Anguish (1988)

Wow! Such a good movie.

Good movie but grossly overrated

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

It's been a good while since I've seen a horror movie this original. Anguish is very creative, especially for its time. Its clever use of the "film-within-a-film"(often mixing both so well you don't know what's the film they're watching and which is the film you're watching). Although it's far from perfect, this is a great big breath of fresh air.The movie starts with a shy eye doctor, John, who still lives with his mother. John gets harassed by one of his patients when he gets the wrong contact lenses. His mother promises to make them suffer, unlocking a serial killer side to John. He makes a visit to the girl's house to give her the correct pair of lenses, and promptly kills her and her boyfriend. We are then shown that this is a movie, and there is an audience watching. We're introduced to two girls, one fully enjoying the movie, and the other completely horrified. As the movie continues on, and John's killings become more frequent and intensified, the girl gets more terrified, to the verge of tears. John enters a movie theater, and starts slowly killing the audience one by one. His killings become too much and the girl leaves to the bathroom. While in the stall, a man walks in. This causes her to go back to her friend to check out the bathrooms. What they don't know is that there is a real killer who has targeted their showing. He dispatches off a few of the staff with his silenced pistol, before coming into the screening. His killings start to mimic John's on screen. He grabs the girl and holds her at gunpoint, slowly slipping into deep lunacy. He talks to the screen, and his cover gets blown. The girl's friend alerts the police, who watch him waiting to make their move. They manage to get their shot and take him out, just as the other movie is ending. The girl is taken to the hospital, where she is attacked by the killer from the movie. As the credits role, it is revealed that this was all ANOTHER movie.This movie is creepy and creative. The acting is very good in most places, nothing that's completely terrible and groan worthy. A lot of the movie has an Argento feel, kinda sleazy and gritty. There's a little bit of gore, but not as much as I wanted. The kills weren't that inventive but were satisfying enough. I think this is one that should be seen by lovers of horror and even those that are just looking for something different. The characters are pretty well developed, particularly the ones in The Mommy (the movie inside the movie). Highly recommended.

After seeing Anguish, I know it will stay in the memory a while as it's not quite like anything else I've seen. However, outside of the central gimmick; there is unfortunately not a great deal to recommend it for. Bigas Luna's film is a horror movie within a horror movie, and as you can probably imagine from that description; it's a completely bizarre and surreal film. The title 'Anguish' seems to be a clue to the order of the day as both segments focus on putting the subjects in a state of anguish with a series of gripping occurrences. The film focuses on John Pressman; an optician with an eye problem and a strange mother. After losing his job, he goes out on a killing spree under the direction of his mother who apparently is using some sort of hypnosis. The spree goes on for a short while and then the film takes a turn for the bizarre as the focus pans out and we find ourselves in a movie theatre with a group of people watching the film we've been watching! However, it turns out all is not well there either, as one of the crowd is a maniacal killer.The main problem I have with this film is simply that while the central idea is very good, the two segments of the story are actually quite mundane. They're both just your average 'serial killer' stories, albeit one featuring a great deal of eyeball violence. The director clearly wanted to excite his audience and get them on the edge of their seats, and while parts of the film are exciting - I didn't find myself in a state of anguish for the duration. I don't often find myself needing a particular point when it comes to serial killer flicks, but this film just feels a bit too intelligent not to have one. I can only assume that the director wanted to portray something along the lines of the idea that a potential killer could be influenced by what they are seeing on screen; although it's never really brought across. Distinctive performers Michael Lerner and Zelda Rubinstein are the pick of the cast and provide memorable leads. The film does deserve a lot of respect for going out and trying to do something a bit different and even though it doesn't come off as well as it might have; Anguish is still well worth seeing.

This movie plays with the audience expectations in a level and maybe it have some characteristics of the terror genre that can be seen in a lot of movies but have some features of its own that makes the movie an original one. It's clear that this movie was not made with a big budget but the cast and crew give life to an imaginative screenplay .Rubinstein and Lerner are really great here. What surprised me of this movie are the original ideas . I will not spoil you the movie at all but after watching so many movies this one still surprise me.The Spanish director Bigas Luna directed this somehow atypical movie in his career , that usually treats themes far from the terror genre or the thriller.It's a good achievement .

Bigas Luna's "Anguish" is a uniquely curious and creatively constructed Spanish horror film that'll unquestionably impress you a lot more than the average routine and dull 80's (American) slasher picture. Luna presents an odd film-within-film structure and, surprisingly enough, both segments contain equal amounts of suspense, creepiness and gruesome images. At first, we follow a middle-aged and slightly insane mother-obsessed optometrist as he goes out at night to butcher as many people as possible & cut out their eyeballs for his collection. His freaky mother (the squeakily voiced midget Zelda Rubinstein) commands him under hypnosis and his modus operandi isn't exactly subtle, as John removes his victims' eyeballs sadistically and without the slightest sense of emotion. Okay, pretty twisted & sick horror tale we got here, or so you think until, after the first couple of murders, it suddenly becomes clear that mother & son's crazed adventure is just an ordinary movie being watched in a fully-occupied theater. We're subsequently introduced to two attractive young girls – one of them feeling very uncomfortable with what she sees on screen – and then "Anguish" truly becomes a one-of-a-kind experience, since a totally new (and supposedly non-fictional) psycho-killer plot develops itself parallel with the macabre (and fictional?) events on screen! Yeah okay, I realize this all sounds very confusing and perhaps even a bit stupid, but director Luno presents it all dead serious and plausible. Simultaneously with John entering a movie theater in "The Mommy" (the title of the first movie) to collect more eyeballs, an actual deranged psychopath spots the two girls and intends to kill them. The film-within-film concept has been done before, but usually very messy and resulting in a severe anti-climax. In "Anguish", however, the tension is masterfully developed and the transitions from 'old' movie to 'new' movie are literally perplexing. Michael Lerner's eyeball escapades are grotesque and really gore (with extreme close-ups of gouged out eyes…yuck), whereas Patty & Linda's nightmarish trip to the movie theater is intense and claustrophobic. The final twist is predictable, yes, as Luna attempts to connect the characters of both films with each other, but I honestly think I would have been disappointed if something similar wasn't done. The acting performances are excellent. Especially Michael Lerner and Talia Paul are splendid, and even Zelda Rubinstein is tolerable. She annoyed the hell out of me in the overrated "Poltergeist" films, but her odd appearance is ideal for an artsy Spanish horror experiment like this. "Anguish" is a terrific film for trained genre lovers, regretfully underrated and misunderstood to this date. Highly recommended!