THE HYPNOTIC EYE

There’s still a lot of debate about exactly how effective hypnotism is. Is it useful as a medical tool? Well, it’s never seemed to work for me. My patients still scream like banshees when I operate on them, even after I’ve subjected them to hypnotic trance. Maybe I just don’t have the knack for it. I know I’m not as good at it as The Great Desmond, star of 1960’s lurid horror-mystery “The Hypnotic Eye”.

This was one of those movies that really left an impression on me as a kid. Back in the early 70’s, I was constantly digging through the TV Guide in search of every horror movie I could find. Some of them I was frankly too young to see, like “Night of the Living Dead”, “Witchfinder General”...and “The Hypnotic Eye”. I caught this black and white gem on Milwaukee’s Channel 6 on the Saturday night horror show hosted by Dr. Cadaverino. The Doc has been sadly forgotten in this day and age, but I used to like him as much as the original Svengoolie, 

The details of the plot of “The Hypnotic Eye” eluded me, but there were certain scenes that I remembered 50 years later. Like the beautiful blond washing her hair with kerosene and setting it on fire with an oven. Or the beauty scrubbing her face with sulfuric acid. Or the woman without eyes. And then there were the mass hypnosis exhibitions where the Great Desmond made audience members growl like dogs or put balloons between their legs. This mix of body horror and absurd exploitation forms the very crux of “The Hypnotic Eye”.

I never forgot those scenes and I bet most folks who saw the movie can say the same. The late 50’s and early 60’s was a time when movies were finally pushing past the boundaries of the restrictive Hayes Code and into genuinely shocking areas of violence, mostly due to the success of Hitchcock’s “Psycho”. Now “The Hypnotic Eye” is nowhere near the level of “Psycho”, but neither is it a cheap throwaway. The film is competently made and directed with the brisk style of film noir. And it has a quirkiness in addition to its jolting shocks that helps to make it memorable.

The lurid script was by William Read Woodfield and his wife, Gitta Woodfield.  William later had a successful television career. There was a cruelty and hatred of women in the story which gave the whole movie an unhealthy sheen, with a twist at the end which made it even more warped (we’ll get into that later). The fact that a woman co-wrote the movie adds another layer of sleaze to the project.There was also a strong cynical bent to the film, particularly the male authority figures. This was a sign of the times, as deadpan police shows like “Dragnet” and “The Lineup” were all the rage. The director was George Blair, who did lots of TV during its younger years. Looking over Blair’s career, “The Hypnotic Eye” was by far the roughest and edgiest project he worked on.

Well, it’s time to meet the Great Desmond and face the Hypnotic Eye! Major spoilers follow so be warned!

The film opens with a shocking scene, as the attractive blond we mentioned earlier sets her hair on fire over an oven. The casualness with which she does this is jarring for sure and even if you could nitpick by noticing the flames have been superimposed over her head, that doesn’t lessen the impact much. Where “Psycho” takes its sweet time getting to its shock scene, “The Hypnotic Eye” gets right to it!

Detective Dave Kennedy (Joe Partridge) arrives on the scene of the crime, where the victim is already swathed in bandages on a gurney. Kennedy tries to speak to her. “Will I be…a monster?” she moans. The EMT shakes his head at Dave: the woman has only minutes to live. “No, no, you’ll be fine,” he lies. She sighs in relief and then expires.

This poor lady is just the latest in a stream of inexplicable crimes where attractive women perform acts of severe self-mutilation, some resulting in death and all resulting in deformity. In each case, the victim has no knowledge or intention of doing herself harm. One victim sliced her face to ribbons with a straight razor, thinking it was a makeup applicator. Another put her face right into a rotary fan. The images your imagination conjures up for these scenes are pretty gruesome. 

None of the crimes make sense. The victims did not know each other and had nothing common except their beauty. Oh, and they also recently attended hypnotism exhibitions put on by the wildly popular Great Desmond. Now this should already get gears turning in Kennedy’s head, but here the cop’s cynical rationalism works against him. He believes hypnotism to be complete bunk and that all hypnotists are frauds.

Nevertheless, he grudgingly accompanies his gorgeous girlfriend Marcia (Marcia Henderson) and her equally attractive friend Dodi (Merry Anders) to a sold out performance of the handsome French hypnotist who has taken the city by storm. Part of it is a night out, part of it is a casual investigation of the man.

So we meet the Great Desmond and his beautiful assistant Justine. Desmond is no Svengali, the sinister, bearded weirdo who was the movie's first great hypnotist. As played by Jacques Bergerac, he is a young, strikingly handsome Frenchman who has a smouldering intensity to him. Bergerac was an interesting character in real life and quite the ladykiller (pun intended), as he was married to Ginger Rogers and Dorothy Malone at different points in his life.

