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Director: Herschell Gordon Lewis
Screenplay: Allen Kahn
Cast: Ray Sager (as Montag the
Magnificent); Judy Cler (as Sherry Carson); Wayne Ratay (as Jack); Phil
Laurenson (as Greg); Jim Rau (as Steve)
A Night of a Thousand Horror (Movies) #56
It seems inappropriate to give an
average review to one of Herschell Gordon
Lewis's just after his sad passing in September 2016, so I'll start this
review with only immense praise to him to counterbalance this, something deserved
as one of the most important people of the American phenomenon of exploitation
cinema. Many directors, stars and producers, including frequent Lewis collaborator David F. Friedman, are responsible for this movement but as much of
its aesthetic style, which became a pop art flourish in itself and is lovingly
paid tribute to with Arrow Video's
cereal box sized Blu-Ray collection of his work, can be found in his pronounced
emphasised on promotion and luridness, his worlds of bright bubblegum colours
alongside bright red gore contributing to an exploitation cinema aesthetic that
I and many others loves, and can be found in anything from fanzines to music
like psychobilly. He was the inventor of the splatter genre, as important in
itself to a whole size of horror cinema of obsessing over blood and using
animal organs bought from the butchers. I like Something Weird (1967) immensely as a snapshot of the growing
obsession with the paranormal which only got weirder, living up to its title,
in the seventies and American pop culture, and whether you like Blood Feast (1963) or not it's a
historically important film that has to be preserved - if not as a Video Nasty
or for being one of the first gore films, at least for Fuad Ramses' giant
eyebrows. His theme for Ten Thousand
Maniacs! (1964) is exceptional, both composing and singing it, and I have a
fondness for the monotonous drum beat, also played by Lewis, that makes up Blood
Feast's main theme. Regardless of my criticisms of The Wizard of Gore, I can only have absolute admiration for Lewis and his career because of all
this.
With this is mind it's a shame to
find faults in The Wizard of Gore
but a large part of this is really because it's an acquired taste in his
filmography than like Blood Feast. This
is entirely down to the very repetitious structure which can be sluggish in the
slower moments - Montag the Magnificent (Ray
Sager) performs a gruesome magic trick involving a female audience member,
(by chainsaw, by swords, by industrial punch press), only for the volunteer
when they seem okay to suddenly die of the same affliction of the trick hours
later, leading to police investigation and broadcast host Sherry Carson (Judy Cler) and her sports journalist
boyfriend Jack (Wayne Ratay) to
suspect Montag is involved. The police procedure is entirely responsible for
the weaker moments of the film. As much as I am someone who doesn't immediately
like a film just for gore, with Lewis
he's at his most rewarding with the sloppy, blood drenched gore scenes or with
the more openly absurd and camp moments of hysteria; the police investigation
and small talk, especially over ninety minutes, is out of place with what makes
Lewis rewarding, particularly when
his most famous film Blood Feast is
a lot shorter in length. This type of exploitation cinema of the period
especially, because of its ninety plus minute length, needs something to keep
the viewer's attention and in this case it lacks the general weirdness of the
titular Something Weird or Mal Arnold's performance in Blood Feast to compensate for the drearier
scenes.
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When Montag is onscreen or the gore is split, The Wizard of Gore becomes entertaining in an incredibly sick humoured way. While his tone is comical, I've always found Lewis' gore, because its exceptionally fake, to actually gross me out, the tactile nature of his polystyrene heads and real butcher shop animal organs exceptionally disturbing at points, close-ups of Montag molesting an actual eyeball, possible a sheep's for all I know, from a very fake doll's head actually gross to see in its viscous and tangible reality. (Not surprisingly, and Lewis would've rubbed his hands in glee at this, the first of his films I saw at eighteen or nineteen, The Gore Gore Girls (1972), actually offended me with its lurid fake prosthetics and leering at their destruction, the infamous milkshake scene taking his obsession with fake gore to its inevitable conclusion, still burnt into my mind whilst having never seen the film since). When it gets to the finale as well and breaks from the repeating of magic tricks, it manages to tap into a legitimately creepy idea of how Montag is able to hypnotise everyone around the country who is watching the TV broadcast he is on; all reduced to staring hypnotised to the screen with blood dripping off the back of one hand each, the director who openly admitted he didn't make art did take into something legitimately freakish I have to commend him on.
While the reason behind the
deaths are obvious, the unexplained supernatural nature of the film, from the
layers of reality cut between in during the magic shows, to the multiple scenes
in (naturally) blood red hue of the bodies being taken away to an unknown
destination, stand out as the more interesting parts. And the final twist is
hilarious in pulling the rug under the viewer and causing them to scratch their
head in bafflement - it's a random turn of events, ending in a kaleidoscope
image, but brilliantly its set up at the beginning with Montag's opening
monologue about the subjectively of reality, forcing one to admit Lewis was purposely fucking with the
viewer out of his (justified) amusement since the beginning. And it's in this where
the film is rewarding, the ideal taste of low brow surrealism found in this era
of American exploitation cinema eventually found by the end. If The Wizard of Gore was slightly
shorter, I would've gladly recommended it but, unfortunately, I have to ask
people who've never seen films of his to proceed with caution due to its
bloated length.
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