Torture Dungeon

This is my second Milligan experience, the first being The Body Beneath, which is a fine vampire epic. This one, as my title suggests, is like a Shakespeare play if all the words of the Bard were replaced by something less good.

It is a fine piece of work if you understand what you're getting into. The costumes are excellent. Susan Cassidy, who plays the female lead, Heather, is a comely lass. When she isn't nude it looks like her clothes are about to fall off. Then there's the eminent Richard Mason who plays Ivan the Hunchback. He's hysterical. Steer clear of Albert the half-wit. His eating habits will make you lose your lunch. And we must not forget Margaret the One-Eyed Hag, played by Maggie Rogers. Possibly the actress really was one-eyed. Considering the budget and talent involved it could not be makeup--it looks too real. So I really wonder what the story could be with her.

The rest of the cast is not remarkable, nor is the story. Just a lot of murders so that one or two of the people could gain power. For all the violence there's not much gore. I did enjoy the beheading at the beginning. It may not have been a masterstroke but it happens so quickly you don't have a chance to see how fake it probably looked. And like I said there's plenty of nudity. I was pleased to see some gay stuff. I would not have thought a film from that time would have it.

It's a good time overall. Like I think I said about The Body Beneath the length of the film is just right. An hour and twenty minutes is the right length for it. If it were any longer you'd probably kill yourself. For the length it is you can be forgiving of its shortcomings. Some may disagree but I think there's something very special about the films of Andy Milligan.

It almost seems inconceivable in this day and age that someone would attempt the pomp and pageantry of a ye Olde England costume gore epic on a budget LESS than a cross-town ferry ride. And yet Torture Dungeon, the first film for producer William Mishkin's newly crowned Constitution Films, is filmic proof that Andy Milligan's audacity knew no bounds. Cue credits, the music - straight from a 40s Gary Cooper western - swells, and a procession of medieval misfits make their way down a deserted Staten Island beach, looking for all the world like a lost borstal passion play, carrying the coffin of the newly-dead king, beheaded in the film's opening by the prissy yet evil Duke of Norwich (`Jerremy Brooks'/Gerry Jacuzzo). The Duke, last in line to the throne and sterile to boot, hatches a plan to marry off the new king, who would plant the royal seed in the Queen's fertile soil. Once plowed, the Queen becomes the unwilling property of the Duke, and the remaining heirs are dispatched to their untimely deaths.

Hal Borske plays the new king strictly for cheap laughs: he's a bumbling half-wit in a blonde pageboy frightwig who eats bugs on all fours and shows more interest in nailing his plate of chicken than his new queen. His on-screen presence is cut short soon after the `conception' scene, and he gets the obligatory stake to the heart. Blood erupts like tomato soup, exit Hal. And in every one of the death scenes from Torture Dungeon, Andy's camera careers around and plummets to the ground as if it was dropped from a Staten Island ferris wheel. There's even a script direction for this: `Swirl Camera'. Now stick that one in the text books.

Unlike The Ghastly Ones, where the gore comes thick and fast, Torture Dungeon spaces its bloodshed, which leaves wide open spaces in the script for Andy's manic exposition. One scene plays like a psychedelic sex hygiene film of the 50s and features a crazed old harridan (a member of Andy's theatrical troupe?) preparing the new queen for her wifely duties while floating around the room on PCP. The Sadean Duke endlessly waxes lyrical about his personal philosophy, declaring himself `not a heterosexual, not homosexual, not asexual - I'm trisexual. I'll TRY anything.' An old chestnut, I know, but from the mouths of Milligan's characters it takes on a new sinister tone. In another memorable scene the depraved duke is caught in bed with a hunchback, unloved and beaten as a child and corrupted by the uncaring world and now the Duke's assassin and willing love slave. So, he says to his wife with a perverse sneer - ever heard of a menage a trois?

With the exception of the garish costumes (an area Andy always excelled at), the production is threadbare at every turn. The torture chamber itself looks like my Brisbane city basement, for chrissakes, and the effect of the evil Duke swinging a chain sounds suspiciously like Andy on a microphone going `Whoosh! Whoosh!' Voices veer wildly from the fruity and over-theatrical Jacuzzo to the flat Noo York drawl from the mouths of some suitably plague-scarred bookies and old Mafia types in Beatles wigs, uttering lines like `the dook of Nor-witch' with deadpan conviction. Local color, but wrong locality. And I think I spotted a Ramone or two in the funeral procession.

Torture Dungeon (1970)

1/2 (out of 4)

Set in England where the Duke of Norwich (Jerremy Brooks) plans to kill off anyone who stands in his way of getting the crown. Him and his demented family begin a killing spree to help him reach the top.

TORTURE DUNGEON is yet another film from the cult figure Andy Milligan and it's another awful one. You know, as I go through Milligan's films it's easy to look at them and wonder just what he was thinking. I mean, here's another period piece that is 99% melodrama with a screenplay that requires everyone to talk non-stop. I mean, who exactly was going to line up and watch this back in 1970? You have to wonder how much money these movies actually made when they were released.

This film here once again features a lot of dialogue as the characters are constantly discussing what they're doing or what they're going to do. It should go without saying that the dialogue is downright boring but what's even worse is the fact that the entire thing is just incoherent and doesn't make a bit of sense. The strange thing is that a lot of the cast members are actually good and manage to deliver good performances throughout the awfulness of the picture. This film also offers up a bit more blood and nudity that most of Milligan's work.

Still, TORTURE DUNGEON lives up to its title with it being "torture" to get through it.

Another of Andy Milligan's endearingly disjointed period-piece horror films...if you've been subjected to any of his other projects, then you pretty much know what's in store. If, however, you're among the uninitiated...well...there's honestly nothing that can possibly prepare you for that particular rite of passage.

As is the case with all things Milligan, TORTURE DUNGEON is entirely obstinate toward every orthodox countenance of filmmaking procedure. Contributing to its off-center allure is a creatively impetuous, Scheherazadian spiel of medieval treachery and lust for power. You just know that a movie's storyline has been slapped around by Andy Milligan when it incorporates gay hunchback love, one-eyed hags, stilted Olde English dialog, and gratuitous pitchfork gore. Plus, being the joke-of-all-trades that he was, Milligan also gave personal appointment to the wardrobe department, resulting in the film's unique visual flair which may be best described as polyacrylic Renfaire psychosis.

Is there anything not to like about this? 11/10

In your reviewer's humble opinion, schlock director Andy Milligan's most entertaining film. Plotless jumble about a power struggle for the throne of England, this has double-crosses, torture, murder, hippie-dippie Renaissance costumes and an abandoned greenhouse for the main set!

Check out this immortal dialogue from the evil prince: "I am not a heterosexual, I am not a homosexual, I am not a bisexual, I am a trisexual -- I will try anything sexual!" This before a hot three-way with a maid and hunchback.

This film is worth seeing for Magda the Marriage Counselor alone.