Asylum Of Satan (1972): An Angel Dust Phantasmagoria
If your movie has Ol' Scratch in the title, I better see him make an appearance. Satan's Storybook has an Aldi-brand Lou Cypher with shag carpet legs. The Devil's Rain has Borgnine's titanic eyebrows perfectly channeling the man downstairs. Asylum Of Satan is a work of art, and therefore no exception. The Morningstar appears in the last act, looking like he'd peg everyone at Fraggle Rock to death after smoking an LSD-dipped loosie behind a Little Caesar's dumpster. Well what's the lead up like? Pure nougat baby, pure nougat.
Lucina Martin awakens in a mysterious asylum, her hospital transfer having occurred under vague circumstances. She's relayed this information by a man in drag who has put a Mrs. Featherbottom level of effort into his disguise. The good news, is that her care is now in the hands of the enigmatic Dr. Specter, an only somewhat-disgraced man of medicine. The other inpatients, including a paralyzed elderly woman and a young blind woman, speak in hushed tones about Specter's capacity for miracles. The common room where this exchange happens has an unusual amount of wheelchair bound robed figures that no one seems perturbed by. Then we see the elderly woman doused by a smoke machine, and eaten by an army of extremely rubber spiders. One by one, Dr. Specter's patients meet a grisly end. Is Lucina next or will her fiancé (A poor man's Philip Seymour Hoffman in a leisure suit) unravel the mystery of this malevolent place before his beloved suffers a gruesome fate? Is this an asylum of science...Or an asylum of Satan?! (Author's note: It's the latter).
William Girdler was an absolute maniac when it came to conjuring schlock. A Louisville, KY native (!!!), he produced his first feature, Asylum Of Satan at 23 but was unwilling to sit on his deep-fried genre laurels. By the time of his tragic death in 1978, he'd directed Three On A Meathook, Day Of The Animals, Grizzly and The Manitou. If you're a normie rube who freebases Marvel gruel, these titles mean nothing. However, if you're a trash-cinema hardbody, then you know this man had a genre boner the size of a ballistic missile. Though Asylum Of Satan was his first feature, it's replete with Girdler magic and infused with seventies schizophrenia, like a plastic-tipped Black and Mild spiked with Angel Dust.
You don't watch Asylum Of Satan because of the white-knuckle "mystery." It's painfully obvious Dr. Specter is an evil madman and his "hospital" is staffed by cultists. You watch this flick because it's untethered in its need to entertain while shellacked in a lead-based paint job. Why is Lucina being pursued by a one eyed ghoul? Why is there so much shoulder kissing in seventies love scenes? Is Lucina's fiancé going mad when he returns to the asylum with police in tow finding it locked up and overseen by a prospector-coded caretaker, or is it merely a cover-up by the nefarious Dr. Specter? (Author's note: It's the latter). These questions don't matter when rubber snakes are devouring a blind lady in a swimming pool. Object film criticism is powerless when the devil is cavorting about with a face only Sweetums from The Muppets could love. Asylum Of Satan is a tincture made from all the outlandish occult movies you imagined in your head, when you saw yellowing posters that could never possibly live up to the fantasy. Just one drop under the tongue should do the trick...Ah what the hell, do six.
-Dr. Benny Graves
