I didn't know Turner Classics had a cult movie night until I scanned the listings yesterday to see what was playing. Even though it was showing at 2:00 A.M., it was worth the trouble to stay up and tune into this bizarre flick, which might be compared to a politically incorrect episode of the 'Addams Family'. You know you've got serious weirdness when the sanest one of the bunch is Lon Chaney Jr., portraying a caretaker for a trio of siblings whose stock in trade is murder and cannibalism. But don't let that sentence put you off, this stew pot of a film is a blast, with a familiar cast of cult classic mainstays, chief among them Sid Haig as demented brother Ralph.
I got a kick out of the dinner scene when talk turned to old time horror films, and when Chaney's "The Wolf Man" is mentioned, he comments - "There's going to be a full moon tonight"! There's also a great nod to "Psycho" with all the stuffed birds in the Merrye mansion. It was also wonderful to see Mantan Moreland in one of his later movie roles, even if his screen time was abruptly ended. He was always fun to watch in those Monogram Charlie Chan films and zombie flicks of the 1930's and '40's. Come to think of it, he looked as good here in his sixties as he did back in his prime.
Speaking of looking good, Carol Ohmart got a bit racy with her bedroom dance number, but did anyone else get the idea that she could have been Meryl Streep's sister here? Her best known film role was that of Vincent Price's wife in one of my earliest horror films as a kid, "House on Haunted Hill", gave me the willies for a week.
Listen, if you've had it with the plethora of slasher/gore nonsense coming out of the mainstream media today, you owe yourself a viewing of this bizarre flick. It's impressionable enough to stay with you for days after a single viewing, and comes close to living up to it's tag line - 'The Maddest Story Ever Told'.
I got a kick out of the dinner scene when talk turned to old time horror films, and when Chaney's "The Wolf Man" is mentioned, he comments - "There's going to be a full moon tonight"! There's also a great nod to "Psycho" with all the stuffed birds in the Merrye mansion. It was also wonderful to see Mantan Moreland in one of his later movie roles, even if his screen time was abruptly ended. He was always fun to watch in those Monogram Charlie Chan films and zombie flicks of the 1930's and '40's. Come to think of it, he looked as good here in his sixties as he did back in his prime.
Speaking of looking good, Carol Ohmart got a bit racy with her bedroom dance number, but did anyone else get the idea that she could have been Meryl Streep's sister here? Her best known film role was that of Vincent Price's wife in one of my earliest horror films as a kid, "House on Haunted Hill", gave me the willies for a week.
Listen, if you've had it with the plethora of slasher/gore nonsense coming out of the mainstream media today, you owe yourself a viewing of this bizarre flick. It's impressionable enough to stay with you for days after a single viewing, and comes close to living up to it's tag line - 'The Maddest Story Ever Told'.