A young female singer finds herself in a house in which a young man has just slaughtered his entire family. On seeing her, it becomes apparent that he is going to kill her too. Thankfully she is armed and so kills him in self-defence. Unfortunately for her, the police arrive and presume that she has killed him and his family. She is found guilty and imprisoned in a woman’s prison. The resident psychiatrist is performing hideous experiments on the inmates.

I knew nothing about Human Experiments before I watched it for the first time today. What kind of film would it be? Whilst I thought it might be a low-budget affair, this is actually modestly budgeted and has known actors cast. Aldo Ray features as does the ever-excellent Geoffrey Lewis. John Travolta’s older sister Ellen also stars.

I love how many left-field plot twists the screenplay takes. Human Experiments starts as a woman on the road film a la Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore but then veers into a female prison sub-genre entry but whilst eschewing many of the cliches of this type of film. I kept thinking of Pete Walker’s excellent House of Whipcord at this point but then the film shifts gear again and ventures into totally unchartered territory. You get the feeling the film is taking risks rather than trying to cater to familiar grindhouse/Drive-In fare.

There are also Stepford Wives vibes with the women being broken and then turned into shadows of their former selves. I also kept thinking of The Manchurian Candidate with later scenes too.

The print I saw was the version released by Severin Films and it looks sensational! Full marks to them for giving the film the TLC it deserves.

Human Experiments is intelligent filmmaking and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

4 out of 5 stars