User Reviews

With Buono's comedic performance as a butcher who decides to take back over his butcher shop after 3 years in the asylum, and the film's overall tongue-in-cheek approach to the story, this film is an entertaining, dark-humored thriller. The film's bloodless approach to the subject matter is also a welcome change as well to numerous others of its ilk. Also, watch for the well-directed climax!!

Ha, Ha, Ha, ha what a laugh. Just seeing the front cover I knew this movie wouldn't be a great movie but a very, very cheesy movie. Just the thought of a butcher using bodies to make sausages and then seeing the people eat and comment on how magnificent it tasted was funny. This movie was hilarious, and took an approach of less gore and blood then most of the horror movies of it's time. I would recommend you watch it if you want to sit back, relax and laugh your heads off.

The film opens with the line "Meat is Meat(alternate title as well), and just like that a B foreign horror film is a B foreign horror film. If you were expecting anything too grandiose, look not here to be sure. Nevertheless, as foreign B horror films go, one could do far worse than The Mad Butcher. Victor Buono sweats his way through the film as an Austrian butcher being released from a madhouse where he spent the last three years for throwing liver at a woman. Boy, with crimes being dealt with in that fashion just think what would happen if it were something else! Upon returning "home," Buono refuses to go home with his wife and soon occupies the spare room above his neglected butcher shop. Things were bad whilst he was gone: the shop is filthy, his brother-in-law is working behind the counter with dirty fingernails, and meat has risen in price catastrophically. Well, what do you expect with Buono in a loveless marriage where his wife controls the purse strings and orders him about? Meat du jour no doubt. The film has all those tantalizing ingredients so common to horror films of the 70s. Shocking violence(at least the suggestion of it) and gratuitous sex(here lots of frontal nudity and some scenes of a suggestive nature). Buono plays the Sweeny Todd type well. He definitely has a certain charisma despite his girth and swarthy elements. He literally pours perspiration throughout the whole movie. The rest of the cast does equally well in what is really a black comedy about a mad butcher who is really quite insane. I did tire of American actor Brad Harris in the hero role, however. The settings are very impressive and the music by Allesandro Allesandroni is compelling. As soon as I heard the catchy, kitschy music I knew I was familiar with it and its sound. Alllesandroni worked with Ennio Morricone in some of the Clint Eastwood westerns of the 60s and the style is unmistakable. The film is not particularly bloody at all, though the opening shots of raw meat being sliced were somewhat distasteful. The film never for one instant tries to take itself too terribly serious, yet it never descends into straight farce either. For its kind of film, it is a cut above the rest.

Master Butcher, Otto Lehman (Victor Buono) has just been released from his 3-year stay in a mental institution. He was there for hitting a woman in the head with 2 lbs. Of liver. Otto was quite comfortable in confinement, and has a hard time adjusting to the outside world.

Thankfully, Otto has his career in sausage making, and goes right back to slicing and grinding his meats into tasty links of fleshy delight.

Otto also finds that killing those who irritate him helps to relieve his tension. But, what to do with those pesky bodies? Well, let's just say that Otto's sausage output increases exponentially.

THE MAD BUTCHER is a rather tame horror-comedy. In spite of the title, there's no real gore to speak of. There are a few, brief scenes containing nudity. Mr. Buono is superb in his unhinged role. His jovial demeanor is unsettling and humorous.

So, as long as your not expecting blood spraying everywhere, you might enjoy this...

The idea behind LO STRANGOLATORE DI VIENNA ("The Mad Butcher" or "Meat is Meat") is not exactly original. Back in the 1920s, there were two versions of the story of Sweeney Todd, several sound versions since as well as the Sondheim play. Also, in more recent years, films like EATING RAOUL and THE CORPSE GRINDERS all had very similar themes of cannibalism. So, to make the film work well amidst all these similar films, it had to offer something more--a better sense of black humor or perhaps more terror. Unfortunately, this film offers none of these--it's just a bad film that missed its chance to be funny or entertaining.

