In a role for which the filmmakers were originally hoping to get Vincent Price, Ray Sager dominates the proceedings for "The Wizard of Gore". A stock company player for gore master Herschell Gordon Lewis, Sager was the last minute choice to play the title role. Montag the Magnificent is an illusionist who hypnotizes pretty female members of his audience into participating in elaborate gags. (Sword swallowing, being punch pressed, chain sawed in half, etc.) They seem to be fine after the performances, but hours later, they suffer horrible and fatal wounds. Inquiring journalist Jack (Wayne Ratay) and his TV host girlfriend Sherry (Judy Cler) decide to investigate the illusionist.

"The Wizard of Gore" has got to be one of HGLs' all time grisliest exercises in sadism. He really seems to take a perverse delight in having Montag run his hands through the pulpy innards of his volunteers. The gore is pretty tacky, but there's just so damn much of it that it's sure to amuse lovers of cinematic violence. As for the movie itself, there's not really that much going on, but at least HGL and his screenwriter, Allen Kahn, prevent this from being purely ordinary shenanigans by injecting a healthy dose of strangeness and surrealism. They definitely push the whole "what is reality and what is illusion" idea, which is brought home by the denouement.

The main drawing card is Sager, who exhibits a welcome theatricality. Judging by his work here, he could have easily had more leading roles, even if only in HGL movies. The rest of the acting is no more than passable, but it doesn't leave one rolling their eyes quite as much as the acting in some of HGLs' other works.

If one wants to see Lewis at his gory best, "Blood Feast" and "Two Thousand Maniacs!" are a safer bet. This one is dragged out much too long.

Six out of 10.

Hershell Gordon Lewis or the "Godfather of Gore" brings us a very early splatter film from 1970. Montag the Magnificent (Ray Sager) wows an audience with magical gore. One of the people in the audience Sherry Carson (Judy Cler) has her own talk show and wants Montag to be a guest on her show where he can show off his magical skills. Of course corpses are showing up after each show. They also just happen to be the people pulled out of the audience that Montag excites his audience in showing their violent deaths.

Where the film is somewhat thin in the plot department it is high in the gore department, especially for 1970. Old school gore hounds may enjoy this flick, even though in today's terms you can tell what are props and what are dummies. But, I give Lewis credit for trying something different and really splashing the gore onto the screen. The film really is just a set up for the kills during Montag's show and without them this movie probably would be the pits. Remember though this film is not for all tastes. Some real spotty acting from everybody, although I did seem to enjoy Sager as Montag. He played the role somewhat hammy and it seemed to work well. Also has some dramatically intense music from Larry Wellington (who worked on 7 other Lewis films). This is the only Lewis film I have seen to date, but will likely see more in the future as I see he cranked out it looks like 29 films back in the 60s.

This might have been an excellent short. And it works wonderfully as a fetish movie if seeing young women getting tied up and mutilated is your cup of tea. As a feature movie it's just dire.

Unusually for a horror movie, it features a young professional woman in one of the leading roles -- and she doesn't even get raped and mutilated in the first five minutes for being a harlot! She investigates a magician who performs gory tricks in his show, with the same girls he performed his tricks on later dieing accordingly. This repeats itself no less than four times (if I counted correctly), each scene lasting maybe ten minutes and being as linear as train tracks in a desert, until her boyfriend muses: "All those girls who went on stage in the show died in the same manner later in the evening. Maybe there's a connection?". His girlfriend is so impressed by his cleverness that she proceeds to fornicate him out of gratitude -- and rightly so. It was the most intelligent moment of the entire movie.

I'm not asking for too much, am I, here? I just want to be entertained. For that, I'm willing to forfeit good taste, intelligent plot, competent acting at the door. In the Wizard Of Gore, though, Herschell Gordon Lewis reveals himself as a gore fetishist. The premise of blurring reality and imagination may be interesting, but it's never developed into a story. Fail!