10 Terrifying Horror Movies Set In Asylums
2. Shock Corridor (1963)
Written, directed, and produced by Samuel Fuller, Shock Corridor is the quintessential example of asylum horror, not to mention an all-time classic.
Johnny (Peter Breck) is a journalist hungry to sniff out the truth about an unsolved murder of a patient at a mental hospital. He’s so determined to get the story (and the Pulitzer Prize for writing it), that he concocts a scheme to get himself incarcerated in the facility. He’s coached by a psychiatrist on how to fool the authorities into believing he’s insane and he convinces his girlfriend (Constance Towers) to pose as his sister and file the police report against him.
His plan is set into motion, and he’s sent to the shady facility. But Johnny soon begins to regret his actions as he witnesses the asylum’s horrors first-hand. His investigation leads him to interacting with a handful of the hospital’s colourful patients, though the madness is infectious and Johnny soon becomes overwhelmed by his new environment.
On one hand, Shock Corridor is pure 60s schlock; it’s a campy B-Movie with exploitative tendencies. On the other, though, Fuller has penned a frightening criticism of American culture at the time.