उपयोगकर्ता समीक्षाएं

A movie like this has to be judged fairly - and that means being judged by the standards of its era. It tackles a subject that in 1938 would have been taboo to pretty much everyone - the scourge of syphilis, and the associated sexual "looseness" that was seen as its cause. Yes, I know that this is considered an "exploitation" film - one dressed up as an educational film in order to get past censors who would have objected to some of the sexual innuendo contained within it. Still, there is no doubt that at one time syphilis was a major health issue, and so this also comes across as something of a "scare tactic" - a way of warning people to avoid sexual immorality lest they contract the terrible disease. Thus, the words "they must be told!" in the opening credits. The first 20-30 minutes or so jump around a little bit. We see a fair bit of a burlesque show attended by a lot of people, some hints of lesbianism as one girl tries to convince another to spend the night with her, "wild" house parties with couples going off together and assorted shots of those wanting to do battle with the disease and the loose morals at the root of it. It then settles down largely to the story of Millicent - a small town girl who went to New York and caught the disease, then returns home and spreads it to her new husband and their child. The tragic results of the disease are portrayed, and the movie then tries to end on a hopeful note.

This isn't a particularly good movie. It drags at times, but I thought the subject matter was worthwhile, and looked at from the perspective of 1938 it was courageous. One can only go so far with courage alone, though. Eventually, you have to judge whether a movie has quality or not. This one fails on that count.

Sure there are camp moments in Sex Madness, a film which somehow tries to gain the notoriety that 'Reefer Madness' has but fails despite having tons of elements that should point in it's favor.

In the beginning it starts off strongly, with all sorts of people going to a burlesque show (and jamming the auditorium up!). This show is probably the highlight of the movie, plenty of silly dancing, no nudity, and clunky choreography. I liked the personalities that showed up for this. A group of randy boys looking to party, a lesbian couple who can't stop pawing each other, and a man who gets all worked up he rapes the first girl he sees. Funny, but ALL of these plot lines get dropped for Millicent (!!), a dancer in the chorus, who finds out she has VD from her doctor. After taking a tour which she's all chipper about seeing icky cases of VD, she goes into treatment, carefully hiding it away from her fiancée. After going home and seeing another doctor who gives her a quack cure, she marries and.. well… you can guess the rest. Rest assured that as foul as it sounds, it drags somewhat, and is nowhere as memorable as 'Reefer', (admittedly, I thought It was going to be of the same looniness). It's okay for some laughs, but doesn't hold up.

At first it was good, but then it got boring. I really loved the burlesque show. It was so great. I wish there were still shows like this now. Men getting turned on by girls in big feathered hats and sequin leotards jumping around with big grins on their faces seem a little less threatening than those who want genitals of women they've never met before shoved in their faces. Sorry to be so graphic, but the movie makes you realize how drastically sex shows have changed.

That is really the main part of the movie that caught my attention. The film does have valid points about how you shouldn't have a kid if you have syphilis. And you shouldn't have sex if you have it either. However, the whole idea of someone with this disease being forbid by their doctor to get married seemed a little strange to me. Plus the main woman was in cloud nine the whole as if the whole world was either completely wonderful or completely horrible.

I also thought the point about the "quacks" was interesting because it's harder today to figure out if a doctor is a quack since we have such a high rate of suing for malpractice. A doctor today might push some unnecessary pills on you so that s/he will get some money from the drug company, but they would never go so far as to guarantee you are cured of syphilis and can now freely have sex with people when you actually weren't cured at all. That's just bogus. I'm glad that doesn't happen anymore.

Watch this movie to see how drastically times have changed but also to educate yourself about this disease. It's the only thing that hasn't changed.

Actually, most film portrayals of sex and drug use before the Hayes Commission were not timid, and then afterwards (circa 1930) they had to have some sort of moral equation showing the results of such behavior. This film, post 1930, would have fallen under Hayes guidelines, and consequently meets those guidelines, and yet the depiction of immoral behavior, for the time, and the consequences of such are fairly progressive. The whole idea of sex education for young persons, and of exposing the public to the reality of sexual diseases, is something still being tossed around in today's society. This film is on the progressive side of this debate, albeit dated, and those snide commenters who decry this film as being too prudish or preachy have little idea of what was really prudish and preachy in the 1930s. The grand images of that past time as presented by Hollywood are merely that, images. The reality is much less wonderful, and each new generation feels that it is the generation that is the most sophisticated of all. I have no fear that the young generation of 2070 will have a great laugh at our current ways.

This is another one of those scare tactic movies from the 30's that's more hokey than fact. I laughed throughout the whole movie watching the antics of "normal" people in the 30's. It's supposed to teach you about the dangers of syphillis, but is more entertaining than informative.

This movie ranks up there with "Reefer Madness" and "Cocaine Fiends"......entertaining and nothing more.

I highly recommend it to anyone that wants a night of belly laughs.

SEX MADNESS is one of those exploitational 'public information' films that weave dark and decadent stories of ordinary, wholesome characters whose lives are ruined by vice. This film exclusively tackles the topic of syphilis, depicting it as a blight that can ruin the lives of men, women, families, and even children.

