dworldeater
Maniac is a gristly, nasty and misogynist horror film. For those such as myself that enjoy this stuff, Maniac is powerful and well done. The film is a collaborative creation between character actor Joe Spinell and director William Lustig. This is a rare opportunity for Joe to act as the lead and he kills it in this film. He totally brings it with a totally intense performance and presence as well as having many layers to this complex and creepy character. Spinell is a brooding loner with some serious issues with his mother, where over the course of the film he runs wild by killing and scalping women in the mean streets of The Rotten Apple. Set in 1980 NYC and taking cues from Taxi Driver, the film is very gritty and sleazy in style and ultra violent in its execution. Plus add gorgeous actress Caroline Monroe ( who had great chemistry with leading man Joe Spinell) and awesome Tom Savini gore and you have one hell of a horror movie. The film has great camera work and an awesome score to boot. This movie when it was released in 1980 was very controversial upon the time of its release and in my opinion is one of the most well made movies of this type. Maniac is a film that lives up to its name and as such is a very disturbing and brutal horror film, absolute classic.
a_baron
This low budget romp through the American nightmare is not really a slasher film, though it does see a maniac running around murdering people for no apparent, or perhaps that should be no rational, motive. This guy is eclectic if nothing else: he murders men as well as women, and he uses both weapons and his hands. "Maniac" is set in New York, and as crime buffs may know, a few years earlier a bloke name Berkowitz was running around doing essentially the same thing, though the Son of Sam was positively normal compared with this guy. So what is his problem?It appears to be something to do with his late mother, that and the fact that eventually he attacks the wrong damsel, who gives as good as she gets and then some. It is likely this film was intended as a quasi-serious exploration of madness, but with gore for the sake of it and absent a proper plot, it is nothing more nor less than yet more outpourings of a sick mind, most probably that of its New York born director William Lustig.
LowellFan09
Falling eyes-first into the provocatively dark poster-art for William Lustig's controversial 'Maniac,' one may suspect it's mostly jump-scares and over-the-top gore that will sustain the viewer throughout their experience, and while there are certainly elements of both woven into the picture (well-done in their executions, to the filmmakers' credit), it's the psychological nature of its voyeuristic suspense by way of its troubled antagonist that really sets this movie apart from the worn-down slasher film we have all come to expect with genre favorites such as 'Friday the 13th' and 'Halloween.' This is a story at its core that can easily permeate any one of our realities, and that, in-and-of itself, is sobering; it is only its production that we can admit to being fictitious. Along the way, we are of no mistake in recognizing how this accurate portrayal of evil is as real as any monster we are able to conjure or confront via our own imaginations, and certainly more dangerous.Joe Spinell bravely and aptly conducts an amazing and harrowing performance as Frank Zito, a deeply-disturbed man who cannot conquer his impulses to commit murder or disconnect himself from his poisoned childhood. The character is incredulously tender as he is terrible, and Spinell brings a humanity to the performance I've rarely witnessed in these sorts of films. If director William Lustig, through atmospheric and seedy direction, brings us to the forefront of the frenzied terror of Frank's street-combing atrocities, it is Spinell's performance that reminds us that we are not experiencing a typical slasher film, but one of which is much more deeply rooted somewhere in our subconscious - a place we may feel uneasy in visiting. While certainly diseased, there's a human nature to be found in Frank Zito; he wants to stop, he knows the differences of right and wrong, only he's constantly left ill-fated, along with that of his victims, by his own damaged decisions.This film is not an easy watch, and perhaps it's not for everyone, but if one is willing to take a close glimpse at how deeply tragic life can be on both sides of the scream, I cannot recommend 'Maniac' enough. It's creepy, it's accurate, it's almost surreal in its telling of the monsters who live among us. It's not a perfect film by any means; in fact, my main quibble is in regard to the relationship between Frank and his photographer love interest played by Caroline Munro. Their chemistry, while great, could have stood for a greater dynamic between the two as the film went along. However, it's a rather small loss in contrast to what we do get: a brilliant lead performance, spot-on direction, a terrifically aiding, musical score by synth-based composer, Jay Chattaway, fantastic special effects by the one and only, Tom Savini (Dawn of the Dead), and a resonating remembrance of just how rarely these things all come together to produce such a memorably important Horror film.DVD and Blu-ray distributor, Blue Underground, released the film back in 2010 in a 30th Anniversary Edition, and it's a real treat, featuring commentaries, interviews with the stars, and the excellent 'The Joe Spinell Story,' documenting the late-actor's life and times. It's a must-own for any fan of the genre, or those of us who just love great films despite the labels attached to it.
TopperHarley29
Now I would like to start off this review by addressing the fact that Gene Siskel walked out on this movie during the infamous shotgun blast movie saying that there was no way the movie could redeem itself. He missed the point of this movie because he just wrote it off as a generic slasher movie when it really isn't and he walked out too early as the movie did redeem itself. This is a movie about a serial killer who's psychologically and emotionally scarred as he has voices in his head and whenever he kills someone he always regrets it later on. It was a really different idea for a movie at the time and I think they executed it very well. Joe Spinelli plays the role of the killer very well and Tom Savini's gore effects in this movie are great as always. It's not a perfect movie as it does drag on in certain moments, but it's still a horror classic in my book and as much as I love Siskel and Ebert I think that Gene Siskel missed the point of this movie due to walking out on it so early.
