Maniac!

Rating:
Summary: Frank Zito Rules!!!
Review: being a huge horror fan and all i don't know how i let this movie get away from me. Joe Spinell Plays as Frank Zito, a weird creepy, psychotic killer who has some serious child hood issues. He takes his anger out on poor innocent young women, he strangles, stabs, shoots, dismembers, and scalps. Thats right Frank Zito does just about everything. Right from the start the movie keeps you focused with an unforgettable killing of a couple hanging out on the beach. Overall this movie keeps you very focused and entertained. I don't think there is any boring scenes, even when Frank Zito is not killing watching this psycho plan his killings is outstanding!!! This movie really puts you in the mind of a sick weirdo with problems.....as far as the dvd goes, i give it 5 stars as well. The DTS surround sound gives he movie a great effect. Anchor Bay entertainment never lets us horror fans down, here they give a great documentary entitled the "Joe Spinell sotry" which gives an insight to his early acting career and personality. You also get a commentary by the king of make up effects, Tom Savini along with the director and producer. On top of that you get a 20 minute radio interview with william lustig(director/producer). Don't miss out on this great horror movie and DVD....

Rating:
Summary: Gritty and real
Review: Not really scary just creepy and realistic. Very sick. I wish that Maniac 2 would have been finished it looked even creepier than this one.

Rating:
Summary: #1 Slasher flick
Review: This movie is awesome. I have no complaints. Its an excellent story about a twisted and deranged S.O.B. Good plot , good acting and get the uncut version for great gore and extreme violent scenes. The head shot scene is absolutley wonderful and one of the most realistic look head shots as this guy ( Tom savini actor / makeup effects guy )gets his head blown off with a shot gun. The movie is just creepy and gives you the chills. One of my top 7 or 8 favorites in m=y collection, well one of my favorites just in general. Its worth the buy you wont be dissapointed, just an all out great slasher film and a definite clasasic.

Rating:
Summary: Good Premise...not so good movie
Review: Don't believe the hype on this one. This movie doesn't hold up and it appears very dated as it is. The premise is promising, but I felt the film progressed too slowly at times. The suspense wasn't there enough to keep me on edge. Joe Spinell's acting was good enough but it couldn't save this one. The two more memorable moments on this DVD are the scene where Frank Zito surprises a couple in a car by jumping on the hood and taking the driver's head off wth a shotgun at near point blank range. Well done, that's the kind of shock value and special effects I expected from this film. The other positive is in the special features section, where there's a Bio piece on star Joe Spinell that I truely found to be more interesting than the movie itself.

Rating:
Summary: A SLASHER MOVIE WITH GUTS!
Review: Why does everyone have to complain about this movie. It's not really sexist like everyone claims it to be. It's just a great movie. The little gore that it shows is great. The only death scene that really wasn't convincing was where the killer was strangling that hooker. She just screamed way too much for someone who is being choked to death...

Yeah this was a good movie. The kill scenes are as follows:A girl gets her throat cut with a straight razor. Her boyfriend gets his throat cut/strangled with what looks to be fishing line. A hooker is strangled and scalped. Tom Savini gets his head blown off with a shot gun (messy.) His girl gets the same but off screen. A girl is stalked in a subway station and gets a knife through her back and out her chest. A model gets a switch blade in her stomach and in a nightmare like dream sequence, the killer's manequin girlfriends come to life, butcher him and pull his f#@kin' head off.

Well, isn't that special???