As is usual for this genre of film-making, the main character is a bright and wholesome young girl whose sordid journey into darkness begins when she appears in a beauty contest. Before long the usual sleazy middle-aged types are taking advantage of her, and when she's diagnosed with syphilis, all seems lost.

There are many other characters in the film, all of whom are designed to portray the different ways in which syphilis can affect the unwary. The effect on unborn babies is explored, as are the quack doctors with their 'cure anything' pills. The subject matter is an interesting one, but unfortunately this is an amateurish production with a plodding pace and very poor acting, so it's near impossible to enjoy.

It's an old scratchy movie about the danger of syphilis. It seems proud of itself for dealing with the disease, although the treatment, so to speak, was better done in Warner's "Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet." It's preceded by one of those announcements trumpeting the seriousness of the subject. You've probably seen them before. If it's not syphilis, it's some other lethal threat. It's the mad empire of Japan, the jack-booted threat of Naziism, the crepuscular shenanigans of "organized crime," the lure of dope, the tentacular charm of Margaret Groin, the girl who refused my invitation to the senior prom because I insisted on wearing Bermuda shorts.

The acting is terrible. Let's get that out of the way first. There has been better acting in a high school production of "Our Town" in Scotch Plains, New Jersey. Story-wise, it seems that the new District Attorney or somebody is raiding girlie shows. His last drag netted eleven girls who were seen removing their hampering garments on the public stage.

I found myself wondering about the agents of social control who were assigned the loathsome task of watching the shows until the crime was committed. I kept thinking of Anthony Comstock, the postal inspector of the 1800s and sworn foe of Margaret Sanger, who couldn't tear himself away from the perusal of salacious material. He even blocked some medical texts from reaching medical schools. A lifetime devoted to reading dirty stuff so he could condemn it, a job to kill for.

This movie runs along similar lines, rather like Cecile B. DeMille's showing us Claudette Colbert taking a nude bath in ass's milk. Terrible stuff. We see a burlesque show with two dozen girls dressed in bathing suits too modest for today's tastes. In the audience, a mustachioed young man is trying to talk his girl friend into spending the night with him. "You can tell your mother you're staying with friends." Nearby a sinister and horny lesbian (in dark clothes) is seducing an innocent young virgin (in white clothes). There are cuts to the maniacal grins of drooling males in the audience. Afterwards, the boys take some of the girls to a house party, where everyone flirts and boozes it up.

Around this point it occurred to me that some viewers might be thinking, "What's WRONG with these people?" It occurred to me that maybe there was nothing at all "wrong" with them, that they were just doing what the situation demanded, that the problem (if there was one) was systemic. As individuals we tend to imitate the behavior of those around us. That's called "culture" and it's why we're doing this in English instead of Urdu, and it's why none of us will wear a toga to work tomorrow. It's why there is no such thing as "The Society For the Advancement of Ugly People." There are of course subcultures into which we may find ourselves swept up because of constitutional quirks as much as culture. There IS a Flat Earth Society and there are presidential elections.

You want a movie about syphilis? Watch "Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet." You want a movie with lots of sex? Just go to a movie.

I dipped into my Mill Creek Cult Classics DVD set this weekend because I was bored. Really, I could have found something better to do (honestly, I was too tired to give anything real my attention). These movies should not really be labeled Cult Classics, but rather "Goofy Old Propaganda Films That Are Mostly Terrible and Which You Don't Really Need to See - Knowing That They Existed Is More Than Enough." I suppose that'd be a bit wordy, though. And it really doesn't help that the quality is abysmal. Obviously, nobody cared enough to preserve these films, but I really wonder what Reefer Madness would look like in high definition. Sex Madness is a pure propaganda film which wants to warn its audience about the dangers of syphilis and other "social diseases." You have to wonder if anyone in 1938 actually plunked down a nickel to see films like this. The film basically consists of a doctor telling a skank that she has contracted syphilis, and what that entails. The authority figures of the film declare that people need to be more honest about sex, but what their honesty amounts to is shouting "keep your damn legs shut or you'll get sores! This is what they look like. Aren't they gross?" Its second piece of advice is probably more helpful: people with syphilis or other VDs need to see a real doctor, and not some quack. I'll bet that, in their embarrassment, the syphilitic would often turn to more discreet, illegal doctors (there's probably some implied abortion there, too). The film is, of course, a total bore, and it looks like crud.

