Tony Trelos is a club singer at a seaside bar. Wanting more out of his career, he is approached by a woman on a beach who owns a record label with her crippled husband. Tony's involvement and exploits with her are more dangerous than he's aware of, however, as she's guilty of a murder, and capable of another.
The second piece of celluloid sleaze that Peter Carpenter wrote and starred in after the atmospheric (and underrated) "Blood Mania," "Point of Terror" is a significantly less thrilling picture—far more talky and significantly less moody. It also seems to be cribbing elements of "Blood Mania" in a lot of ways, as it follows borderline identical plot arcs that have been minutely tweaked: Man becomes involved with wealthy woman. Woman is unstable and a murderess. Family member enters the picture and complicates matters further. Same formula, different canvas.
The film is peppered with some of the most ridiculously "seventies" musical numbers you'll ever see, and also boasts a significant amount of skin from a buxom Dyanne Thorne and the hunky Carpenter. There is a nice doubled-over twist at the end of the film that is clever but rather cheap, and the general impression I got after it was over was that Carpenter seemed to have wanted to do-over "Blood Mania," but this time invoke as much of Jess Franco's "Succubus" as he could.
All in all, "Point of Terror" is a middling thriller that, while mildly amusing, is more or less a rehash of Carpenter's prior (and better) film. It is, like "Blood Mania," relatively well-shot, but it lacks the performances and moodiness that made the former so watchable. For a piece of grindhouse sleaze, "Point of Terror" is watchable, but it's lacking both in spirit and inventiveness. 5/10.