Rating:
Summary: Gritty and Realistic Horror Film...
Review: As a jaded, twenty year plus fan of horror movies I can honestly say that few films unnerve or frighten me, The Shining and The Exorcist are a couple that spring to mind. That being said, Maniac (1980), stayed with me long after the final credits rolled due to its mix of gritty realism and brutal, explicit violence.
Shot in pre-Giuliani New York, director Bill Lustig did an excellent job of exploiting the city's grimier and seedier side. This is the x-rated underbelly of New York as seen in other horror classics such as Ferrra's Driller Killer, Fulci's New York Ripper and Henenlotter's Basket Case. A vast wasteland of grindhouse cinema, porn and prostitutes. Amidst the filth, Frank Zito (Joe Spinell in a career defining performance), stalks the streets murdering and mutilating at random, haunted by the legacy of abuse he suffered at the hands of his own deceased mother, Carmen. Frank also attempts a relationship with a beautiful photographer (played by Caroline Munro from The Golden Voyage of Sinbad), before regressing into a deep psychosis that results in a climactic scene where Frank is set upon by the ghosts of his many victims.
Universally loathed by mainstream critics and feminists upon its release for its perceived misogny and over the top graphic violence (courtesy of special effects wizard Tom Savini), Maniac is actually one of the more memorable and intellectual films to spring from the late seventies and early eighties horror craze. To classify Maniac as a slasher film would be to do the film a severe injustice, this is a film about a serial killer told almost entirely from that killer's perspective unhampered by the usual plot trappings of the slasher film (i.e. horny teens retreating to the woods, bumbling cops in pursuit of the murderer). The film is also set in a uniquely urban landscape and the antagonist uses an array of weapons including a shotgun, not normally seen in the Friday The 13th films and its numerous clones.
The accusations of misogny can squarely be blamed on a controversial ad campaign that featured a poster of an anonymous killer carrying a large knife in one hand, a woman's bloody scalp in another and a very obvious erection in a pair of tight and gore soaked blue jeans. The film's violence is not entirely aimed at women, two of the most gruesome deaths befall male characters. Moreover, it is a sad fact that most serial killers' do target young women so it could be argued that director Lustig was merely going for a heightened sense of realism. The film is certainly less hateful in tone than other notorious exploitation films like Craven's Last House On The Left or Zarchi's I Spit On Your Grave. A measure of controversy was nonetheless merited considering that New York City was still recovering from the crimes of real life maniac, David Berkowitz-The Son Of Sam when this film was thrust unto the unsuspecting public. One murder scene in particular is especially reminiscent of Berkowitz's modus operandi.
The film is well paced and Spinell's descent into madness is nothing short of fascinating, Spinell was surely one of the silver screen's most underrated actors. The gore supplied by Tom Savini (Friday The 13th Part IV, Dawn Of The Dead) is plentiful and among his best and most believable work. The film also features some nudity in the form of a bathtub scene (a sly variation of the shower scene from Hitchcock's Psycho perhaps? another psycho killer film about a seemingly normal man with a homicidal mother fixation).
Anchor Bay has done an outstanding job once again with this film, the video and audio is above average and a plethora of extras are included. Potential viewers should take note that there are a series of short 'jumps' in chapter 13 of the DVD, these are not a result of a glitchy DVD as I first thought but rather imperfections found on the master reels of Maniac(1980), this is touched upon in the director's commentary. The most fascinating of the extras is a lenghty biography of late actor Joe Spinell, that includes recollections from family and friends featuring actor Jason Miller (The Exorcist). A gallery of outrage section is also very humorous, spotlighting the slew of negative publicity the film garnered upon its original release. The commentary track with director Bill Lustig and special effects man Tom Savini is also very revealing and will be of great interest to aspiring, low budget filmakers.
Maniac(1980) may have bore the brunt of critical disdain upon its release but in hindsight it remains one of the only truly shocking and vibrant horror films to emerge from that period.

Rating:
Summary: A brutal but interesting film
Review: I have ordered the limited edition collectible tin from Amazon (limited to only 5000 copies) and have been waiting several months and I don't think I am going to get it. It is long gone out of print and I recently just hunkered down and dropped the $80 for a new copy. I must say, it was TOTALLY WORTH IT. This is the ultimate slasher film with over the top gore galore. It's a story about a man who seemingly kills for no reason. But as time goes on and you start hearing what is happening inside his head and you start to realize why he is doing what he is doing. If you like slasher films with a little more intellect than Friday the 13th and want an inside look at what the killer is thinking (along with totally realistic gory kill scenes), this film is for you. I must say, though, if you are waiting for the collectible tin copy from Amazon directly, however, good luck. If I were you, I would get this from one of the merchants like I did before they start selling it for something ridiculous like $150.

Rating:
Summary: Intense
Review: The central debate surrounding this movie seems to be whether or not it rises above the level of the common slasher movie. Naturally, this is a subjective notion, so it can't be definitively proven, but I think it does. I don't think it really is trying to be a a deep or complicated film, but I think it manages a certain level of intensity uncommon to the slasher film. Whether or not this is true for you is a more difficult question. There are a great many horror fans out there who seem to find it impossible to take horror films seriously, and enjoy them on a purely camp or light-hearted level.(Not to say that enjoying horror films in this way is inherently bad, though I'd say that there are plenty that are worthy of genuine praise) If you are one of this sort you will doubtless think of this as 'just another slasher movie', and may or may not find it terribly enjoyable. Those of you who, like myself, can frequently take horror films seriously, may find a lot to admire here. Either way, I think this is a good film.

