House of the Living Dead


House of the Living Dead, also known as Doctor Maniac, is a 1974 science-fiction horror film directed by Ray Austin. The film, an international co-production between Great Britain and South Africa, takes place on a plantation in Apartheid-era South Africa and deals heavily with the occult.

Plot

The storyline follows a white family running a plantation farm on the Cape Colony in South Africa. The family consists of a mother and her two sons, Michael and Breck. Michael runs the house while Breck spends his time alone in his room, deformed and insane, conducting experiments to try to prove the soul is an organic object able to live outside the human body. Michael's fiancée Mary arrives to marry him, much to the mother's dismay as she wants the family to end so the long history of madness can stop. Meanwhile, strange things begin to happen at the plantation, such as voodoo, which is assumed to be the work of the local black neighbors, and murder.

Awards

was recognized as Best Actor at the 1974 Sitges Film Festival.

Content

The film contains very little gore and no zombies at all, as would generally be expected of a title containing "Living Dead". It is sometimes confused with the substantially more popular video game series House of the Dead. It is 86 minutes long and is rated Australia: R. It goes under various names – Doctor Maniac in the UK and US, Curse of the Dead also in the US, and Kill, Baby, Kill when released to video.

Cast