Two Thousand Maniacs! (1964)
Something Weird Video / Fullscreen (4:3) / Color / 1 disc / 83 minutes

A warning to motorists: If you are traveling through the South and happen to roll into a town where the patrons are waving Confederate battle flags and the children brandish miniature nooses like party favors, then you’d best turn your hooptie around and lay heavy onto the speeder.

Of course, if you are the carpet-bagging Yankees in Herschell Gordon Lewis’ 1964 rednecksploitation-turned-splatterhouse masterpiece, TWO THOUSAND MANIACS!, it’s already too late. This ain’t DELIVERANCE y’all. It’s a hell of a lot worse! You better just day-um well make sure you wore your Confederate flag boxers and show some respect to the Dirty South.

TWO THOUSAND MANIACS! was shamelessly culled from the Scottish legend that became the basis for the 1954 musical film BRIGADOON — a tale about a town that reappears from the Highland mist every 100 years.

Now take that scheme and drop it into the middle of a southern hamlet filled with pissed-off tobacco-chewing hayseeds hell-bent on revenge and you have a movie as sublime as a Moon Pie and an R.C. This flick hits you in the chest like a triple-shot of SoCo, and lays heavier on the gorge than a slab of Paula Dean’s Mac and Cheese. Better get your Tums ready …

Filmed in St. Cloud, Florida on a shoestring budget somewhere around $60,000, MANIACS is the second film in Lewis’ so-called “blood trilogy,” which includes 1963’s stunning BLOOD FEAST and later, COLOR ME BLOOD RED, in 1965. Lewis’ films were notable for introducing shocking, in-your-face full-color gore to audiences more accustomed to off-screen violence. It all looks rather tame now, especially compared to the crimson-stained, computer-generated ilk of most crime procedurals on network television, but even so, MANIACS has a few nasty surprises up its sleeve, even for the most jaded connoisseurs of weird film.

The story takes place in the town of Pleasant Valley (population, 2,000), which could be located in South Carolina, Georgia, or really anywhere in the South. All we know is that it’s about 110 miles from Augusta (Which could place it somewhere near Clemson, S.C. hehehe…).

Three couples, including troubled husband and wife, Bea and John, who are riding with Dave and Beverly, and stranded schoolteacher Tom, who catches a lift into town from Terry (Playboy Playmate Connie Mason), are lured off the main highway and into the town by some well-placed detour signs, where they are heralded as guests of honor for the town’s centennial celebration.

Unfortunately for our guests, the festivities revolve around a blood ritual rooted in events of the Civil War. We learn, via one of those ostentatious “historical marker” signs that are everywhere here in the South, that Pleasant Valley was destroyed by a rogue band of Union soldiers at the end of the Civil War, who apparently took pleasure in mutilating residents during the sacking.

It quickly becomes apparent a simple battle re-enactment won’t suffice. One by one, the northerners are disposed of in macabre ways.

Sexy blonde Bea (Shelby Livingston) is seduced into the woods by the leathery cracker Harper (Wow, is it the rope belt? Is that what drives the ladies wild????) for some afternoon delight. He gets his cut-up alright — by lopping off her thumb with a pocketknife in what HAS to be the film’s sickest scene. Later, surrounded by grinning hicks and rebel flags, she’s further dismembered, and ultimately cooked on a spit for the evening celebration. (As kids growing up in the various barbeque regions of the South, we were taught to never ask what was in the “hash” so to speak. Now I know… Good Lord! Choke …)

Stoned on moonshine force-fed to him by the charming belle Betsy (Linda Cochran), John (Jerome Eden) finds himself in dire straits when he’s hooked up for the “horse race” — also known as a good old-fashioned drawing and quartering. The mood goes somber after the dirty deed is done, but a poignant rendition of “Dixie” on banjo and a group sing-a-long suddenly emerges. Look away, look away indeed, and yes, that was a severed arm you just saw.

Stranded schoolteacher Tom (Thomas Wood), gets suspicious of the town’s hospitality — the fact he’s a northerner in a noose-waving southern town upsets him. Go figure. His discovery of the aforementioned expository historical marker convinces him that the town’s intentions aren’t friendly: “It means this centennial is a centennial of blood vengeance! It means we’re here to be killed!”

Meanwhile, skinny hipster David (Michael Korb) is lured to the “barrel roll” event. In true WICKER MAN fashion, he’s forced into a nail-lined barrel (Lovingly painted in Confederate yellow with a battle flag) and rolled down a hill as a feverish, grinning crowd looks on.

His companion, Beverly (Yvonne Gilbert), doesn’t get off any better. She’s the victim of a carnival “reverse dunking booth” contraption known as the “teetering rock.” Instead of falling INTO a tank of water, a large rock falls ONTO her. Absolutely brilliant! Be sure to watch the reaction shots of the crowd afterwards. Note the cold, somber eyes, the slow nod of the head and the grim expressions. Lewis is a frigging genius!

Tom and Terry of course, manage to escape the ordeal planned for them by enlisting the help of stunted, cat-strangling youngster Billy. Alas, when proper law enforcement is secured, the town of Pleasant Valley is nowhere to be found, at least for another 100 years.

MANIACS has all the Lewis trademarks: The bad acting, the questionable camerawork and editing, flat lighting, etc. But MANIACS somehow benefits from its weaknesses, if that makes any sense. The movie looks amazing. Made when St. Cloud looked more like Spanish Mayberry than the tourist mecca outside Orlando that it is today, MANIACS took advantage of the rural mise en scene and warm Florida sun. Scenes are covered in the hateful emblems of the Confederacy, and the menacing mini-nooses, apparently used to strangle cats, are always carried by the children.

The over-the-top characterizations of southerners, with their sleepy eyes and lazy drawls, make for wild, frightening fun. The scene in which Tom attempts to fake a southern accent while on a payphone is priceless! Lewis seems to have a good handle on the customs and quirks of the south. In 1964 Lewis also unleashed MOONSHINE MADNESS, which he made in rural South Carolina. I have to wonder if the two films cross-pollinated each other at all.

Editing and photography is jarring but interesting. I particularly appreciate how Lewis lingers on Bea’s legs several times before those same gams are lopped off and roasted in a later scene.

The Technicolor look, the humor, the good-spirited fun amid the violence (all set to an excellent bluegrass soundtrack compliments of the Pleasant Valley Boys), and ultimately, the “happy” ending, make MANIACS seem reasonably innocent. Yet it hints at some of the darker, violent themes that would become prevalent in films later in the decade, when the feel-good era that began in the 1950s ended and filmmakers responded to civil rights issues and the Vietnam quagmire.

Something Weird Video has done an admirable job with the digitally restored presentation. The DVD comes with the original theatrical trailer, an awesome audio commentary featuring H.G. Lewis and producer David Friedman, an outtake reel and a “gallery of exploitation art.”

Be sure to pay attention to the hilarious theme song, “The South’s Gonna Rise Again” featuring H.G. Lewis himself on lead vocal, reportedly so he wouldn’t have to pay a professional singer.

TWO THOUSAND MANIACS was remade in 2005 as 2001 MANIACS and featured Robert Englund (NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET’s Freddy Krueger). But was a remake really needed? The original is more fun than a night of ‘coon hunting.

For its combination of DELIVERANCE meets Dukes of Hazzard meets the Mason-Dixon Pawnshop owners from PULP FICTION, MANIACS gets a shamefully choice four stars! This is a must-see!

Check out the excellent trailer for MANIACS below: