Roberts Blossom, Cosette Lee, Leslie Carlson

A man living in rural Wisconsin takes care of his bed-ridden mother, who is very domineering and teaches him that all women are evil. After she dies he misses her, so a year later he digs her up and t...( read more  read more... )akes her home. He learns about taxidermy and begins robbing graves to get materials to patch her up, and inevitably begins looking for fresher sources of materials. Based closely on the true story of Ed Gein.

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73% liked it

848 ratings

R, 82 min.

Directed by: Jeff Gillen

Release Date: February 1, 1974

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Flixster Reviews (86)


  • December 2, 2009
    Portray of a serial killer.
    One of the most disturbed ones, even if his homicidal numbers are not quite exactly top ranked in the charts.
    But that didn't keep Ed Gein from gaining reputation as one of the most deranged minds of modern time.
    And one of the most notorious ones amon...( read more)gst his peers.

    Murderer. Grave desecrator. Cannibal. Necrophiliac. Human skin stylist.
    And also a God fearing boy.
    The whole package.

    Inspired, among others, the serial killers in Psycho, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Silence of the Lambs and American Psycho. Featured in several songs of more extreme bands (being Slayer's Dead Skin Mask the obvious highlight).

    For all that and more, he deserves a very special place in all hearts.

    The ones he didn't eat, that is.

    Now, for the movie.
    Probably the best among the ones that tried to portray him. But that's not saying that this is in fact a masterpiece.
    Not really.

    This is a fairly effective display of what should be a day in the life of old Theodore, but I still think it's a light one.
    Nevertheless, and although I thought at first I wasn't going to give much credit to this one, it's definitely worth a look.

    Because (make no mistake about it) it does in fact have a great amount of true and accurate information regarding what happened and how it happened.
    I just think they should've darkened it up a little more.

    Such an unsettling mind deserved that much.
  • May 13, 2008
    Oh yeah! This is what us genre fans like to call a REAL horror film! "Deranged" is shocking, insensitive, cold-hearted and features a 'you-don't-like-it-go-to-hell'-honesty you can't possibly walk away from! This is the pretty damn factual, and therefore hugely disturbing, recons...( read more)truction of the case of Wisconsin serial killer Ed Gein. This guy was crazier and far more dangerous than any fictional horror character could ever be and therefore he was a nearly endless source of inspiration for independent filmmakers who wanted to bring a horrific tale. "Deranged" appears to be very cheap and amateurish, but it's one of the rare films in which the low budget production values actually contribute in making the story more grim and realistic! Ed Gein really was a poor and simple-minded farmer who went absolutely berserk after the death of his beloved mother and he refused to accept her passing away by replacing her with cadavers that he kept in his house. The characters' names have been altered, as well as the timing of the story, but Ezra Cobb's actual crimes are frighteningly truthful and portrayed with a chilling eye for detail. The film's biggest trump is unquestionably the casting of the rather unknown actor Roberts Blossom whose impressive and straight-faced performance will make you more than once wonder whether he isn't a real madman! Other aspects that definitely increase the creepiness are the constant funeral music that guides the film and the colorless, depressing set pieces. "Deranged" is not a total gorefest (mainly due to the lack in budget) but the murders are nonetheless explicitly illustrated and quite bloody. Strangely enough, the film's devastating tone is regularly undercut with brilliant flashes of morbid black humor, like Ezra's encounter with an overweight widow who talks to her deceased husband. In short, "Deranged" is a typically 70's cult treasure that should be watched by every horror fan on this planet.
  • March 21, 2008
    Considering there has only been one real-life set of crimes that has intrigued me enough to pursue it or know the name as a sort of automatic filing label in my brain, it's kind of surprising this movie passed in one ear and out the other for me.

    Ezra Cobb (Roberts Blossom) is a...( read more) sheltered man living alone with his bed-ridden mother (Cosette Lee) who directs him to avoid women, who she believes are instruments of the devil, riddled with gonorrhea and syphilis and planning to take financial advantage of Ez as soon as she leaves this earth. Fire and brimstone are the cornerstones of her dying speeches to shaking, worried, desperate Ez, who tries to feed her soup on her deathbed, sure that he can keep her alive a little longer. Of course, she does die, and so Ez is left alone, taking on the role of handyman to Harlon Kootz (Robert Warner) and his family, including his wife Jenny (Marcia Diamond) and son Brad (Brian Smeagle). Ed, I mean, Ez, however, still misses his mother and is absolutely grief-stricken over her death. He begins to hear her voice, asking him to bring her home. Of course, he does just that, shocked to find her in a state of decay and determined to put this to right.

