Perhaps the late great Michael Gough's last stab at a leading role and he relishes it, but the film (made for another prominent exploitation figure, Richard Gordon) lets him down pitifully! Incidentally, I guess the reason why his name is not as well-known (apart from aficionados) as that of, say, Vincent Price or Christopher Lee is that, even at his best, the overall quality of the films were markedly inferior! Anyway, this pits him in another typical environment – people being sent to a health clinic come face to face with their worst nightmare; similarly, we have a reconstituted fire victim for a villain with a dwarf as his all-purpose servant (played by Skip Martin). The hero is the future star of the sexy "Confessions" series Robin Askwith, while his female counterpart (who does little throughout the film but disrobe and scream her head off!) proves to be the niece of Gough's assistant and lover, a former Madam whose clients had served as the doctor's guineas pigs!! Typically, he intends building an army made up of wholly subservient subjects; amusingly, they are frequently made to exercise in his private gym but this does nothing to remove the very conspicuous scars on their lobotomized foreheads! Also on hand is Dennis Price as the bemused (and openly gay) tour agent who advertises Gough's specialized treatment; a review I read claims his performance is hilarious but, to me, it only felt embarrassing! His character is eventually revealed to have been blackmailing Gough, but he is disposed of before long (as are a number of others) in inventively grisly fashion via decapitation-by-blades protruding from the doctor's Rolls Royce (with a strategically-placed basket to catch the falling head)! There is also the sinister elderly station master (perhaps intended to evoke Boris Karloff!) who informs Gough of new arrivals. What to make, then, of the slimy Swamp Thing-like monster which is revealed to be hiding under the villain's 'synthetic flesh'…?! P.S. For a more rewarding (and sobering) contemporaneous film on the same themes, try Alain Jessua's SHOCK TREATMENT aka DOCTOR IN THE NUDE starring Alain Delon and the late Annie Girardot.

Those who deprecate this film for its wooden acting, improbable plot, ridiculous dialogue, and dire special effects are missing the point. It's a romp. More tongue-in-cheek spoof of Hammer Horror than anything else, this openly silly flick is fabulously enjoyable. Just don't expect to be scared, because it's meant to be ludicrous. The scene of a dwarf (the superb Skip Martin) arranging a pair of drugged biker guards in order to use them as a stepladder is brilliantly funny, and evokes classic comedy from the era of Vaudeville. Laurel & Hardy, Bob Hope, and Abbot & Costello also appeared in tongue-in-cheek "scary" movies of a similar ilk, but this quintessentially British product throws in a cheerful dollop of seaside-postcard "Carry On" style foolishness with Robin Askwith from the "Confessions of ..." sex comedy series.Enjoy!

In Britain between the rise of Hammer Horror films, sometime around 1958 and the release of their version of 'Dracula', and the early/mid 1970's there were scores of cheep horror films released. These can, I believe, be placed into one of three categories, Low Budget Classic (ie the aforementioned 'Dracula', its stablemate of the same period 'Frankenstein', 'The Pit and The Pendulum' etc), Cult Films like 'Circus of Horrors', 'Scream and Scream Again' etc, and the outright awful! Guess which category I would place 'Horror Hospital'?! This film is simply ludicrous, far too illogical, even within the world it has created for itself, and so poorly put together that it gets nowhere near being a LBC, and falls so short of being a Cult that it is laughable.I am aware that it is difficult to view any horror film of any age by modern day standards, the genre has moved on so rapidly, and become so much more graphic, but even by comparing this film to its contemporaries it falls well short of any real horror and scares. Today it is about as scary as a wet weekend in Weston-Super-Mare (for non-Brits that is a seaside town in the west of England that is mainly populated by the over 60's!, a British equivalent of, say, Atlantic City!). The concept of a Health Farm - not even a proper hospital note! (the makers had to squeeze in a line of dialogue to justify the title!) - being used for experimentation on the feckless youth of the day - young people who, of course, no one will notice have gone missing (don't these kids have parents?) and turned into "zombies" (although as "zombies" I would have thought that Dr Storm would have found better things to use them for beyond that of acrobatics!) is beyond belief. To go into all the plot holes would take all day, but I have one question, why do all the thugs wear leathers and crash helmets all the time, even when in doors? (Apart, of course, to disguise the fact that at least one is a woman! When was the last time you saw a male thug clearly wearing lipstick?!) The one really big question about this mess of a film is this, just how did talented people like Michael Gough, Ellen Pollock and, most notably, Dennis Price, became embroiled in such rubbish? Wait... I have thought of one redeeming feature, albeit a personal one! Over the past few years I have become friends with a Mr Robert Dearberg. Guess who was the editor on this mess? Yep, my old mate Bob Dearberg, the one and same person! We spend a lot of time discussing the merits of this film, that movie etc, and often disagree. The next time Bob slags off a film I have enjoyed I can look him in the eyes and say just two words.. "Horror Hospital"...!

The atmosphere of this movie is unmistakably '70's like, with ridicules hair-cuts and outfits. The movie is like many other genre movies from the '70's, meaning that it features nudity, lots of gore and yes also a dwarf. The movie further more of course also features some really bad sound and fake looking reddish '70's blood. The acting is below par, as you would expect, with the exception of course of Michael Gough, who's presence alone is good enough to uplift this movie. He is not as well known as a Peter Cushing or a Christopher Lee but his acting is always excellent.The movie is unnecessarily slow at times. Some sequences go on for too long without really adding something to the build up or the overall story and movie. It doesn't make the movie always flow really well and make the movie feel overlong, even though it's well below 2 hours short.The atmosphere and horror elements of the movie are rather good. The movie uses some nice and atmospheric settings and some effective but simple cinematography. Michael Gough also adds to the movie its atmosphere and horror, also with the help of his killing automobile and mysterious henchmen and other strange characters.The story itself is quite ridicules, mainly because it isn't going anywhere really. Therefor the movie perhaps makes a bit of a pointless impression but overall the movie is entertaining enough to consider this a simple and typically enjoyable '70's genre movie.Obviously a movie for fans only.4/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/