The Asphyx (1972) I don't remember too many 1970's horror films with startling, high concept ideas behind them......they usually stuck to the usual suspects - vampires, werewolves, zombies, aliens, assorted psycho slashers, etc, etc.......
But let's all tip our hats to this decidedly oddball little gem.....which manages to blend mad science run amuck (and gone awry) with an unforgettable hellish, paranormal entity.
The film, a slowly paced British affair, drapes itself in pseudo 'Masterpiece Theater' pretentions. Most of it occurs in a gorgeously decorated country mansion, photographed like exquisite portraiture by legendary cinematographer Freddie Young ("Lawrence Of Arabia", "Doctor Zhivago", "You Only Live Twice").
For its lead role of an occult-obsessed scientist, the film snagged Robert Stephens(who shined in the title role of Billy Wilder's "The Private Life Of Sherlock Holmes".) A far more accomplished actor than this movie deserved, he threw himself into it as if center stage at the Royal Shakespeare Company.
Stephens more than earns his keep playing mid 19th century supernatural science guy, Sir Hugo Cunningham. . He elegantly contributes enough uppercrust gravitas to make you swallow the movie's outrageous, ghostbusting premise..... while photographing people at the moment of death,(including his own son's accidental demise) his images capture 'The Asphyx', a skeletal, shrieking wraith, that represents the victim's soul, making an exit for the Great Beyond or wherever.....
Now fully crazed, Sir Hugo, aided by his skeptical worried stepson Giles (Robert Powell) poisons a guinea pig but manages to isolate and box up its Asphyx before the animal can die. . With its Asphyx trapped, nothing can ever kill the guinea pig ever again .rendering it immortal.....and a potential threat to pet store profits. But what a find for mankind! (Heh, heh, heh, heh....)
The mad, mad doctor, as you knew he would, can't wait to immortalize humans, starting with himself. The nervy doc conducts his own electrocution, luckily cutting off the juice just before he turns crispy and allowing Giles to snag his Asphyx. Wow...imagine the hospital bills he'll neve rack up....
Now immortal, Robert Stephens gets to rant and rave some more as inevitable calamites pile up and his experiments go.....uh....horribly wrong, to say the least. I wish I could tell you this makes for a lot of ridiculous, horrific fun, but the movie, for all the gruesome tragedy on display, never moves out of low gear, staying stodgy throughout.
Even worse, it's bookended by a modern day prologue and epilogue that seems raise all sorts of questions about the movie's own mythology......and finishes up with that obscene curse of 1970 films and TV shows.....the freeze frame. "The Asphyx" remains odd and weird enough for cult horror fans to seek it out.....but it never really delivers the loony guilty pleasures promised by its high concept.
2 stars (**), The only good news - the 1970's use of freeze frame endings was not immortal, thank the Movie Godz......
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