Hell on Reels: "Psychomania"

Psychomania is an old-fashioned early 1970s horror biker flick that I've been meaning to see for quite some time. It has the coolest classic movie poster image—a skull wearing a skull-like helmet with crossbones—that has always stuck with me. I first saw it when I was a kid when my mom and her sister were dating the same bikers who had the film on VHS. One of them, my mom's boyfriend, was a skinny little dude who was a Vietnam vet. One day, while outside drinking beer with his buddies, he stuck the bitter end of a shotgun in his mouth and blew his head off while sitting on the porch. Yeah.

That evening, when my mom burst into the house weeping, I was watching another movie that I will forever associate with tragedy instead of entertainment and "good times": Rock 'N' Roll High School, featuring The Ramones.

(Oddly, now that I think about it, all three of us—my mother, this suicidal man, and myself—went to see the 1989 adaptation of Stephen King’s Pet Sematary in the theater. The movie, starring Dale Midkiff, Denise Crosby [just shy of her Star Trek: The Next Generation role], and the late Fred Gwynne—Herman Munster himself, in almost perfect casting—also featured Pet Sematary, arguably one of The Ramones' most famous songs. Strange coincidences, considering the movie’s themes of death and resurrection, and the fact that Psychomania is all about suicide. Of course, all the original Ramones are now dead, leading some to speculate about the "Curse of the Ramones." But I seriously digress.)

Back to it: Psychomania is about a gang of English bikers from the era when Creem magazine and Black Sabbath still got kids groovin’ and movin’. Tom (or Ted? Some guy who looks vaguely like David Warner in leather pants and a turtleneck) lives with his mother, a medium or witch or bruja or something—she holds séances and channels spirits. Despite their spooky side hustle, they live in a high-end mansion with a servant named Shadwell. Tom/Ted, however, runs with a gang of lousy bikers. And biker mamas, too.

He has an amulet and a pet toad, and there’s a room in the house that reveals an awful secret. (Hidden rooms in films always fascinate me; they’re metaphors for the buried "thing" in the subconscious mind—too terrible to contemplate.) He goes inside, something goes down, and—voilà!—we find out that Tom/Ted can die and be resurrected, coming back as a literal "Living Dead" (which also happens to be the name of his gang).

The “hidden room” ties into Tom/Ted’s father, who was murdered (by his mother?). But on a deeper level, it’s about a man dying and being “reborn” to live out his father’s bleak destiny. A cycle of vengeance, perhaps.

The rest of the gang follows suit. They all die, then come back, committing murder and tearing through small-town streets, the English countryside, and a field of ancient stone monoliths called the “Seven Witches” (imagine something like that being in England). Did I mention the ridiculous scene where Tom/Ted is buried sitting on his motorcycle? And it’s not even customized with long tailpipes or anything cool—it’s just a basic bike. Lame.

Tom/Ted has a couple of gal pals—one looks like she escaped from a Renaissance fair (at least to me), and the other rocks a pair of white Nancy Sinatra go-go boots with a zip-up pink leather jacket. She hangs herself and laughs about it.

All the gang members wear helmets with that badass skull logo from the movie poster, plus leather jackets with their names embroidered on the front. They return from the dead to terrorize the town, but they don’t look like cool zombies. They look the same as before—just as lame, just as wannabe. They roll through police stations and grocery stores, but it’s more laughable than terrifying.

The ending is ho-hum corny and involves a toad and people turning into fossilized dog turds. The coolest thing about this movie—besides the skull-and-crossbones helmets (what kind of biker gang even wears helmets?)—is the acid rock soundtrack. Otherwise, while it’s always nice to see a film from the era of great horror actors like David Warner, Freddie Jones, Donald Pleasance, and John Hurt, it’s regrettable that none of them appear in this dog turd. The only notable name it can seemingly boast is Beryl Reid.

Now I’m off to screen Werewolves on Wheels and The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue back-to-back! (Brave man, I know.)

Born...to be...reviled! (Cue Steppenwolf.)

P.S. I checked. The name was Tom. Played by George Sanders.

Directed by Don Sharp.

Screenplay by Arnaud d'Usseau.

Psychomania

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