The Funhouse

Two teenage couples decide to hide inside a carnival funhouse and spend the night there but when they witness the murder of a gypsy fortune teller by a hideously deformed employee they end up fighting for their lives. It has been many years since I last watched this, back then it was on bootleg VHS. Although I now own it on DVD I did actually opt to watch on tape, though not a bootleg this time! Bizarrely this got banned - but never successfully prosecuted - in Britain as a Video Nasty. Reality is there is little in the way of gore or nastiness here. The film starts with a shower scene, an obvious nod to Psycho, but with a bit more flesh on show! Most of the running time takes place at the fair but it's not until the second half that it really turns into a horror movie. Horror and the carnival often go hand in hand and here Hooper has done a fantastic job, in my opinion this is one of his best movies. It is very rich in colour, atmosphere and tension. Great make up by the legendary Rick Baker. Funhouse is creepy but fun viewing, highly recommended.

Certainly not in the list of greatest Tobe Hooper films, but must say it is an old slasher you would need to see if you are a fan of that genre. We are introduced to Amy Harper (Elizabeth Berridge) in a scene that is Alfred Hitchcock's PYSCHO meets John Carpenter's HALLOWEEN. It surprisingly does work well and works better than most films that have been influenced by those pair of classics. I think you can thank Hooper for that. Amy is off to the carnival with her new boyfriend Buzz (Cooper Huckabee) and two other friends Liz (Largo Woodruff) and Richie (Miles Chapin). After some good scenes that well set up the carnival atmosphere they decide to spend the night at the funhouse.

Hooper really does create some very good tension in the film. To go along with good and intense music by John Beal. Along the way though we do see a major influence to this film and that is FRANKENSTEIN. What with one of the workers of the funhouse hidden behind a Frankenstein's monster mask and the secrets that are revealed about that character. Personally, I feel the second half of the film doesn't work as well as the first. Not to say that the second part is bad. Far from it, but to me the build up just seemed to work better than when you are getting into the meat of the story.

Rick Baker did some good makeup effects and also starring Kevin Conway who nicely portrays three different barkers at the carnival and William Finley as Marco the Magnificent.

Fast-paced and atmospheric thriller set in and around the carnival midway. Two couples visiting the local traveling carnival decide to spend the night in The Funhouse and fool around as a lark. After witnessing a murder, they become the targets of a deformed maniac and his barker dad who are determined they will not leave to report it to the police. I read the Owen West (aka Dean Koontz) novelization back in the day, which was infinitely more padded with back story, abortion issues, religious fanaticism, and a rather Byzantine attempt to link the heroine and her younger brother to the killers before they ever set foot on the midway. Mercifully, the film abandons all of the excess baggage and strips the story done to the bare essentials. I enjoy Tobe Hooper's direction here much more so than that shown in the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre as it seems we are seeing a much more polished effort. He nicely establishes the atmosphere of the midway, which by turns is colorful and sordid. The central characters are nicely delineated (although due to the abandoning of the subplots from the novelization, Shawn Carson's younger brother seems like a fifth wheel rather than integral to the story) and well played by an appealing cast. They seem like credible and overwhelmed young people rather than fodder for the axing. Lead Elizabeth Berridge, in particular, has a nice girl next door quality and radiates a resourcefulness through her terror without ever seeming like either Superwoman or a victim. The make-up for the primary killer is particularly effective and novel. The film builds up a substantial head of steam before going for broke in a wild Grand Guignol climax. The score is also worth mentioning as it provides a very effective counterpoint to the action. Ironically, this film is rarely mentioned by horror fans, having been buried amid the morass of Friday the 13th clones that proliferated in this period, but it is definitely one that should be rediscovered.

Up until THE FUNHOUSE, Tobe Hooper had only come pretty close to recapturing the relentless and ruthlessly nightmarish feel of the classic that catapulted him to fame, THE Texas CHAINSAW MASSACRE. TCM 2 came closer than most of his films, but it traded in psychological terror for buckets of blood 'n' guts, where the first TCM had very little.

THE FUNHOUSE goes back to Hooper's roots, trading in the gore for playing with your nerves like Jimmy Page playing guitar. Traveling carnivals have always had a sinister, menacing undertone to them - that's part of what makes them so attractive - and Hooper, with a smart assist from Larry Block's script, takes that queasy unease and turns it up to '11', so that when the true horror is revealed, it's intensified that much more.

Four friends on a double date (Elizabeth Berridge, Miles Chapin, Cooper Huckabee and Largo Woodruff) decide to hole up in the Funhouse of a traveling carnival just outside of town way past closing time, just for kicks. It's a weird place that gives off a freaky vibe, but they don't come to realize just how freaky, until they see something that puts all of their lives in danger, and realize to their horror that not all the freaks in the show are fake...or at all "fun".

I don't want to spoil the surprises, but as is his habit, Hooper front-loads the movie with some acting vets, including genre favorites William Finley and Sylvia Miles. Plus the great Kevin Conway plays a pivotal role in bringing about the terror and death that the seemingly endless night holds for the trapped teens.

Anyone expecting Hooper and company to just pour on the gore is bound to be disappointed. THE FUNHOUSE is more about empathy and atmosphere...I mean, who HASN'T been through a funhouse like this at some time in their lives? The more you can put yourself in the place of the main characters, the spookier the film will be for you - especially in the third act.

Kudos to everybody for putting in some damn good performances, but especially to Berridge and to Wayne Doba who gives us a monster that is by turns pathetic, disgusting, pitiful and horrifying. And for John Beal, who created a score that plays with your nerves just as powerfully as the visuals do.

This is one of those best viewed alone, with the sound up and all the lights out...And don't worry - if you screech like a little schoolgirl at some parts, it'll be our secret, I promise...(hehheh)

Fun-loving teenagers break into a carnival funhouse for an overnight spree and discover that there's a bloodthirsty and deformed murderer inside waiting to pick them off one by one.

The Funhouse can't help but be unfavorably compared to director Tobe Hooper's triumph, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It doesn't quite hold a candle to that film and it's intensity, but all the candy colors of the funhouse corridors aren't a terrible place to lounge around for 90 minutes and the makeup effects for the main bad guy are impressive.