Based on a novel by Fredric Brown, this psychological thriller tells the story of a young woman whose life goes out of control after she becomes the victim of a terrifying attack by a knife-wielding madman. Her initial trauma is exacerbated by an unorthodox psychiatrist whose treatment not only causes her condition to deteriorate into a psychosis but also leads her into seriously aberrant behaviour that's linked to a statuette that she associates with her life-changing ordeal. The statuette in question is known as "Screaming Mimi".
One day, Virginia Wilson (Anita Ekberg), a New Orleans dancer who's vacationing at her stepbrother's home at Laguna Beach, California, runs straight from the beach to an outdoor shower cubicle where, almost immediately, she gets attacked by an escapee from a local sanitarium who, after killing her dog "Rusty", advances towards her brandishing a large knife. On hearing her screams, Virginia's stepbrother, Charlie Weston (Romney Brent), produces his rifle and shoots and kills her assailant.
Virginia is so traumatized that Charlie takes her to the nearby "Highland Sanitarium" where she's put into the care of a psychiatrist called Dr Greenwood (Harry Townes) who soon becomes infatuated by her and also becomes more and more controlling as her treatment progresses. After about six months, recognising that she's becoming increasingly anxious to be discharged, Greenwood gives up his job and in an effort to ensure that they both leave their past lives behind them, takes her to a city where, acting as her manager, he secures employment for her as an exotic dancer at the "El Madhouse" nightclub. By this stage, Greenwood and Virginia are generally known as Bill Green and Yolanda Lange.
Yolanda's tremendously popular in her new role and Bill Sweeney (Philip Carey), a newspaper columnist who reports on the city's nightlife for "The Daily Times", is introduced to her by the club's proprietor Joann Masters (Gypsy Rose Lee). Sweeney, who was captivated by Yolanda's dancing, finds her irresistible and also becomes intrigued by a statuette that he notices in her dressing room. Her insanely jealous manager quickly intervenes, however, to bring her meeting with this handsome man to an abrupt end.
Later that night, Yolanda again gets assaulted by another knife-wielding attacker and remembering a similar assault in which a woman called Lola Lake was murdered, Sweeney searches through some of his newspaper's records and finds a photograph of Ms Lake's body and notices that lying beside it is a statuette that's identical to the one he'd seen in Yolanda's dressing room. Intrigued, he then decides to investigate further to solve the mystery surrounding the attacks and to determine what significance, if any, the statuettes had to the crimes.
In order to be believable as someone who's so incredibly attractive to so many people, it was vital to the success of this movie that whoever was chosen to play Virginia should have exactly the right qualities and it's hard to imagine that anyone could have fitted the bill any better than Anita Ekberg whose looks were absolutely stunning and who also had the ability to affect a king of vagueness which conveyed just how detached her character was from reality.
The other outstanding feature of this movie is its cinematography which is strikingly good throughout. In scenes involving Virginia and Dr Greenwood, the contrast between her innocence and his dubious motives is emphasised by him often being enveloped in shadow whilst she's seen in the light and there's also a knockout scene in which a neon light outside an upstairs room intermittently lights two small areas (one in which the couple are lying down together and the other in which Yolanda's dog "Devil" is lying peacefully).
"Screaming Mimi" is a bizarre movie that features a whole assortment of off-centre characters and a main protagonist whose mental state is extremely unstable. Virginia, who ironically exchanges one madhouse for another, is at her most composed when she regularly mesmerizes the patrons of the "El Madhouse" with her dance routines that obviously appeal strongly to everyone in an audience that comprises people of differing ages and sexual orientations. The intensity of the voyeurism that's seen whenever she performs her bondage-themed dances is extraordinary and the club's singing bartender and dancing waiters are absurdly funny. "Screaming Mimi" is wonderfully off-beat and full of eccentricities and these qualities, no doubt, contributed strongly to the cult status that this movie now enjoys.
One day, Virginia Wilson (Anita Ekberg), a New Orleans dancer who's vacationing at her stepbrother's home at Laguna Beach, California, runs straight from the beach to an outdoor shower cubicle where, almost immediately, she gets attacked by an escapee from a local sanitarium who, after killing her dog "Rusty", advances towards her brandishing a large knife. On hearing her screams, Virginia's stepbrother, Charlie Weston (Romney Brent), produces his rifle and shoots and kills her assailant.
Virginia is so traumatized that Charlie takes her to the nearby "Highland Sanitarium" where she's put into the care of a psychiatrist called Dr Greenwood (Harry Townes) who soon becomes infatuated by her and also becomes more and more controlling as her treatment progresses. After about six months, recognising that she's becoming increasingly anxious to be discharged, Greenwood gives up his job and in an effort to ensure that they both leave their past lives behind them, takes her to a city where, acting as her manager, he secures employment for her as an exotic dancer at the "El Madhouse" nightclub. By this stage, Greenwood and Virginia are generally known as Bill Green and Yolanda Lange.
Yolanda's tremendously popular in her new role and Bill Sweeney (Philip Carey), a newspaper columnist who reports on the city's nightlife for "The Daily Times", is introduced to her by the club's proprietor Joann Masters (Gypsy Rose Lee). Sweeney, who was captivated by Yolanda's dancing, finds her irresistible and also becomes intrigued by a statuette that he notices in her dressing room. Her insanely jealous manager quickly intervenes, however, to bring her meeting with this handsome man to an abrupt end.
Later that night, Yolanda again gets assaulted by another knife-wielding attacker and remembering a similar assault in which a woman called Lola Lake was murdered, Sweeney searches through some of his newspaper's records and finds a photograph of Ms Lake's body and notices that lying beside it is a statuette that's identical to the one he'd seen in Yolanda's dressing room. Intrigued, he then decides to investigate further to solve the mystery surrounding the attacks and to determine what significance, if any, the statuettes had to the crimes.
In order to be believable as someone who's so incredibly attractive to so many people, it was vital to the success of this movie that whoever was chosen to play Virginia should have exactly the right qualities and it's hard to imagine that anyone could have fitted the bill any better than Anita Ekberg whose looks were absolutely stunning and who also had the ability to affect a king of vagueness which conveyed just how detached her character was from reality.
The other outstanding feature of this movie is its cinematography which is strikingly good throughout. In scenes involving Virginia and Dr Greenwood, the contrast between her innocence and his dubious motives is emphasised by him often being enveloped in shadow whilst she's seen in the light and there's also a knockout scene in which a neon light outside an upstairs room intermittently lights two small areas (one in which the couple are lying down together and the other in which Yolanda's dog "Devil" is lying peacefully).
"Screaming Mimi" is a bizarre movie that features a whole assortment of off-centre characters and a main protagonist whose mental state is extremely unstable. Virginia, who ironically exchanges one madhouse for another, is at her most composed when she regularly mesmerizes the patrons of the "El Madhouse" with her dance routines that obviously appeal strongly to everyone in an audience that comprises people of differing ages and sexual orientations. The intensity of the voyeurism that's seen whenever she performs her bondage-themed dances is extraordinary and the club's singing bartender and dancing waiters are absurdly funny. "Screaming Mimi" is wonderfully off-beat and full of eccentricities and these qualities, no doubt, contributed strongly to the cult status that this movie now enjoys.