Double Feature with Vincent Price

My earliest memory of Vincent Price was watching Hilarious House of Frightenstein when I was a kid in the early 1980s (syndicated in that time, the original series was filmed in 1971). This was a Saturday morning children's variety TV show that aired mostly in Canada. He appears in the opening and closing credits and short vignettes in between the major segments. The program is actually being re-run right now on the Space channel in Canada at 4:00 AM (on a daily basis). Sometimes, if I'm up that early, I'll make sure to catch his closing monologue (recited by Price, in front of the 'Frightenstein' monster while holding a candle) that is played at the end of every episode:

It would not be years later until I got to see an actual Vincent Price movie. I believe that it was the "Tales of Terror" Roger Corman production where three Edgar Allan Poe short stories are presented (Black Cat, Amontillado, M. Valdemar). The circumstances that I got to see this are interesting. It was during my first year of college and I was staying at the dormitory for a few days of the Christmas Holidays because of certain circumstances. Being unable to sleep at 2:00 AM, I crept to the common TV area and there was a VHS tape with "Tales of Terror". It was so quiet that one could hear a pin drop, so the darkness and time of night certainly added to the atmosphere as I watched this movie.

As I watch more and more of Vincent Price (The Bat, House on Haunted Hill, Last Man on Earth, Oblong Box, Wax Museum, etc), I notice that whether the film is good or bad overall, I am thoroughly entertained. Some have said that his performances are hammy and over-acted, but I consider these to be complimentary rather than defective. If film narrative was realistic, then the stories would be boring. Every actor that is considered "great" are hammy in their performances--Jack Nicholson, Robert De Niro, Al Pacino play pretty much the same character in every single one of their films and we can recognize their trademarks from miles away--but that doesn't stop people to pay to see them and be entertained.

I would have liked to have been born earlier so I could have seen his films during their original theatrical runs and other great B-movies as well. I think my favorite era for horror film is definitely the 1950s and 1960s (an honorable mention to the 1970s as well). I also really like Gothic Horror and you don't see too many of these being made today. Even if they started to make these again, I'm not sure they would be as good, even with superior CGI. I like the type of lighting and colors that were used back then--an aesthetic that could probably only be achieved with the film equipment of that era.

And Vincent Price, being the most noteworthy actor of those times, is the definite representative of this 'golden' age of horror movies.

I was very fortunate and grateful to receive the Vincent Price MGM Scream Legends Collection as a gift, recently. I have just finished watching the first two films of the collection:

Tales of Terror (1962)- 10/10
These re-interpretations of 3 classic Edgar Allan Poe stories are simply a delight to watch, and I was very happy to see this movie again 17 years later.

The highlight is The Black Cat co-starring Peter Lorre book-ended with Morella at the beginning and followed by The Case of M. Valdemar (w/Basil Bathbone). As with most theatrical adaptations of Poe, the writers take some creative liberty to enhance the narrative of the story. But most Poe fans will forgive this in this case because the spirit and essence of these stories are preserved. For example, "Cat" is really a composite of The Cask of Amontillado and the title's namesake combined together.

Twice Told Tales (1963) - 9/10
This is quite a lavish and top notch production for an anthology horror film. While I am not familiar with Nathaniel Hawthorne's works (for which this movie uses 3 of his stories), I was highly entertained by these ghost stories.

More Quick Movie Reviews + Photo Stills

Here are more reviews of movies that I've watched recently, along with some still photographs that I took myself.

The White Gorilla (1945) - 3/10
This film is included in the Tales of Terror 50 Movie Mega Pack. It is more of an adventure film (set in Africa) rather than a horror movie. A very low-budget affair that splices in footage from a silent movie from the 1920s. The results are comical and atrocious at the same time. There are nice shots of elephants, lions and hippos, however.

House of Usher (1960) - 7/10
I love Edgar Allan Poe and Vincent Price, so I was really looking forward to watching this as this was the first in the American International Pictures foray of the Poe films directed by the legendary B-movie director, Roger Corman. In all honesty, I felt that the movie dragged on a little bit too long for it's 80 minutes, although the last 20 are really worth waiting for. I suppose that because the short story is only a few pages long, they had to inject a romantic angle. Although it deviates from the source material, I really love the sense of gothic atmosphere. I recently got a Vincent Price boxed set as a birthday gift and I will be reviewing more movies like this in the future.