The film starts well. Victor Buono is being released from a mental hospital after a three year stay. However, unlike what you'd expect, he does not want to go. After you see his awful wife (an annoying harpy) and leech of a brother-in-law, you understand why. At first, things go well--Buono is happy to be back at his job as the owner of a butcher shop--but he absolutely refuses to go home to live with these creeps. At this point, I liked the film--it had a nice quirky sense of humor.

Unfortunately, the film soon digressed into a mix between a sex film (with ample boobage) and a super-low budget film--as evidenced by terrible dialog and cheesy action. In fact, once the killings started, the fun stopped--and it SHOULD have reveled in a campy dark sense of humor. To make things worse, all humor or attempts at humor disappeared at the end--and the film just seemed sick, as the guy you wanted to like (the butcher) started becoming more of a sick pervert--and it's very uncomfortable laughing at a guy who is essentially a sex offender AND murderer. Killing people in funny ways can be funny to some, but rape is a sure comedy killer. It made the film seem much more exploitative and less watchable or fun.

Overall, a very bad film that should have been a lot better. Even THE CORPSE GRINDERS (a very bad film) is much better than this mess. Unsavory and difficult to like...even on a kitsch level.

Cliché #22 alert: This film features a fight near the end where the hero is attempting to rescue the damsel from the maniac. During the entirety of this fight, she just stands there and watches--offering no help at all! Frankly, if such a dumb cliché were true, I would say that he'd be best to just let the dumb lady die!! After all, she'd too stupid to live!!

One of the only things this movie has in common with other more well-known Italian horror is the over-dubbed dialog track. Other than that, the movie is pretty much a bore-fest, with no real gore aside from Otto preparing cuts of meat.

To make matters worse, the flick is painfully repetitive. We see the main character serving sausage in the park, the Lady who changes in front of her window and the Journalist, usually on some date, then Otto the Butcher brings his cart back home to his shop, he slaps around his Brother-In-Law, then everything starts all over again. This happens about 3 times in the middle of the movie.

I can see this movie providing entertainment when you are having a few drinks with your friends, and you want to watch something just for laughs. Gorehounds, look elsewhere.

Odd blend of black humour and gruesomeness featuring a good, over-the-top performance from Buono, whose bulk and mild manner make for an effective psychopath.

The story is a Sweeney Todd rehash that catches the sinister aspects, while retaining the comic elements and being relatively gore-free.

Otto Lehman is shown to be sexually inadequate and belittled by his wife, resorting to voyeurism to satisfy his desires as he spies on a woman across the street. His frustrations trigger his aggression, while the butcher theme is used as a means of disposing of bodies, but isn't the motive for the killings.

Obvious similarities to 'Psycho' and 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre'; also real-life German serial killers Fritz Haarman and Peter Kurten.

The film has enough to recommend it as an above average entry into the slasher genre, although the light hearted approach does tend to outweigh the horror elements too much.

A variation on the oft-told Sweeney Todd story, The Mad Butcher stars Victor Buono as Viennese butcher Otto Lehman, who, after spending three years in a madhouse for slapping a customer with two pounds of liver, is finally declared sane. Of course, this being a horror movie (of sorts), Otto is still far from mentally stable, his mind eventually snapping while being nagged by his shrewish wife Hanna (Karin Field). After throttling her, and breaking her neck, he decides that the best way to dispose of his wife is to turn her into sausages, which he sells to the public. Other victims follow, with the sausages a huge success with Otto's customers. Meanwhile, intrepid reporter Mike Lawrence (Brad Harris) has his suspicions about the butcher but struggles to convince the police that he is up to no good.

Black comedy is the order of the day here, with the horrific notion of grinding up people for sausages played for fun rather than frights, sweaty lard-bucket Buono's performance almost as camp as his King Tut in TV's Batman. Director Guido Zurli gives his picture a ghoulish, garish look through strong use of primary colours, which adds to the comical tone, and employs a jaunty soundtrack throughout. Since there is very little blood on show, Zurli compensates with a reasonable amount of gratuitous female nudity, Otto ogling his shapely neighbour Berta (Franca Polesello) as she undresses each night at her window, while his brother-in-law Karl (Luca Sportelli) brings home prostitute Frieda (Hansi Linder) who happily displays her wares.