Many people out there have complained about the script, to which I respond, 'what script?'. Pretty much all there is to it is this: Zito stalks, Zito kills, Zito sits in his apartment, Zito hangs out with photographer chick, climax, the end. But yeah, what script there is isn't terribly impressive on any level. Major debate surrouds Spinell's performance, as he is generally accused of being either great or terrible. I tend to come down in the middle. I think he's generally pretty good, though he does go a bit over the top some times. I'm not gonna say his performance is necessarily unbelievable, as what I know of serial killers and psychotics leads me to believe that they could behave in any manner, no matter how outrageous or odd, but he's occasionally to weird or wimpering to be effective, regardless of whether or not the behavior reflects reality. However, he's more good than bad, I think, particularly in the low-key scenes.(And despite what the critics may tell you of his scenery-chewing, 90% of the scenes he's in are low-key) Admittedly, I don't think there's a whole helluva to his acting in these scenes, but it works. The rest of the performances aren't great, but they are given so little emphasis that they barely matter.(However, the voice acting in the audio flashback is indeed terrible, as is the dialogue. Definitely one of the film's weakpoints.

Suggestions that this film is misognynistic are pretty ridiculous.(And offensive, since the way people go on and on about violence against women suggests that women are just a whole helluva lot more important than men, especially when you consider that men are murdered at about 3 times the rate that women are.) First of all, there are 7 onscreen victims, 3 male, 4 female. Second, the 2 most violent and gruesome deaths in the film, as well as the one which I consider to be the most painful looking of all are reserved for the men Furthermore, the violence in this film is harsh and grotesque, far from pleasant and never portrayed as something 'fun'.(Of course, I don't think that films with wacky, fun violence are dangerous either, but the notion that that sort of movie is potentially dangerous is ever so slightly more believable) Hell, Zito himself doesn't enjoy it, exemplified by the hesitancy he shows, his all too apparent self-hatred and his reactions to his own deeds.(i.e. when he runs off to vomit after committing murder) Furthermore, Zito is not exactly the sorta character most people are going to admire, his murderous nature aside, as he is a fat, greasy, lonely and depressed slob. I admit that this film *might* cater to the tastes of those who have murderous impulses, but it's hard to imagine how it might create these desires. Certainly, this is still an exploitation film which wallows in violence(exemplified by its less than classy artwork), but I think it is primarily interested in exploiting people's perhaps slightly perverse obsession with serial killers, rather than one's secret desire to be one. Of course, none of this is gonna convince anyone who believes otherwise, but I can't help defending it.

Naturally, this is an extraordinarily desolate and dank picture, to go along with the violence. Pretty much the whole film is grimey, and most of it is dark, but in a stark, blunt fashion rather than a sort of stylized urban wasteland. The direction is relatively flat, appropriate for the subject matter, and the music is ominous and very low-key for the most part. The first 3 murder scenes follow in rapid sucession, and are all fairly effective in their own way. The first gives a real sense of how I'd think most serial killers would operate, as it is just so sudden, random and brutal. Zito's murder of a prostitute is disturbing in its setup, as he just lies on the bed and watches her pose for him in her leotard type outfit. I don't quite know why that part is so effective, but it is. The much famed and rightly praised stalking scene in the subway station is extremely intense, despite the viewers knowledge that any encounter is almost certain to end in the death of the potential victim. Zito's eventual hallucination that the mannequins in his apartment come to life and assail him is quite unnerving as well.(Though it gets a little weird and weakens a bit as the scene goes on. It starts off great, though)

This film is not as gory as it's made out to be, but it's still pretty brutal and frank in it's deciptions of violence. The most famous scene is where Tom Savini has his head blown-apart by a shotgun, an effect which is commonly cited as the best head explosion in film. Personally, it was a little disappointing, and nowhere near as cool as the head-explosion in Scanners. It is an impressive effect, however, and it is actually more effective in the context of the film, as the more classic head explosions tend to elicit laughter, which wouldn't have been appropriate. The much famed scalpings aren't as unnerving as advertised. The actually cutting isn't very effective, but it is quite painful when he starts to pull back the skin. The violence really gets going in the closing scenes, but not so much so that it becomes to over-the-top, and thus campy or funny. The gore fx isn't up to modern-day standards of realism, but it still holds up quite well for the most part,(and much better than most of its contemporaries) and thus it doesn't ever detract much from the film.

This isn't exactly the funnest movie I've ever seen, but it is fairly tense and compelling. Horror fans should at least see this, and then they can draw their own conclusions.

Rating:
Summary: MANIACement Bon
Review: Quoi que vous fassiez peu importe ou vous allez le MANIAC vous retrouvera et vous assassinera brutalement. Joe Spinell incarne le role du maniac et on jurerais qu'ils ont belle et bien donner le role a un vrai déranger. Le seul déffaut du film: les meurtres sont malheureusement tres prévisible. Mais tellement cé réaliste on se fou du reste. Tom Savini au make-up (merci encore pour tes magnifiques scene gore) Tom incarne lui meme un petie role et il ce fait lui meme éclater la tête au fusil de chasse. Âmes sensible ce film est choc et dérangant par sont réalisme et ces decors glauques. je le conseil pas à tout le monde mais un DVD a posséder pour tout fan du type. Autre recommendation du genre : Henry Portrait of a serial-killer.