The Funhouse (1981): An early Tobe Hooper gem

The Funhouse was the first studio film directed by Tobe Hooper, who had become known for his 1974 no-budget proto-slasher, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Universal Pictures hired Hooper to make The Funhouse to cash in on momentum from Paramount's 1980 box-office smash, Friday The 13th. Hooper had followed up The Texas Chainsaw Massacre with the TV miniseries Salem's Lot, a 1979 ratings winner for CBS. So obviously, he was landing on the right people's radar.

Hooper at the time was looking to make a movie in a carnival setting, and he jumped at the opportunity when Universal called with a script already in hand.

Tobe took his slim budget and a small cast of young actors to Miami, where traveling carnival workers tended to spend their winters and were happy to help make a movie during their spare time.

The Funhouse, released to theaters in March 1981, was a modest success. Unfortunately, it did get lost in the shuffle of several higher-profile horror films of the time. It didn't leave much of a lasting impression with anyone other than Steven Spielberg, who quickly hired Hooper to make Poltergeist, a blockbuster success the following year.

The opening scene in The Funhouse starts as an homage to John Carpenter's Halloween, with the point of view through the eye openings in the kid's mask. Then it turns into the Psycho shower scene and eventually becomes a silly little sight gag. It's great, and it pulled me completely into this movie.

The basic plot is this: Four teens on a double date visit the carnival and decide it would be fun to sneak into the funhouse and spend the night there. In the middle of the night, they witness a carnie-on-carnie murder. The back half of the movie has them trying to find their way out of the funhouse while being chased by the killer.

It's a simple, basic plot. The carnival setting, though, is a lot of fun. A couple of twists about the murder and the killer that I don't want to spoil here make it really interesting.

There is not a lot of gore here. We get a couple of jump scares and one or two terrifying moments. Elizabeth Berridge, who would make a splash a couple years later in Amadeus, is an engaging final girl. And Tobe Hooper obviously knows how to keep the joint jumping.

I give The Funhouse four stars on Letterboxd. It holds up really well.