So much average

Just perfect...

Highly Overrated But Still Good

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

A scientist (played by Vincent Price with his usual aplomb) discovers an organism that attaches itself to the human spine and feeds on the feeling of fear from the host person. The parasite is known to be present as it makes the spine of the person feel a tingling sensation. For this reason its known as a Tingler.Add into this premise a plot line involving a couple who own a small cinema, one of whom is deaf and mute and another story strand involving the wife of Price's character and her potential infidelity.I was obsessed with the film's director William Castle as a boy as I had read so much about the gimmicks he dreamt up to make the audience's movie-going experience something out of the ordinary and in keeping with a 'roll up, roll up' circus host as well as a filmmaker.The gimmick for The Tingler was for some of the seats in the larger cinemas to have an electrical device attached underneath so that some audience members really did feel a tingling sensation at the end of the film when Price's character has to announce to the cinema audience within the film that The Tingler is loose in the theater somewhere. Castle also employed planted screamers in the audience and people who were told to faint at specific points. A young John Waters famously went to see this film on its original release time after time but only after checking under every seat until he found a seat that had the device attached.As I had read plenty about Castle and his brilliant brand of showmanship it was almost as if this overshadowed the actual films. His films weren't available in England when I first read about his work and so there was an agonising wait before I could see any of his filmography.And here in lies his greatest gimmick. For all of the pranks and hoopla, his film's are actually amazingly made, beautiful to look at and constantly achieve just the balance of terror, kitsch and camp.The Tingler is no exception. It captures the opulence and majesty of 50's American living in some scenes (check out the set design) but also a kind of affectionate simplicity of small town life symbolised by the gorgeous little moviehouse.But then there's the pure hilarity of The Tingler which is obviously a large rubber bug. Its one of the funniest scenes in the movie when Price tries to convince fellow characters that The Tingler could in fact kill a man effortlessly and quickly. But then thats the magic of Price- a camp knowingness and deadpan delivery. A raised eyebrow from him says more than a hundred lines from an inferior actor.Even the introduction from Castle could be evaluated as high art if it was viewed merely as a short film rather than as an intro to his movie. The filmmaker warns people of what is to come and that they should scream for their lives if they experience what is being played out to them on the screen.High art. C'mon Criterion- release a William Castle boxset already.

This is one of those 1950's movies that are hopelessly hokey, a plot that is thinner than a see through bikini, but is fun none the less. William Castle, better known for the original "House on Haunted Hill" than this one, once again teams up with Vincent Price in a hopelessly cheap film that does have one elaborate murder sequence, or is it murder of a good 90 minutes?A real dedication to this type of film was done much more elaborately later when John Goodman did "Matinee", as when you watch this one it is obvious Goodman's character is based on Castle, even the producers own introduction to this movie at the start. It is so much fun that it is really campy in a lot of ways, even in 1959.We have a silent movie theater, a mute woman, her strange husband, Price as the Doctor working in his lab, his evil wife trying to kill him, and her sister trying to court Daryl Hickman. They want to get married but evil sister and Prices wife doe not want that. Since she has all the money to control Price and her sister, well a buck is always a buck and so it goes.Then there is The Tingler, ah the little piece of terror that lurks inside all of our bodies. Price has found it and is going to tell all of medical science about it once he isolates one. The little critter actually resembles a shelled seafood but the special effects budget for this one are blown on a color sequence that is a part of the murder. Actually, this murder sequence is pretty elaborately done, and there is a bit of a twist, is it induced by a drug or did it really happen?All I can say is the spirit of Price and Lawrence Woolsey are all wrapped into this movie somehow. As for it really being scary, I think the dark sequences made for theater showings are made for groping your date, though I wonder if the vibrators Castle put into theater seats when they showed this one enhanced that groping feeling?

The Tingler its directed by William Castle, infamous for his gimmicks on movie theaters, often compared to Hitchcock, but I say that he may be better than Hitchcock.The Tingler has some great acting and a slow pace, but its quite atmospheric, the movie itself its great, it has even some very chilling and suspenseful moments, many people find the tingler to be quite campy, and it is, but I think that's what William Castle wanted,a surreal feeling. The film talks to us about fear, and the monsters it can produce, hate and senseless violence have always come from fear and the movie illustrates that very well.Overall, great acting, directing and writing, definitely recommended for those who are willing to look for more than just a B-movie.

William Castle classic about a pathologist (Vincent Price) studying the effects of fear on the human body who arrives at the conclusion that a creature exists in all of us that feeds on fear. He calls this parasite the Tingler. Price wants to capture a living Tingler to prove his theory, but it's virtually impossible since people scream when terrified and those screams kill Tinglers. Well, a theater owner with a deaf mute wife he's eager to dispose of might provide the answer to Price's dilemma.Complete and utter nonsense but I love it! Price is awesome, as usual. This is the movie where Vincent Price takes LSD, kids. That has to be seen to be believed. Backing him up is a nice cast. Philip Coolidge, Darryl Hickman, and Pamela Lincoln are all good. Patricia Cutts is great as Price's bitchy tramp wife. Judith Evelyn gets to silently ham it up as the deaf mute. This is William Castle's masterpiece. It has a very original story, a great horror star, and, of course, a patented Castle gimmick (Percepto!). While it does have tremendous camp value, it actually is effective as a thriller. I especially liked the creative use of color in one pivotal scene. It's just a fun movie. Do yourself a favor and watch it asap!