The scenes where Desmond shows his skill in front of a rapt audience are pretty striking and often absurd. He has a row of business suited men entranced on stage. He convinces one he is burning up in the desert, another that he is freezing to death and yet another is turned into “the meanest dog there is”, growling and snarling away to the delight of the crowd. Dave is still far from impressed and insists to Marcia it’s all phony.

Eventually, Desmond wants to bring some ladies on stage for the next part of his act. He selects three attractive young women to join him. We notice that he passes over older or less attractive women for this…we also notice that his rather stunning assistant Justine is subtly guiding his choices. Among the three women is Dodi. It is Dodi who is placed under Desmond’s spell tonight, with the other women assisting. Desmond tells her that her body is becoming stiff as a board. Then he tells her she is becoming “as light as a feather”...Dodi soon is floating in air! She is then returned to normal and makes her way back to Marcia and Dave. Dave is grudgingly impressed with Desmond’s act.

After the show, the trio are ready to continue their night on the town. But a suddenly entranced Dodi begs off and wants to return to her apartment. Marcia and Dave continue on their own, arguing about the sincerity of Desmond’s act. This is a good place to mention that Marcia Henderson is not only gorgeous as Marcia, but delivers an extremely effective and spunky performance. Her mind seems to be light years ahead of the plodding Dave, who finds it hard to believe Desmond’s connection with the mutilation murders.

As you might suspect, Dodi returns home and cleans up before going to bed. But instead of the usual beauty cream, she applies sulfuric acid to her face! She crumples to the ground, her once beautiful face now toxic and smoking!

Dodi awakens in the hospital, remembering nothing unusual about the previous night except for when she was hypnotized by Desmond. In her mind, it should have been beauty cream on her face. Fortunately for her, plastic surgery will eventually alleviate the worst of her disfigurement. This is the diagnosis of her soft-spoken, rotund doctor. What makes this doctor a curiosity is that he was played by one Fred Demara. Forgotten now, Demara was notorious at the time of “The Hypnotic Eye” for being “The Great Impostor”...a man who pretended to be the master of many different fields. At times, he was a medical doctor, a judge, a policeman, an inventor, a pilot, and many more…without having any practical experience in any of these jobs. Demara was eventually revealed as a phony, but that led to a period of great celebrity for him. Including winding up in this small cameo part in “The Hypnotic Eye”.

Marcia is now absolutely convinced that Desmond is behind the mutilations. She plans to become one of the hypnotist’s subjects herself in an attempt to catch him. Meanwhile, Dave approaches his friend, police psychologist Dr. Hecht, to ask him what he knows about the field of hypnotism. Dr. Hecht, played by Guy Prescott, seems to be a rather eccentric character. When we first meet him, he is busy throwing darts at a cheesecake picture of the bodacious Jayne Mansfield! The pipe smoking Hecht tells Dave that in the hands of a true master, hypnosis can indeed make people do acts they would normally rebel at.

Dave and Dr. Hecht then decide to talk to the surviving victims of the mutilations. This is one of the creepiest parts of the movie. They first talk to a bitter, chain-smoking woman whose eyes are now empty pits. The makeup here is crude but effective. They then try to talk to the woman whose face was torn up by a fan’s blades…she hides behind a door and refuses to leave her home now that her face is ruined. We see a visage criss-crossed by deep scars. The women have hazy memories of the night they were hypnotized, but they remember hearing the name “Justine”...Desmond’s attractive assistant.

Meanwhile, Marcia meets Desmond after another of his performances…one where she was chosen to go onstage herself. There is an instant attraction between the two. Desmond hypnotizes her in his dressing room, this time using a flashing beacon to enhance the hypnotism. The two then go out on a date…with Dave and Dr. Hecht following discreetly behind.

Desmond sure knows all the hot night spots in town. He takes her to a beatnik cafe inhabited by chain-smoking hipsters. Before the arrival of the hippies in the late 60’s, beatniks were the easy go-to when a movie wanted to poke fun at counterculture types. The cafe, modeled after the notorious real life hangout The Gas House, has absolutely no relevance to the rest of the movie but like most beatnik scenes, it’s entertaining nonetheless. Of course, there are bongos, guys wearing berets and spaced out chicks wearing skin tight pants. The bongo player is actually “Big Daddy” Eric Nord, known as the real life “king of the beatniks”. There is an absurd “beat poem” read by a beret wearing goof, who happened to be Lawrence Lipton, a real poet and father of James Lipton of “Actor’s Studio” fame. This whole scene is a time capsule of 1960 counterculture.

