Month: June 2015

Circus of Horrors (1960)

CIRCUS OF HORRORS (1960)
Article #625 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 11/30/2002
Posting date: 4/25/2003

A plastic surgeon on the run from the law uses a circus as a front to continue his research.

Having endured at least one similarly themed movie in the past (BERSERK), I didn’t really expect a lot from this one. I was pleasantly surprised; what a world of difference a good script can make in this type of movie. The characters have a lot more dimension than I usually expect from a movie like this, and there are unexpected touches that are, if not totally necessary, at least indicative of a certain complexity in the conception of the story (my favorite: a poignant moment involving a clown after one of the murders). The movie feels a little like a cross between Hammer and Italian horror; it’s British origin and its blood recall the former, and the sadism of the story recalls the latter. I enjoyed this much more than I expected, though a few of the special effects aren’t quite up to par.

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The Penalty (1920)

THE PENALTY (1920)
Article #624 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 11/29/2002
Posting date: 4/24/2003

A double amputee known as Blizzard seeks revenge on the doctor who crippled him for life.

I’m always a little amazed at how well Lon Chaney could act when he was hampered by costumes that must have been incredibly painful. He is such a malicious, malevolent, evil man here that he takes your focus away from the fact that he hobbles around on crutches for the length of the movie. The story itself is only slightly a horror story (basically, the fact that the villain is a double amputee and a certain air of degeneracy in the proceedings) and offers only the slightest whiff of science fiction (basically, part of the plot deals with transplants), so it remains largely marginal. It starts out with a Mabuse-like setup, but it ends up not really delivering in this regard; the ending seems doctored, artificial and pat, and is not very satisfying. This one is primarily of interest for Chaney’s performance.

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Project X (1968)

PROJECT X (1968)
Article #623 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 11/28/2002
Posting date: 4/23/2003

In the future, a spy in possession of important information for national security has had his mind erased by a drug. Scientists are called in to try and help him recover the information.

The only other time I know of that William Castle flirted with science fiction was in THE TINGLER, a movie which was primarily horror. This one is closer to a pure work of science fiction, with an interesting premise and some great ideas, and though it has a couple of horror elements, it is not a horror movie. Unfortunately, Castle seems a little lost at what to do with it all; there are some moments that are poorly handled from a dramatic perspective, and the movie comes across as somewhat vague and incomplete, but the ideas and the concepts are actually intriguing enough to hold your interest. It’s worth a viewing, but I’m left wondering how much better the movie could have been, and I’m a little disappointed that it didn’t quite gel as well as it could have. It’s something of a failure, but it’s more interesting than some successes.

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The Premature Burial (1962)

THE PREMATURE BURIAL (1962)
Article #622 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 11/27/2002
Posting date: 4/22/2003

A man is haunted by visions of himself being buried alive.

This is a rather dullish entry in Roger Corman’s series of movies based on the works of Edgar Allan Poe. One of the problems with this one is that the premature burial theme had been used in both HOUSE OF USHER and THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM before them, so it wasn’t particularly novel. The absence of Vincent Price is also sorely felt; not that Ray Milland isn’t a good actor, but the role seemed tailor-made for Price, and at the end, when the character flips out, Milland is simply not as much fun as Price would have been. Actually, there’s a nice revelation at the ending, but it just doesn’t seem worth going through the whole movie to see it. Hazel Court is also in the movie, as well as Dick Miller and John Dierkes as the gravediggers.

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The Pit and the Pendulum (1961)

THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM (1961)
Article #621 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 11/26/2002
Posting date: 4/21/2003

A man tries to discover what caused the death of his sister, and uncovers a horrible tale of torture and infidelity.

The last twenty minutes of this movie are great and memorable; I just wish the hour that leads up to this part of the movie were as good. Since the story on which the movie was based is short and compact, I’m not surprised that it needed to be fleshed out to make a full-length movie; I just wish they hadn’t borrowed quite so much from “The Fall of the House of Usher” to do so, especially as Corman had just directed a version of that story the previous year. It also doesn’t help that the actor who plays the brother is singularly dull, generally delivering his lines in a slow monotone punctuated with “meaningful” pauses; unfortunately, it is his character that drives the story in the first part of the movie, so we see an awful lot of him and not near enough of Vincent Price or Barbara Steele. Still, that last twenty minutes is strong enough to make the wait worth it, and though this will probably not be my favorite of the Corman Poe movies, it is a worthy entry to the series.

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