The Tingler Movie Review 262

The Tingler is a 1959 horror movie directed by William Castle and starring Vincent Price,Darryl Hickman and Judith Evelyn. This film is well known for using lots of gimmicks to scare audiences.

Price plays Dr.Warren Chapin who performs autopsies at a prison. While performing one, he meets a man called Oliver Higgins(Philip Coolidge) who owns a cinema. They chat and he brings Warren to meet his deaf and mute wife,Martha(Evelyn). Warren has a keen interest in fear and he sees that Martha passes out from the sight of blood. He is intrigued by how people react to terror. He goes back to his house and his lab. He has a theory that when people are really scared, a creature called The Tingler appears in their spine and makes it tingle. The creature can kill unless the person can scream. Warren has an assistant, David(Hickman) who is also interested in the effects of fear on people. Warren's wife is Isabel(Patricia Cutts) and she cheats on Warren openly. Their marriage is a sham and Isabel's sister, Lucy(Pamela Lincoln) is David's fiancee. Isabel is a bit of a cow and she shows little interest in Warren's experiments.

Warren meets Oliver again and he discovers that Martha is not well. Warren goes to see her and gives her a sedative to relax her. She awakens later and has horrible visions of creatures out to kill her. She dies of fright. Oliver calls Warren and tells him. Warren brings her to his lab to do an autopsy and finds The Tingler in her spine. He takes it out and puts it into a box. Unfortunately, Isabel sees it and she dopes Warren sets The Tingler on him. He only just escapes with his life. He discovers that Oliver is the one who frightened his wife to death. He set up the visions to scare her and kill her. Warren comes over with The Tingler. He needs to put it back where it came from- Martha's spine. Before he can, it escapes into the cinema and frightens everyone. Warren tells the audience to scream as loudly as they can and they manage to capture it.

Warren puts it back into Martha's body and he leaves intending to call the police and tell them about Oliver. Oliver is suddenly confronted with Martha who seems to have come back to life. Oliver is scared and he can't scream. Picture fades to black. We can hear him drop to the floor, presumably dead. This was an enjoyable movie. It is old, but I liked the idea of The Tingler. Price was very good in this. It is well worth a watch. It gets a 7/10.