Metacritic reviews

Despite all the cinematic thievery and homage, The Funhouse manages to stand on its own as an eerie, slow-brewing slasher that builds quite a bit of effective tension and dread leading into the more generic final act.

Hooper doesn’t entirely escape the rote business of semi-regular mutilations and impalings, but The Funhouse succeeds in updating a monster from the Universal pantheon and setting it loose in the type of traveling death trap that’s been haunting small towns forever.

It's rare that any film follows through its chosen themes with such attention to detail, much less leavening the package with a truly anarchic blend of black humour.

Mr. Hooper almost persuades us that he is up to more than just gore, creepiness and trauma.

While certainly not as interesting or accomplished as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Funhouse is a cut above the average slasher film.

Devotees of director Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre will be particularly disappointed with the almost total lack of shocks and mayhem.

The Funhouse begins with a lamely facetious reprise of the shower sequence from Psycho and slides steadily downhill there. [18 Mar 1981, p.B4]