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Charles Fleischer (born August 27, 1950) is an American actor, comedian and voice artist. ...

Differences between the book and movie

• In the book, the re-animated Samantha became more and more corpse-like as the story progressed.

• The ending of the book is totally different from the ending in the movie, which saw Sam turn into a robot that closely resembled BB and then snapping Paul's neck offscreen. The book ends at a moment in which Sam and Paul are on a bridge, fighting in the rain, Sam is on top of Paul and Paul, thinking that Sam is trying to kill him, kicks her off of him, hard enough that she goes over the railing, crashes into the ice below and then goes through the ice into the water. Paul, realizing that Sam wasn't trying to kill him, but rather was just trying to take him with her when she would have jumped anyway, because , as the book states it "she did not want to go into the darkness alone. She wanted him with her", then swan dives off the bridge, with the final line of the book being Paul's final thought- "So this is what love comes to".

• Paul has a nickname in the book, Piggy, which is never mentioned in the film.
• The old woman who killed BB in the film was Elvira Parker. In the book, she is Elvira Williams.
• The infamous "Basketball decapitation" is not present in the book. In the book, Sam murders Elvira by drowning her in her bathtub
• In the film, Beebee is killed when Elvira blows him apart with a shotgun. In the book, the shotgun is still the instrument of Beebee's destruction, but it is Samantha's father who wields the weapon and he beats Beebee to death with it, rather than shooting it.
• In the film, Samantha and Paul are in their middle teens. In the book, Sam is around twelve years old and Paul is only thirteen.
• The persona of Dr. Johanson differs greatly between the book and the film. In the film, he is a friendly man who welcomes Paul to the university. In the book however, he is old, stubborn, ignorant and grouchy, clashing with Paul on several occasions.

Alternate Versions of the Movie

The original USA VHS release of the movie contained cuts which were implemented by the MPAA in order to prevent an X rating (at the time, 1986, there was no NC-17 rating). These scenes have been restored on the DVD release from the Twisted Terror Collection released by Warner Bros. on Sept. 25th, 2007. These scenes include:

• In the scene where Samantha is dreaming about her father intruding in her bedroom, Samantha breaks a vase on her nightstand and stabs her father in the stomach with it. In the VHS release all that is shown is blood spurting out on Samantha's bed and close-ups of her father's face laughing and taunting Sam. On the newly released DVD, the scene includes blood spurting out on Sam's face and lots of it and close ups of Sam's face as she screams and gets coated in blood.

• In the scene where Sam takes her revenge on her murderous father, Sam trips her father on the stairs leading to the boiler room and burns him inside the boiler. In the VHS release, when Paul comes to conceal the body, the scene is edited to briefly show Paul pulling Sam's father out of the boiler, without showing much of his charred body. In the DVD release, when Paul pulls her father's upper body from the boiler, as he pulls him out and puts him on the ground, a close-up of his charred skeletal face is shown.

• In the infamous 'basketball' scene, Samantha crushes Elvira's head with a slam from the basketball that Elvira had stolen from the teens earlier in the movie. In the VHS release, when Sam throws the ball at her, Elvira's head explodes on impact and then cuts back to Sam watching in amazement as Elvira's headless body wanders around the living room until it falls down in the floor. In the DVD release, when Sam throws the ball at Elvira's head, more explosion is shown as Elvira's head completely shatters from her shoulders and shows her headless body wander directly from the wall around the living room, spurting blood and then cuts back to Sam watching in amazement as the body comes to rest in the floor.

• In an earlier version of the movie, Elvira's death was filmed to be less gorier than the final shot. Instead of shattering her head with a Basketball, Sam smashes Elvira through her front door leaving the upper half of her body hanging outside the door and the lower half still inside. In the same earlier version, in the scene where Paul is dreaming about Sam's father coming up out of his bed, Sam's father comes completely out of the bed and lunges for Paul. In the final cut of the film just his charred head comes out of the bed and exhales smoke. These alternate scenes can be seen in the theatrical trailer found on the new DVD.

External links

• Deadly Friend at the Internet Movie Database