The Daily Dig: Hellhole (1985)

“Hellhole” lacks substance but makes up for it with a ton of nudity and inmate intimacy, almost redeemed by one great performance.

Susan witnesses her mother’s murder and ends up in an institution run by a sadistic doctor. Let’s dig into 1985’s HELLHOLE, directed by Pierre De Moro and Tom DeSimone!

As I See It

I’ve often shouted from the mountain tops that the nineteen eighties were the golden age of horror films. Most of that has to do with the era that I happened to be born in and lived through as a young, spooky kid.

The deeper I dive into fringe films that lie within the purview of this column, the harder I find it to defend my opinion. I’m not off it yet, but the gratuitous, substance-free films I encounter are leading me to reassess. Nostalgia is a pair of rose-tinted sunglasses that reeks of decay.

That said, this is not a film so bad that it is making me rethink my life.

It’s just OK. Expectations are where the problem enters. You’ve got to at least respect the cowboys and girls who were making genre films that bordered on absurd, genre-bending, or transcended stereotypes.

The major stereotype that takes a backseat here is the role of the exploiter. Normally, we’d see some creepy male doctor muscling his way into the pants of vulnerable asylum patients. Not in the hell hole. Here, Dr. Fletcher is a powerful woman who uses lobotomies and protocol to feed her sexual appetite. The casting for that role is perfect. Mary Woronov is not to be trifled with.

The droning, lobotomized patients seem like proper pod people who help, but you never really care about Susan or her plight. They just tried to throw a pretty blonde in as a protagonist and hoped that would be enough for you to invest yourself. That role is as impotent as the ending.

Famous Faces

Mary Woronov (Dr. Fletcher) had that authority figure role down pat. She was Miss Togar in Rock n’ Roll High School and came back for the sequel Rock n’ Roll High School Forever as a different but equally menacing character. She was also featured in Chopping Mall, Night of the Comet, and Terrorvision. Quite a B-Horror resume.

This was Robert Z’Dar’s (Brad) first film role. Z’Dar was born with a rare genetic abnormality called cherubism, which made the lower half of his face larger than normal. You should know him as Officer Matt Cordell in Maniac Cop and the subsequent sequels or as Face in the uber-enjoyable buddy cop film Tango and Cash, which starred Sylvester Stallone and Kurt Russell. His fame wasn’t limited to those films, though. He featured or starred (usually as a villain) in well over one hundred movies.

Of Gratuitous Nature

Bad shit always happens when someone is showering. If Sylvester Graham hadn’t been so successful in spreading his ideology of cleanliness, horror writers would never have known how to put someone in such peril. This could easily find its way to this section of the column on any given day if it weren’t for the gratuitous shower brawl in the sanitarium or the patient mud bath. You might think you’ve found yourself watching some Skinemax, softcore prison porn.

Heartthrob

A climatic action sequence following Robert Z’Dar would have been enough for me if I were a casting director in that era. He showed the promise of being a home run villain.

Ripe for a Remake

The list of horror tropes is long. An insane asylum? Check. Exploiting patients? Check. Gratuitous scenes of sexual misconduct? Check. There is nothing new under the sun.

Spawns

No progeny to report.

Where to Watch

As of publishing, Shout Factory has two copies of the Blu-Ray left, but it contains scant extras. You can stream Hellhole on Tubi, Screambox, Apple TV, or Shout Factory TV.