The Mansion of Madness

This is a Mexican adaption of the Edgar Allan Poe story 'The System of Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether'. It tells the tale of a journalist who travels to a sanatorium to report on eccentric medical techniques practised there. This is frankly a really bizarre feature. Right from the get go this is odd. It is sort of a horror film yet its atmosphere is almost quirky a lot of the time. The music reflects this by being spectacularly inappropriate throughout. I suppose with a central idea of the lunatics taking over the asylum, the general off-kilter strangeness is imbued in the music and general mood. There is a multitude of oddball characters that feature throughout the picture, culminating in a finale involving menacing chicken people. No, seriously.

I guess this movie can best be described as a surrealist film. Seeing as its Mexican and made around the same time as Alejandro Jodorowsky was making movies this makes more sense. There must've been something funny in the Mexican tap water back in the early 70's. So I suppose it will probably appeal more to those who appreciate weird art films rather than anyone after a Gothic horror yarn, which to be honest this film really isn't. While it's certainly a memorably nutty film, it would be remiss to not mention that it's a little rough around the edges as well. It's really a mixture of quite bad film-making with some pretty impressive moments. The overall strangeness is probably ultimately its chief selling point though. So if you have an interest in the bizarre then this certainly will tick a few boxes for you on that score.

It was the grisly demon-possession flick "Alucarda" (1978) that first made me aware of the talents of the late, underrated Mexican director Juan L. Moctezuma. Anxious to see more, I popped in the DVD for Moctezuma's first film, 1973's "The Mansion of Madness" (also, fortunately, on the Mondo Macabro label), and was pleased to discover that it is another winner, although much less disturbing and intense a horror outing than "Alucarda." The film nicely captures and expands Edgar Allan Poe's 1845 short story "The System of Dr. Tarr and Prof. Fether" (one of many that Roger Corman never got around to adapting!), and shows what can happen when the inmates of a madhouse literally take over the asylum. In the film, we make the acquaintance of a young man named Gaston Leblanc who has recently graduated from journalism school in 19th century America, and played by hunky dude Arthur Hansel (who looks a good 20 years too old for the part). Leblanc returns to his French homeland to do a story on a mental institution run by one Dr. Maillard (Claudio Brook, the doctor turned demon slayer in "Alucarda"), whose innovative "soothing system" of letting his inmates run free has been causing quite a stir in medical circles. But shocking surprises await Leblanc as he enters the titular "mansion of madness"....

This film, I should say, starts out very strangely, and Maillard's initial tour of his institution may cause some viewers to shake their heads in bewilderment. My advice would be to stick with it, though, as several plot twists serve to both clarify matters and ratchet up the suspense. Novice film director Moctezuma gives the viewer something interesting to look at in virtually every shot, especially toward the picture's conclusion. That banquet sequence is a literal phantasmagoria of oddball characters doing unusual things, the frame filled with hyperkinetic wonder. Kudos also to cinematographer Rafael Corkidi, especially for his stunning work outdoors. A welcome addition to the Poe story here: a romantic subplot of sorts featuring an inmate named Eugenie, played by beautiful Ellen Sherman. And speaking of "beautiful," Susana Kamini, who played the gorgeous Justine in "Alucarda," can be seen in this film as well. Look sharp: There she is, playing the topless inmate on the receiving end of that fishing pole! Opening with a pensive voice-over amongst lovely country scenery and concluding with a seeming homage to--of all people--"Little Caesar"'s Rico Bandello, the picture is a fascinating experience from beginning to end. Thanks again, you Mondo Macabro maniacs!

I kinda like this bizarre Mexican flick which was a mix of "Hearts of Darkness" and "The Island of Dr. Moreau". Anyone familiar with these types of movies made south of the border in the seventies know that coherent plots are not to be expected. Gaston LeBlanc has come to witness the revolutionary treatments of Dr. Maillard in his spacious sanitarium. When he is introduced to the Doctor and his lovely niece Eugenie he is taken on a tour which begin an array of odd encounters with the patients who seem to roam free. As Gaston beholds the increasingly eccentric methods of Maillard's "soothing system" he begins to question the mental stability of the doctor. Chicken Man would of had me running out the front door long ago but I guess that's just me. After one of the Doctor's religious ceremonies involving Eugenie almost comes to a murderous end if not for Gaston's intervention she is taken away for punishment which for what he's witness can be just about anything. Gaston saves Eugenie, whom he has fallen for, and she tells him that Maillard is actually an escaped convict named Fragonard who led a revolt by the inmates imprisoning the real Dr. Maillard and his staff. With Fragonard's system for controlling anyone he sets out for, what else, world domination!

