The Haunted Palace (1963)

 "One becomes accustomed to the darkness here."

Not many films have been made adapting the works of H.P. Lovecraft, writer of cult horror stories evoking the nameless, ancient horrors that lurk behind everyday reality... and, er, massive racist, by the standards of his own time, let alone ours. Imagine my surprise, then, that this- the first ever cinematic adaptation of a Lovecraft tale (his only full novel, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward)exists... and was helmed by Roger Corman himself in the style of the Poe films he was also busy making. 

Naturally, the title is pinched from Poe, we end with some verses from Poe, and the style absolutely evokes the Poe films, with Lovecraft very much downplayed. Yet this is, nevertheless, full-on Lovecraft, full of delightfully overwrought existential dread, and explicit mentions of not only the Necronomicon and the Great Old Ones but specifically of Cthulhu and Yog-Sothoth.

And it's really rather splendid, with Vincent Price hugely entertaining as both the eponymous Ward and his depraved warlock of an ancestor. We have unspeakable horrors from the past; unfriendly locals in a tavern aside from one scientifically minded individual; "satanic" rituals"; disturbing body horror with the mutated locals (particularly the girl born with no eyes!) and a perfectly paced horror movie that ends up feeling very similar indeed to Corman's Poe films.

There is an extremely uncomfortable scene featuring attempted marital rape, which is not exactly the right kind of disturbing. But there are angry villagers with torches. There's a snake and a tarantula. There'sa creepy old portrait with terrifying eyes. And the whole things just so damned entertaining.

The Raven (1963)

 "But you'd be kiled!"

"I do hope not..."

I haven't checked how many of Roger Corman's Poe films I've seen. It's a lot. It's possible, with this film, I've seen them all. 

They are, of course, all B movies, bless them. They all acknowledge the fun side of that. Corman has always understood the power of kitsch... except in Frankenstein Unbound. This film makes me wonder if the tongue in cheek subtletiesof his other Poe films are wittier than they come across, Because this film is full of ironic, fourth wall- threatenning humour.

Understandably, many films are based on novels or plays. Few films are based on poems, yet this film begins with a recital of Poe's masterpiece- I love the poem, unfashionable thought it is; compare it to the adolescent nature-wanking drivel of John Keats- and just has fun.

Vincent Price is a great avtor, one who deserved more than B movies. Here he shows his prowess at deadpan humour. Peter Lorre not so much, but you can't take your eyes off him Hazel Court is more of the classy straight actress, but her performance works very well indeed. Boris Karloff cannot fail to be the consummate evil sorcerer. He was born to play such a role.

Yet Jack Nicholson- yes, he was once this young- turns out to be a bloody good comic actor, moving beyond the point of treating B movie characters like Shakespeare, as he was previously known to do, and showing a real comic timing. 

This film is a joy, despite the tenuous connection to Poe, and the cast is fascinating. So is the deliciosly garish direction, exalting in the possibility of Technicolor.

I know this film is very silly, but I love it.

The Oblong Box (1969)

 "We have knowledge of things you know nothing of..."

This film is an odd yet enjoyable beast. It's an adaptation of an Edgar Poe Story, sort of, as it has pretty much no scenes or characters in common with it other than the coffin itself. This is no sea voyage along the Eastern Seaboard of the USA, but a British horror film of the late '60s with literally all the tropes that implies.

This is no bad thing.

It's 1865, and looks good, as such historical films often do, Vincent Price stars, inevitably, given the double whammy of British cinema of this time worshipping him and given him work and, of course, his association with Poe, courtesy of the great Roger Corman, having ceased but five years before.

The script is original, not Poe in the slightest, par for the course for a British horror film of the period, but it works. Both Price and Christopher Lee are amazing.

Gordon Kessler's direction is Jekyll and Hyde. His domestic scenes are ho-hum, but his scenes of horror and excitement are creative and inspired. The film centres on African voodoo, the opening scene feels- and is- quite unthinkingly racist- yet the sensitive treatment of Harry Baird's noble african character goes some way to mitigate, and the script goes some way to show colonialism as the original sin behind all of this.

This is not, perhaps, a great film. But, for those of us who love this type of horror, it is exquisite.

Bloodbath at the House of Death (1984)

 "What is that?"

"Sounds like a lot of monks exploding."

