Paranoiac

(1963)***

The fragile homeostasis of a dysfunctional family is disrupted when a mysterious man baring an uncanny resemblance to a long lost son/sibling arrives at the door one day. Although he is suspected of being an imposter, the psychological damage proves to be too much for the family, which is thrown into a spiral of turmoil, despair, and ultimately murder.

Summerisle reviewed this earlier (see below). What a strange little film. One thing I’ve noticed about horror films from the 60s is that they seem to be more violent and thematically more sinister than from previous decades. It could probably be argued that this reflects a shift from an innocent Leave it to Beaver world to a world where our president is assassinated. Sure, monster movies and the film noirs of the 30s, 40s and 50s were thematically dark, but they still had a different feel to them. One thing that makes these early films so striking is that regulatory committees forced directors to convey evil and violence in a much more artistic manner. The use of shadows, jump cuts, and deep focus substituted for overt brutality and sadism. When watching films from the 60s we begin to see a shift to more onscreen realism - check out The Sadist, also filmed the same year as Paranoiac, to see what I’m talking about. Paranoiac is ultimately a satisfying “horror” film that inadvertently examines the insidiousness of unresolved grief and the ravages of mental illness.