How Do You Fight A War Called Madness?

It will take you to the edge of your mind!

Don't blink for a second, because nothing is what it seems.


William Peter Blatty, author of The Exorcist, proved a workmanlike producer/director for 1979's The Ninth Configuration. Army psychiatrist Col. Kane (Stacy Keach) (teetering on the sanity brink himself) tries to minister to the patients in a military mental hospital. The fact that the hospital is located in a brooding old castle is hardly conducive to speedy recoveries. Nor does the mid-film barroom brawl indicate that Kane's approach to mental health is all that workable. Blatty adapted the screenplay for The Ninth Configuration from his own novel Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane (which also served as the film's title during one of its many releases). It is hard to tell if what you're going to see is the "director's cut," since there are several versions of this film, running anywhere from 99 to 140 minutes. ~


The Ninth Configuration, (also known as Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane) is a 1980 American film directed by William Peter Blatty. The film is based on Blatty's novel, The Ninth Configuration (1978) which was itself a reworking of an earlier version of the novel, first published in 1966 as Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane! The initial 1966 publication of the novel featured an exclamation mark at the end of the title, while all subsequent publications saw it removed.
The first half of the film has the predominant tone and style of a comic farce. In the second half, the film becomes darker as it delves deeper into its central issues of human suffering, sacrifice and faith. The film also frequently blurs the line between the sane and the insane.

The Ninth Configuration was not a commercial success upon its cinematic release in 1980; however, it received generally strong notices and a Best Picture nomination at the 1981 Golden Globe Awards. Although the film did not win, Blatty did win a Golden Globe for the film's screenplay. After initially poor box office returns in its test markets, Warner Bros. returned the film to Blatty and allowed him to take it to another distributor. United Film Distribution, affiliated with the United Artists theatre chain and best known for releasing George A. Romero's Dawn of the Dead, picked up the film and released it in other markets under the title Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane. Blatty initially sold the videocassette rights to New World Pictures, who released it on tape in 1988. Later on, Warner Bros. reacquired the U.S. rights to the film for all media, though their current DVD is basically a clone of the UK edition produced by independent distributor Blue Dolphin.
Leonard Maltin has described the movie as "hilarious yet thought-provoking, with endlessly quotable dialogue and an amazing barroom fight scene."[8] Blatty's screenplay was later published in 2000 with commentary by English film critic Mark Kermode (Kermode also contributed to the audio commentary and featurette on the film's DVD release in 2002). Kermode has described The Ninth Configuration as "a breathtaking cocktail of philosophy, eye-popping visuals, jaw-dropping pretentiousness, rib-tickling humour and heart-stopping action. From exotically hallucinogenic visions of a lunar crucifixion to the claustrophobic realism of a bar-room brawl, via such twisted vignettes as Robert Loggia karaoking to Al Jolson and Moses Gunn in Superman drag, Blatty directs like a man with no understanding of, or interest in, the supposed limits of mainstream movie-making. The result is a work of matchless madness which divides audiences as spectacularly as the waves of the Red Sea, a cult classic that continues to provoke either apostolic devotion or baffled dismissal 20 years on.

Several versions of The Ninth Configuration were released in cinemas and on video tape and DVD (one version retained the title Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane). In the original theatrical release and the Blatty-endorsed DVD, it is the intention that Kane killed himself with the knife. In some versions released during the intervening years, an alternate ending was used in which it is said (via added voiceover by Stacy Keach) that Kane died of wounds inflicted by the bikers.

Release Date: August 8, 1980

Distrib: UFDC