This isn't Monty Python. Let's make that clear. It's nowhere near in the same league.  Yet, with some added innuendo, it's a similar style of humour. And, quite frankly, it doesn't need gto be anywhere near as good in order to entertain. This is never going to have a claim to be the greatest comedy film of all time, but it's a delightful way to spend ninety enjoyable minutes. And, knowing that good comedy doesn't have to be superlative to be good, one can enjoy a silly little film like this.

My dad is rather partial to Kenny Everett, and I watched and enjoyed a lot of his stuff as a kid. But he seems to have largely disappeared from the zeitgeist, his friendship (and patronship of the London gay scene) with Freddy Mercury aside. Puzzlingly, he's not a gay icon, perhaps because he was (it seems with tongue at least partially in cheek) a Thatcherite Tory. I am, I can say with some confidence, no Tory. but political affiliation, within the bounds of democracy, decency, tolerance and patriotism, should not disqualify an artist from acclaim.It's fair to say I will never blog Triumph of the Will, but let's have a sense of proprtion here. Kenny Everett was a damn good comic performer, as this film makes very clear.

Of course, Pamela Stephenson is magnificent too. Sex therapist she may be these days, but I certainly can't think of a thespian who can portray being pleasurably ravished by a poltergeist Beelzebub woth quite the same elan. And yes, I agree: that sentence may very possibly never have been written before.

 Vincent Price is, of course, magnificent as usual, with a comic talent very much on display, despite looking shockingly old and unhealthy. And the cast is, in general, superb, as is the direction. And the script, while having no pretensions to greatness, is very funny indeed in this alternately witty and very silly horror spoof. I want to see more Kenny Everett.

Diary of a Madman (1963)

 "Considering your endless studies of the criminal mind..."

You know when you start watching a film expecting a B movie, despite the literary basis of the script, and end up with a phiolosophical, literate and genuinely creepy little horror film? This is one of those nights. I don't care that the critics don't care for this film: they're wrong.

Obviously, Vincent Price, with that voice, is charismatic, extraordinary, and carries the film through sheer presence. But that's a given. Plus, the film and, indeed, the director, are fairly obscure. Perhaps what I'm truly blown away by is the original story (or two stories) by Guy de Maupassant- I've never read his short stories and, unlike other French authors, he isn't widely read in the English-speaking world. Yet I read that considerable liberties were taken with the source material beyond just conflating the two stories.

Nancy Kovack is excellent, of course, as a woman we are made to see as evil for her love of money and pleasure, but what options did a woman have in the France of 1886 beyond gold-digging? There's quite a feminist critique to be made of this fim, methinks.

Neverthleless, it's a thoughtful and deeply psychological approach to horroe which not only focuses on well-rounded characters but roots the horror in those very character traits. The nature of the "Horla" (why that name?) may be vague, but its effects are not.

All this, and we get a milieu of the (very) Hollywood version of the Paris of the artistic era of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and so forth. I recommend this film really rather highly indeed.

Laura (1944)

“Murder is my favourite crime.”

As one would expect of a famous film noir from the heyday of the genre, this film is magnificent, indeed close to perfection. The atmosphere, the direction, the cast, the witty script and the delightfully clever unfolding plot... this is not so much a film upon which one passes judgement, as a film to gaze upon in awed amazement. It’s that good.

Ultimately, this is because of the clever, witty, melancholy script and Preminger’s superb direction, but the film is full of extremely real-seeming characters. Gene Tierney is mesmerising as the eponymous murder victim herself, and Dana Andrews strokes the right notes as Detective McPherson. Yet it is Clifton Webb, as the witty, arrogant yet somehow likeable Waldo Lydecker, who truly astounds in what must have been a deeply satisfying role. Then there’s Vincent Price, impossibly young, playing a part totally unlike what he would later be known for.

The film is seventy-six years old as I write. And yet it has a world-weary and deeply intelligent level of psychological perceptiveness that feels somehow more “modern” than most contemporary cinema. Each character feels like a thinking, feeling, self-justifying human being, with real motives. And yet the film also functions perfectly as a clever and gripping whodunit. Everyone must see this film.

Batman: The Ogg Couple

"But this isn't exactly woman's work."

This episode is a very odd beast here, at this point of the season. I suspect it was made at the same time as the earlier two parter; it’s certainly odd to see Egghead with Olga but, by this point, the two of them have outworn their welcome.

