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List Price: $9.99 | | Label: Image Entertainment
Salesrank: 18198
Released: April 4, 2000 |
| Our Price: $5.51 |
| Used Price: $14.18 |
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MPAA Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Is it magic? Or wholesale slaughter? Montag the Magnificent (Ray Sager), The Wizard of Gore, is a seedy small time magician with a shocking stage act. Hypnotizing pretty young women from the audience to be his obedient volunteers, Montag then proceeds to mutilate them in a series of Grand Guignol illusions. A woman is cut in half with a chainsaw, another is drilled through the stomach with a giant punch press, a metal spike is driven through one gal's head, and two ladies are forced to swallow swords. Trouble is, after the show, the "illusions" become all too horribly real. Blood, guts, and offbeat surrealism in another crackpot classick from "The Wizard of Gore" himself, director Herschell Gordon Lewis.
Description of Wizard Of Gore (Special Edition):
"People ask me, 'What does this scene mean?' My answer is, 'Why are you looking for significance in my films?' It's just part of the overall impression of unrealism." Director Herschell Gordon Lewis, speaking on the commentary track of The Wizard of Gore special-edition DVD, refers to the film's incomprehensibly red-tinted graveyard scenes, but he could have been referring to any number of moments in this Grand Guignol gross-out. A seedy, histrionic magician caked in cheap pancake makeup cuts a female volunteer in half with a chainsaw, hammers a spike through another woman's head, and eviscerates a parade of unlucky stooges in full view of his audience. They witness an amazing bloodless illusion, but we see what's really going on: a nasty spectacle of blood and guts and gaping wounds and the homicidal wizard rooting around in the gore like a kid in a mud puddle. It has something to do with mass hypnosis, but that doesn't explain how his victims zombie-walk out the door, falling apart minutes later. But that's hardly the attraction of the film, one of the notorious blood feasts that earned Lewis the nickname "Godfather of Gore." The performances are wooden, the dialogue hackneyed, and the effects unconvincing at best, but the film delivers gross-out gore by the buckets and ends with a crazy mind game of a coda. It's not exactly surreal, but it is most certainly unreal. --Sean Axmaker
Wizard Of Gore (Special Edition) Reviews:
Avoid this turkey! 
2009-11-24 - The plot is intriguing - Is the illusion the apparent deaths on-stage or the temporary continued zombie-like "life" of the murdered?
But the acting is absolutely terrible! The actors sound as if they are reading their lines for the first time. I kept watching thinking it had to get better - It didn't!
By today's standards the "gore" is relatively tame - For its time it might have been daring. But this movie did not age well at all. And the degree of gore seems simply there as its own element - not really so relevant to the plot.
Avoid this turkey!
We're off to see the wizard the wondeful wizard of GORE 
2009-11-23 - THE WIZARD OF GORE
**** Out of 5
Release Date- October 23rd, 1970
Running Time- 95-Minutes
Rating- NR
Screenplay- Allen Khan
Director- Herschell Gordon Lewis
Starring- Ray Sager, Judy Cler, Wayne Ratay, Phil Laurenson
Released in 1970 The Wizard of Gore was yet another blood soaked horror flick by exploitation filmmaker Herschell Gordon Lewis; The Wizard of Gore is the 3rd movie I've seen by Lewis with the first two being The Gore-Gore Girls and Color Me Blood Red. I highly enjoyed Gore-Gore, but I thought Color Me Blood Red was lousy, but Wizard of Gore gets things back on track and is as of right now my favorite HG Lewis movie.
Some have accused the movie of being boring with such witty comments about the movie calling it The Wizard of Bore and I suppose I can see why some might find it boring, but I can honestly say I was never once bored. As much as I liked The Gore-Gore Girls when there were lulls in the action I did every so often lose a little bit of interest, but Wizard of Gore I can say I was never once bored at all. The Wizard of Gore lives up to its name; if you want gore you got in buckets! Some of the gore F/X don't look great anymore, but for the most part they still pack a punch and can be rather gruesome and I loved every second of it.