Very cheesy, a little bit sleazy, and surprisingly breezy, The Mad Butcher is by no means a great film, the story-line rather predictable and repetitive, but it passes the time easily enough. 5/10.

This isn't the type of movie I'd usually watch, but a friend who's obsessed with obscure films brought it over. I found that I was thoroughly entertained by the movie. It has a quirky comedic feel, although it has a horror/slasher theme to it. There definitely isn't anything in it that shouts special effects and some of the editing is a little amateur, but it works. Buono's facial expressions really make up the bulk of the entertainment.. the cop/reporter guys are way too fake but the women are hot.. not to mention partially nude in many scenes. By the time they catch up with the bad guy, you really feel satisfied that his activities are being exposed. I wouldn't recommend it as a 'great' movie to watch, but definitely worth checking out if you are in the mood for something a little different.

When formerly respected local butcher Otto Lehmann (Buono) is released from a mental health asylum (calmly explaining he's now cured of his ills after a good lie down), his wife's incessant nagging quickly flips his crazy switch, and he soon finds his murderous impulses escalating out of his control. Intrepid local reporter Brad Harris suspects Otto might not be as cured as his small-goods, but lucky for Otto, his knackwurst are proving to be a hit, particularly with the local constabulary.

Looking at the box cover to the video version of this movie, one might be reluctant to view, for fear of the unsavoury content that might be lurking within. Having seen this movie a few times, I can say with confidence, that such a reluctance would be unwarranted. Far from being another inept slasher movie, this Italian offering is an inspired black comedy, that benefits from a deliciously maniacal performance by the inimitable slapstick villain, Victor Buono. His camp acting more than compensates for the paltry production values and often claustrophobic staging. Performances like this, underline the untimeliness of Buono's death in the early eighties.

Perhaps this was the movie from which sausages attracted the rather unpleasant colloquialism of "mystery bags"? But then "meat is meat", as they say.

Big, creepy looking Victor Buono is released after serving 3 years in a mental institution but it's not long before he's committing murder and turning his victims into sausage meat at his Vienna butcher's shop. Watched this on VHS as Strangler of Vienna. I think a better title would have been The Mad Butcher of Vienna. Anyway it is a black comedy, very similar to Sweeney Todd. Very little gore in the print that I saw so and apparently uncut, so I'd question the parents guide here. The film dies suffer from bad dubbing but there are some colourful characters, the humour works reasonably well and we get a few instances of female nudity. Pretty tame by today's standards.

I can relate literally. I grew up as a child with a grandparents who owned a corner meat market and grocery. I found this slightly amusing having been raised around a butcher/meat cutter and found moments of it to be sorta humerus in a dark sick twisted humor. You should never mess with a person who owns a meat market cause they could make you into sausage, burgers and have it their way instead of the burger king way. I would watch it again . I found it on the B-rated movies app under a private roku channel and enjoyed watching it . I have a special love for old 1970s bizarre horror and this one was right up my alley. It had all those things I like about the 70s horror movie from the cheesiness to the obscure nature of the film.

After being released from a mental hospital Otto returns to his old job as a butcher.He tries to adjust to his new life,but after a bitter argument with his wife he accidentally kills her.Fearing he will be sent back to the hospital he grinds up her body and sells it as sausages.As friends and relatives start asking questions about her disappearance they too start ending up in the butcher's display case."The Mad Butcher" is an enjoyable black comedy with tasty main performance of Victor Buono.It's loosely based on two criminal cases of German serial killers/butchers Georg Grossman and Fritz Haarman.8 out of 10.Meat is meat and human sausages are human sausages.

Don't rent this cheap flick... A guy who kills people and feed their meat to his customers? Boy, no wonder his sausage is so good. Yeah right. The Mad Butcher will put you to sleep and leave you bored to death... not on the edge of your seat.

THIS MOVIE SUCKS, DON'T WATCH IT!!!!!