Perversidad

Movie takes place at a huge seaside hotel in California. In it handyman Jason (Randolph Roberts) attacks and kills blonde women. He then hides the bodies so they just go missing. The hotel has a security man searching for the people and beautiful Lisa James (Tiffany Bolling) is hired to sing there. She has black hair...but decides to wear a blonde wig which has Jason after her.

This was the first (and last) film shot in "Duo Vision"--basically a split screen used in 99.9% of the film (there are a few shots in the film not using it). It actually works pretty good sometimes. You see a person on one side of the screen and see what he's thinking of on the other. Still, it's just basically a gimmick to sell the film (it didn't work). The story itself is familiar and the killings are pretty non-bloody (this has a PG rating), but the acting itself is actually not half bad and the film kept my interest. Not a camp classic by any means but an OK film with a well-used split screen process. I give this a 7.

OK, if you've heard anything about this movie, it's that the entire thing is in split-screen. 1970 was in the period when movie gimmicks were dying; William Castle had turned to producing with "Rosemary's Baby" and given up directing, 3-D was dead, and the audience participation concept was eradicated. "Wicked Wicked" must have been a nice return to the selling gimmick. Only this time, you didn't get items as a gimmick (bloody axes, 3-D glasses, plastic coins, barf bags), the whole movie viewing experience was a gimmick. Unfortunately, the makers of the movie thought that the split-screen effects would make "Wicked Wicked" a great film. In fact, it's just the opposite.

I have always loved the idea of split-screen techniques used in movies (employed heartily by Brian dePalma for "Carrie", "Dressed to Kill", and others) and jumped at the chance of seeing this when I heard of the gimmick. Here's the final verdict: fun to watch, just don't take it seriously. The plot is flimsy (a murderer is stalking a hotel) and most of the acting horrible. But how can a movie go wrong with Tiffany Bolling in the cast? Beautiful blonde Tiffany Bolling spends half the movie in a black wig, the other with her gorgeous blond locks playing a lounge singer stalked by the killer. This woman steals the show, just like she does in "Kingdom of the Spiders" and "The Candy Snatchers". The music is atmospheric and makes for great background music, but is finally pushed to the point of head-splitting annoyance!

If you enjoy split-screen and Tiffany Bolling, watch the movie. If not, you will probably find the whole thing tedious (which most of it is) and a cheap attempt to win an audience. Doesn't work a horror film, but will definitely win a larger cult if MGM just releases this on video (likewise with "Night of the Lepus" and "Private Parts"!).

"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!!!

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.

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!