Linbeymusol Wonderful character development!

AboveDeepBuggy Some things I liked some I did not.

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Brenda The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

neener3707 This film is pleasantly surprising in its quality considering it is a trashy 70's B-horror film. Set in an isolated lunatic asylum, a young woman gets a job after a tragic accident kills a member of the staff. Coming at a tense time in the asylum, the woman must deal with the patients becoming more and more erratic and violent. What follows is a swirl of madness and violence that isn't as shocking as the trailer/tagline suggest, you won't have a panic attack, but there are still enough chills and frights to keep even veteran horror film viewers interested. As said before, this film is surprisingly well made for a film with such a low budget. The acting is what really surprised me the most. Normally in films of this nature we see cheesy and awful, but in this film, the cast does a surprisingly great job performing the story and their characters. While a few actors aren't so good, the rest do a fantastic job. Characters are fully fleshed out and some you will find very sympathetic, due to both solid writing and good acting. The story is also quite competent, keeping you interested throughout the film, also with some twists that caught me by surprise. While the film isn't as graphic as some movies today, the kill scenes are well filmed and frightening. Without giving to much away, the final kill is superbly directed and very effective.In short, this film is as good as it gets for low budget 70's horror, with surprising quality all around.

Cristi_Ciopron In a '70s private sanitarium, the physicians are at ease playing the weirdest medical games, free from any prudence (endowing the patients with weapons, like in the dryly and efficiently satirical scene of the 1st murder, when the physicians looks as insane as his patient, and has an intriguing look of carelessness and incompetence), delving into alternative psychotherapy, and the plot actually has a dramatic underbelly, there's something respectable, mostly the acting, by people who enjoyed their roles (the usual cartoons of cinema insanity) and the thrill of the plot, and by the directing (good, unhurried scenes, like the open-minded young nurse's arrival at the sanitarium, in the aftermath of the murders), with a sense of satire, until it indulges in aqua-fortes of delusional behavior and it becomes a moderately convincing rip-off of a '60s stage-play (the ravings, the screams, like in Albee or Williams). The _jurisconsult is aware of the uselessness of the treatments as given in the sanitarium, they are like the Popsicles cherished by the childish giant.The new nurse arrives from a dignified professional world, into the realm of insane experiments. The actress, a '70s starlet with an eerie look, and nowadays the highlight of the cast (as she probably was at the time of the release, as well), does a reasonably sunny role.'The Basement' has a mystery puzzle plot, with scattered hints: the doll, the phone, the missing vials …. It's a satire, with the placidity of the female psychiatrist in the aftermath of her colleague's demise (when she receives intruders, she seems one of her patients), the insane psychiatrists who were also neurosurgeons, the knowing smiles of these deluded medical workers, who put themselves at the mercy of crazy people, the shocking carelessness of the sanitarium life, with the murderer left free, and the young nurse's room open to the patients during her sleep. The patients don't look like sick people, they seem stock movie weirdos.

Brian T. Whitlock (GOWBTW) Working at a psych ward can be a very scary thing. Especially, when you get transferred from a big hospital. For one nurse, it's an experience she will forget. Dealing with people with different psychological conditions can be a handful, but one must have a cool head for it. But during the transfer, one of the original nurses is killed by a patient who has a doll and treats it like it was a real baby. There's one who killed his own platoon; a man name Sam who had one lobotomy too many which makes act like a 8 year-old; and there's a former judiciary clerk who axed the doctor who was about to hire the nurse. When the replacement nurse takes over, it's all about to come together. This place has more secrets than you possibly know. The replacement doctor is really a patient in disguise, and she not only have the doctor killed, she also killed the telephone repair man, which one of the patients took a liking to. She also cuts out the tongue of the elderly patient so she wouldn't warn the new nurse. When Sam decided to let the nurse escape, all the other patients turned on the fake doctor, and utter mayhem is what happens after wards. I'll tell you straight, this movie is crazy. Nothing more I can say about it. 3 out of 5 stars.

shango7200 In the opening credits of "Aloha Bobby and Rose" (1974) you can see a movie theater marquee showing "Last House on the Left" & "Don't Look in the Basement" ! (I suspect that 90% of the fans on here never saw this in a theater because they were too young). I was not aware of the extra gore AND *nudity* ( the classic Allyson & phone company man scene) on the DVD after all the times I saw this (edited for TV) on good ole WOR Channel 9's FRIGHT NIGHT (Saturdays, 1:00 AM late 70s thru the early 80s). There is no way a remake can come close to the sleazy , creepy, late-nite atmosphere of D.L.I.T.B. I love hearing how people first reacted to seeing this on TV to begin with. Seems like most had seen it in 1980 or so on TV (at least that's when I did). YES: we need this to be listed under it's more common title instead of the post release "Forgotten" name.