Death Bed: The Bed that Eats (1977)

There’s this bed, see, in an old, abandoned house. When people sleep in it, the bed eats them. Roll credits.

To be fair, the bed has a backstory and there is a conclusion, but Pulitzer Prize material it is not. This is a very low budget, very independent film that despite the amateur status proves to be quite watchable. Shot silent and dubbed in post, Death Bed is mostly an art film, narrated by a ghost behind a painting.

The film rose to fame when back in 2007 comedian Patton Oswald did a bit on it, referring to it as “The Bed that Eats People” in a comedic flourish. It was shot in 1972 and a print wasn’t stuck until 1977. There it sat until bootleg copies began circulating. It got a DVD release in 2003 and the rest is history.

Kinda interesting if mostly for it’s unusual narrative style, it is a very watchable film. It has a dreamlike quality and the most was made with amateur actors. Compare it to the bulk of the super low budget amateur films, it rises above. On the overall watchability scale, I give Death Bed an impressive AMRU 3.