Sunday, October 9, 2016

31 Days of Horror #8: The Tingler (1959) **

Directed by the showman William Castle and starring horror legend Vincent Price, The Tingler is relentlessly silly, but always entertaining.  Price plays a pathologist who discovers fear actually triggers the growth of a parasite on people's spines and then undergoes an LSD trip, one of the first acted out on film - so it might be worth watching for that. Gimmicks aside, The Tingler makes little sense, with goofy subplots and Price playing it all with a straight face. Castle had nurses on call during screenings and installed buzzers in the seats, a charming showmanship Joe Dante payed tribute to in his 1993 film Matinee.  Not "gory" by any means, simply horror as amusing diversion, nothing more and nothing less. 


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