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| The Funhouse | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Credits | |
| Title: | The Funhouse |
| Directed by: | Tobe Hooper |
| Written by: | Lawrence Block |
| Produced by: | Mark L. Lester Mace Neufeld Brad Neufeld Derek Power; Steven Bernhardt |
| Music by: | John Beal |
| Cinematography: | Andrew Laszlo |
| Edited by: | Jack Hofstra |
| Production | |
| Distributors: | Universal Pictures Mace Neufeld Productions |
| Released: | March 13th, 1981 |
| Rating: | R |
| Running time: | 96 min. |
| Country: | USA |
| Language: | English |
| Budget: | Unknown |
| Gross: | $7,886,857 |
| Navigation | |
| Previous: | — |
| Next: | — |
The Funhouse is an American feature film of the horror genre. It was directed by Tobe Hooper with a script written by Lawrence Block. It was produced by Mace Neufeld Productions and released through Universal Pictures. The film premiered theatrically in the United States on March 13th, 1981.
Plot[]
A masked intruder attacks teenager Amy as she showers (resembling the opening scene of Halloween and the shower scene from Psycho). The attacker turns out to be her younger brother Joey, a horror film buff, and his weapon is a fake rubber prop knife.
Against her father's wishes, Amy visits a sleazy traveling carnival with her new boyfriend Buzz, her best friend Liz, and Liz's irresponsible boyfriend Richie. At the carnival, the four teens smoke marijuana, peep into a 21-and-over strip show, heckle fortune teller Madame Zena, visit the freak show exhibit, and view a magic show.
Richie dares the group to spend the night in "The Funhouse", which is actually a dark ride. After the park closes, the teenagers settle down inside the funhouse, at which point they witness the ride assistant, a silent man in a Frankenstein's monster mask, engage Zena as a prostitute. He experiences premature ejaculation, but despite his request, Zena will not return her $100 fee. He murders her in a violent rage.
The teenagers try to leave, but find themselves locked inside the funhouse. As they attempt to escape, Richie secretly steals the money from the safe from which the masked assistant took Zena's fee. The funhouse's barker, Conrad Straker, discovers what his son Gunther Twibunt (the masked assistant) has done to Zena. Conrad also realizes that the money is missing. Thinking Gunther took it, he attacks him. Gunther's face is revealed to be gruesomely deformed with sharp protruding teeth, long white thinning hair, and red eyes.
The teens see this, and Conrad realizes someone is watching after Richie's lighter falls on the floor from the ceiling he and the others were hiding in. Buzz concludes that Richie has the money. Richie insists that he would have split the money with the others. Despite Liz wanting to return the money, Buzz knows it's too late since they are now in danger. Conrad stalks the funhouse to eliminate any witnesses and heckles Gunther into a murderous rage. The teens arm themselves with the various funhouse props as weapons.
Richie is hanged with a rope by Conrad, and the remaining three witness his corpse riding through on a cart. Liz, hysterical, falls through a trap door and is confronted by Gunther. She stabs him with a dagger, and he kills her by pushing her head through an industrial exhaust fan. Buzz stabs Conrad to death when he confronts him and Amy, but is then killed by Gunther. During a showdown between Amy and Gunther in the funhouse's maintenance area, Gunther is electrocuted and crushed to death between two spinning gears.
As dawn breaks, a traumatized Amy emerges from the funhouse and heads home as the animatronic fat lady perched atop the entrance laughs.
Cast[]
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Elizabeth Berridge | Amy Harper |
| Shawn Carson | Joey Harper |
| Jeanne Austin | Mrs. Harper |
| Jack McDermott | Mister Harper |
| Cooper Huckabee | Buzz Dawson |
| Largo Woodruff | Liz |
| Miles Chapin | Richie |
| D. Lee Carson | Geek |
| Sonia Zomina | Bag lady |
| Ralph Morino | Truck driver |
| Kevin Conway | Funhouse/Freakshow/Stripshow barkers |
| Herb Robins | Carnival manager |
| Mona Agar | Mona |
| Wayne Doba | The monster |
| William Finley | Marco the Magnificent |
| Suzie Malnik | Carmella |
| Sylvia Miles | Madame Zena |
| Sid Raymond | Stripshow MC |
| Larry Ross | Girly show heckler |
| Frank Grimes | Strip show voyeur |
| Frank Schuller | Poker player #1 |
| Peter Conrad | Midget with lady |
| Mildred Hughes | Tall lady |
| Glen Lawrence | Spectator |
| Shawn McAllister | Garbage collector |
| Sandy Mielke | Garbage collector |
| Mike Montalvo | Spectator |
| Sherman Bergman | Carnival worker |
| Raymond Forchion | Man in tent show |
Notes & Trivia[]
- The tagline to this film is "Something is alive in the funhouse...something that, tonight, will turn the funhouse into a carnival of terror!"
- Was first released to home video in 1987 by Good Times Home Video. It was released in laserdisc format on February 6th, 1992. It was released to DVD on October 19th, 1999. The film was re-issued to DVD by Universal Studios on September 7th, 2004.
- Was filmed at Norin Studios in North Miami, Florida.
- The UK release of the film ran three minutes shorter than the US theatrical release. Excised scenes included extraneous dialogue between the characters.
- Mace Neufeld Productions also produced The Omen IV: The Awakening.
- Author Dean Koontz wrote a novelization of the screenplay under the pseudonym Owen West. The book contains a lot of backstory added by Koontz. Because of this, and the fact that the book was released before the movie due to a delay in post production, it is often mistaken that the movie is based on the book, but the book is in fact based on the movie. [1]
- Films that share similar themes as this one include Deranged, Basket Case, The Hills Have Eyes, Motel Hell, House of 1000 Corpses and Hatchet.
- "Funhouse" was also the title to a season two episode of Freddy's Nightmares.
External Links[]
References[]
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