Shock Corridor

You may have to swallow a morsel of disbelief over the wonderfully Fullerian premise that a reputable newspaper editor and a psychiatrist would connive at the crazy scheme whereby the reporter hero (Breck) has himself committed to an asylum so that he can win the Pulitzer Prize by solving the murder of an inmate. Once done, you're in for a gripping ride. The journalist's latent paranoia is beautifully observed in his relationship with his stripper girlfriend (Towers), as well as in the relish with which he notes the success of his simulation of madness; and the gradual descent into real madness, as he frustratedly waits and watches for flashes of lucidity in the three inmates who witnessed the murder, is riveting story-telling. The camera-work (Stanley Cortez), tracking and constantly adumbrating the descent into darkness, is amazing.