Murder
    in Law

The decidedly oddball MURDER IN LAW bridges the gap between the slasher movie and the emerging From Hell thriller. Clearly partly satirical, it’s sometimes hard to tell where the humor ends and anything approaching a serious approach starts. Like many low-budget horror films and thrillers from that era, it’s hardly a sensitive depiction of mental health—featuring gurning and twirling patients—and the security is so poor that the criminally insane Milly can walk out not once but twice. MURDER IN LAW is strengthened by a truly wild performance from Marilyn Adams—who genuinely transcends bad movie acting—as the utterly demented mother-in-law, who grimaces and scowls all the time while insulting everyone nearby. In this way, the character would fit neatly into most John Waters films. Although probably coincidental, MURDER IN LAW includes several elements we would later see in Waters’ SERIAL MOM (1994), his satire of From Hell thrillers—such as the reversal of expectations about matriarchs, purposefully campy acting, and the addition of onscreen times and dates to give the film a fake true-crime vibe. Another possible reference point is Nick Millard’s CRIMINALLY INSANE (akaCRAZY FAT ETHEL) (1975), also set in San Francisco, where another character, wrongly released from an asylum, dances around the city in a delusional state and kills anyone who irritates her.
 
Joe Estevez—younger brother of Martin Sheen and uncle of Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez—is well known for his roles in low-budget cult, action, and horror films. Here, he plays things relatively straight. Possibly being the only notable name in the cast (and probably the highest paid), his character disappears in the middle to play golf and is absent for the entire final act (alongside onscreen son Guilbeau) to go on a fishing trip. The main conflict centres on Arlene and her mother-in-law, and the film builds a semblance of suspense after Milly returns home to assault her and her teenage granddaughter, culminating in a climax that exploits slasher-movie tropes. Milly even takes on something of a nightmarish look after Arlene hits her in the face with a pie, stalking them around the house in her stolen nurses’ uniform—as her daughter-in-law ludicrously defends herself against her swinging knife with a plastic broom. MURDER IN LAW may not appeal to everyone, but for those who are attuned to ‘80s video store, low-budget weirdness may well find much to dine out on here—I know I did. 
 
Director Tony Jiti Gill remains somewhat of an enigma. He was an Indian director based in England, born in 1961, and earned a degree in cinema production in Hollywood in the mid-1980s. Before MURDER IN LAW, he was probably best known for directing the documentary ROCKING SIKH (1986) about Indian Elvis impersonator Peter Singh. An even bigger mystery is Adams, who appeared in a few horror films around that time, most notably as another harridan of a mother in THE INVISIBLE MANIAC (1990). She is often mistakenly listed as being the wife of late comic book artist Neal Adams, but that’s a different Marilyn Adams.
 
Also known as MILLY in some regions, MURDER IN LAW was filmed on location in Los Angeles and San Francisco in 1988. It was shot on 35mm film, indicating that its creators aimed for a theatrical release (and may have had a few showings in 1989), but it ultimately received a wide video release nearly five years after completion in 1993 through the Monarch label in the United States. It is so obscure that no newspaper reviews exist beyond capsule synopses.