Verdict
Summary
I, Madman works on so many different levels that it’s a shame more people don’t know about it. It’s a one-of-a-kind sleeper, completely unlike any other film, but it’s a guarantee that fans of the genre (especially those who love the ’80s) will be delighted by it. The film is scary, sexy, and continually inventive and cool. Fans of old school make-up and monster movies of the classic era should absolutely check this one out if they haven’t already.
Plot:
A reader of a pulpy horror book is shocked when the book she’s reading turns out to be nonfiction and the ghoulish author comes to terrorize her!
Review:
A pretty woman named Virginia (Jenny Wright) spends her time working at a sprawling used bookstore in Los Angeles, and by night she takes acting classes. She has a handsome boyfriend who’s a detective (played by Clayton Rohner), and she has a reading habit that might kill her! She takes a grubby used hardcover pulp horror novel home to read one night, and she’s hooked. She figures out that the author only wrote one other book called I, Madman, and by some mysterious serendipity, the book ends up at her doorstep. She begins reading it, and suddenly, her reality is altered when the ghoulish narrator of the story shows up around town in her peripheral vision, seemingly stalking her. The ghoul (played by Randall William Cook who worked on the impressive makeup and special effects) has a mutilated face and looks like The Phantom of the Opera or Darkman, and for some reason he’s fixated on Virginia as someone to terrorize. Thinking she’s going crazy, she turns to her boyfriend for help, but he disregards her, until one of her fellow acting students turns up murdered, and she knows without a doubt that it was this ghoulish person that did it. Her story makes the cops laugh and embarrasses her boyfriend, but it’s true: The ghoul is real enough and has somehow crossed over from the world of her book and into her reality, and what’s even stranger is that she realizes that the book she’s been reading is not fiction, but nonfiction, which is important … because the story is coming true for her. How will she escape the clutches of this “madman” and keep her sanity intact?
A very clever and thoroughly original culty horror film from Tibor Takacs (The Gate) and makeup guru Cook, whose participation in this endeavor is vital to its success, I, Madman works on so many different levels that it’s a shame more people don’t know about it. It’s a one-of-a-kind sleeper, completely unlike any other film, but it’s a guarantee that fans of the genre (especially those who love the ’80s) will be delighted by it. The film is scary, sexy, and continually inventive and cool. Fans of old school make-up and monster movies of the classic era should absolutely check this one out if they haven’t already.
Kino Lorber has just reissued I, Madman on Blu-ray after Shout Factory’s edition went out of print. This release ports over all of the special features from Shout’s edition – which include an audio commentary by Takacs and Cook, plus a making-of feature – but it adds a new video essay, which fans might appreciate. The disc comes with a slipcover and a reversible sleeve with two artwork options.
