While I wouldn't call "Violent Midnight" a porno film, I was VERY surprised when I tried to watch this with my family. After all, the DVD was unrated and from the early 1960s.
I saw that AMC was running this at 4:45 am today so I stayed up to check it out. Another in a long line of terrible decisions.
Sinister Cinema carries this title and like IMDb, they insist it contains "axe murders galore." In fact, there is not one single axe murder in the entire film.
Psychomania is a neat little slasher flick that has been unfairly maligned by its relationship to the creators of the genuinely dreadful (though entertaining) Horror of Party Beach. The film is shot in stark black and white, with a look that sometimes anticipates Night of the Living Dead and a trench-coated, gloved killer that pre-dates the giallo genre (Bava's Blood and Black Lace was a year away).
I watched this film because of oddly good reviews and repeated claims that it depicted axe murders. Being made in 1963, I was curious to see how this was handled.
Violent Midnight (Psychomania) is a nice little film in the Psycho tradition that, for the most part, manages to overcome the handicap of a very limited budget. If you can get past the spotty acting and the less than stellar production values, you'll discover an interesting early slasher.
A Korean "one-man war machine" who witnessed the loss of many soldiers in his platoon, has found his niche in art..yet Elliot Freeman(Lee Philips)is seen as the possible killer right at the beginning after his rather crazy middle-aged father is shot by someone in the bushes point-blank in the face.
A film probably better known by its alternate, later title of "Psychomania," "Violent Midnight" (1963) proved a very pleasant surprise for me indeed. The film centers around Elliott Freeman, a young, reclusive painter who won't be a free man much longer if the local police have their way.
