Nightmare Never Ends (1980)

Cataclysm

Cast:

Cameron "Space Mutiny" Mitchell is Lt. Sterne
Marc "From Key Largo with Humphrey Bogart to this movie..." Lawrence is Abraham Weiss / Dieter
Faith Clift is Claire Hansen
Richard "BULL from Night Court" Moll is James Hanson

What the box says:

The investigation into the mysterious death of an aging Nazi war criminal hunter brings a surprising revelation to the cop working on the case. It appears the old man was actually an individual with ties to the Nazis, who seems to have not aged in appearance in spite of the passage of over 30 years. The policeman and some other individuals decide to track down the mysterious individual to find out his horrifying secret.

Plot:

Dr. Claire Hanson has been suffering from nightmares for weeks. Her hsuband, James, a Nobel-award-winning author who has just written some sort of super-popular athetistic book.

My most famous roll is going to be a bailiff named "Bull."
He decides to take Claire to Las Vegas, hoping the trip will calm her...At a psychic night club act, the psychis reads Claire's mind which is one of her nightmares about a group of Nazis being executed by one of their leaders. After the show, Claire tries talking the pychic into helping her. Later, some mirror image kills the psychic.

Alec Weiss, Nazi hunter, calls one of his friends, Lt. Sterne, to arrest a man. Weiss shows photos of one of the Nazis who he saw in a concentration camp. He's seen a "Mr. Olivier' who he claims is identical to the one of the men he's been hunting. Sterne can't get Weiss to explain how any man can still look in his mid 20s 60 years later. Weiss later tries to sneak into Olivier's mansion. Well, the jump scare seems to end Weiss from this movie.

James and Claire have dinner. She tries explaining the vision about the Nazi party and how the Devil is loose on the Earth. James doesn't believe any of her ideas.

Elsewhere, some cult is discussing if James should be recruited into their group and how his biggest opposition iss his wife.

Papiani, a defrocked monk, meets James and tries to warn him about Satan. Papiani is so worried, he stands outside Hanson's house to stand guard. However, the cops drag him away.

The cops investigate Weiss's apartment. Sterne is getting his police special sense activated because of Olivier

Next night, Claire and James meet Jim, nephew, and his girlfriend, Ann, at a disco. Claire has asome nightmare about a being chased through a tunnel at the club. Later, Olivier runs off with Ann, attacks her, and later drops her off outside the club. Jim tries to hunt Olivier down however, that doesn't work off very good.

Sterne questions the ever-more super-smug Olivier.

At church, Papiani explains to Claire how to kill a demon. She goes to an occult shop where the blind guy questions her about her husband...

Sterne is still studying Weiss's research.

Claire is nervous about James's new TV special where he rages against religion. Afterwards, Olivier wants to meet with him. James goes to meet the guy. Hours later, James is having flashbacks and nightmares of being chased by Native American Indians. Finally, Olivier appears and offers to allow James to join the cult. However, he refuses and is scared to death...

Sterne is following Olivier across the city.

Papiani tries to get in touch with Claire. She refuses at first. He finally blames her for the death of James because she should have killed Olivier. He is going after Olivier if something goes bad, it'll be up to her...

That night, Papiani goes in commando-style to Olivier's mansion. However, he's attacked by winds and blown down stairs and off the roof.

At the morgue, Sterne meets Claire about Papiani when Olivier arrives. Sterne starts questioning him until another cop lets him go.

I'm telling you these pictures show a second gunman on the grassy knoll.
Later, Sterne shows his friend the pictures of various wars with Olivier from World War 1 and 2 and back to 1870s. They decide to check out Olivier's mansion. Super-evil man gasses the other cop. Sterne rushes back for the car. However, it explodes killing him...

The next day, Claire and a friend run over Olivier and carry him off in the car trunk. They take him to an operating room. Claire starts some sort of surgery while her friend continually stabs Olivier.

I'm not angry even when continually stabbing someone with a scalpel...
Claire removes Olivier's heart. However, he's possessed the friend and chokes Claire. Afterwards, he walks off...

What I say:

This is one of those so low-budget movies that wind up on the Mill Creek 50 or 100 movie DVD sets. I don't think there's anything shocking in saying that most of those movies aren't known for their cinematic brilliance. In fact, part of this movie was edited with a couple other movies into the anthology movie, Night Train to Terror.

Cameron Mitchell in Klansman Space Mutiny Well, he's appeared as the guest star in most of the 1970, and 1980s TV shows...If one goes from Alias Smith and Jones to Matlock, that's a wide resume of TV shows...

Considering he is just a large villain in Galaxis, it is hard to see Bull from Night Court especially with hair. Here, he plays the heroine's husband who's a Nobel-award winning author and seems to be the maximum-athesist. Does seem to be one of those people that is not just always right but the person who thinks that anyone around him who disagrees with his brilliance should be announced for their wrongness.

Jumping from a batch of characters is hard enough to keep track of in a low budget 90 minute movie especially when names are less normally mentioned than in badly dubbed 1970 Kung Fu movies. Most characters that have less personality than worn-out washcloths. Characters pop up and disappear, like Claire's nephew and his girlfriend that appear for a couple of scenes before the villain dispatches with them. Nightmares, visions, demons, Indian flashbacks, defrocked monks, this movie looks like a number of random plot notions are just thrown together to see which stick. I think it's safe to say that any movie with a title like Nightmare Never Ends probably isn't going to have a Disney fairy-tale ending.

With the plot description, I was expecting something more like Lucifer Complex or Madmen of Mandoras. Well those movies aren't going to be known for their greatness. A movie with Nazis and a secret cult (almost implying Omen and Rosemary's Baby) you'd be expecting something more than something like this. However, Nightmare Never Ends has to be one of the most boring movies I've run across in quite awhile. Thankfully, it's not quite in same category of Massacre which may be one of the its high points. Well, giving Richard Moll something to act in before Night Court is probably the other point.

Quotable Dialogue
"You haven't met your quota for the last 3 weeks."
"I don't know any Papiani."
"There's anew disco..."
"I see betteer without artificial light."
"We can dispense with the mumbo jumbo..."
"I see swastikas swimming in my oatmeal."
Morals of the Story
Las Vegas police commonly contact Scotland Yard.
In the early 1980s, it is easy to surgically de-age 70 year old war criminals to their physcial 20s.
Random movement is the key to Disco dancing.
Police Lts are excellent Disco dancers.