Set in 19th-century France, the film follows a journalist visiting a rural insane asylum in which he uncovers that the inmates have overtaken the doctors and staff, and implemented a series of gruesome treatments.

In 19th-century France, journalist Gaston LeBlanc visits a sprawling, remote psychiatric hospital in the mountains where a Dr. Maillard has purportedly invented revolutionary treatments for the mentally ill.

Blanche is caught and brutally raped, and Julien is also captured and tortured by the men, but he eventually escapes, wandering the woods still tied up.

In the doctor's dungeon, innocent people are chained, tortured and stuck in glass cages, then forced to take part in gruesome games of ritual slaughter.

Film scholar Doyle Greene cites The Mansion of Madness along with Moctezuma's Alucarda (1977) as "ground-breaking" for its blending of stylistic elements of classical horror with more contemporary surrealist and experimental visuals.

The repeated appearance of a white horse, Carrington’s alter ego, and the elaborate surreal feasts and costumes, have been credited as demonstrating the artist’s vision and several of her recurring motifs.

[4] Scream magazine reviewed The Mansions of Madness in 2016, writing that "if you manage to see beyond its jarring shortcomings, you will be treated to a film that is not only visually stunning, but which also leaves you with a frisson of disturbing melancholy that will haunt you for days to come.