Lindsay Finch (Mary Wilcox) is attracted to dead men. To satisfy her urge she attends various wakes and funerals. After everyone leaves she goes up to the corpses lightly caresses and kisses them. She then leaves. After one such incident she is observed by Fred McSweeney (Timothy Scott). The next time she shows up to a funeral at the same parlor, Lindsay is approached by Fred. He tells her that he has observed her before and that what she is feeling is called necrophilia. He then tells her that he belongs to a group who worships the dead and that she is not alone in what she is feeling.
Fred gets her name and address from her car registration and then tells her that he will let her know the next time his group has a get-together in case she wants to join in. Soon after, a letter arrives telling Lindsay that there will be a meeting at the funeral parlor. Lindsay goes to the funeral home but freaks out and runs away. Fred contacts her and smoothes over her concerns.
In the meantime, Lindsay has continued to haunt funeral parlors and wakes. One evening she is at yet another parlor viewing another young man’s corpse. There she meets Alex Martin (Lyle Waggoner), the brother of the deceased. Alex is attracted to Lindsay. At first she isn’t interested in him but Alex reminds Lindsay of her father (Michael Pardue). Eventually they begin dating and fall in love. They marry, but Lindsay suffers from a childhood trauma and is unable to consummate her marriage. Alex, unaware that Lindsay likes dead people, is at a loss as to what to do about Lindsay’s phobia and ends up following her to try to find out what she is keeping from him. What he finds is not good.
“Love Me Deadly” was released in 1973 and was directed by Jacques Lacerte. It is an American exploitation horror film.
Well, I don’t know about this one. There is a smattering of weirdness here and there. There are also a lot of romantic montages with inspirational music surrounding some rather horrific scenes of someone being embalmed alive. In addition, there is also some male nudity among the female nudity. There are no actual sex acts with dead people but things are implied and there are some actual attempts before the scenes are cutaway. Most of the icky scenes are on the short side, but some of the mental images linger long after. Like I said, weirdness.
The male lead of the film is Lyle Waggoner. He is best known for playing Steve Trevor in the 70’s action show “Wonder Woman” and from his stint on the “Carol Burnett Show”. Lyle’s run on the show lasted from 1967 to 1974. He left after the seventh season of the show, which was just after he did this movie. People have speculated that doing the film had something to do with him no longer being on the show. Others say that he just wanted to expand his acting range and pursue other acting projects.
The movie was actually better than I expected, but still not all that great. It is as tasteful as you can get considering the subject but still has some parts that were so exploitative that they clashed with any romantic parts. This one is going to be mostly for cult fans of the bizarre who still hanker for a love story.