Homicidal

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Homicidal

1961,

1h 27m,

Horror

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Watchlist

Watchlist

75%

12 Reviews

Tomatometer

66%

1,000+ Ratings

Popcornmeter

75%

Tomatometer

12 Reviews

66%

Popcornmeter

1,000+ Ratings

Chaos and danger reign when good girl Miriam Webster (Patricia Breslin) meets her half brother's girlfriend, Emily (Jean Arless), a mysterious blonde bombshell living at their family's Southern California estate. Emily serves as the nurse for the sibling's aging, wheelchair-using guardian, Helga Swenson (Eugenie Leontovich). She is not, however, as sweet as she seems. Emily soon reveals herself to be a murderous schemer who will stop at nothing to steal Miriam's extensive inheritance.

Maxine Dowling

New York Daily News

Sep 22, 2021

3/4

Castle, whose specialty is turning out horror and ghost tales, has succeeded in achieving several moments of terror in this story of a homicidal maniac on the loose in a small, sleepy community.

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Noel Murray

The Dissolve

Oct 21, 2013

3.5/5

What's really surprising about Homicidal is that...it's an enjoyably bizarre film, making some of the basic elements of Psycho even freakier.

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Joe Lipsett

Horror Queers Podcast

Jul 5, 2026

3.5/5

It's basically just 'William Castle does Psycho', but you can't deny it's entertaining. Jean Arless is fantastic in her dual performance

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Trace Thurman

Horror Queers Podcast

Jun 30, 2026

3/5

A tongue-in-cheek riff on Hitchcock's 'Psycho', William Castle's 'Homicidal' boasts an excellent first and last 15 minutes, with a middle hour filled with so much clunky exposition that it threatens to derail the whole experience. Thankfully, it doesn't.

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Wesley Lovell

Cinema Sight

Nov 22, 2022

1.5/4

Mediocre to acceptable acting is plentiful and the plot, while for the most part inventive, lacks a lot of good narrative structure and yields an intriguing, but predictable ending.

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Tim Brayton

Antagony & Ecstasy

Jul 4, 2015

7/10

There never was a Psycho knock-off quite as overt about it, yet at the same time as creative and effective in its own right,

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Han R

Feb 9, 2017

A little-known gem. Hysterical, over the top camp classic. I can't understand how this hasn't entered the "bad movie night" hall of fame.

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William Castle

Director

Glenn Corbett

Karl

Patricia Breslin

Miriam

Joan Marshall

Emily

Eugenie Leontovich

Helga

Alan Bunce

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Synopsis

Chaos and danger reign when good girl Miriam Webster (Patricia Breslin) meets her half brother's girlfriend, Emily (Jean Arless), a mysterious blonde bombshell living at their family's Southern California estate. Emily serves as the nurse for the sibling's aging, wheelchair-using guardian, Helga Swenson (Eugenie Leontovich). She is not, however, as sweet as she seems. Emily soon reveals herself to be a murderous schemer who will stop at nothing to steal Miriam's extensive inheritance.

Director: William Castle
Producer: William Castle
Screenwriter: Robb White
Distributor: Columbia Pictures
Production Co: Columbia Pictures Corporation, William Castle Productions
Genre: Horror
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Jul 26, 1961, Original
Release Date (Streaming): Aug 31, 2010
Runtime: 1h 27m
Sound Mix: Mono
Aspect Ratio: 35mm

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