Rish Outfield's reviews
In glorious 3-D(!!), Professor Jarrod is a wax sculptor who loves his creations as if they're his own children. But when his treacherous partner at the wax museum sets it ablaze (and Jarrod with it), he is unable to sculpt anymore (and is missing his face). Well, after a few mysterious murders (including said doublecrossing partner), Jarrod opens a new wax museum, filled with figures so incredibly lifelike, you'd swear you saw these faces before. At their funeral, perhaps?
This was apparently the first film released in 3-D by a major studio (a hint was the poster which read, "The first feature brought to you by a major studio in 3-D!"), and it was the first film in 3-D I've gone to (I don't think Captain Eo counts). The pleasure of putting on the glasses and seeing everything, from the Warner Bros. logo to the chandeliers poke outward is hard to describe. Even if I had hated this film, I don't know if I could give it a bad review. But then again, Freddy's Dead had some 3-D in it, and that didn't stop me from hating that. The only truly negative thing I can say was that it seemed long, even though it only clocks in at ninety minutes, probably reminding me that my generation has no attention span.
Set in the 1920's, this had some very strange moments. Women were flighty, fainting things with corseted waists the size of their necks. Men were brash, chauvinistic things ("Only a skirt could think up such nonsense"). One of said corseted women (Carolyn Jones) was a golddigger with a high, squeaky voice and she seemed to typify the attitude of the times. It was a romantic period (if I can go by the film, which had moments that seemed to be out of the 1800's) and one I'd like to see more of. The story wasn't particularly original, and miles away from complex, but what this film had going for it was that it was fun. The 3-D, though distracting every once in a while while you're brain tried to make sense of the images, was exciting and new. The scene where a barker hits a paddleball into the camera has to be seen to be believed, especially since it is so gratuitous. We enjoyed it, though–-there was even a bit of applause from the audience, which is always nice (back home, a movie character could fly right out of the screen, walk up the aisle, and buy everybody a bag of popcorn, and no one would applaud). Vincent Price, as usual, is just too likable for words whether slinking about and saying nothing or stuck in a wheelchair and speaking smoothly and craftily. When we know he is the killer and we know he is deformed, we find him more likable than the heroes. And I still rooted for him even though I knew he would plunge to his death. Or did he--there was never a Return to the House of Wax, was there?
Best Scare: One of the Can Can dancers sticks her . . . can directly into the camera–-and your face.
I'd Recommend It To: If you can see it in a theater in 3-D, don't walk, RUN. On video it's probably pretty average.
Note: Are there still houses of wax? Besides ones featuring fake Elvises and Liza Minellis. Maybe it's just that, because we see department store mannequins every single day, wax figures don't hold novelty. It could be that with television, movies and video games, people find sculpted figures as dull as imagination and books. I don't know. Perhaps the era of wax museums is gone forever, much like the era of movies in 3-D.