The Funhouse

Plot synopsis:
Against her stern father's orders, teenager Amy Harper visits a sleazy traveling fun fair with her new boyfriend Buzz, her best friend Liz, and Liz's irresponsible boyfriend, Richie. At the carnival, the four teens smoke marijuana, peep into a 21-and-over strip show, heckle fortune teller Madame Zena, visit the freaks-of-nature exhibit, and view a seedy magic show. Amy's 10-year-old brother, Joey, sneaks out of the house to go to the carnival as well.Richie dares the group to spend the night in "The Funhouse" - actually a dark ride. After the park closes, the teenagers sneak back into the fairgrounds settle down inside the ride, at which point they witness the ride assistant (a man in a Frankenstein suit who never speaks) engage Madame Zena as a prostitute. He experiences premature ejaculation, but despite nothing physical having happened, Zena won't return her $100 fee. He strangles her to death in a violent rage.The teenagers try to leave, but find themselves locked inside the ride. As they attempt to escape, Richie secretly steals the money from the strongbox from which "Frankenstein's monster" took Zena's fee.The fun fair's barker, Conrad Straker, then discovers what "Frankenstein's monster" (his adopted son Gunther) has done to Zena. Conrad also promptly realizes that all the money from the strongbox is missing. Thinking Gunther took it, he attacks his son, at which point Gunther's mask is removed, revealing a gruesomely deformed face with sharp protruding teeth and ruby-red eyes.When Richie's lighter falls from the teens' vantage point, Conrad realizes someone is watching. At this point, Conrad and his "monster" son Gunther then stalks through the ride to eliminate any witnesses after also heckling the reluctant Gunther into a murderous rage. Throughout the ride, various props readily double as murder weapons.Meanwhile outside the funhouse, Joey hangs around the dark carnival after it closes for he witnessed Amy and her friends enter the funhouse but did not come out. While searching for a way in, Joey is suprised by the appearance of the unmasked Gunther/Monster at an air vent and attempts to flee only to be found by the other carnival workers who call his parents to pick him up. Mr. and Mrs. Harper soon arrive to pick up the clearly traumatized Joey to take him home (with the implication they will beat him as punishment for sneaking out to go to the carnival). Joey is unable to speak and thus explain to his stern and abusive parents that Amy and her friends are still inside the funhouse.Trapped in the funhouse, the teens quickly die one at a time by the hands of Conrad and Gunther. Richie is first when Gunther throws a noose around his neck and he is strangled to death. Liz is next when she falls through a trapdoor in the floor to a hidden air vent where Gunther approaches. She attempts to sexualy intice the sex-starved monster who lets his guard down for a mintue and Liz stabbs him with a dagger. Wounded but angry, Gunther snatches the dagger away and viciously stabbs Liz to death.Meanwhile, Amy and Buzz attempt to break out of the funhouse through one of the exit ride doors only to be confronted by a gun-toting Conrad. The barker tells them that he is only protecting his son from the authorties and implies that Gunther had previously killed two teenage girls a few months earlier whom inticed him. Just then, Buzz lunges at Conrad to wrestle the gun away from him and manages to impail the barker against a prop sword. Just then Gunther the monster arrives and seeing his father dead, attacks Buzz who attemps to shoot him. Amy is forced to run only to find Buzz's dead body a minute later after Gunther apparently wrestled the pistol away from Buzz and shot him with it.With only Amy remaining, she is terrorized by the funhouse props and dummys which leads her to flee to funhouse maintenance area underneath the building where Gunther follows her to kill her as well leading to the suspenseful, climactic showdown. Amy defends herself with a crowbar against Gunther the monster who grabs the crowbar away from her only to get electrocuted on a nearby fuse box when he swings the crowbar to strike Amy where he is then caugh on a track chain that controls the moving cars through the funhouse. But Gunther revives and grabs Amy only to get crushed to death when the track chain drags him through two spinning gears as Amy screams.As dawn breaks, an exhausted and shaken Amy emerges from the funhouse through the broken down doors while the animatronic fat lady perched atop the ride laughs. Amy then slowly walks out of the deserted carnival, passing a few carnival workers taking down the rides and tents as she heads for home.

Tags: comedy, murder, cult, violence, humor, suspenseful, sadist

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