It doesn’t help that Egghead, the more established of the two and played by no less a figure than Vincent Price, is so emasculated. He’s reduced to riding a donkey as the Cossacks ride horses, always one step behind, and always playing second fiddle. Worse, it’s one thing playing the coward to ensnare Batgirl into a trap, but the episode ends with him showing real cowardice. And he does nothing cool, has no agency and is nothing but a sidekick for the whole episode. As for Olga, Anne Baxter plays her well, but the character is just a tiresome cipher. I’m glad she won’t be back. It’s just a shame the once cool character of Egghead has been utterly ruined. Such a sad exit.

As for the episode itself, it’s a fairly standard third season single episode. Attempts at high camp are perfunctory and the whole thing feels superfluous after the earlier two parter.

An eminently skippable episode. Was it originally supposed to be a three parter with the other two?

Batman: How to Hatch a Dinosaur

"Think they can crack it, Commissioner?"

This second episode begins with a threat to undermine Egghead as much as the previous episode did, as we first see him riding that silly donkey all poised to play second fiddle to the increasingly annoying Olga.

Fortunately, this time those fears prove unfounded and Vincent Price gets the chance for a proper outing as the arch-criminal, with Egghead this time taking the lead. And his plan is gloriously bonkers: steal some radium, steal a dinosaur egg, and get the egg to hatch into a live dinosaur which will, for some reason not quite clear, fall under the control of Egghead and Olga and in no way turn agaist them. That it seems to do so is the most predictable and obvious trope ever. This is all very silly.

Except this is the right kind of silly. This is high camp, not low camp and, unlike the previous episode, this instalment has plenty of fun at the expense of its own tropes. So yes, the dinosaur is an unconvincing man in the suit- but this is completely diegetic, and the man in the suit is Batman.

We also have O'Hara noting that poisoning the water supply is a "favourite trick of Gotham City's arch criminals". Meanwhile we have Alfred. holding two phones, giving the same information to Batman and Batgirl in a splendidly silly bit of slapstick. And Robin even gives the fourth wall a knock ("Why didn't we think of this before, Batman?") when the Dynamic Duo find a way of using technobabble to track down the baddies at a moment convenient to the plot.

This is much, much better, and enormous fun- and Barbara is a surfer? I didn't expect that!

Batman: The Ogg and I

"Yes, the aroma is unmistakeable."

Oh dear. Another episode wth far too much going on to have enough fun, I'm afraid; it's all plot, plot, plot, and although said plot is at times promisingly silly (Egghead wants a "tax" on all eggs eaten in Gotham City, while it's not clear what Olga wants aside from marrying both Egghead and Batman), there's nowhere near enough fun with the fourth wall. And this time we can't, this being the start of a two parter, blame the new format.

No; the problem is that we have two villains struggling for air time. Anne Baxter is superb, having previously played Zelda the Great early in the first season, but the character of Olga is a bit ill-defined. So she's a Cossack queen from some fictional Slavic country, she has an outrageous and broadly Russian accent and... that's it, and while Baxter is superb with the accent and her charisma, the character is far too vague. Worse, the return of the splendid Vincent Price as Egghead is diluted.

There are some good moments- I smiled as Egghead implored Olga to forget any eleborate trap and just kill the Caped Crusaders- but not enough to prevent this overly packed episode feeling like a slowly deflating balloon. And, yet again, there isn't even a cliffhanger.

I hope there's more of Egghead next time.

Batman: An Egg Grows in Gotham & The Yegg Foes in Gotham

An Egg Grows in Gotham

"All the King's horses and all the King's men won't be able to put you together again!"

This is one of the best two parters so far with a sparkling and gloriously silly script and a splendidly camp and charismatic Vincent Price as the eggceptionally pun-tastic Egghead. I enjoyed it hugely. Eggcept... I have to be that person who points out that something from decades ago is a little bit incredibly racist but, well, look at the portrayal of Chief Screaming Chicken here, a whopping big "Red Indian" stereotype played by an eighty year old white man.

But there’s no denying how eggstremely fun this is, from the shameless puns coming to the extremely silly idea of Gotham City only being leased from the Mohicans with nine raccoon pelts as rent each year. And of course the Wayne’s are one of the founding families. Unfortunately the one remaining Mohican in Gotham, Chief Screaming Chicken, is said outrageous stereotype (“How?” “When?” “Where?”) and is credulous enough to be manipulated by Egghead. Yes, there’s a line from Batman acknowledging that “Indians” have a lot to be aggrieved about, but you certainly couldn’t show this on telly today.

