03/11/10 - The Mansion of Madness (Edgar Allan Poe: Dr. Tarr's Torture Dungeon)

The Mansion of Madness (Edgar Allan Poe: Dr. Tarr's Torture Dungeon) (1973, 88 min)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068504/

Another Wednesday means it's time for another "bad" film. This one didn't look promising from its introduction but I was still hoping for some entertainment.

The film is about a traveler (Arthur Hansel) who visits an asylum to study the inhabitants and how they are treated. The odd Raoul Fragonard (Claudio Brook), disguised as Dr. Maillard (another character) is who runs this sanatorium.

I will preface these comments by saying that I have never seen a movie try and fail at so many things as this film has. For one, the movie can't decide if it wants to be serious or a comedy. Unfortunately, it isn't good at either. Mostly, though, the film is serious, trying to make us care for the various "inmates" of this asylum and how cruel they are treated. But when it introduces some insane person and then you never see them ever again, there's absolutely no attachment to them whatsoever. Thus, I don't care about any of them. As for the main characters, the acting is so terrible and atrocious that I find myself in a similar state of apathy towards them. The banter between the two leads is so bland and stiff that I almost couldn't stomach it after a while. As for the comedy points, the movie occasionally tries to insert goofy sound effects into the piece to where it seems like I'm watching a live action version of Looney Tunes. This was entirely inappropriate and just contributed the overall ill effect this movie produced.

The film slowly (ever so slowly at 88 minutes) marches towards a grand finale. Unfortunately, this finale is just as bad as the preceding time. In the end, there's supposed to be a final confrontation between the two leads where we assume the "good" guy will kill the evil impostor doctor. Instead, some random woman bursts into the middle of the fight, grabs a gun, and shoots the bad guy in the heart. Then we get what seems like a five minute death scene. A horrible ending to a horrible film.

Overall, I gave this film a 4/10. I can't think of a single thing done right. Even little things like the sound effects are poorly done. With so much random pointlessness going on all over the screen during each scene, I thought something would go right, but that didn't turn out to be the case.