Alice, Sweet Alice

Year releasted: 1976

by Nathan Rabin
October 10th, 2001

Rites of passage, almost by definition, have scary undertones, given that they permanently transform their participants. For Catholics, a first communion is no exception. As a public rite of passage with much attached ceremony, it's potentially embarrassing, should the event not go as planned. It also presents, if the film Alice, Sweet Alice is to be believed, the possibility of getting snatched, stabbed, stuffed in a box, and set on fire in mid-ritual by a raincoat-clad, masked figure. This fate befalls young Brooke Shields--during her cinematic debut, no less--and soon the hunt is on for the killer. Could it be her slightly older sister Alice (Paula E. Sheppard), who spends most of the first reel taunting Shields while wearing a raincoat and a mask? Or it could it be someone else? (Presumably, the sinister villain of Don't Look Now has an alibi, having been occupied with a different movie.) A suspect from the start, Sheppard receives no words of comfort from grotesquely obese landlord Alphonso DeNoble, whose character is introduced sharing a can of cat food with a beloved pet. "God always takes the pretty ones," DeNoble says, shortly before menacing Sheppard into a corner. Sheppard retaliates by strangling a kitten and throwing it to the ground. Shocked, DeNoble lets her get away, but soon she's in trouble again, as her aunt falls victim to the raincoat killer. Eventually, another suspect presents herself in the form of the church's crazy Italian cleaning lady, played by Mildred Clinton. "Maybe you are afraid God will send St. Michael to take another of your loved ones," Clinton says, attempting to help Alice's mother (Linda Miller) understand her situation. Slipping further into insanity, Clinton kills once more in mid-communion, this time in full view of the church. Hauled off to jail, she leaves the world safe for both kitten-killing children and those less bloodthirsty.