Skip to main content
Horror Cult Classic

Desert madness, chained patients, and a mad doctor’s castle of horrors.

HELP ME... I'M POSSESSED

1974 · 1h 19m · PG · Horror

A mad doctor runs a sanitarium in the desert, where his hunchbacked servant whips women who are chained in the basement and cuts the legs off bodies so they'll fit in the caskets. Complications ensue.

5,471 FilmsIn The Vault
Vault UpdatedDaily
Curated ByHumans
No AlgorithmBullsh*t
Vault Note

Proof that castle real estate in the desert is always a bad sign.

Programmer's Pick

If you like your horror with a heavy dose of hunchbacks, chained up patients, and a castle that’s more madhouse than manor, this one’s got your number. Charles Nizet delivers 79 minutes of desert psychodrama, complete with a doll-hugging sister and a doctor whose ‘treatments’ are anything but therapeutic.

— SassyFlix Programmer
Quick Answer
What is Help Me... I'm Possessed about?

Help Me... I'm Possessed is a 1974 American horror film directed by Charles Nizet about a mad doctor running a desert sanitarium where disturbing experiments and sinister acts unfold.

Synopsis

In the American desert, a young couple has been brutally murdered and the local sheriff immediately suspects fishy goings-on at the castle-like sanitarium run by reclusive Doctor Arthur Blackwood (Bill Greer).

Assuring the sheriff that his work there is entirely above board and consists of little more than helping disturbed individuals return to society, he does little to allay the police’s fears, not least when his loopy doll-hugging singing sister appears.

Indeed, we soon learn that the doctor is perhaps not entirely qualified, housing a collection of chained up, scantily clad ladies, a Catweazle-alike prisoner and a hunchback in his basement, all at the mercy of his insane experiments, designed to rid them of madness.

When not being whipped and brutalised, these ‘volunteers’ suffer an even worse fate if they don’t behave or illicit positive results, being killed by snake, guillotine and being hacked up to fit the wrongly-sized coffins.

The arrival of the doctor’s new wife (Peters) sees his plans begin to unravel as disappearing members of staff and her cranky husband arouse her suspicion. Worse still, when she uncovers his experiments she learns that the harnessed ‘evil’ extracted from the patients has manifest itself as something malevolent and hideous.
Details & Specs
Director
Charles Nizet
Writers
Bill Greer, Deedy Peters
Release
1974
Runtime
1h 19m
Genres
Horror
Also Known As
Nightmare at Blood Castle, The Possessed

Why Cult

Castle Sanitarium Setting

The film’s action unfolds in a castle-like sanitarium in the American desert, making for a memorably bizarre backdrop.

Eccentric Cast of Characters

From a loopy singing sister to a hunchbacked assistant and chained basement dwellers, the film is stacked with oddball roles.

Mad Doctor Experiments

Dr. Arthur Blackwood’s ‘treatments’ include chaining women in the basement and questionable surgeries to fit bodies in caskets.

Questions from the Vault

What is Help Me... I'm Possessed about? +

Help Me... I'm Possessed follows a mad doctor operating a sanitarium in the desert, where bizarre experiments and sinister happenings plague his patients.

Who directed Help Me... I'm Possessed? +

Charles Nizet directed Help Me... I'm Possessed.

How long is Help Me... I'm Possessed? +

Help Me... I'm Possessed has a runtime of 79 minutes.

What genre is Help Me... I'm Possessed? +

Help Me... I'm Possessed is a horror film.