Amanda Norman
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Vincent Price House of Wax 1953 Review
OMG!
You have to remember that my blog is titled ‘Inside the Mind of a Horror Photographer’ and it’s all coming out now.
I decided tonight that I wanted to watch a Vincent Price classic and chose a House of Wax as I remember it vaguely from my teenage years. The film, which is one of Vincent Price’s greatest in my opinion, is brilliant and had me laughing at 
the intermission part.
I watched the version made for 3D and the Intermission was so cheesy with a man playing with a small bat with a ball attached to string. He was deliberately aiming it at the camera, purely to show off 3D, but it was also a part of the film where he’s encouraging people to enter the waxworks.
Vincent Price who plays Professor Henry Jarrod, was magnificent in his portrayal of a brilliant wax sculptor who is renowned for creating dummies that look so life like. His business partner suggests burning down the place and splitting the insurance and after a struggle, his museum is burned to the ground destroying all of his wonderful work. Jarrod survives the fire, but he’s severely disfigured and cannot use his hands like previously. He then turns to murder and uses real bodies to create his life like wax dummies.
Revenge is sweet when Jarrod murders his partner and uses his body as a feature in his chamber of horrors and you will have to watch the film to see how the storyline unfolds.
The thing that I find very disturbing are the similarities between Vincent Price’s character, Professor Henry Jarrod and the real life Body Worlds scientist Gunther von Hagens. They both use dead bodies as exhibits and they both wear the same hat.
Have you ever been to one of Gunther von Hagens exhibits?
I have about 5 years ago roughly and I’m still numb to this day. Although people say that it’s for scientific purposes that Hagens does it, I think he does it for art as well. I remember seeing one of his creations, a man standing there with his skin draped over his arm. I was shocked, but I can’t complain as I paid £11 to see it as I was caught up in the curiosity of it all. You can’t tell me that the creation below isn’t art?
Back in the 1950’s when a House of Wax hit the cinema, I bet people never imagined in their wildest dreams that people in the future would pay to marvel at creations made from the bodies of the deceased. It would have been viewed as pure fantasy, but you know different if you’ve ever walked amongst Hagens dead. It’s even more shocking when you visit Hagens website and he has a page all about body donation.
I wonder what Vincent Price would have thought of it?
Extreme Horror is INSIDE For Halloween
To celebrate Halloween, my favourite time of the year, Luke and myself invited the one and only @HorrorExtreme (Steve) round to watch some movies, review them and have a laugh. I can admit that both I and Luke ( @1uk3) were very nervous about having to watch one of Steve’s choices, but he brought a selection down and I chose a French movie titled Inside.
Prior to the launch of Inside, things started taking a weird turn when @HorrorExtreme decided to chat up Sheila. What’s wrong with that you might ask?
When @HorrorExtreme asked for a custom rosary, I never knew it was for Sheila. He was very taken with her…
Then the wandering ghost made his appearance and unsuccessfully scared us.
At last, the film was ready, but one of us was about to crash and it was only 20:30. What a cop out Luke! That’s what you get when you don’t pace yourself and you had to feel sorry for him with his white pallor and bloodshot eyes.
Film Review of Inside (2007)
Absolute blood fest of a movie, which @HorrorExtreme thought was sweet.
As soon as I found out that the movie I had chosen was French with subtitles, I momentarily paused as I didn’t think I would get into a film that I would have to concentrate on reading. I thought about it and took one look at the other bloody and gory DVD’s on the table and I thought it was safer to stick with Inside and I’m glad I did.
I was instantly grabbed by the cinematography, which was outstanding and it certainly set the tone for the movie. I didn’t realise that the main character called Sarah (Alysson Paradis), was a female photographer, but she used a Canon, enough said!
It was quite a bizarre film as I couldn’t fully predict what was going to happen. The female photographer who was clearly pregnant, was slowly coming to turns with life after surviving a car crash, which killed her husband. I couldn’t make out if she was being haunted or actually stalked by another female played by Béatrice Dalle in a black dress with a corset on top. Then came the scissors! Oh my God!
If you get off on lots and lots of blood in your movies, you have to watch Inside. Yes, at one point I will admit hiding behind my cardigan with hand over my eyes not wanting to see what was happening on the screen, but the storyline was that compelling that I couldn’t turn the movie off.
Following Inside and the movie review that myself and @HorrorExtreme did, which should be on his site soon, it was now time to watch a film of my choice and here it comes…..
The Abominable Dr Phibes (1971)
Of course I’ve seen this movie before with the magnificent Vincent Price, but I hadn’t seen it in years and @HorrorExtreme had never seen it.
I love the imagery in this film and immediately you’re freaked out by a man rising from the ground dressed in a shimmering black cape and gloves, face concealed and playing a massive organ. Then if that’s not enough, you’re introduced to Dr Phibes Amazing Clockwork Orchestra and then a beautiful woman arrives to dance with the hooded one.
The Abonimable Dr Phibes is the tale of Dr Anton Phibes who takes revenge on the nine doctors who couldn’t save his wife’s life. A frogs head, bats and draining a victim of his eight pints of blood are some of the methods used by Dr Phibes.
Vincent Price is very good in this movie, but I do prefer Theater of Blood and his acting in that film a lot more than this one.
Now you won’t get a review out of ‘cop out whimp boy’, Luke or @HorrorExtreme as they had both passed out by this stage and I was the last one standing.
Vincent Price Reads Edgar Allan Poe – The Tell Tale Heart
I can’t think of a better partnership in horror than Vincent Price and Edgar Allan Poe. Can you?
Vincent Price’s reading of Poe’s ‘The Tell Tale Heart’ is full of suspense and horror and it’s simply amazing to watch.
Part 1
Part 2