I can see how "Dr. Tarr's Torture Dungeon" can turn people off. If you are expecting a gory exploitation/torture horror film you will be sadly disappointed. This is actually more of a comedy than anything as the sheer lunacy of some of the scenes inspire some serious laughs. Claudio Brook as Maillard/Fragonard is especially entertaining as his rantings and constant cackling convinced me that nobody is more crazy in this asylum than him. It does have some slow moments when the dialogue gets a little to wordy for me but the occasional pair of naked breasts made up for that. I don't know what director Juan Lopez Moctezuma's fascination with bird people was but he definitely had an ample amount in this movie. Not everyone's cup of tea but nonetheless a movie that kept me entertained for most of its 82 minute run time which is a lot more than I can say for most of the other titles in this "Chilling Classics" collection. Give it a shot.

I've waited a long time to see DR TARR'S TORTURE DUNGEON and after I watched it, I was really disappointed by it. It's not the Baroque film I expected it to be. The trailer (which I saw on a Something Weird DVD) is much better than the entire film, which is remarkably forgettable. There are almost no stand out scenes in it and the look and feel is interesting but it doesn't even come close to other Baroque styled movies out there, from Fellini or Jodorowsky. The characters are dull and there's almost nothing dramatic going on, even though we see rape, crucifixion, insanity, etc.

The main problem with DR TARR'S TORTURE DUNGEON was the fact that it was a talk-a-thon more than anything else. It was almost like watching a book. I just wanted the film to have moments of silence or mood or something, instead we see/listen to the main characters chit-chat endlessly about dull stuff.

A missed opportunity.

If Terry Gilliam and Alejandro Jodorowsky joined forces and made a film while tripping on acid, the result might look like Mansion of Madness, directed by Juan López Moctezuma (producer of Jodorowsky's equally bizarre El Topo).

The film stars Arthur Hansel as journalist Gaston LeBlanc, who is sent to write an article on the ground-breaking psychiatric work being done by Dr. Maillard at his remote sanatorium. On Hansel's arrival, it's abundantly clear that the man who introduces himself as Maillard (Claudio Brook) is every bit as mad as his patients, and that the lunatics have taken over the asylum, yet the journalist seems oblivious to this fact and takes a tour of the madhouse. Maillard spouts unintelligible nonsense about his radical treatment (which he calls 'the soothing method') while introducing Hansel to various occupants of the hospital, including his pretty daughter Eugénie (Ellen Sherman), a man who thinks he is a chicken, and an old codger called Dante who is chained to a cross in the dungeon.

Hansel finally cottons on to the fact that something isn't right and tries to escape, taking Eugenie with him. The writer learns from the woman that the man who calls himself Maillard is actually a brigand named Raoul Fragonard who has taken the sanatarium by force, released the patients and locked up the staff, including the real Dr. Maillard, who is Eugenie's father. While on the run, Hansel is reunited with his friend Julien Couvier (Martin LaSalle), but the trio are soon captured and taken to be sentenced by Fragonard...

Hardly a frame goes by without something incredibly weird happening, the abject lunacy accompanied by a score that would be best suited to a kids' Saturday morning cartoon (comedy drum rolls, xylophone glissandi, a penny whistle). The whole thing looks and feels like a demented comic-book, with over-the-top performances to suit, but it's all so relentlessly delirious and in-your-face that it winds up being extremely irritating as a result. I think I have a fairly high tolerance for surreal cinema, but this one was just too much for me, with patients lurking in chimneys, random nudity, a band playing bizarre instruments, people trapped in glass boxes, a nutter riding a sheep carcass, a dance routine from three weirdos covered in feathers, a man hidden by celery, and Fragonard being shot whilst wielding a turtle.