The Wax Mask

Plot

Paris, 1900: a couple are horribly murdered by a masked man with a metal claw who rips their hearts out. The sole survivor and witness to the massacre is a young girl. Twelve years later in Rome a new wax museum is opened, whose main attractions are lifelike recreations of gruesome murder scenes. A young man bets that he will spend the night in the museum but is found dead the morning after. Soon, people start disappearing from the streets of Rome and the wax museum halls begin filling with new figures.

Cast

Production

On speaking of his rivalry between himself and Lucio Fulci, Dario Argento stated that at the Rome Fanta Festival in 1994, he saw Fulci in a wheelchair, describing him as being in a "dreadful physical condition". Argento was informed that Fulci was about to have a serious hospital operation. Argento felt that working would help Fulci recover, and decided to back him in a project of his choosing. Initial plans for a project involved doing a modern adaptation of The Mummy with Dardano Sacchetti working on a screenplay. The project later became a remake of Andre de Toth's House of Wax. Argento liked this idea, and screened copies of de Toth's film as well as Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933). Fulci and his collaborator Daniele Stroppa decided to declare Gaston Leroux's short story "The Waxwork Museum" as their official source of inspiration in case they had any legal problems with Warner Bros..

According to Alan Jones, Fulci and Argento argued about the direction of the film, with Fulci wanting a more atmosphere driven film while Argento wanted to increase the gore. Pre-production lasted longer than expected as Argento was working on post-production and promotion for his own film The Stendhal Syndrome (1996). Fulci died on March 13, 1997 leading to Argento to turn to special effects artist Sergio Stivaletti, who he had previously worked with on films as early as Phenomena (1985). Stivaletti stated that he was shocked when Argento contacted him, finding that he "had been looking or a chance to direct and thought it would be with [his] own film and script [...] I was in the right place at the right time and accepted the offer." Stivaletti made changes to Fulci's script, tailoring it to his interest in special effects. Variety stated the budget for the film was under $1.25 million.

Release

The Wax Mask was released in 1997.

Critical reception

Variety reviewed the film favorably, terming it "a luridly entertaining return to the style of Britain's Hammer productions of the '60s" and "a highly enjoyable salute to cheesy vintage horror" but lamented the lack of "a guiding hand with the actors". AllMovie complimented Stivaletti for "[d]isplaying a competent handling of the material, as well as the stylistic excesses that have become synonymous with Italian horror" and concluded that the film "ultimately serves its eerily entertaining purpose."