AllMovie

With a cast sure to please cult and horror fans alike, this pseudo-women's-prison film from director Hikmet Avedis is a good bet for genre followers. Pretty Dianne Hull plays Kelly McIntire, a disco bartender who is poisoned as part of a botched murder scheme and sent to a mental hospital. Once there, she is raped by evil orderly Carl (Bo Hopkins), witnesses murders and suicides, and eventually escapes only to be dragged screaming back to the horrors of the fifth floor. Cathey Paine, who played Leslie Van Houten in Helter Skelter, is among the many familiar faces, which also include such horror icons as Robert Englund and Michael Berryman. But the film belongs to Bo Hopkins, who is all smiling menace and who turns in a scary performance and gives the film what force it has, as screenwriter Meyer Dolinsky puts Hull through some rather unconvincing maneuvers in the lead. Still, although there are a number of lapses in logic, they don't detract from the frightening premise that almost any statement or action could be construed as a sign of dementia in the proper circumstances.