    Interestingly enough, despite the wild deviations of the other films based on Ed Gein (Psycho, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,* The Silence of the Lambs--Buffalo Bill, not Hannibal), this one is reasonably accurate, especially as film adaptations go. I was surprised that the film opened by addressing his mother's controlling, dominating, self-loathing misogyny as used to raise Ed, hinting at the effect it later had on him. We're brought in close to Ed (forget "Ez," it's so close as to be pointless, and we all know who it is) and see some measure of sympathy for him as it begins. Blossom plays him as a simpering, dependent, scrawny man in his 40s who lived for his mother and was never allowed to develop a backbone. He tries to follow his mother's teachings with some measure of strength, but is otherwise completely without a will of his own. We feel some pity for him in this, and at least see the roots of what comes from it. Cleverly, the way Blossom performs it and Jeff Gillen and Alan Ormsby direct it, we don't end up thinking, "Gee, he wasn't that bad!" or "The poor fellow!" We certainly see his victims as victims, and him as monstrous. There are no bones about this, despite the fact that we see the tragedy of poor parenting and the horrid effect it can have on someone, leaving fault not with that parenting, but with the result of it (in this case Ed).

    There is not a lot of focus on his, er, trophies (for the sake of most, I'm not going to list them, you can look them up if you want) or in some ways even on the murders, until the end when we see his mind completely devolving as he falls into the sickening trap of feeling the power that his acts have given him. Stumbling into the first, but finding something in the act as he continues, until he, too, does not realize where he has let himself wander. There is some gore--it should be noted that I've seen the R-rated and not the unrated version, which includes far more gruesome acts--but not an awful lot. Moreso we find thoroughly decayed corpses being used as companions, which is disturbing in an altogether different way. Blossom never plays this aspect for complete, drooling madness, nor for pure evil. Ed is a severely misguided and altogether screwed-up mind, and is acting as if this group of women is indeed still alive and keeping him company.

    Rather a surprise for its treatment of the events, even going so far as to underline the idea that these events are true but for the names and locations, it even employs a narrator (Leslie Carlson) who occasionally appears to tell us he is a reporter who first wrote about the story. This can be a bit distracting, but not overly so, and can break the tension--appropriately--at some moments. It's a good idea that doesn't quite work like it should, but does not bring the movie down for it.

    Special moment: most of the scenes revolving around "Ma Cobb's" death are soaked in church organ music playing various hymns, but when Ez brings a skull to her that is to be her "company" and places it on a bedpost, suddenly the chord goes amelodic and sustains, the sort of music you would more expect out of a horror movie, but not jarring or overly loud, just a sudden change in atmosphere that tells us Ez has finally lost it, that up to then he was crossing major lines, but now he has passed the point of no return.


    *As someone once said, really, "The Wisconsin Rifle Double-Homicide" would not have been near as menacing a title.
  • July 9, 2007
    A superb tale of a deranged man, who does unspeakable things with girls and dead bodies after his overbearing mother passes away. The movie is bizarre and effective, with great acting by Robert Blossoms (the old man down the street from the "Home Alone" movie.) In ways, it's bett...( read more)er than the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. The plot is a bit soap-operish and the acting is a bit silly, but there are enough icky and freaky scenes to effectively show us how deranged this man really is.
  • October 29, 2008
    A different sort of film based on the Ed Gain case. First of all you have a narrator, who identifies himself as a reporter, and appears in the film as the narrative that gives this film a strange aesthetic. Also Roberts Blossom plays an amazing disturbed man, and it's hard to not...( read more) like him as he does it so well.
    As for the story, it unfolds episodically split up by the narration and has a certain '70s strangeness to the entire mood and presentation. It's hard to put a finger on it, but it's worth seeing. I mean, this is co-directed and written by the writer of Dead of Night, who was also the star and co-writer of Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things. Plus Tom Savini had his hand in the make-up effects.
    Done, you're sold.
  • August 2, 2009
    A great movie that is closet to the true story of ed gein.
  • April 9, 2009
    Rather accurate as far as Ed Gein's basic story goes, far more than other stuff "based" on him... however, that ultimately leaves it slightly boring.
  • October 20, 2008
    Who would have thought that Ed Gein was such a well of creativity? Yet another movie based on the Wisconsin serial killer's life.
  • July 2, 2008
    A fictionalized telling of the story of the infamous killer, Ed Gein. Roberts Blossom plays the lead with a fine mix of the pitiful and the frightening.
  • May 8, 2008
    Based on the true story of ed gein who's the inspiration for most of todays movie psychopaths. It's a fascinating watch even if the low budget is painfully obvious at times.

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Deranged Trivia


  • Mr. Parker: He looks like a deranged Easter Bunny. Mother: He does not! Mr. Parker: He does too, he looks like a pink nightmare!  Answer »
  • Original HG Wells horror story of a deranged scientist who uses his remote island as a base for experiments in creating half human/half animal creatures. With Burt Lancaster?  Answer »
  • Who has such a Charmed life she has stayed in Beverly Hills, her daughter went missing and used to cruise the mall and fought off deranged stakers?  Answer »
  • He's been a drag queen, a vampire slayer, and a deranged criminal from the past awakened in the future.  Answer »

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