Lady in White is one of those ghost story movies that has a very detailed plot that there’s no way to describe it easily. And it’s very involved plot works better with its eerie tone.
Set in the Fall months of 1962, the events start around Halloween and end before Christmas. Set in an upstate New York community, it centers around a family of Italian-Americans dealing with a near tragic event. Frankie Scarletti (Lukas Haas) is the younger son of the widowed Angelo Rodolfo Scarletti (Alex Rocco in a rare good guy role). Frankie enjoys writing stories but he’s not the most popular kid at his school.
A prank by some bullies leaves him locked in the coatroom at his school on Halloween night. After a few hours, he witnesses the apparition of a young girl, Melissa Anne Montgomery (Joelle Jacobi), get murdered by an invisible figure. Some time later, a man hidden in the darkness walks in attempting to open the grate over the heating vent. But he spots Frankie hiding up on a and attacks him, strangling him unconscious.
In a near-fatal vision, Frankie sees the girl ask for help in seeking her mother. Frankie survives the attack and is revived by his father. The police arrest the school janitor, Harold “Willie” Williams (Henry Harris), a black man who they find drunk watching TV in the basement, on suspicion.
However, Angelo isn’t too quick to think the janitor is involved while several townspeople seem to want to tie him to a string of killings over the years. Director Frank LaLoggia, who wrote the script, focuses on racial tensions at the time. Angelo’s parents live with them and speak mostly in Italian hinting that Angelo may or may not have been a child himself when they immigrated to America. Part of the reason Frankie is pranked is because he doesn’t want to hear the janitor called the N-word.
But because of his injuries, Frankie is unable to speak as he has a neck brace on for weeks. Still, he tells police he can’t identify his attacker. With help from his older brother, Geno (Jason Presson), they begin to investigate the events as the apparition of Melissa appears to them. They also discover what the attacker was searching for.
Katherine Helmond pops up in an eerie Miss Haversham-like character who lives alone in an scary house that is falling apart. The actress was known at the time for more comedic roles on sitcoms Soap and Who’s The Boss? Seeing her in a supporting crucial role with her red hair color is a nice twist.
Rocco is another surprise. He famously played Moe Greene in The Godfather. In his 20s, he was connected to the Winter Hill Gang in Boston. He became famous for playing heavies and bad guys. So it’s nice seeing him here playing someone different.
Haas, of course, is the star and the actor was the go-to child actor before Macaulay Culkin and Elijah Wood. His distinct look that made him famous in Witness works the same here. It’s easy to believe he’s an innocent child caught up unwilling in something more sinister.
Unfortunately, the movie was a major success. LaLoggia was able to independently finance it. Produced on a budget of a budget of $4.7 million, it only made a third of that at $1.7 million.
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