The Funhouse

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Horrorphile - July 2008

The Funhouse

July 8th 2008 00:27

The Funhouse (1981) is a relatively innocuous ride, but it has potential. I can see this being remade with greater measures of oomph! eeek! and boo-yah! There is a lot of scary fun to be had at the carnival, and although director Tobe Hooper claims to really like the movie, he could have made it so much better. All the ingredients are there, but out clunks a mediocre movie.

Four teenagers head to the local fair on a double date; Amy (Elizabeth Burridge) and Buzz (Cooper Huckabee), Liz (Largo Woodruff [what is it with American actor's names?!]) and Richie (Miles Chapin). The two guys look like they’re in their late 20s, but there’s nothing new there.

The Funhouse Elizabeth Burridge and Shawn Carson

Amy (Elizabeth Burridge) is given a scare by her kid brother Joey (Shawn Carson)

We first meet Amy at her home where she’s about to shower. Her fresh face looks so young, that when she disrobes and reveals a very ample bosom it’s rather disconcerting. Someone is stalking through the house; their POV shows them take a knife from a sheath on a bedroom wall, then puts a clown mask to their face, hmmm, Halloween(1978) anyone?
?!

The Funhouse Cooper Huckabee and Elizabeth Burridge

Buzz (Cooper Huckabee) and Amy gawk at one of the Freakshow exhibits

The stalker then enters the bathroom and (in homage) pulls back the shower curtain and attempts to stab young Amy. But the knife blade bends instead of penetrates, aha, it’s made of soft plastic! Amy pulls the mask off to reveal her mischievous kid brother Joey (Shawn Carson). He sure must have got an eyeful! Amy swears she’s gonna get him!

The Funhouse Largo Woodruff and Miles Chapin

Liz (Largo Woodruff) and Ritchie (Miles Chapin) trundle into The Funhouse

The four adolescents (I use that word tenuously) wander around, visit palm-reader Madame Zena (Sylvia Miles), Marco the Magician (William Finley), and the Freakshow exhibits which includes a cow with a cleft palette and another with two heads (no special effects make-up there!), then Richie suggests it would be really cool if they hide inside the Funhouse ride overnight as a kind of dare to themselves.

The Funhouse Cooper Huckabee, Elizabeth Burridge, Largo Woodruff and Miles Chapin

Buzz, Amy, Liz and Ritchie hide out in The Funhouse

The girls are in for a laugh, so they smoke a joint behind one of the carnival tents and jump onto a couple of Funhouse carts. The Funhouse is basically what was called the Ghost Train at the fairs I used to go to as a boy; crazy mechanical puppets and eerie sound effects in the dark as you’re shunted around on what feels like a labyrinthine miniature train track, eventually bursting out at the exit in a state of frightened excitation.

The Funhouse Wayne Doba and Sylvia Miles

Below the couples, Frankenstein's Monster (Wayne Dobo) attacks Madame Zena (Sylvia Miles)

What started as a lark quickly turns dangerous and deadly after they witness a murder, stupidly Ritchie steals money belonging to a freaky man in a Frankenstein mask (Wayne Doba), and then when the freaky man’s father, Conrad Straker (Kevin Conway), one of the carnival barkers, sees a lighter dropped through the cracks in the ceiling by Ritchie he sends his freaky son to get them.

The Monster without his mask

But not before the freaky son tears off his Frankenstein mask to reveal an even more hideous visage underneath; a demonic-looking face split in half, almost as if he might be the half-human offspring of the cleft-palette cow! The special effects mask designed by Rick Baker and applied by Craig Reardon is very disappointing though. It simply looks like another mask. I guess the budget didn’t leave much for Rick to play with, unlike An American Werewolf in London, released the same year.

So the two couples are terrorized by the monster, whilst Amy’s kid brother, who made the curious decision to sneak out of home and follow them to the carnival, I guess he had a bad feeling.

