HOUSE OF WAX (1953)

Some critics refer to this movie as the beginning of Vincent Price's career in horror films, and I guess that's true, although he did do a handful of pictures before this (THE INVISIBLE MAN RETURNS, SHOCK) that might be described as quasi-horror, and he didn't do another one until THE FLY in 1958. For me, this movie is interesting for two other reasons: 1) it was originally presented in 3-D and it's fun to watch for all the gimmicky shots sprinkled throughout the movie, and 2) it looks and feels like a direct predecessor to the Hammer horror films of the 50's and 60's, with its attention to period detail, its use of occasionally gaudy color, its insertion of a standard lackluster romance, and most importantly, its moments of Gothic horror. Price plays an artist whose wax sculptures, which he displays in a museum, are considered extraordinarily beautiful and lifelike. The museum is barely breaking even (partly because Price refuses to pander to common tastes and make sensationalistic tableaux) and his business partner (Roy Roberts) wants to get out to invest in something more lucrative. An admiring art critic (Paul Cavanagh) is willing to buy Roberts out, but not soon enough for Roberts, so he burns down the museum, intending to collect the insurance money. Price tries to stop him, but is instead caught in the conflagration and assumed dead. Actually, he survives but with horribly scarred hands and face. Soon, Roberts is found dead, an apparent suicide hanging in an elevator shaft, but we know that Price has tracked him down, killed him, and taken the insurance money for himself. Months later, Price resurfaces (wearing a lifelike wax mask over his hideous face) with a new museum, backed by the art critic, and new statues, made by assistants supervised by Price. This museum, unlike the earlier one, is a chamber of horrors and proves to be a smashing success; also unlike in the earlier museum, some of these statues are actually dead bodies covered in wax. Roberts' hanging body is the first of these, and the second is Carolyn Jones, Roberts' mistress, presented as Joan of Arc. Jones's roommate (Phyllis Kirk) notices the resemblance and mentions her suspicions to her boyfriend, sculptor Paul Picerni, who does some work for Price. The police, still baffled by the death of Roberts (and the disappearance of his body), soon come sniffing around, and when Price decides he wants Kirk to become his waxen Marie Antoinette, we get an exciting climax involving chases, a guillotine, and a huge bubbling vat of wax set to be poured all over a naked and screaming Kirk.

Price is good here, not quite as scenery-chewing as he would be in later movies. We have sympathy for him for quite a while, seeing him as a dark avenging angel, until he threatens Kirk, and frankly, even after, as Kirk and the rest of the good guys (including Frank Lovejoy as a police lieutenant) are a colorless lot. The make-up for Price's damaged face is quite effective. His hulking, sinister assistants are well played by Nedrick Young and a young Charles Bronson (as the deaf-mute Igor). It's startling to see Carolyn Jones, who I know so well as the dark-haired, stately Morticia Adams, as a bleach blonde with a goofy voice. Kirk and Picerni are bland, bland, bland, with Picerni out of commission during most of the climax (though to be fair, it's because he is almost beheaded by Igor). The 3-D gimmicks include a line of Can-Can girls and a fist thrown right at the viewer, but best of all, the movie stops dead in its tracks for a minute while a man shilling on the street for the museum bounces paddleballs at us. I wish that Warners could have included the 3-D version of the film on the current DVD (if SHARKBOY AND LAVAGIRL can be presented in 3-D on DVD, why not this?), but it's nice to have this film in good shape, and even better, the 1933 movie that inspired this, MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSUEM, an early color feature, is included on the flip side. [DVD]