Movie Review: Madhouse (1974)

Synopsis: Actor Paul Toombes is hosting a New Year's party in celebration of his fifth movie starring as masked serial killer Dr. Death when his new bride, Ellen, is decapitated by someone wearing Toombes' Dr. Death costume. Twelve years later, Toombes' career has been left in shambles by the murder, which many believe he committed, and a stay in a mental hospital but is being given a second chance in London thanks to his friend, Herbert Flay, who wants to bring back Dr. Death as part of a television series. Soon after arriving, however, multiple people are murdered and Toombes once again becomes a suspect.

Who's in it? The movie stars Vincent Price, Peter Cushing, Robert Quarry, Adrienne Corri and Linda Hayden.

Review: I've had Madhouse in my movie library since last year but never took the time to watch it until finally doing so this morning. After seeing it for the first time, I am sad to say it was a bit of a disappointment for me.

I'll start out by saying the premise of the film is decent and some of the slasher scenes were fun to watch (suspenseful without being ridiculously gory). I also thought the combination of Vincent Price as Toombes and Peter Cushing as his friend/writer Flay, worked. In fact, I plan to look for some of the other movies they starred in together.

The main problem with this movie is it is extremely predictable. The film does go to some lengths to convince the viewer Toombes could have committed the murders without knowing it, either through hypnotism or a mental break. However, even with the attempt at the red herrings, there was never any doubt as to who the real killer was and that did take away some of the magic.

Also not helping this movie was the fact most of the killer's victims weren't exactly good people. There were a couple that were exceptions to that, but a stalker actress, a blackmailing couple and a sleazy producer were hardly people I could find hard to miss. On top of it, some of them would have been great possible suspects had the movie used them differently.

The movie's ending also didn't help change my opinion of the film. It was, admittedly, different. However, it was also one of those endings that seemed to be weird just for the sake of being weird and didn't really tie up any loose ends. In other words, it was passable as an ending but wasn't anything that was so amazing, it would make up for the rest of the film.

Final Opinion: The movie does have its moments, and I do like Peter Cushing and Vincent Price. However, the obvious real killer did keep this from being as good as it could have been.

My Grade: C

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