Product Details

• Actors: Jimmy Lydon, Sally Eilers, Warren William, Regis Toomey, Charles Arnt
• Directors: Edgar G. Ulmer
• Writers: Adele Comandini, Fritz Rotter
• Producers: Leon Fromkess
• Format: Black & White, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono)
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Image Entertainment
• DVD Release Date: September 18, 2001
• Run Time: 87 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00005NG0H
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #162,930 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Strange Illusion" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Clean-cut American teen Jimmy Lydon is tormented by nightmares in which his deceased father warns him about Mom's new boyfriend, and he feigns madness to infiltrate a mental hospital where he suspects the answers lie. Yes, it's Hamlet refigured as a suburban film noir thriller with a psychiatric twist. Former Hollywood leading man Warren William is thoroughly wolfish as a silver-haired lothario whose slick charm and classy manners hide a disturbing taste for teenage girls, and Sally Eilers plays his mark, the young widow with two teenage kids and a sizable life insurance payoff. B-movie legend Edgar G. Ulmer (Detour) overcomes a starvation budget to create a modest little thriller with understated mood, simple but eerie dream sequences, and a creepy undercurrent of corruption and sexual deviance. --Sean Axmaker

Product Description

The highly acclaimed DVD collection of low-budget auteur Edgar G. Ulmer's classic genre films continues with this fabled film noir. "Strange Illusion is another stylish low-budget feature directed by Edgar G. Ulmer," writes Carl Macek in Silver & Ward's indispensable guide "Film Noir," "The most interesting aspect of the film rests in its updating of Hamlet, complete with a message from beyond the grave and the faked insanity, into contemporary thriller. The asylum sequences are controlled visions of chaos and corruption, a mental hell sardonically defined by Ulmer." A Poverty Row suspense classic as only Ulmer made 'em.

See all Editorial Reviews

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The Creepy Warren William Film, July 23, 2001

By	Linda McDonnell "TutorGal" (Brooklyn, U.S.A) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Strange Illusion [VHS] (VHS Tape)

My never-ending search for Warren William movies eventually led me to "Strange Illusion", one of the last films of his career, in which he plays an honest to God creep!

Teenage Jimmy Lydon has been plagued by nightmares since his father's unsolved murder--and the latest one seems to suggest danger surrounding his mother. The next thing you know, mom announces she has a suitor, Warren William. Guess what? Uh huh, that's right. So this is partly David Copperfield/Mr. Murdstone and partly Hamlet/Claudius, as one reviewer made note. An unsavory twist is that Warren William has a fancy for underage girls, which doesn't bode well for Jimmy's girlfriend.

Still and all, I liked "Strange Illusion" because it is major camp on top of everything else--others in my family hated it, though. Ergo, I guess it's just one of those movies you have to make up your own mind about.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Ulmer's best beside Detour and Ruthless, January 28, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Strange Illusion [VHS] (VHS Tape)

Sometimes Mr. Maltin fails with his comments, and to compare this thrilling fantasy movie with Shakespeare's Hamlet is laughable. O.K., there are the usual cheesy sets on PRC's small backlot, but otherwise the dreamy programmer is one of the best in its class. Ulmer again showed his ability to make the best of his extremely low budget. Within this, photography is very good, whereas the music score with its "adaptation" of Schumann's piano concerto gives you the possiblity to cry or laugh. Fine opening, indeed.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Low budget, high style, September 18, 2004

By	Timothy Hulsey (Charlottesville, VA United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Ulmer's ambitious, cockeyed update of "Hamlet" is one of his best Poverty Row films. Cheesy sets, half-baked scripts, and overwrought acting are to be expected from these ultra low-budget productions, and they're all in abundance here. But because Ulmer brought his screwy artistry to even the seamiest Z-grade projects, this film is shot through with a grimy gutter poetry. _Strange Illusion_ isn't a cult masterpiece like _Detour_, but it's still worth seeing.

For my money, this film's treatment of psychoanalysis, exploitative though it may be, is still superior to Hitchcock's _Spellbound_.