House of Wax

Most people will find this movie creepy even today; those who love camp will enjoy the prolonged ping-pong paddle scene catered to the orginal 3-D audience.

All in all, one of Vincent Price's best films, proving once again that nobody goes horribly insane quite like Vincent Price.

The movie begins with Vincent Price as Professor Henry Jarrod. He takes pride in his wax figures which he often refers to as his friends. They speak to him, and he understands them well, and how they want to be made. In a way to make more money, an investor burns up the museum and flees the sight leaving Jarrod for dead. A couple of years later, people begin to disappear, kidnapped in the night. This happens at the same time that Jarrod, who is now in a wheelchair, wants to reopen his museum, with new figures that resemble some of the people that disappeared. He claims that he uses pictures of the missing people in the paper as a muse for the figures, but a women named Sue knows better. She swears that the figure of Marie Antoinette looks like her kidnapped friend Cathy Grey. Sue decides to make it her mission to find out what is going on at the house of wax.

Another great thing in "House of Wax" is the acting. In the recent Harry Potter film, the director has long takes. Scenes of about five minutes all in one take. The same happens in "House of Wax" except some scenes could be closer to eight or nine minutes. This is amazing considering some actors nowadays act for about thirty seconds before cutting away. The actors back then really had to act for many minutes at a time. "House of Wax" is a great horror film, and try and catch it on tv.

ENJOY!

Rated Approved back in 1953, but if I had to rated it probably a PG for brief violence.

The wronged artist takes his revenge by creating a House Of Wax or Chamber Of Horrors in the style of today's Ripley's Believ It Or Not Museum. Wax figures pose in scenes of dramatic violence taken directly from history - the beheading of the wives of Henry the 8th in Tudor England, the burning of Joan of Arc, the guillotine executiones of the French Revolution, etc and a very impressive Ford's Theatre replica in which John Wilkes Booth shoots Abraham Lincoln. Vincent Price's character is killing his victims and then uses their corpses as wax statues. The heroine of the film picks up on his little scheme since the death of her friend (played by Carolyn Jones who would later play the role of the tv mom Morticia Addams in The Addams Family 1964-1966). Her body became encased in wax as the Joan of Arc statue. The film was originally made for 3-D, the current rage in the movies of the 50's especially for sci-fi films and monster movies. Much of the movie is scary because it's so subtle. The creepy, eerie sense of being alone in a wax museum, where the eyes of the figures watch you is very predominant. Suspense builds and there is a sense of mystery typical of a Gothic novel of the 19th century or an Edgar Allan Poe story. The film is set in 19th century New York City. A great film to watch and suited for fans of the older horror genre. Not exactly Alfred Hitchcock nor Bela Lugosi films but Vincent Price carries the movie with aplomb and this style of horror became his trademark. Five stars all the way. The performances by all the lead actors are well done. The movie is subtle, psychological horror drama with no blood but with a very scary sense of criminal madness. This "artist" is really the kind we don't want to have around these days.