Really fun, colourful and lavish Vincent Price horror film.
Although campy in spots, darkly comedic in others, the film does manage some creepy and eerie scenes (kinda).
The choice to have Phibes talk without moving his lips, however 'interesting' in theory, is just ridiculous in execution.

This has always been one of my favorites. It has the look and feel of a seriously demented episode of The Avengers. And it should since the director, Robert Fuest, created the kitschy off-kilter production design that marked the color years of that show in the late 60's. Absolutely everything is completely and totally over the top. All this and Vincent Price, too. 'Nuff said.

The Abominable Dr. Phibes may not be the “most terrifying picture ever made” as its marketing proclaimed it to be; in fact, it’s not really all that scary at all unless it happens to trigger an audience member’s phobia. But as a game of criminal cat-and-mouse it holds up very well. Dr. Phibes is an interesting and entertaining villain, and The Abominable Dr. Phibes is an entertaining film. Read full review.

Not a particularly taxing role for Price, but who else could you have for to play the role?!

thanks to the B-Movie Cast for recommending this!
it's really strange - but fun!

So I guess this film was MEANT to be over-the-top? It was hard to tell, but looking back it's the only explanation for this film there is. I'll admit it was very fun despite how mind-boggling it was. The sets were great as well. However the story was just so convoluted, dialogue was atrocious, scenes inexplicably placed for no reason. To say the least it was a messy affair. I have no idea how they made a sequel to this.

Dr Phibes is the original Jigsaw. This movie is just amazing in the way it combines so many weird parts to make a great story.

Was grooving on the Grand Guignol style for a while, but I don't know if this really works cinematically. The sad thing is that there was real potential here, but cutting back and forth between Phibes and the investigators made it feel really choppy and robbed it of much of its momentum. Still, it had its moments, and it's hard to hate a movie with this line: "A brass unicorn has been catapulted across a London street and impaled an eminent surgeon. Words fail me, gentlemen."

A dude gets killed by getting impaled by a brass unicorn head getting catapulted from across the street.

Very weird and highly entertaining....uh... welll....
It is difficult to really say what kind of movie this really is, there are some horror elements, but often we follow the killer rather than the victims, and there is mostly no element of suprise. When we are not watching the doctor kill his victims in odd ways the focus is on the policemen hunting him down, or trying to do so at least. The segments of policemen finding the mutilated bodies of the doctors victims are riddled with dark humour and overall weirdness.
The whole thing isnt very tightly put together, but stylish and inventive and very, very entertaining.