Apparently Steven Speilberg asked Tobe Hooper to direct E.T. but Hooper turned the offer down because he was already committed to doing The Funhouse (1981). Speilberg got him for the next movie; Poltergeist (1982), although rumour has it Speilberg was on-set most of the time calling the shots.

Amy screams for help in vain

The cast are mediocre at best, but there are three stand-outs: Elizabeth Burridge has genuine charisma, Kevin Conway has a ball (playing all three carnie barkers), and Sylvia Miles hams it up before being strangled in her skimpy gypsy attire.

The Funhouse Cooper Huckabee and Kevin Conway

Conrad Straker (Kevin Conway) is pinned

The Funhouse is rated R in Australia (no one under 18 is allowed to view the movie), which is very odd as there is seems to be nothing in the movie that fits the criteria for such a high rating. I’d love to know why it has received such extreme censorship. There’s a scene of pot-smoking, a couple of scenes of bare breasts, a little swearing, and some moderate violence; but no graphic blood-letting or gore, and certainly no full-frontal nudity, sex, or sexual violence. Very strange, perhaps it’s a mis-rating?

The final girl is given a final chill outside The Funhouse

It’s not that Tobe Hooper is an incompetent director, far from it, but The Funhouse just doesn’t deliver the goods. It could be remade with the whole nightmare carnival element ramped-up and exploited to the max. Remember carnivals are full of weirdo carnies and extreme joyrides; the fear factor needs to be smashed with a hammer so that it shoots high and hits the bell. Hooper dabbles with the scares, but ultimately delivers with a whimper, not a bang, the movie by no means being the terror-ride it should’ve been.

Perhaps it’s that silly freak mask, it just failed on all levels, and he’s the monster we’re meant to be scared of. The Funhouse puppets (genuine articles from the turn-of-the-century) are neat though, and there’s a fantastic rising crane-shot halfway through the movie that for cinephiles is almost worth the price of admission. If I’d been the camera-operator, damn, I’d have been scared!

Here's the original trailer:

The Funhouse DVD is courtesy of Umbrella Entertainment, many thanks!

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Posted By: Bryn - Category: movie reviews

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Comments

6 Comments. [ Add A Comment ]

Comment by Damo

July 8th 2008 01:30

For the Sake of Argument
My Apologetics

I have seen a few film that have been R rated for not real reason. 'Double Vision' was one that seemed less deserving that half the MA movies about.

I think at the beginning of the 80's the R rating was part of the marketing for low budget flicks. Something like a badge of honour. A lot film may have been rated in the 70's and 80's and never reassessed since.

I seem to remember a different poster for Funhouse am I correct.

Comment by Bryn

July 8th 2008 03:39

Horrorphile

Damo, yeah, you're probably right, it no doubt got slapped with an Aussie R back in '81 for the drug use and females in jeopardy angle. In my mind this movie should definitely be re-rated MA. That is an original poster, but the video and DVD artwork features a menacing clown-cum-jack-in-the-box.

Comment by KylieW

July 8th 2008 04:45

Celebrity Obsession

I think I have seen this movie, but can't really remember anything about it.

I've read that Dean Koontz based his book Funhouse on this movie - novelised it so to speak. It was a bloody good book.

Comment by Bryn

July 8th 2008 07:11

Horrorphile

Kylie, ahhh, yes, I was meant to mention that. He wrote it under a psuedonym, Owen West, I think. The movie was delayed and so the book came out first and thus readers thought the movie was based on a novel, but it was actually a novelisation. Good huh?

Comment by Nathan 1

July 9th 2008 17:30

Might look into this one just for fun (carnival horror has a strange attraction)...a good carny horror film is carnival of souls the 1998 one. Actually I can't remember if it's good but it still sticks in my mind despite having seen it as a kid.
That's weird you say that about Koontz because I was reading Intensity which seemed just like the film Switchblade Romance.

Comment by Bryn

July 10th 2008 01:23

Horrorphile

Nathan, I didn't know they'd remade Carnival of Souls. I liked the spooky original from the 60s.

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