Review of House of Wax (1953) by Stuart K — 19 Jun 2012

Directed by Andrà (C) de Toth (The Stranger Wore a Gun (1953) Thunder Over the Plains (1953) and Man on a String (1960)), this is a short yet effective horror film, with another great performance from it's star, it was also the beginning of the 3D craze in the 1950's, and this has moments that were made for 3D, it also has some very creepy, unsettling moments.

Professor Henry Jarrod (Vincent Price) is a devoted wax figure sculptor, whose museum is destroyed by financial partner Matthew Burke (Roy Roberts), who didn't want Jarrod to be bought out by Sidney Wallace (Paul Cavanagh).

Jarrod is left with disfigured hands, so years later, he plans to recreate his museum and his works with the help of student Igor (Charles Bronson ). At night, a lone, disfigured man murders women and makes waxworks out of their bodies, when Cathy Gray (Carolyn Jones) is found dead and her body goes missing, her friend Sue Allen (Phyllis Kirk) see's a waxwork in Jarrod's new museum of Joan of Arc whose likeness is like that of Cathy, and she becomes curious as to what's happened, and she becomes suspicious of Jarrod's methods.

It's a well made and very lavish horror film, with Price hamming it up again, but in a good way. It has some moments of quite unsetting and upsetting horror, like all the waxworks melting at the start is near unwatchable.

But, it's fun seeing Bronson as a mute dummy, 21 years before Death Wish.