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MADHOUSE
aka
THE REVENGE OF DR DEATH
Rating: 
UK. 1974.
Director – Jim Clark, Screenplay – Ken Levison & Greg Morrison, Based on the Novel Devilday by Angus Hall, Producers – Max J. Rosenberg & Milton Subtosky, Photography – Ray Parslow, Music – Douglas Gamley, Special Effects – Kerss and Spencer, Makeup – George Blackler, Art Direction – Tony Curtis. Production Company – Amicus/AIP.
Cast:
Vincent Price (Paul Toombes), Peter Cushing (Herbert Flay), Robert Quarry (Oliver Quayle), Natasha Pyne (Julia Wilson), Adrienne Corri (Faye Carstairs), Linda Hayden (Elizabeth Peters), Ian Thompson (Bradshaw), John Garrie (Inspector Harper), Jenny Lee Wright (Carol Clayton)
Plot: Twelve years after distinguished horror actor Paul Toombes retired from a nervous breakdown, he is persuaded to return to England to reprise his famous role of Dr Death in a tv series. But as shooting on the series begins, someone dressed as Dr Death starts killing off the cast and crew.
This AIP/Amicus co-production seems to have been a conscious attempt to copy the success of Vincent Price’s The Abominable Dr Phibes (1971) and its sequel Dr Phibes Rises Again (1972) and, in particular, Theater of Blood (1973) – all of which centered around Vincent Price playing a flamboyantly eccentric character engaged in a series of tongue-in-cheek killings. This copies the same formula but the tongue appears to have become unglued from cheek, much to the film’s loss, where only becomes apparent its utter routineness. Everything is predictable, particularly the identity of the Dr Death killer. The title Madhouse has no particular reference, unless it is to Cushing’s country mansion with his mad wife Corri in the decaying basement – but this is hardly a major feature of the film and the film does not fall into the Old Dark House genre.
The film’s greatest distinction is probably its featuring of horror icons Price and Cushing both of whom rise to audience expectations. Its one other distinction is its willingness to use the horror genre recursively – ie it being a horror film set around horror films. There are the odd amusing asides – “if this were a horror film, by now you’d be dead,” Price comments as starlet Linda Hayden tries to blackmail him. Boris Karloff and Basil Rathbone are credited among the opening cast list despite the fact their appearances only come from scenes taken from AIP’s Tales of Terror (1962) and The Raven (1963).
Copyright Richard Scheib 1999-2012
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