Elvira & Movie Macabre 1

One of my fondest midnight viewing memories was to watch Elvira's Movie Macabre on Friday and Saturday Nights in the early 1990s.  These were obviously reruns from the 1980s.  While watching movies that are so bad they are good is a lot of fun, Elvira makes it even better.  I wish I had recorded these shows back in the day, but there are ways to acquire these episodes if you try hard enough.  This week, I watched 2 movies, both hosted by her.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) - 8/10
I had heard so many things about this movie when I was a kid, and I finally got to watch it. The version that I watched was hosted by Elvira on Hallowe'en Night in 1997--a copy which I obtained through tape trading on the internet. I thought that the movie was corny at first, but the last 30 minutes were very effective at conveying the sheer terror that the final protagonist was going through.

Maneater of Hydra (1967) - 4/10
I bought this on a special Elvira "Double Feature" DVD.  I am fairly generous when watching and judging old horror movies, but this one was not very good.  The dubbing was terrible and it looked like they transferred this movie from a worn-out VHS tape to DVD.  But it was fun to anticipate when Elvira was going to cut in and say some clever puns and corny jokes.  This a spanish horror movie involving a mad botanist who has created a vampiric tree that terrorizes travelers to his islands.

The Long Hair of Death (1964)

Last night I watched The Long Hair of Death starring Barbara Steele. I thoroughly entertained by all 94 minutes of it. When you combine Italian Gothic horror with the greatest actress in the history of horror films you get pure cinematic gold. The story involves a revenge from beyond the grave combined with Borgia-esque political intrigue. Steele is always in fine form here, and it was obviously an astute decision by the filmmakers to title this movie after the her trademark long and thick black hair.

The movie starts off with a witch burning of an innocent, Helen (played by Steele) who swears revenge in front of everyone who witnesses it. She had two daughters with the eldest, Mary (played by Steele in a dual role) who had evidence of her mother's innocence and is killed by Count Humboldt. The youngest daughter, Elizabeth, grows up and then is forced to marry the Count's son. Shortly thereafter, things get very interesting when Helen is seemingly resurrected. I won't spoil too much after this, but I will add that the payoff was very well done, though the middle act meanders just a little bit. That being said, I loved the Gothic atmosphere (dark hallways, secret passages, cobwebs, candlesticks, and the whole bit) in spite of the fact that the picture was rather poor--I suspect that this was a DVD copy of a VHS transfer.

My plan for this blog is to provide my own image captures of the movies that I watch. Unfortunately, the batteries in my digital camera had died before I could take pictures as I was watching the movie. I will probably just take screen captures on my computer at a later date and upload them here on this posting.

*EDIT: As promised, here are a couple of stills from "The Long Hair of Death".

This was the first movie that appears in the 50 movie mega pack, Tales of Terror. I have bought 5 mega packs so far: Horror Classics, Nightmare Worlds, Tales of Terror, Sci-Fi Classics and Chilling Classics. I have watched all of the movies in the Horror and Nightmare sets it took me almost two years to finish watching them (at a rate of 1 per week). These sets are comprised of mostly public domain movies and are put out by Mill Creek Entertainment.

Rating: 10/10 (using my B-movie scale)

Introduction

I'm a big fan of B horror movies. I used to watch all of the classic films such as Citizen Kane, Ben-Hur, but there are only so many of these that were made. So I started to watch low budget horror films, the kind that you can find in the cheap DVD bin at Wal-Mart. I think one of the first of such purchases was Night of the Living Dead on VHS for $3. While I did see the 1990 remake in movie theatres, I had never seen the original 1968 version before.

After this blog posting, I will proceed to watch The Long Hair of Death starring Barbara Steele. It is from the Tales of Terror 50 movie pack put out by Mill Creek Entertainment. I will try to post a review shortly after I am done watching it.

I really like these low-priced public domain movie box sets. While it's true that most of the movies aren't very good, I try to find at east one positive aspect from a movie while I watch it. And besides, you get about 50 movies for only $15.