Simply Perfect

Absolutely the worst movie.

The story-telling is good with flashbacks.The film is both funny and heartbreaking. You smile in a scene and get a soulcrushing revelation in the next.

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

This use to be, hard to find, bit of Psychotronic Cinema has finally been released in an excellent transfer and Baby Boomers and modern fans of off-beat, exploitive, gimmick-ridden, bizarre, cultural phenomena, and just good old fashion B-Movies can get in on the "eye" popping fun.It is guaranteed that if you see the first few minutes there is no turning back. With its gruesome opening and creative camera shots it will trans-disfigure you for the next 80 minutes or so. After all, this one is full of treats for Dive-In Movie lovers. There are some good makeup effects, a beatnik scene, some Noirish Photography, sexual innuendos, and more. With a nod to Director/Huckster William Castle and a marketing-persuasion to suggest to the zombified TV viewers to leave their "living" rooms for the Theaters. This fun-fest has one thing or two that keeps it from reaching the best of the best, the very long audience hypno scene for one. But who cares, the rest of this is so entertainingly enticing that most viewers are helplessly seduced by this little seen Movie. In the ads, and also on screen, there was a very strong WARNING to not try Hypnosis at home. For a bit of equally hokey irony, they could have added...Not for the impressionable (the target audience).

Hypnotic Eye, The (1960) *** (out of 4) Surprisenly effective horror film has Detective Steve Kennedy (Joe Patridge) investigating some gruesome cases where woman are self mutilating themselves in a wide range of ways. One day Kennedy and his girlfriend (Marcia Henderson) are watching a hypnotist (Jasques Bergerac) and his assistant work (Allison Hayes) and soon it becomes clear that they're putting some sort of spell on the victims. THE HYPNOTIC EYE isn't going to win any awards at the Oscars and I'd say a lot of people are going to be put off by it simply because it's a horror movie but if you're willing to give it a chance you'll be surprised at how good it actually is. Yes, there are still plenty of issues with the film but on the whole I thought it delivered just about everything you'd want from a film like it. As a horror fan, the pickings around this time were rather slim so it's refreshing to see a movie like this where it really goes for it all and delivers some effective chills. What was so surprising about the film is how graphic some of the images were when it came time to show the woman mutilating themselves. It's done in various ways including one setting her face on fire, another splashing acid in her face and another puts her face in a fan blade. Of course these images aren't shown in gory, graphic detail but the opening with the woman setting herself on fire was perfectly done and it really sets up everything else that is going to follow. The make-up effects of the mutilated women are pretty impressive as well. The cast offer up some good performances with both Patridge and Bergerac doing nice work and Henderson is good as well. Hayes is the name best remembered to horror fans and she's given one of her best roles here. I think there is one major flaw in the picture and it happens towards the end when we're treated to the hypnotist doing various tricks on people in the crowd and making them perform for the viewer. This long sequences happens towards the end and it really slows down everything going right in the story and it happens at a time when you should be getting to the ending. This sequence should have remained on the cutting room floor because what follows is a pretty good ending and a nice little twist.

... and that's too bad since for schlocky horror at its spartan best you just can't do any better than 50's and 60's vintage films like this one, Macabre, and From Hell it Came. This was never intended to compete with the likes of Universal's Frankenstein.The central issue of the plot is that the great beauties of the town are mutilating themselves. One puts her face in a running fan, another washes her face with acid, another shampoos with the flames of a gas stove. None of the girls remembers doing what they did much less why they did it. Police detective Steve Kennedy is running into a bunch of brick walls in his investigation when one night his girl takes him to see a show featuring a hypnotist. The next day the girl that was with them during the show, and one of the guests that was invited on stage as a subject for hypnotism, is found mutilated too. The detective and his girl begin to suspect the hypnotist, but still the questions remain - why and more so how, since all of the girls were found alone.The film is full of the kind of stream of consciousness dialogue and wooden acting that was a trademark of Jim Abrahams and the two Zuckers, except they were doing this kind of thing on purpose often as a spoof of these kinds of movies, and in these old B horror films it works well. Plus this old film is loaded with scenes that were knocking on the door of breaking down the old production code once and for all such as Desmond the hypnotist putting his subjects in a sexually receptive trance so that he can make out with them while a deliberate yet passive Justine looks on vicariously. The film has been splendidly restored by the Warner Archive, and I highly recommend that copy as everyone else who is peddling DVDs of the movie is using third rate unrestored copies. Not just for Halloween, this one is for anytime you're in the mood for a guilty pleasure.

Involving story starts out with separate reports of young and beautiful women intentionally disfiguring themselves. Investigators come to think they may be linked to a suave hypnotist (Jacques Bergerac) and his sexy female assistant (Allison Hayes in one of her best roles), so one of the detectives decides to use his own girlfriend as bait. This is a consistently interesting film, even if you have to suspend a good deal of disbelief in accepting how easily the culprit can get away with his schemes. The whole concept feels ahead of its time for the period and there are some surprises, especially in a reveal at the end. Good movie. *** out of ****