Tales From the Loony Bin

To mark the occasion of this, the third time that I have been in Portland, OR, today will be a look at a movie that is quite obscure, and has gone under quite a few names since its release in 1972. The Roy Ward Barker directed Asylum is a movie that is divided into four short stories about a prospective doctor whose job is to find out who is Dr. B. Starr by interviewing four different people who are in confinement at the asylum.

The first story involves a woman and her plot to get rid of a woman who was betrothed to a man she loved. Unbeknownst to her, the woman had studied voodoo, which meant that after she was hacked to pieces, she somehow killed the man and the parts started going after her. The second story is told by a tailor who had tried to make a suit for a person using an unusual fabric that brought anything to life, even the dead. The third story is told by a woman who had been in the asylum before and was being monitored after the first release. The final story is told by a doctor who tries to transfer his soul to an automated miniature version of himself, complete with oversized head.

The movie itself is pretty campy and often makes no sense if you don't go through the entire stories. Also known as House of Crazies, this movie is a little slow in its pace, and there isn't much in the way of gore to speak of, but the overall camp value is pretty good if you need a change of pace from the usual fare of gore and violence.