Two Thousand Maniacs!
Two Thousand Maniacs! is a 1964 film from the USA, directed by Herschell Gordon Lewis, running 87 minutes. reelscum files it under splatter and hicksploitation.
- Year
- 1964 · 1960s films
- Country
- USA
- Runtime
- 87 min
- Director
- Herschell Gordon Lewis
- Updated
- 29 Oct 2026
- Obscurity
- known (29/100)
- Also known as
- 2000 Maniacs · Centennial
Defined in the glossary: Splatter, Hicksploitation
H.G. Lewis, a Southern town, and gore effects that predate everyone.
Herschell Gordon Lewis's best film, and a nasty piece of Southern-gothic gore. A ghostly Confederate town lures Northern tourists to a centennial celebration and murders them one by one in inventively cruel ways, as revenge for a Civil War massacre. The politics are queasy and the film does not examine them.
It is cheap and crude, but the premise is eerie and the kills are staged with real showmanship. Lewis essentially invents the American gore film here, a year after Blood Feast.
Historically important and more atmospheric than its budget suggests.
Trailer
The numbers
Nobody has rated this yet. Be the first to make a claim you'll have to defend.
Your call
Where to watch
Legal options in USA
Links open in a new tab (↗). Availability data via TMDB and changes constantly, so confirm on the service. Legal options only. Checked 8 Nov 2026. All options ↗
Discuss with AI
Open a chatbot with a question about this film already typed out. Useful for a second opinion, plot detail, or where to find a copy.
Filed alongside
The Driller Killer
Abel Ferrara's debut. More interesting as a document of downtown New York.
Dead & Buried
Stan Winston effects and a good twist. Underseen.
Frontier(s)
Texas Chainsaw with a French accent and a swastika over the door.
Maniac
Savini's effects, Spinell's performance, and a very bleak little film.
The Exterminator
A flamethrower and a meat grinder. Death Wish with the restraint removed.
Walking Tall
One sheriff, one hickory club, and the blueprint for every Southern vigilante picture after it.
Blood Feast
The first gore film. Barely competent, historically unavoidable.
Tetsuo: The Iron Man
Sixty-seven minutes of industrial nightmare. Nothing else looks like it.
Basket Case
$35,000, shot on 42nd Street, and completely charming. The best kind of cheap.
Frankenhooker
A man rebuilds his dead girlfriend from the parts of exploded sex workers. Exactly that stupid, and great.
Nekromantik
German, banned widely, and much sadder than its reputation suggests.
From Beyond
Stuart Gordon and Jeffrey Combs do Lovecraft again. A machine that lets you see what should stay unseen.