Deranged

This dark, stark account of the murderous activities of Wisconsin necrophile Ed Gein (the real-life character who inspired Psycho and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre) impresses not only through its occasional flashes of black humour (Gein, distressed by his beloved mother's death, exhumes her, and when she proves a little taciturn at the dinner-table, kills various women to keep her company), but by the sheer austerity of the direction. The more sensationalist aspects of the story are admirably underplayed, and Blossom's nicely gauged performance lends the film surprising conviction.