Desmond and Marcia are amused by their trip to the beatnik joint, but afterwards, things get serious when they go to Marcia’s own apartment. Just as it appears the couple are ready to get it on, Desmond again puts Marcia into a deep hypnotic trance. And now Justine enters the picture. The hypnotist turns to his assistant and wearily asks, “How many more?” Justine’s answer reveals a lot: “As long as there are faces like this.” Aha, things are starting to move in a new direction.

Desmond takes his leave and Justine has Marcia take her clothes off for a shower. Sadly, we don’t get to see Marcia in the altogether, but that would have given the movie the kiss of death…an X rating. Justine turns the heat in the shower up to boiling levels. “Refresh yourself with a cool, cool shower,” Justine tells Marcia. But just then, there comes a hard rapping on the door…Dave and Dr. Hecht have decided to move in.

Justine tells Marcia to put her clothes back on. She is to tell Dave and Dr. Hecht that Justine is an old school friend come to see Marcia. A dreamy Marcia does just that while Justine leaves through a window. Dave knows that something is up…Marcia never attended college. Dr. Hecht realizes she has been hypnotized. It’s now become obvious that Desmond and Justine are up to their ears in the mutilation cases. And this is a good place to mention that Justine is played by the always alluring Allison Hayes, the 50 Foot Woman herself. She is always the highlight of any movie she appears in.

Marcia, following Desmond’s hypnotic command, returns to the next show, another sell-out. This time, Desmond proceeds to hypnotize the entire audience using his flashing disk. This leads to the movie’s craziest scene, as Desmond commands the crowd to perform a variety of bizarre feats, waving their hands, stomping their feet, playing with balloons and other such buffoonery. Many feel this oddly comic scene ruins the suspense of the end of the movie, but I think it gives “The Hypnotic Eye” another level of quirkiness and absurdity. And anything that makes a movie more memorable is always worth it!

Dave and Dr. Hecht arrive at the theater to confront Desmond and prevent Marcia from being the next victim. They barge right onto the stage and Desmond tries to stop them with his hypnotic disk. But the men are in no state of mind to fall prey to mesmerism. Justine takes the bedazzled Marcia high into the precarious rigging back stage. Dr. Hecht begs her to let Marcia go and come with them: “You’re young and beautiful and have your whole life ahead of you!”

“What kind of life would I have with this face?”, she snarls in response.

“Your face?”, responds Hecht. “You have a beautiful face!”

“If it’s so beautiful, then you can have it!” Justine replies and rips off the perfect mask she wears to reveal the ravaged face beneath…one that looks much like her victims.

Desmond then grabs Hecht and prepares to kill him, but Dave manages to shoot the homicidal hypnotist and put an end to him. As Desmond crumples in death, Justine screams and jumps from her high perch. She lands next to Desmond, joining him in death. Dave rescues the traumatized Marcia.

Dr. Hecht returns to the crowd and delivers the movie’s closing speech…a virtual public service announcement advising the public to only use hypnotism under medical supervision!

It’s a hokey ending to a disorienting film, but one fitting to the time. There are a lot of mysteries here that are never revealed. What caused Justine’s disfigurement? Could it be that Desmond himself was somehow responsible? Was it guilt that caused him to assist her demented crusade against beautiful women? Or did he fall for her before that ever happened? We never find out and in some ways, that allows us to come up with our own answers.

Of course, the film’s presentation of hypnotism is wildly inaccurate. A mass hypnosis like the one Desmond does at the end of the movie has never been done anywhere at any time. The scene where Dodi becomes “as light as a feather” also seems more like magician’s trickery than a hypnotic spell. Perhaps Desmond is just as much a magician as a hypnotist. It is true that persons under hypnosis can be made to do unusual things, but not to the extent that is shown here.

Ignoring scientific accuracy (something I, Dr. Abner Mality, am guilty of myself on occasion), “The Hypnotic Eye” emerges as a most unique and peculiar thriller with a very sleazy plot and some amusing scenes. George Blair’s direction is sharp and crisp and there’s a real film noir look to the movie. It is different enough from the other “Psycho” knockoffs of the early 60’s that it can be considered outside of that description.

Is the film perfect? Hardly. But it’s also not one of those “so bad they’re good” films (how I hate that description!). It has its own peculiar merits and is definitely worth a watch for lovers of bizarre movies.

So make sure you follow the advice of Dr. Hecht and don’t play around with “The Hypnotic Eye”!