Ruthless journalist Johnny Barrett fakes his way into a psychiatric hospital to uncover the facts behind an unsolved murder. But as he closes in on the killer, madness closes in on him.
Chosen for My Noir by
Andrew Kotting, director, writer and artist:
“Shock Corridor is a demented film noir with psychological and social overtones hanging on by its fingernails to a mountain of fear. I’m always dizzy after this film. Frederick Wisemen’s Titicut Follies flirts with Gunvor Nelson’s Take Off to beget a premature One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. But there is a story. A writer wants to win a Pulitzer Prize by uncovering the facts behind a murder inside a mental hospital. He pretends to be mad by relating accounts of incest with his imaginary sister who is played by his go-go dancing girlfriend. He manages to get locked up in the institution where the murder took place. Once inside he is sidetracked by the behavior of his fellow inmates and eventually succumbs to the thing that is Bonkers. Dali and his dream sequence have nothing on this.”