Tonight on TCM, they showed The Awful Dr. Orloff. And after that they showed Bride of Frankenstein. Well, far be it from me to complain about Bride of Frankenstein, but I’ve seen it lots of times, and I own a few copies of it. But what The Awful Dr. Orloff was paired with as a double bill in America in the 1960s was The Horrible Dr. Hichcock. And seeing as how TCM has Sundays with Hitch going on now, don’t they owe it to us to show us one of the rarest classic horror films of them all, and one that steals scenes from Hitchcock movies? I’d say they do.
Now, The Horrible Dr. Hichcock was actually an Italian Gothic horror film from 1962 called L’Orrible Segreto del Dr. Hichcock (The Horrible Secret of Dr. Hichcock: It was renamed The Horrible Dr. Hichcock to match titles with The Awful Dr. Orloff, which itself was actually named Gritos en la Noche {Screams in the Night}; now try to figure that out of you can.), and it was a movie about the most taboo of subjects: necrophilia and perverted sexual relations, drug addiction, murder, malpractice, scopophilia, and weird love triangles. (Simply unbelievable that it’s 51 years-old!) It’s a masterpiece of the truly perverse and bizzare, and yet it’s completely gorgeous and ravishing to look at. And as the title tells us, it’s also a tribute to the Master of Suspense himself: Alfred Hitchcock. (I’m guessing the misspelling was intentional to avoid legal troubles.)
And, as I mentioned before, TCM is having a Hitchcock thingy where they show all Hitchcock movies all Sundays this month (or something). So wouldn’t it be great for them to have The Horrible Dr. Hichcock as their International Spotlight? Most people have never seen this movie, I’d venture to guess, and it’s a doozy! And seeing it in its intended widescreen would be amazing! So how about it, TCM? Give us something unexpected and odd and fantastical, and apropos for Sundays with Hitch?
BTW: I have read lots of movie reviews and such on the internet, but I think the very best piece of film criticism I have ever read online is a piece on this movie by Liz Kingsley at And You Call Yourself a Scientist! (BTW: This reference is, if memory serves, from the movie I Was a Teenage Werewolf). Check it out here; you won’t be disappointed!:
And here’s the trailer for L’Orrible Segreto del Dr. Hichcock:
