House of Wax (1953 film)
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House of Wax is a 1953 American horror film starring Vincent Price. Director André De Toth’s remake of Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933) is one of the first 3-D films. MPAA Rating: PG.
Plot
Professor Henry Jarrod (Vincent Price) is a devoted wax figure sculptor for his museum in 1910s NYC. When his financial partner, Matthew Burke(Roy Roberts), demands more sensational exhibits to increase profits, Jarrod refuses. In retaliation, Burke torches the museum for the insurance money, leaving Jarrod for dead. Miraculously, Jarrod survives (though his hands and legs are rendered useless) and builds a new House of Wax with help from threatening deaf-mute sculptor, Igor (Charles Bronson).
The museum’s popular "Chamber of Horrors" showcases both famous crimes and more recent ones, like the murder of Jarrod's former business partner by a cloaked, disfigured killer. Burke's fiancée, Cathy Gray (Carolyn Jones), is also attacked. But when Cathy’s friend, Sue Allen (Phyllis Kirk), visits the museum, she makes a discovery that leads to the horrifying truth behind the House of Wax: it is full of murdered people coated in wax.
3-D
Stereoscopic 3-D was an alternative technology (like Cinemascope, Cinerama) used by 1950s studios attempting to compete with the new threat of television. Just over 50 titles were release in the 3-D process during its 2-1/2 year heyday. House of Wax was always shown in dual interlocked 35 mm projection with polarized glasses. The film was re-released in the period of 1975 through 1980 in both single strip 35mm Stereovision 3-D and in Stereovision's pioneering 70mm 3-D process, where it played in major venues like Mann's Chinese Theater, in Hollywood, and the huge Boston Music Hall (seating 4300 patrons).
Among the 3-D scenes featured in the film are a museum fire, a paddleball man, and can-can girls. Ironically the director De Toth was blind in one eye, and unable to experience stereo vision or the 3-D effects.
Impact
Many people have reported their memories of the film to be extra vivid, as compared to other films of the same period. One theory holds that scary 3-D movies are saved in a special "experiencial memory", that is, where you store actual experiences, as opposed to artificial film experience #redirect [[Template:Fact]]. Some researchers think that what you see with "your own two eyes, in stereo 3-D" is more likely to leave a powerful memory.
The title was borrowed for a very different story line, as a modern film remake starring Elisha Cuthbert and Chad Michael Murray, released in 2005.
Main cast
- Vincent Price — Professor Henry Jarrod
- Frank Lovejoy — Lt. Tom Brennan
- Phyllis Kirk — Sue Allen
- Carolyn Jones — Cathy Gray
- Roy Roberts — Matthew Burke
- Paul Picerni — Scott Andrews
- Paul Cavanagh — Sidney Wallace
- Charles Bronson (as Charles Buchinsky) — Igor
External links
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