Review: Tales From the Crypt

On a scenic tour of some caves, five strangers encounter the ‘Crypt Keeper’ (Sir Ralph Richardson in a monk’s robe), who tells stories about each of them that paints them in a decidedly unflattering, and often criminal light. In the first tale, Joan Collins plays a greedy housewife who commits a grave crime only to be terrorised herself by an escaped mental patient dressed as Santa. In the second we have Ian Hendry as a family man on a secret rendezvous with his mistress. After a nasty car wreck, Hendry finds people seem to be running away from him. Thirdly, a snooty father and son (the latter played by Robin Phillips) think kindly old widower Peter Cushing (in a truly touching performance) brings the wrong level of class to their neighbourhood, and scheme to drive him out, leading to disastrous results. The fourth tale has dodgy businessman Richard Greene and wife resorting to superstition to change their luck, leading to bad luck after bad luck. Finally, former Army Major Nigel Patrick is appointed the new manager of a home for the blind. Unfortunately, the rude and dismissive Patrick rubs the patients the wrong way with his callous cost-cutting measures.

 

Amicus did one thing pretty darn well: Horror anthologies, particularly “The House That Dripped Blood”, “Asylum”, and “From Beyond the Grave”. So it wasn’t much of a surprise to me that they took this famous EC Comics title to the big screen in 1972. Directed by Freddie Francis (“Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors” and “The Torture Garden” for Amicus, “Nightmare” and “Dracula Has Risen From the Grave” for Hammer) and scripted by Amicus figurehead Milton Subotsky himself, this is one of their best anthology films for sure. Things start off well, with a good Douglas Gamley (“The City of the Dead”, “From Beyond the Grave”, “Asylum”) score and a great-looking crypt setting for the wraparound scenes. It’s wonderfully atmospheric and creepy. Sir Ralph Richardson’s Crypt Keeper appears in entirely human and non-decrepit form. That will annoy Crypt Keeper purists perhaps, but I’ll take an ominous Ralph Richardson over a fatuously cackling puppet any day of the week. He’s terrific, serving a similar function to Peter Cushing’s character in Amicus’ “Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors”.

 

The first story shows that even in 1972 Joan Collins was a duplicitous, treacherous bitch on screen. Here she’s also homicidal. Since that’s a bit simple, we also get the threat of a homicidal Santa. It’s a great start – scary and funny, if short. Next up we have Ian Hendry well-cast as a cheating bastard. Angie Grant is hotter than hell as his short-lived mistress. This one looks like it’s set for the oldest trick in the book, but then…WHAM! It goes in a completely unexpected and bloody marvellous direction. The film is 2-0 now. Our third story features a perfectly cast Peter Cushing, who apparently used the death and grieving for his own wife to play a grieving widower who communicates with her via Ouija board. He’s a kindly old man who gets screwed over by a thoroughly rotten, heartless snooty piece of crap played by Robin Phillips. The story doesn’t quite work in truncated form like this, but Cushing is so terrifically sympathetic and Phillips so thoroughly odious that it still isn’t bad. It also has a genuinely funny, grisly ending. Up next is Richard Greene and his lovely booming voice for another go-round of the oft-told ‘Monkey’s Paw’ story in ‘Wish You Were Here’. I think anthologies go to this well a bit too often, but this is a frequently hilarious story that is overall better than the Cushing story due to all of its clever twists and turns. Look out for the very funny bit that puts a spin on the whole ‘I wish he were  back in the condition he was in before his demise’ idea. Choose your words very, very wisely, ladies and gents when making a wish. As with most of these films, the first and last segments prove best and this film ends strongly with Nigel Patrick as a heartless, rigid military man turned director of a home for the blind. The always subtle Patrick Magee plays one of the blind residents who looks like he’s about to go on a psychotic rampage from moment one. A jolly good ham job by him, with Nigel Patrick playing a horrible, insensitive prick very well indeed. In fact, the best thing about this entire film is that it’s hard to deny that these horrible people deserve their fate by the end of each story. Sometimes you end up thinking some of the characters are a bit hard done by, but not here (some might feel a bit bad for Greene, but I didn’t). There’s an absolutely brilliant end to the last story, as well as a nice twist in the wraparound stuff, if a tad too similar to “Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors”.

 

A rock-solid anthology film where even the one dud segment actually isn’t a dud, it’s just weaker than the rest. The first and last stories are top-notch, as are the bulk of the performances from a pretty stellar cast (particularly Peter Cushing and Nigel Patrick). Good fun from Amicus.

 

Rating: B-