1st watched 2/13/2007 - 1 out of 10(Dir-Dwain Esper): Absolutely horrible excuse for a movie. I mean, if it did it's job of educating the public against syphilis it might have been somewhat worthwhile, but even this attempt was executed very badly. This is another one of those late 30's attempts to educate the young folk on the horrors of loose living and boy does this one stink!! The acting is inept, and the plot is exactly what we'd expect from this type of movie. A local good girl moves to the big city and has supposedly one bad night of rolling in the hay and turns up with the dreaded social disease. She is told not to marry until her disease is behind her, so her longtime sweetheart waits in the wings while she treats her disease and hides it from him. A quack then supposedly cures her, she marries and then things get worse as she has a baby that gets sick and her husband gets it to. Why oh why did the health department have to get involved in making movies back in those day?? I'll have to check into this..but anyway the movie gives very little information about the disease -- just that if you party-hearty, get laid, you'll get it and your life will be Hell!! As far as I'm concerned this fire-and-brimstone type of teaching is not enough and in my opinion isn't even education. Well, I think I've said enough, avoid this clunker at any cost.

Sex Madness (1938)

BOMB (out of 4)

A sweet, young woman decides she wants to be a star so she tells her fiancé that their love needs to be put on hold while she goes to New York City to make it big. She doesn't make it big but she does have sex with someone and sure enough she catches syphilis.

SEX MADNESS comes from director Dwain Esper, the man best remembered for MANIAC as well as other exploitation films. It's hard to believe but at one time films like this one, REEFER MADNESS and THE COCAINE FIENDS were controversial pieces of filmmaking that passed themselves off as education pictures while mainly just wanted to draw attention to a naughty subject and make money off of a public willing to pay it.

Most of these films are incredibly awful without a single thing to really recommend in them. THere are countless awful things about this picture including some really awful performances, a really stupid story and of course everything technical is bad. THe editing, the direction, the cinematography and even the bad stock footage that is used at times. Oh yeah, don't forget the horrid dialogue that happens. As with other VD films, this one here features "real footage" as shock value.

I'm not going to lie, as awful as this movie is, it's still fairly entertaining simply because of how awful it is. All the false information given, the way everything is hyped up for drama and the ridiculous message are all Bad Movie Cinema 101. On that level, SEX MADNESS is worth watching.

It's a public service film against immoral sexuality and the spread of STD like syphilis. This is really bad. It's modeled after Reefer Madness. The acting is bad. The filmmaking is much worst. It is interesting to see the various sexuality being lumped together as bad behavior. There is a creepy old guy who is obviously a rapist. There are loose showgirls throwing a party. There is a suggestion of lesbianism. There is pre-marital sex. There is the casting couch. It's all equally evil. As for camp possibility, it's too long for that. At some point, it gets boring even as an exercise in ridicule.

The best part of this movie are teh early scenes in a Burlesque theatre of the 1930's. Easy sex, homosexuality adn lesbianism right on the merry old screen. In 1936!!!! It's also interesting to see the theatre itself and backstage if you are a fan of theatres of yesteryear.

After that you can pretty much turn it off because it becomes overly dramatic and preachie. With plenty of bad acting. I bet people left the theatre at this point.

This time it's syphilis, gonorrhea, VD, etc. OH BOY! I bet the teens really learned something from this piece of tripe! Listen, I know how serious these diseases are just like the next person but a film like this to "teach the dangers of it" is a no go. All their anti-drugs and anti-alcohol and anti-wild sex films like these apparently didn't do any good... all this is still around today and even worse than ever before. All a film like this does is put the viewer to sleep.

I guess they stuck all these into a 50-pack together so one can either fall asleep faster or teach us something - which ever comes first and I'm banking on the falling asleep. Zero entertainment value and a waste of disc space.

1/10

Okay, "Reefer madness" might have been so uniquely hokey that we get a laugh or two. I doubt that it was even effective in its day. However, it has moved to a sort of cult classic.

This presentation of "sex madness" does not even get off the ground. The poor acting is just that, poor acting and stilted dialog is just that, stilted dialog. To keep you interested in this they have to throw in wild parties, sex out of wedlock, lesbians, and the kitchen sink.

This alpha video presentation is not even worth renting. It might be a great gag gift for somebody you don't like.

The basic story is of a young girl going to the big city to make it big. She gets caught up in a casting couch; this casts the way she shall be for the rest of her life.

Another cautionary propaganda film. This one is not good so much as hilariously and purposefully bad.

Films like Sex Madness are early-middle 20th Century examples of Abstinence-Only sex education. In other words, the message really is, "Don't have sex because scary things can happen. Yes, those urges are natural, but only a person with low self-esteem would want to engage in intercourse before marriage. And, anyway, you might catch a deadly disease to boot."

Though these films typically portray the problem for both men and women, the message is really about women and their bodies as baby-delivery devices. I love the assumption abstinence-only supporters make: that when you're married, you won't catch STDs. OKEY DOKEY.

Sex Madness is worth watching especially if you are coming to terms with why the white-American-middle-class vision of the world has always lacked any real intelligence. Its mission has always been white people pro-creating. The film's message need not be smartly portrayed; rather, it should be portrayed repeatedly and simply for mass consumption.

I do get a kick out of the comments left for these films by IMDBers who take these genre films seriously and are shocked after watching them. Of course they are wrong. They are tools of oppression.

Finally, it's worth the purchase of the DVD for the two US Navy hygiene films that come as bonus features on an Alpha Films copy. Cocaine Fiends is my favorite of the bunch.