Country: U.S.A.
Genre(s): Drama
Director: Samuel
Fuller
Cast: Peter Breck /
Constance Towers / James Best
Plot
Looking to boost his
career with a sensational story, reporter Johnny Barrett pretends to be a
disturbed man in order to pass as a patient in a mental ward and solve a recent
murder. Things don’t go as planned,
however, and he soon loses touch with his own sense of reality.
What I Liked
Few films can find
let alone walk the wobbly tight-rope between B-movie schlock and fine art as
well as “Shock Corridor.” Quaking with a
neurotic mess of silly psychos, face-biting nymphos, pop psychology,
electroshock therapy, strippers, and incessant yelling, the film is a
black-and-white kaleidoscope of exploitation ridiculousness. Yet it rises above other films of its kind in
two very important ways.
First is the
unabashed way in which the filmmakers use a mad house as a metaphor for 1960s
America. As Barrett gets closer to three
of his fellow patients in particular, he learns of that the sources of their
illnesses stem from the social ills of contemporary society. One man has been so ostracized for his
Communist beliefs that he has convinced himself he is dead Confederate General Jeb
Stuart to compensate. One of the
scientists who designed the atom bomb has reverted back to a childlike state to
avoid the guilt of responsibility. And,
most fascinating of all, a black man is so troubled by his status as second
class citizen that he comes to believe himself not only a white man, but a
member of the KKK.
Even more important
to the film’s status as a bonafide classic is the cinematography. The severely underrated cinematographer Stanley
Cortez (“The Magnificent Ambersons,” “The Night of the Hunter”) enhances the
sense that the ward is a world all to itself, with its own innate natural laws. As the story continues and Barrett’s own
psyche falls pretty to these laws, the camera angles go off-kilter, distort,
and sometimes turn completely upside down, adding to the growing sense of
unease. The claustrophobia of the film is
made more potent through Cortez and director Sam Fuller’s emphasis on the
single hallway the patients call “the street” and the shadows lurking in the corners
and side rooms. Thus the movie has a
unique, eye-popping look that can only be described as psychedelic noir.
The movie’s likable
blend of cesspool and quality clearly left its mark on later generations of
filmmakers. From an infamous Dave
Chappelle skit, to the motifs found in “Shutter
Island” by Martin Scorsese, to a lot that can be found in Quentin Tarantino’s
work, much of what was considered so deviant about “Shock Corridor” when it
first came out is now considered brilliant when modern filmmakers imitate its
strangeness.
What I Didn’t Like
The movie’s depiction
of psychology and psychosis can’t be taken seriously. But accurately capturing the complex nature
of the human mind was likely not anywhere on Fuller’s agenda. “Mark Twain didn’t psychoanalyze Huck Fin and
Tom Sawyer,” complains one character in the film. It’s true, and seems to be Fuller’s
point. He’s telling us a story and, just
because the details used to tell that story might be scientifically incorrect,
doesn’t mean the story doesn’t have something to tell us.
Like the goofy
psychos of the ward, the B-movie melodramatic acting and shock value tactics
would be hard to put up with if it wasn't for the fact that the film's better qualities render its faults charming as only the best cult cinema can be.
Most Memorable Scene
If Fuller got the
nature of personal psychosis wrong, he certainly captured the insanity of mass
psychosis with frightening realism. As I
mentioned earlier, the insanity of society itself is a major theme of the
film. The moment when a black orderly is
chased down the hall by a ravenous crowd of mental patients who have been spurned
into attacking him by a racist rant from another black man is a fine
example. The whole scene is legitimately
terrifying, an unflinching portrait of the madness in human civilization.
My Rating: 3.5 out of 5
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