| The Wizard of Gore | |
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Theatrical poster for The Wizard of Gore |
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| Directed by | Herschell Gordon Lewis |
| Produced by | Herschell Gordon Lewis |
| Written by | Allen Kahn |
| Starring | Ray Sager Judy Cler Wayne Ratay |
| Music by | Larry Wellington |
| Cinematography | Alex Ameri Daniel Krogh |
| Editing by | Alex Ameri (as Eskandor Ameripoor) |
| Distributed by | Mayflower Pictures |
| Release date(s) | October 23, 1970 (USA) |
| Running time | 95 min. |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $60,000 (estimated) |
The Wizard of Gore is a 1970 film directed by Herschell Gordon Lewis. It stars Ray Sager and Judy Cler. According to crew member Daniel Krogh in his book The Amazing Herschell Gordon Lewis (1983), the film was shot in Chicago, Illinois and a number of surrounding suburbs during the early summer of 1970.
This film was remade in 2007 starring Crispin Glover as Montag The Magnificent.
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The film is about a magician called Montag the Magnificent (Ray Sager) who delivers hectoring speeches about the nature of reality to his audience and then performs mutilation tricks on female "volunteers". The women appear unharmed immediately afterward but later collapse, dead, in public or at home—mutilated in the same grisly fashion suggested by Montag's stage tricks (cut in half with a chainsaw, drilled through with a punch press, etc.). Audience member Sherry Carson (Judy Cler), a local TV talk show hostess, and her boyfriend Jack (Wayne Ratay) begin to suspect that Montag is somehow involved in the murders. He and fellow reporter Greg (Phil Laurenson) attempt to research the case but are unable to come up with any solid evidence.
Montag agrees to appear on Sherry's show to perform a fire trick; when the cameras roll, he hypnotizes not only everyone in the studio, but also the viewing audience at home. With a wave of his hand, Montag starts a blaze and is guiding Sherry and two plainclothes cops toward it when Jack intervenes and pushes Montag into the fire instead. Screaming, the magician dies.
Back at home, Sherry and Jack have a drink as they discuss their strange experience. Suddenly, Jack laughs and begins peeling his own skin from his face to reveal that he is actually Montag. "What makes you think you know what reality is?" he asks Sherry before disemboweling her with his bare hands. However, still alive, she tells the baffled Montag that none of what has happened was real, and that even he is part of her illusion. "You are no longer even here," she informs Montag. "You'll have to start your little charade all over again."
"But I...I am Montag!" the magician stammers helplessly. Then he is back onstage, dazed, reciting the same speech that he delivered to his audience at the beginning of the film: "What is real? How do you know that at this second you aren't asleep in your beds, dreaming that you are here in this theater?" And in the audience an unimpressed Sherry turns to Jack, muttering, "You know what I think? I think he's a phony."
In The Amazing Herschell Gordon Lewis, Daniel Krogh notes that the film's graphic gore effects were accomplished with two sheep carcasses. The carcasses, which had to be carried around for more than two weeks while the film was being shot, were soaked in Pine-Sol. Krogh also describes how the chainsaw sequence was filmed: two women, one whose upper body was exposed and another whose legs were exposed, played the single victim. A fake midsection filled with animal organs, mortician's wax and condoms full of stage blood were placed between the two women.
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