It could be regarded as falling into the folk-horror genre.
In some peaceful English town there’s a biker gang who call themselves The Living Dead. They’re really just juvenile delinquents. They’d like to be evil, but they’d get in trouble with their parents if they actually did anything evil.
The leader of the eight-member gang is Tom Latham (Nicky Henson). His girlfriend Abby (Mary Larkin) is one of the two female members of the gang. The other is Jane (Ann Michelle) and she’d like to be leader of the gang.
Tom really is a bit of a nutter. He’s obsessed with the idea of dying and then returning from the dead. He thinks his mother (played by Beryl Reid) and her butler Shadwell (George Sanders) know how this can be done. He thinks his father tried to do it but failed. Mrs Latham is a medium but it appears that she really can contact the dead. All Tom has to do is to convince Mrs Latham and Shadwell to reveal the secret.
Which they decide to do. It’s probably not a great idea because Tom is already unstable but he’s going to keep annoying them until they give in to him.
The secret is to commit suicide, but to really believe with all your heart that you’ll come back.
Tom tries it and it works. He suggests that all the gang members should try it.
Of course you can only die once. Once you’re dead you’re pretty much invulnerable. Which means that you don’t have to face any consequences for your actions. If you’re already inclined to violence you can now indulge that taste as much as you like.
But you do have to be prepared to kill yourself first, and you do have to believe.
Pretty soon the gang is leaving a trail of corpses in its wake.
Chief Inspector Hesseltine (Robert Hardy) has no idea what’s going on. He eventually starts to have an inkling of the truth but the police really are powerless. Maybe the gang can be stopped, but not by the police.
Tom likes being dead but he wants Abby to be dead with him. She thinks she’s ready to do it, but maybe it isn’t really so easy.
If you’re expecting a zombie biker movie with typical movies zombies and lots of gore you might be disappointed. There’s no gore at all. And these zombies look like normal human beings (which personally I think is a lot more interesting). To describe this as a zombie movie is in fact misleading. These bikers are brought back from the dead by means of an occult bargain with dark demonic forces. This is more of a witchcraft or even a satansploitation movie than a zombie movie.
This is really supernatural horror, but done as an action motorcycle movie in a contemporary setting.
The acting is OK. Nicky Henson gives Tom the right mix of arrogance and stupidity. George Sanders is a bit restrained as Shadwell. Beryl Reid overacts, which is what her role requires. Robert Hardy could be relied on to play a cop. The other players all give entertaining performances.
Abby is the closest thing in this movie to a three-dimensional character and Mary Larkin does a pretty reasonable job. Abby is the only member of the gang who actually gives some thought to consequences.
For the most part the low budget is no problem. The stunt work is very good. There is only one real special effects shot and unfortunately that’s the one time where the tiny budget becomes a problem. It just doesn’t work, but it’s only one scene at the end.
Don Sharp was a fine action director and he understood pacing so this project was ideal for him. He knew what was needed and he knew how to achieve it on a small budget.
One of the things I like about this movie is that it bears no resemblance whatsoever to other zombie movies. This movie is its own thing. There’s something refreshing about that. The weirdest thing is that these are violent outlaw bikers but they like folk songs.
The fact that the script is a bit of a mess, that major plot elements are not resolved in a clear-cut way, that characters’ motivations are sometimes obscure and the whole movie is somewhat incoherent and stylistically confused is what makes it work. It gives it an oddball flavour and a definite trippy ambience. The movie’s worst flaws are its greatest strengths.
Psychomania has its own unique flavour and for all its oddness it’s a great deal of fun. Highly recommended.
The BFI Blu-Ray/DVD combo offers an excellent restored transfer (very impressive given that the negative of this film has been lost) with lots of extras.
In some peaceful English town there’s a biker gang who call themselves The Living Dead. They’re really just juvenile delinquents. They’d like to be evil, but they’d get in trouble with their parents if they actually did anything evil.
The leader of the eight-member gang is Tom Latham (Nicky Henson). His girlfriend Abby (Mary Larkin) is one of the two female members of the gang. The other is Jane (Ann Michelle) and she’d like to be leader of the gang.
Tom really is a bit of a nutter. He’s obsessed with the idea of dying and then returning from the dead. He thinks his mother (played by Beryl Reid) and her butler Shadwell (George Sanders) know how this can be done. He thinks his father tried to do it but failed. Mrs Latham is a medium but it appears that she really can contact the dead. All Tom has to do is to convince Mrs Latham and Shadwell to reveal the secret.
