Mansion Of The Doomed
Directed by Michael Pataki (1976).
Michael
Pataki has an amazingly varied career, he’s the voice of the banned Ren &
Stimpy character George “Liquor” American. He's acted in exploitation like The Glove
with Rosie Grier and John Saxon, Dead & Buried, Graduation Day and a lot
more, check it out here. He’s done everything in between from cartoon voices to scraping the bottom barrel of 70’s TV. Even though he’s only credited with a few films and connected
to the Band clan (Albert and Charles). He also directed our star attraction tonight Mansion of The Doomed.
Pataki decided to attempt a trashy remake of Eyes Without A Face and let Stan Winston handle the eyeless makeup effects making this run down looking oddity a little more special. Let’s try and forget that Frank Ray Perelli (who wrote this and LaserBlast) was ever involved. Put that shit out of your mind right now. I love TV movie quality films with a sinister edge and Mansion has this in common with another favorite of mine, the Toolbox Murders. Richard Basehart stars as the criminal surgeon who must trap people into handing over their eyeballs for his daughter’s transplant. Before Stan Winston soared onto glory he constructed all the eyeless people fighting each other in their jails and does a pretty decent job, another Alien connection is an appearance by Lance Henrikson. Although the picture is very dark, you still get a good view of the effects. The poor rubes that trust the doctor must be so confused when they wake up, I mean one minute they are doing awesome in a job interview then the next their eyes are being surgically removed (and immediately thrown in the trash once they fail). The Doctor knows that the eyeball transplants won’t work, but is a blithering idiot and cannot bring himself to stop. There are so many close calls and goofy scenarios as the Doc. cons people out of their ocular jackpots! One of the best scenes: while kidnapping a little girl, she goes “Hey this aint the way to DisneyLand!” Two stars from another favorite of mine are featured too, Mel (Vic Tayback) and Gloria Grahame (stars of Blood and Lace). Here’s the link.
Pataki decided to attempt a trashy remake of Eyes Without A Face and let Stan Winston handle the eyeless makeup effects making this run down looking oddity a little more special. Let’s try and forget that Frank Ray Perelli (who wrote this and LaserBlast) was ever involved. Put that shit out of your mind right now. I love TV movie quality films with a sinister edge and Mansion has this in common with another favorite of mine, the Toolbox Murders. Richard Basehart stars as the criminal surgeon who must trap people into handing over their eyeballs for his daughter’s transplant. Before Stan Winston soared onto glory he constructed all the eyeless people fighting each other in their jails and does a pretty decent job, another Alien connection is an appearance by Lance Henrikson. Although the picture is very dark, you still get a good view of the effects. The poor rubes that trust the doctor must be so confused when they wake up, I mean one minute they are doing awesome in a job interview then the next their eyes are being surgically removed (and immediately thrown in the trash once they fail). The Doctor knows that the eyeball transplants won’t work, but is a blithering idiot and cannot bring himself to stop. There are so many close calls and goofy scenarios as the Doc. cons people out of their ocular jackpots! One of the best scenes: while kidnapping a little girl, she goes “Hey this aint the way to DisneyLand!” Two stars from another favorite of mine are featured too, Mel (Vic Tayback) and Gloria Grahame (stars of Blood and Lace). Here’s the link.
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