Watch horror Movies for free with Amazon Prime

The Abominable Dr. Phibes

1971
8
Director: 
Robert Fuest

SYNOPSIS: 

A group of surgeons had operated on the beloved wife of Dr. Phibes, abandoning her in the operating room because she was believed to be dead. Driven mad by grief, the man prepares a fatal recipe to carry out his revenge.

REVIEW: 

The Abominable Dr. Phibes, directed by Robert Fuest, is a jewel of British horror cinema that combines gothic, grotesque and black humor in a fascinating and macabre mix. Played by a charismatic Vincent Price, the film tells the story of the eccentric and brilliant Dr. Anton Phibes' revenge against the doctors he believes are responsible for his wife's death.

The plot develops as a series of murders inspired by the plagues of Egypt, an idea as ingenious as it is disturbing, which gives life to visually surprising sequences. The baroque aesthetic, with rich sets and saturated colors, creates a dreamlike and surreal atmosphere that recalls expressionist cinema and art deco. Making it all the more fascinating is the soundtrack, which alternates organ music with jazz motifs, contributing to the sinister elegance of the film.

Vincent Price, despite acting almost exclusively with the expressiveness of his face, gives one of his most memorable performances. His Dr. Phibes is a tragic villain, both frightening and melancholic, who inspires a strange form of empathy despite his brutality.

A one-of-a-kind film, The Abominable Dr. Phibes is a perfect example of auteur horror, capable of mixing cruelty and irony with an extraordinary aesthetic taste. A must-see for lovers of cult cinema.

SIMILAR MOVIES REVIEWS

OTHER MOVIES REVIEWS

Gretel e Hansel

2020

A reinterpretation at times unpublished of the famous Grimm fairy tale, by the director son of art Oz Perkins who wanted to distort the original story by making major changes. Gretel is the real protagonist of the film, here becoming the older sister, the witch instead seems more like a modern Wicca with a very hostile attitude towards the male gender who lives in a house that is not at all colorful and inviting but rather dark and disturbing. Furthermore, the story is marked by a strong feminist imprint.  There is little horror in this film but a lot of dark... Read More

Nosferatu

2024

Remake of the 1922 German silent expressionist film classic "Nosferatu the Vampyre", loosely based on the novel Dracula (1897) by Irish writer Bram Stoker. For me, who saw the 1979 cult movie "Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht", the comparison with this new version is inevitable, which did not excite me. The aforementioned was certainly much simpler and poorer in its sober and perhaps even a little squalid staging and focused a lot on the perverse and disturbing charm of the protagonists, the beautiful Isabelle Adjani and the damned Klaus Kinski. Here, however, the... Read More

Within

2016

There is little to say about this film, a banal story (how many horror films begin with a family moving?) and also copied, it recalls for example "Crawlspace" by David Schmoeller from 1986 with Klaus Kinski, it offers some small surprises but not even very original. The film takes a long time to get going and given the initial sunny atmosphere you immediately wonder if it is really a horror and in fact the disturbing scenes are very few, perhaps girls will like it more given a certain romanticism à la "The Phantom Of The Opera". The actors are good looking and also quite... Read More

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?

1962

Based on the novel by Henry Farrell released in 1960, the film is considered the progenitor of the psycho-biddy subgenre where the protagonists are mentally unstable elderly women, ready to terrorize the unfortunate ones on duty. Playing the disturbing sisters in this psychological thriller, a small jewel of genre cinema, are an unforgettable Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, great Hollywood stars now in their twilight years. Despite being free of bloody or macabre scenes, the film is a hallucinatory journey through sadism, madness and family resentments... Claustrophobic,... Read More

Let It Snow

2020

A soft horror film produced in Ukraine, very beautiful on a visual level thanks to the spectacular locations in Georgia... a glacial setting, which instills no small amount of anguish and chill in the heart. Filmed in a classic style, it is a rather simple and short story that flows quickly without leaving any particular shivers, but some scenes are particularly anxiety-inducing and an unbearable and disturbing Christmas song acts as a background. The protagonist Ivanna Sakhno is very good.