Bis die Gänsehaut erstarrt

The movie serves the gimmick of two screen viewing, but it's more annoying and pointless than anything. Lots of the time one side is just someone doing something mundane like examining wallpaper or sleeping while the other side has the important stuff. There was no real need to do an entire movie like this, it was just an interesting idea to try... unfortunately in practice, it kind of sucks. It's a standard slasher movie with bad acting so you're not missing much if you never see this. Needed a better plot and more thought out use of the duo-vision to be of any worth.

"Wicked, Wicked" was a film that I waited with such anticipation to see at the age of 12 - after seeing the promo trailer on television and the poster in the theater my curiosity was aroused.

I loved films as a child - any film. As long as it seemed like an event. I was not big on classics at the time so my catalog was being developed. I don't think that at the time it was supposed to be a great film.

It was fun however. And later in 1976 - when my parents owned a theater I persuaded my father to get "Wicked, Wicked" as a second feature for "Demon Seed" - it is a fun film and only for the excitement as "Earthquake" has Sensurround as a gimmick - "DUO-VISION" was the gimmick.

See it for the excitement - not for the logging into your classic diary. It does make you laugh and wonder about the time period. Not much different from today - I have walked out on several of todays movie, while sitting through all of "Wicked, Wicked" as a child.

It is fun!!!

Wicked, Wicked is unique in that it is shot entirely in DUO-VISION (a gimmick of early 1970's cimena). Brian DePalma used this technique with great success in both Carrie and Phantom of the Paradise. The problem here is that Richard Bare is no Brian DePalma and the story is completely idiotic.

the one saving grace of this film is the moment at which the duo-vision becomes "uni-vision" during the climactic moment of the story. You have to see it to appreciate the greatness of that one shot. Perhaps the director came up with that idea and then made a whole story around it?

This movie has several strikes against it from the outset. First off, is the split-screen ("duo-vision") gimmick, which is effective when used sparingly by filmmakers like Brian DePalma (or going WAY back silent French filmmaker Abel Gance), but is pretty annoying when used extensively (check out the ill-advised sequel "More American Graffitti"), and likely to give many viewers a splitting headache. Then there is the killer who is stalking a seaside hotel. The movie not only makes no attempt to hide his identity from the start, but the clues he leaves along the way are so incredibly obvious that you want to scream at the protagonist (a dimwitted, womanizing security guard)for not being able to figure out who he is. Finally there's the wretched theme song ("Wicked, wicked, that's the ticket. . .") that was apparently actually sung by actress Tiffany Bolling, who should have stuck to stripping off in bad movies like this (and speaking a stripping off, Bolling takes her usual gratuitous shower in this movie behind a particularly opaque shower curtain, just to add insult to injury).

Despite all this though, I kind of enjoyed this movie. It has an enjoyably nasty sense of humor, and only in the 1970's could anyone possibly get away with making a wrongheaded experiment in cinematic ineptitude like this and still have it backed by a major studio (MGM). As for those who find this misogynistic or offensive, check out a couple other Tiffany Bolling vehicles/feminist treatises "The Candy Snatchers" and "Centerfold Girls" sometime!

With the split screen there are two stories being told with 2 soundtracks. Frequently, the dialogue side is turned down so that it can't be heard over sounds from the other half. It's extremely annoying and reduces any interest in watching the rest of the film.

Was it that poorly mixed for theaters, too, or was this just a bad copy on TCM?

I was also amused by the organist playing some random mood music. We see the sheet music for the piano score for the 1925 PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, but the notes visible in some shots are not the ones being played. It may be legit Phantom music, but who knows for sure?

Other reviewers here have sufficiently summarized the rest of the film.