Irrational Hatred: As noted above under Disproportionate Retribution, the movie gives no indication that the surgical team that failed to save Victoria Phibes actually did anything wrong. The Abominable Dr. Phibes is a deliberately campy 1971 British horror film directed by Robert Fuest, starring Vincent Price as the eponymous doctor and Joseph Cotten as his nemesis. How many people are responsible ... about life and death? Can doctors be held responsible if they are not able to save someone? And how would you actually be able to tell if they did not do their best? Also does it really matter or is our Dr. Phibes here out of his mind anyway? I think the latter question is easier to answer.

Lampley, Jonathan Malcolm (2010). Women in the Horror Films of Vincent Price. McFarland & Company. p.155. ISBN 9780786457496. Lampley quotes Vincent Price Unmasked (1974) by James Robert Parish and Steven Whitney for this figure. Vulnavia slashes the canvas painting, and now Phibes warms up the organ for one more performance of "War March of the Priests." The next victim is a man named Doctor Kitaj. Kitaj is on vacation and decides to take a trip in his personal single-engine airplane, but Phibes and Vulnavia sneak onto the airfield and fill Kitaj's plane with a horde of rats. Kitaj and his pilot don't realize that a dozen of the rodents are inside of the plane until they are several miles up in the sky. The rats tear into the pilot, forcing the plane to crash into the ground, killing both of them. After the first few murders, Inspector Trout gets on the case. He becomes Phibes' main antagonist for this and the following film, trying to prove that all of these murders - the doctors and nurse who had been on the team of Dr. Vesalius (Joseph Cotten!) - are connected. Phibes then stays one step ahead of the police, murdering everyone with bees, snow, a unicorn statue, locusts and rats, sometimes even right next to where the cops have staked him out.Vincent Price has always been a personal favorite of mine and he gets to go full monty here on a host of victims in this stylized, colorful thriller. For those of you wondering how to pronounce the title, I would have been at a disadvantage myself if I hadn't seen a brief intro to the picture last night on Turner Classics. The host pronounced 'Phibes' like the word 'fives' but with a 'b'. So I thought that was pretty helpful or I'd still be wondering about it. Starring Vincent Price, Joseph Cotten, Peter Jeffrey, Virginia North, Hugh Griffith and Terry Thomas. Klemensen, Richard; publisher. "The Definitive Dr. Phibes". Little Shoppe of Horrors. Des Moines, Iowa, October 2012: Number 29. As the police unscrew Dr. Whitcombe and the unicorn head from the wall, an old gentleman loudly demands their consideration for quiet. Artistic License – Biology: Locusts are not carnivorous and cannot be induced to eat human flesh, no matter how hungry they are - or how that human flesh is garnished.

Director Robert Fuest, production designer Brian Eatwell (creator of the film's noted art deco settings), and composer John Gale all remained from The Abominable Dr. Phibes team. [6] Price, Peter Jeffrey, and John Cater reprised their roles from The Abominable Dr. Phibes. Hugh Griffith and Terry-Thomas also appeared in both films, but played different characters. Caroline Munro appeared in both films as Victoria, Phibes' late wife, but in both films her role was limited to lying silently in a glass coffin. [6] It was originally planned for Phibes to have a new assistant in the sequel, but the studio insisted that Vulnavia be retained, despite the fact that the character dies in the first Phibes film, and despite the unavailability of original Vulnavia actress Virginia North, who was pregnant at the time. [6] Valli Kemp was cast as a replacement. Following a strange rash of deaths, a police inspector realizes that the deaths were all of the men were in the employment of a doctor who let a distinguished professor's wife die in their care and sets out to stop him from continuing his plan of revenge against them.The death scenes really are ingenious, and while they may have some more squeamish viewers squirming, usually are not that bloody.

Pirie, David (September 1971). "The Abominable Dr. Phibes". The Monthly Film Bulletin. 38 (452): 179. But The Abominable Dr. Phibes is much more than just a 'tour-de-force' by Price. It stands as one of the most entertaining and original horror movies ever made. It's an innovating movie in every way you look at it and - like none other - it passed the test of time. The film is over 30 years now and it still looks refreshing and extremely cool. To me personally, the single title also sums up several reasons to proof that horror is the most powerful genre in cinema. First and foremost, it brings together two types of cinema that are hard to amalgamate. Face it, the basic plot of Dr. Phibes is a love-story and a tale about how to deal with the loss of a loved one...Much more than a ravenous psychopath, Dr. Phibes is a hurt romanticist! Secondly - and most teachers will deny this - Dr. Phibes is an educational film!! I guess we've all learned about the Biblical Plagues that overcame the Pharaoh in school, but it'll be much more easy to number and memorize them after you've seen this film. You might even say The Abominable Dr. Phibes is a valuable history lesson. And finally, this movie really proofs to me that horror is the "underdog"-genre in cinema. Do you remember how the plot of Se7en impressed the whole world when it came out in 1995? Both critics and audiences called it innovating, dared and highly original...but were the true horror fans impressed as much? I don't think so because the basic principles the killer in Se7en uses are just a pale tribute to the methods Dr. Anton Phibes employed. Elegant Classical Musician: Vulnavia does this twice, playing a violin as Phibes engineers the deaths of his victims. And Vulnavia is a hottie... Pykett, Derek (2008). British Horror Film Locations. McFarland & Company. p.12. ISBN 9780786451937.Director Robert Fuest started by designing sets. While working on the TV show The Avengers, he got excited about directing and ended up working on seven episodes of the original series and two of The New Avengers. Soon, he'd be working in film more and more, starting with 1967's Just Like a Woman. Between the two Phibes films, And Soon the Darkness, The Final Programme and The Devil's Rain!, he became known for dark-humored fantasy and inventive sets, several of which he designed himself.