Psychomania (1971)

The most wonderfully deranged film in the history of British cinema is Psychomania. When it went into production in Shepperton Studios in late 1971, this was to be the first-ever quality zombie-biker-in-Middlesex horror film.

Tom (Nicky Henson) is the leader of a motorcycle gang called ‘The Living Dead’. He’s an upper-class delinquent who still lives with his mummy.

With the aid of a frog-worshipping cult, his satanic mother (Beryl Reid) and her shifty butler Shadwell (George Sanders), Tom makes a pact with the devil and willingly commits suicide in the belief that he’ll return from the dead.

Soon after his death and subsequent upright burial still straddling his motorbike, Tom wheelies straight back from the grave as an immortal biker with a bad attitude problem.

As a result of Tom’s successful reincarnation, the rest of the gang begins committing suicide and returning from the dead as the now zombie Living Dead gang – virtually all of whom sport the brand of stage-cockney accent last heard in Here Come the Double Deckers.

Only Tom’s girlfriend Abby (Mary Larkin) refuses to follow his example, incurring the anger of her undead friends. With the gang wreaking havoc throughout the countryside, it’s left to Tom’s mother to stop the mayhem.

Naturally, it all ends badly, with Beryl being turned into a toad “for all eternity”. But despite its faults and a restricted budget, Psychomania admirably fulfils its brief of entertaining the viewing public.

Shadwell
George Sanders
Mrs Latham
Beryl Reid
Tom Latham
Nicky Henson
Abby
Mary Larkin
Bertram
Roy Holder
Inspector Hesseltine
Robert Hardy
Sergeant
Patrick Holt
Hatchet
Denis Gilmore
Jane
Ann Michele
Chopped Meat
Miles Greenwood
Gash
Peter Whiting

Director
Don Sharp

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