Madhouse
Synopsis
The bad news is you have houseguests. There is no good news.
A horror movie star returns to his famous role after years in a mental institution. But the character seems to be committing murders independent of his will.
Popular reviews
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Miss Peters, as they say in horror movies, you will come to a bad end.
-Paul ToombesLoosely based on Angus Hall's 1969 novel Devilday, the story ends up being a bit ahead of it's time and maybe that's why it suffers in the execution. It's the last film to be directed by Jim Clark from the last screenplay written by Greg Morrison and Ken Levison. Clark would go on to have a fairly successful career as a film editor, while Morrison and Levison were apparently never heard from again.
Vincent Price is essentially playing a caricature of himself as Paul Toombes, a horror icon who's most popular portrayed character is Dr. Death. At the beginning of the film his…
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A loving look at the business of ridiculous horror movies (starring Vincent Price as a distinctly Price-ish movie star, and featuring footage from actual Price movies doubling as footage from the films of the Price-ish character Price is portraying) but also a wholly successful ridiculous horror film. It's legitimately surreal, and totally fun, and Robert Quarry is even in it, playing a shady ex-pornographer! (Trigger warning: spiders.)
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Hadn't seen it for about 15 years. Still an entertaining bit of fluff, seeing Cushing and Price together is worth the price of admission alone.
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Vincent Price was a perfect human being.
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By 1974, this was already an antiquated piece of horror and now it belongs in a museum. If this had come out in 1965, it would have been ground breaking, but it came out the same year as Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which is sort of like debuting your brand new model of rotary phone the same day the iPhone 4S came out. Also, this flick has one of the stupidest endings I've ever seen.
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A spiritless and convoluted slasher film, "Madhouse" has very little going for it beyond some creepy atmospherics and the use of numerous clips from Vincent Price's previous films.
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Poorly written with gaping plot holes, scattershot elements and an uneven tone but Price and Cushing save it to some extent.
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Madhouse is a relatively forgotten Vincent Price film that deserves a much wider audience. The story involves an aging horror star asked to reprise his most famous role one last time until things start going wrong. It's a fairly standard set-up and to be honest the pacing is quite poor and the story is barely adequate for the run-time but you're here to watch Vincent Price, who not only salvages this movie but makes it quite fun. Several of my favorite Price scenes are in Madhouse and without giving too much away, the ending is one of the best I've seen from the horror genre in some time. It doesn't make much sense but for pure effect it works wonderfully.…
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Vincent Price was a perfect human being.
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Has everything a Vincent Price movie should have: Blood, laughs, camp, creepiness, and insanity...and a bonus of some awesome sets/makeup and clips of old VP classics.
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Miss Peters, as they say in horror movies, you will come to a bad end.
-Paul ToombesLoosely based on Angus Hall's 1969 novel Devilday, the story ends up being a bit ahead of it's time and maybe that's why it suffers in the execution. It's the last film to be directed by Jim Clark from the last screenplay written by Greg Morrison and Ken Levison. Clark would go on to have a fairly successful career as a film editor, while Morrison and Levison were apparently never heard from again.
Vincent Price is essentially playing a caricature of himself as Paul Toombes, a horror icon who's most popular portrayed character is Dr. Death. At the beginning of the film his…
-
By 1974, this was already an antiquated piece of horror and now it belongs in a museum. If this had come out in 1965, it would have been ground breaking, but it came out the same year as Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which is sort of like debuting your brand new model of rotary phone the same day the iPhone 4S came out. Also, this flick has one of the stupidest endings I've ever seen.
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Streaming: PG rated slasher movie without an on-screen slash. Excellent movie. Why have I not heard of this film until now!??
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There's more ham here than the biggest farmyard, but don't let that put you off this entertaining horror whodunit.
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Hadn't seen it for about 15 years. Still an entertaining bit of fluff, seeing Cushing and Price together is worth the price of admission alone.