Movie: Horror: Chamber of Horrors
Movie: Chamber of Horrors
Year: 1964
Rating: Two severed hands.
Mr Blount: George Washington Mason, is what he called himself. Went patriotically mad on the Day of Independence.
Mr Draco: And shot his wife and two bystanders, claiming they were British spies.
Mr Blount: That's right, but a man has no right just to shoot people merely because they're British, has he?
Inspector: I agree. That's a bit drastic.
At the beginning of the movie, there's a scrolling text accompanied by a Very Serious Narrator, and the text in summary, announces that this film is so scary that the theatre has instituted "a visual and audible warning at the beginning of each of the Four Supreme Fright Points. The Fear Flasher is the visual warning. The Horror Horn is the audible warning." And then both are demonstrated, to avoid confusion, and it's like my tv's having a seizure. You know, I'd like something like this built in for other shows where warnings are desperately needed. For instance:
--any show where animal-related violence will occur so I can change the channel at speed
--at any point in CSI Miami where Horatio's about to say something in his Big Deal Voice ("Warning! Warning! Protagonist is taking himself too seriously! Whoop whoop!")
--at any point in Miami Vice where the show's writers stop writing and encourage the audience to just focus on Don Johnson's hair ("Warning! Warning! You are watching Season Five!")
Where was I? Oh yeah. The Chamber of Horrors, which opens with a cat playing a piano, and then some dude marries a dead woman. Which just goes to show you what a good time you can have on a Friday night in Baltimore.
The Good:
--I've said it before but I'll say it again: SEVERED HAND! WOOT!
--And a wax museum. That's right, it's a twofer. (And of course it features a serial-killer exhibit, because that's the law.)
--An outspoken old lady in a big hat orders everyone around, tracks down her own homicidal nephew ("He was always kind to animals but cruel to servants. That's a bad sign, I assure you."), flirts shamelessly and brings her bull mastiff to tea parties. She also loves scandalizing everyone with family gossip and a good cigar:
Mrs Ewing Perryman: She was like a...silly fainting virgin, and Jason kept her on a pedestal, which is a damn silly place for a man to put a woman. Makes it that much easier for her to kick his teeth down his throat.
I have a new role model.
The Bad
--Midget jokes.
--Older movies all seem to suffer from slow pacing; I suspect this is because as horror's evolved it's gotten much more fast-paced and shocking, so that movies like these with layered and interwoven narratives seem too tame in comparison.
--A Rudimentary acquaintance with physics leads me to suspect that you can't actually hack your own hand off with an axe underwater.
--After the killer escapes, the movie gets a bit inadvertantly camp, but again, perhaps that's a matter of perspective. Who knows? Perhaps nineteenth-century Baltimore did look like a very special episode of Dynasty.
The Meta
Sadly, this one's from 1966, before meta was invented, kids. You'll all just have to use your imagination.
Year: 1964
Rating: Two severed hands.
Mr Blount: George Washington Mason, is what he called himself. Went patriotically mad on the Day of Independence.
Mr Draco: And shot his wife and two bystanders, claiming they were British spies.
Mr Blount: That's right, but a man has no right just to shoot people merely because they're British, has he?
Inspector: I agree. That's a bit drastic.
At the beginning of the movie, there's a scrolling text accompanied by a Very Serious Narrator, and the text in summary, announces that this film is so scary that the theatre has instituted "a visual and audible warning at the beginning of each of the Four Supreme Fright Points. The Fear Flasher is the visual warning. The Horror Horn is the audible warning." And then both are demonstrated, to avoid confusion, and it's like my tv's having a seizure. You know, I'd like something like this built in for other shows where warnings are desperately needed. For instance:
--any show where animal-related violence will occur so I can change the channel at speed
--at any point in CSI Miami where Horatio's about to say something in his Big Deal Voice ("Warning! Warning! Protagonist is taking himself too seriously! Whoop whoop!")
--at any point in Miami Vice where the show's writers stop writing and encourage the audience to just focus on Don Johnson's hair ("Warning! Warning! You are watching Season Five!")
Where was I? Oh yeah. The Chamber of Horrors, which opens with a cat playing a piano, and then some dude marries a dead woman. Which just goes to show you what a good time you can have on a Friday night in Baltimore.
The Good:
--I've said it before but I'll say it again: SEVERED HAND! WOOT!
--And a wax museum. That's right, it's a twofer. (And of course it features a serial-killer exhibit, because that's the law.)
--An outspoken old lady in a big hat orders everyone around, tracks down her own homicidal nephew ("He was always kind to animals but cruel to servants. That's a bad sign, I assure you."), flirts shamelessly and brings her bull mastiff to tea parties. She also loves scandalizing everyone with family gossip and a good cigar:
Mrs Ewing Perryman: She was like a...silly fainting virgin, and Jason kept her on a pedestal, which is a damn silly place for a man to put a woman. Makes it that much easier for her to kick his teeth down his throat.
I have a new role model.
The Bad
--Midget jokes.
--Older movies all seem to suffer from slow pacing; I suspect this is because as horror's evolved it's gotten much more fast-paced and shocking, so that movies like these with layered and interwoven narratives seem too tame in comparison.
--A Rudimentary acquaintance with physics leads me to suspect that you can't actually hack your own hand off with an axe underwater.
--After the killer escapes, the movie gets a bit inadvertantly camp, but again, perhaps that's a matter of perspective. Who knows? Perhaps nineteenth-century Baltimore did look like a very special episode of Dynasty.
The Meta
Sadly, this one's from 1966, before meta was invented, kids. You'll all just have to use your imagination.