Hospital Massacre aka X-Ray (1981)

September 27, 2018

Directed by: Boaz Davidson

Written by: Marc Behm, Boaz Davidson

Starring: Barbi Benton, Charles Lucia, Jon Van Ness

Quote: "Can you touch her in all her secret places?"

Trivia: This film was shot at night in an actual abandoned hospital.









Hospital Massacre (aka x-Ray aka Ward 13 aka Be My Valentine, Or Else), filmed in 1981, was another of those movies created to capitalize on the Slasher film craze of the early 1980s. The movie has all the great death scenes that the genre is famous for and even has a scary location, the hospital. But Hospital Massacre has something else that the other slashers didn't have: a playboy playmate. Playboy Playmate Barbi Benton is really what sells this movie and sets it apart from the 1000s of other slashers that came out at the same time. That's not to say that the kill scenes, comedic moments, and characters are not top notch, because they are, but the topless Playmate is what this movie banked on... and yes, of course, she does get topless.

The story begins with a young girl getting a Valentine's Day card from a boy. After making fun of the boy to another kid, the boy retaliates by hanging the kid from a coat rack. Fast forward twenty years and the young girl whose name is Susan Jeremy (Barbi Benton) is now in her thirties, divorced, with a daughter and a boyfriend. On a seemingly normal day, Susan goes to a hospital to receive the results of a routine test she had undergone. However, while at the hospital, things begin to get weirder and weirder. Firstly, a man in a surgical uniform is killing the doctors and patients throughout the hospital. Also, the doctors seem disturbed about Susan's medical results but refuse to tell her anything, instead she keeps sinking deeper and deeper into hospital bureaucracy and medical authority. Susan has to both fight for her life and her sanity as the masked killer tries to murder her and as the hospital tries to declare her insane. It is being dropped into a Franz Kafka novel with Jason Vorhees.

The movie has some really great death scenes and a great killer. The janitor upon discovering a murdered doctor has his head dunked into sulfuric acid. Susan's boyfriend is decapitated and his head put into a box and left for her to discover. When she later tries to report it to the medical staff, the head has been replaced with a cake, making Susan look insane. Later, Susan's ex-husband is killed with a hatchet and once again, when she tries to report it, she's thought to be losing her mind and is then restrained. During the final surgery scene, the doctors and nurses are killed one by one, leaving Susan to battle the crazed surgeon, who is, of course, the boy from the beginning of the movie. Hell hath no fury like a ten year old rejected some two decades before.

Aside from killing a dozen or so people, the killer also almost pulls off the ultimate Gas Lighting job in history. From changing her medical records twice to making it look crazy, even I wasn't sure that this wasn't all a hallucinatory nightmare. He also does a great job behind his surgical mask of appearing like a madman. Since the mask covers his features, the killer grunts, moans, and screams during the killings which makes them all the more unsettling. But, the killer gets greedy, tries to kill her and she burns him up. For whatever reason, this guy is extremely flammable because when she puts a little fire on him, he goes up like a torch.

The movie also has a decent amount of comedy to lighten up the whole film. When Susan enters the hospital elevator she sees a guy that looks to be covered in blood, but later we see that he's just a drunk covered in ketchup from his hamburger. The drunk proceeds to wander around the hospital the rest of the movie, aimlessly. There is also a part at around the 45 minute mark where a bunch of elderly patients proceed to talk trash on Susan for no apparent reason (other than dementia possibly). "Young and lovely on the outside maybe, but old and rotten on the inside. Old and putrid. I wonder what ails her? All her bones are decaying and her organs are all rancid. And her blood is as malignant as slime." Such a bizarre moment in the movie, but it helps to create a disturbing atmosphere to the hospital.

Hospital Massacre is full of odd moments to add to the eccentricity of the film and make the hospital almost as unsettling of a place as the killer himself. There are the increasingly invasive medical experiments that Susan is forced to go through. One involving her getting almost entirely naked and having the doctor press on her lower pelvic area. There are the doctors and patients that stare wildeyed at Susan throughout the movie. And the doctor that tells her, "Don't you worry baby." Very weird for a doctor, right?

Finally, the score is done great in the film. The use of stringed instruments is great for creating a cacophonous now and building the tension in the film. There are moments when the instrument noises are almost deafening.

...what's your thoughts?