Maniac, 1934

Maniac (Dwain Esper, 1934)

The film Maniac was the oldest out of the eight films that I have watched and probably the most difficult to analyse due to the quality of the film and some of the conventions that are used within this film are not used within the rest of the films that I have watched.

At the beginning of the film there is a cast list and a foreword which introduces the film and is describing how the brain works with your emotions and is connected to your physiological state and how anyone could be become dangerous and unstable. I feel by using the foreword it is an interesting technique as it requires the audience to read the information and make some sense of the text before the film begins as it give an insight into what is going to happen. Along with non diegetic music playing in the background which is slow and classical it is not the typical music you would expect from a Slasher film as they are normally more eerie. The villain of this film is the evil doctor and who is crazy due to his job bringing a corpses back to life. It is also shown that his assistant is a unusual and slightly unnerving as if something is wrong with him. Later on within the film it is discovered that he is running away from the police and becomes a assistant so that he can hide from the police. It is also shown that once he kills the professor he takes on the role of the professor so that he wont be caught and ends up being driven by playing the character. I like the use subtitles used within this film as they describe certain words and explain what they mean such as “Paresis“. These explanations are often taken from different sources such as “Crime ands the Criminal, Phillips A. Parsons PhD” are featured in this film.

One of the most memorable scenes within the film is four which features him taking his sadated victim into a cellar because people are starting to suspect the professor. Within this scene there is a variety of different features used and one of them is with the "black cat which is traditionally bad luck and this is also shown in the film "When a Stranger Calls" where a black cat is seen. The victim within this scene one of the characters is american whereas the professor is russian and stands out within the community which would make the audience suspious of his character. The clothing that the professor is wearing which is a typical laboratory coat suggests the doctor/professor is professional and stable which is contrasted to his character whom is unstable and contrasted to his persona.

The film follows a linear structure and shows how the doctor plans to bring his colleague who was shot dead back to life. The doctor who is the central protagonist is a unstable man because he feels that he can bring a dead man back to life and also injects a innocent person with a drug which results in him turning crazy. The way in which the doctor talks and laughs is eerie and creepy and will make the audience feel uneasy. There is also young women which are wearing revealing clothing which is typical of the Slasher genre as it is not unusual because young women are usually the first people to die. Young people/teenagers are also normally the pre determined audience for Slasher films as they are normally the first to be murdered. Due to when the film was made the film was in black and white although I feel this didn’t take away any of effectiveness from the atmosphere that was meant to be created which was one of uneasiness and fear.

From looking at this film which was the oldest out of all of the films I have realised that some of the conventions and camera shots that were used within this film are still used with the most recent Slasher films and these are the ones that I will be wanting to convey within my own film.