The screenplay by Allen Khan is pretty much what one can expect from a low budget gore flick, but there were some decent ideas presented even if they never really go anywhere or make much sense. The screenplay is pretty much the same scenes over and over again just worded differently, but overall while the script may not be great it was actually better than I expected it to be; but I doubt anyone will really care about the script since it's just merely there to well kill time before the gore.
Director Herschell Gordon Lewis delivers a gore drenched cult classic; the pacing is fairly well done and like I said I was never bored during the movie even when there were lulls in the action. The Wizard of Gore is a bit sloppy and rough around the edges, but this is what makes the movie so entertaining. HG Lewis is very much a schlock director The Wizard of Gore delivers on that. The biggest selling point is the gore and Lewis never holds back and showing us the gore; from insides being ripped out and all being shown close up, HG Lewis delivers on what the fans want.
The acting is obviously wooden and that does make the movie all the more enjoyable, but the characters though were fairly interesting and likeable. Montag the Magnificent played by Ray Sager was just awesome. Sager's performance is over the top and silly, but that is exactly how the character was meant to be played. Ray Sager actually went onto have a fairly successful career as a producer with the Prom Night sequels as well as the TV series the Eleventh Hour and was an assistant director on such films as My Bloody Valentine (original) and Terror Train.
The Wizard of Gore was a highly enjoyable splatter flick and we just don't see movies like this anymore. It seemed once the 80s ended a lot of low budget horror flicks got terrible and not in a good way. Many try to make a cult flick, but I think it something that just happens. The Wizard of Gore has found a new lease on life with the remake with Crispin Glover and being mentioned in the surprise blockbuster Juno. If you are a fan of HG Lewis or schlock cinema this comes highly recommended.
A classic in it's own right. 
2009-04-17 - While I don't consider this to be an excellent movie, it isn't without merits. The plot is something you would probably hear around a campfire. This could normally spell bad news, but I actually found the plot to be pretty entertaining. There's actually some pretty crazy twists at the end of the movie. One thing this movie accomplishes without question is extreme gore. The sword swallowing scene managed to actually gross me out a little. The acting is pretty lousy, but I found the man who plays the magician to be very entertaining. The way the film was edited, especially during the gory illusions, is pretty lame. The music is incredibly weird, but strangely fitting. In the end this is an extremely gory and interesting movie that's worth watching at least once through.
Violent, trashy, sleazy, and fabulous 
2009-02-07 - I'm an avid Herschel Gordon Lewis fan, and this film is my favorite, hands down.
It is full of hideous gore. But people aren't mentioning very much how trashy and sleazy the film is! And I'm talking about FUN 1960s type trash.
Attractive girls are dismembered, hatched up, and forced to swallow swords. But Herschel Gordon Lewis presents these monstrous things in a light-hearted, no-big-deal fashion. That, and the extremely low budget is where the sleazy look of the film probably comes from.
Did I mention that I LOVE this outlandish piece of cinematic trash? But if you're a fan of contemporary Hollywood gore films, you'll hate this film.
ABRACADAVER...
2009-01-07 - Montag the magician (Ray Sager) is in town. He is performing his very theatrical illusions before stunned audiences. Women are chosen at random from the crowd, taken onstage, and mutilated! This is done by chainsaw, metal spike, sword, and punch-press! The mesmerised onlookers stare blankly, as they can see none of the true carnage. Montag is more than a mere showman. He is a serial-murderer w/ the ability to cloud the minds of any witnesses of his outrageous crimes! It's up to a TV-talk-show host (Judy Cler) and her sports-writer boyfriend to uncover this mystery and bring an end to the slaughter. The finalé brings quite a wicked surprise for Montag! If you enjoyed 2000 MANIACS, or any of Herschell Gordon Lewis' other productions, then TWOG will be a gooshy treat...