Which they decide to do. It’s probably not a great idea because Tom is already unstable but he’s going to keep annoying them until they give in to him.
The secret is to commit suicide, but to really believe with all your heart that you’ll come back.
Tom tries it and it works. He suggests that all the gang members should try it.
Of course you can only die once. Once you’re dead you’re pretty much invulnerable. Which means that you don’t have to face any consequences for your actions. If you’re already inclined to violence you can now indulge that taste as much as you like.
But you do have to be prepared to kill yourself first, and you do have to believe.
Pretty soon the gang is leaving a trail of corpses in its wake.
Chief Inspector Hesseltine (Robert Hardy) has no idea what’s going on. He eventually starts to have an inkling of the truth but the police really are powerless. Maybe the gang can be stopped, but not by the police.
Tom likes being dead but he wants Abby to be dead with him. She thinks she’s ready to do it, but maybe it isn’t really so easy.
If you’re expecting a zombie biker movie with typical movies zombies and lots of gore you might be disappointed. There’s no gore at all. And these zombies look like normal human beings (which personally I think is a lot more interesting). To describe this as a zombie movie is in fact misleading. These bikers are brought back from the dead by means of an occult bargain with dark demonic forces. This is more of a witchcraft or even a satansploitation movie than a zombie movie.
This is really supernatural horror, but done as an action motorcycle movie in a contemporary setting.
The acting is OK. Nicky Henson gives Tom the right mix of arrogance and stupidity. George Sanders is a bit restrained as Shadwell. Beryl Reid overacts, which is what her role requires. Robert Hardy could be relied on to play a cop. The other players all give entertaining performances.
Abby is the closest thing in this movie to a three-dimensional character and Mary Larkin does a pretty reasonable job. Abby is the only member of the gang who actually gives some thought to consequences.
For the most part the low budget is no problem. The stunt work is very good. There is only one real special effects shot and unfortunately that’s the one time where the tiny budget becomes a problem. It just doesn’t work, but it’s only one scene at the end.
Don Sharp was a fine action director and he understood pacing so this project was ideal for him. He knew what was needed and he knew how to achieve it on a small budget.
One of the things I like about this movie is that it bears no resemblance whatsoever to other zombie movies. This movie is its own thing. There’s something refreshing about that. The weirdest thing is that these are violent outlaw bikers but they like folk songs.
The fact that the script is a bit of a mess, that major plot elements are not resolved in a clear-cut way, that characters’ motivations are sometimes obscure and the whole movie is somewhat incoherent and stylistically confused is what makes it work. It gives it an oddball flavour and a definite trippy ambience. The movie’s worst flaws are its greatest strengths.
Psychomania has its own unique flavour and for all its oddness it’s a great deal of fun. Highly recommended.
The BFI Blu-Ray/DVD combo offers an excellent restored transfer (very impressive given that the negative of this film has been lost) with lots of extras.
4 comments:
I think part of the problem Psychomania has is that the overall bargain-basement vibe makes it hard to distinguish between the parts that are deliberately silly or odd, and the parts that are supposed to be serious but look silly or odd by accident. A lot of viewers seem to think that the protagonists being England's most middle-class biker gang is a mistake, that they should be terrifying Hell's Angels satanists but the filmmakers messed it up. Pretty sure that's the point!
My only real issue is that final effects shot, normally that kind of thing doesn't bother me but here it really does put a damper on the whole thing.
Going by the name and the poster, I wouldn't have touched this with a ten-foot barge-pole, but your review has given me second thoughts. Probably won't rush out to find a copy, but I'll keep an eye open.
Morgan said...
I think part of the problem Psychomania has is that the overall bargain-basement vibe makes it hard to distinguish between the parts that are deliberately silly or odd, and the parts that are supposed to be serious but look silly or odd by accident.
Yes, it's a weird mix of things that really work and things that really don't work. But somehow it still ends up being an enjoyable mess.
tom j jones said...
Going by the name and the poster, I wouldn't have touched this with a ten-foot barge-pole, but your review has given me second thoughts.
It's one of those movies that draws you in despite its flaws. Or maybe it draws you in because of its flaws. But it's too weird to be boring.
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