Funhouse: Carnival of Terror

Hooper's modest slasher movie set in an amusement park, will convince you that it’s not advisable to go on dark rides, especially if they have physically deformed men inside. In the first five minutes, The Funhouse starts off with a relatively playful tribute to the movies Halloween and Psycho, but then unfortunately starts to drag its heels with a very slow pace and it takes a good half of the movie before any real horror happens. Moreover, the horror action doesn’t really bring anything new or innovative to the table, given it‘s the year 1981. Tobe Hooper has far more entertaining entries in his filmography. It is interesting that The Funhouse, despite zero gore and no explicit content, got on the well-known list of so-called “video nasties”, instead of the now-infamous Last House on Dead End Street, as that movie had been released under the alternative title The Fun House and British censors oddly confused them and put the wrong movie on the list. Amateurs. (18/02/2020)

Up until now, I thought Tobe Hooper was the creator of only one great movie, but proved my wrong with this one. Quentin Tarantino adores it and praised it in his book, and I'm not surprised. Funhouse is basically the concept of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (a murderous family), transposed to the setting of a carnival. Visually impressive, atmospheric, where the genius loci of the House of Horrors is exploited to the max. Perhaps only the mask of the main villain is like something out of a stupid cheesy B-movie, otherwise maximum satisfaction for me. And Elizabeth Berridge is fantastic here, especially in the tense ending. (07/10/2023)