Annoyingly, though, this is brilliant. All the nonsense about “fish” being spelled “ghoti” and the superb comic acting from Adam West and Burt Wars as they counteract the laughing gas with sad pills Is hilarious.

The cliffhanger is delightfully silly- Egghead draining the mind of Bruce Wayne to discover whether he’s Batman is refreshingly unusual.


The Yegg Foes in Gotham

"I guess I laid an egg..."

So what’s a “yegg” then?

Ok, the cliffhanger resolution is rubbish, but they often are. Conveniently Egghead gets just enough info from Bruce to discover that he has “a mind full of trivia” and it’s “inconceivable that he could be Batman”.

Unfortunately, the raccoon pelts have not been paid over by midnight, so the lease of Hotham has reverted back to Screaming Chicken- whose new police commissioner is Egghead. The Dynamic Duo are exiles while the police are comical unable to stop the ensuing crimewave. Fortunately, there’s a loophole, and this plotline is abandoned the moment full comic effect has been reached. Now Egghead is robbing the Treasury (did American cities in the ‘60s not just deduct taxes from salaries?)  followed, of course, by the robbery of eggs from Old MacDonald’s Chicken Farm. Because of course. And the episode ends with the most pun-tastic fight ever.

Take away the dodgy racial bits, and this would be a contender for best story yet. Unfortunately the dodgy racial bits (“My face is so red.”)  can’t be ignored.

The Last Man on Earth (1964)

“You’re freaks, all of you!”

I never did read Richard Matheson’s novel, or any of the other film adaptations, which made me pleasantly unspoiled for this strange little English language Italian film, starring Vincent Price and some Italian actors with impressive language skills, much though the concept reminds me of Day of the Triffids.

What I particularly love about this is that it’s a proper tragedy, not just in the sense of misfortune but how Dr Morgan exhibits hubris, and a tragic flaw. This turns it from a fascinatingly done but nonetheless fairly predictable post-apocalypse world into something more, and allows a trust ending.

Most of the film is taken up with Morgan’s daily life as the last man alive, using garlic, mirrors and plentiful cars to loot so he can survive and slowly kill as many sleeping vampires as he can during the daytime. He even keeps track of the date (civilisation ended in 1965!) for the benefit of nobody but himself, a defiant gesture. This is interspersed with flashback scenes of the “bacterium” slowly killing off civilisation and humanity, including his wife and daughter, until he is utterly alone- organised, determined but empty inside. Vincent Price, cast very much against type, gives a magnificent performance here which is very different from the parts he usually plays, although sadly his appearance and voice mean that Richard Mathewson was probably right to consider him miscast.

The final minutes of the film are a hammer blow- at first it seems Morgan is not alone, but the other survivors are merely infected people who are able to manage their condition with medication. They kill him because, amongst the vampires he has killed, have been some of their people and he, the last remaining “pure” human, is a threat. Morgan does knowing that humanity and civilisation will indeed eventually survive- without him. It’s a devastating twist for a rather good little film.

The Masque of the Red Death (1964)

"Each man creates his own God for himself, his own Heaven, his own Hell."

I'd seen and blogged a couple of Roger Corman’s Poe films before, and found they’ve always been impressive in how they were scripted, shot and acted. But this one absolutely stands out as the finest by far. It’s superb, taking an Edgar Allan Poe short story and making a dark philosophical treatise that almost echoes Bergman’s The Seventh Seal.

The setting is simple; a gothic castle in Renaissance Italy and the dark, plague-ridden countryside. But the film eschews realism in order to make the countryside darkly stylised, while there’s a sense that this community is cut off from the rest of Italy, giving Prince Prosperous absolute power over all he surveys. An openly Satanist prince would not possibly have been able to survive in Renaissance Italy, of course, but the film exists in its own claustrophobic, deeply atmospheric little world.

And at the centre of it all is the magnificent, extraordinary Vincent Price, giving one of the performances of his career. His mellifluous voice, the arch of his eyebrow, the looks of sardonic sadism- all this makes him utterly compelling as a charming sadist with absolute power and a love of Satan. There are subplots- Hazel Court as a princess fated to a gory death after giving herself to the Devil, and the horrifying revenge of a dwarf for the insult to his lady- but the film entirely focuses around the compelling figure of Prospero, and his eventual comeuppance is glorious.

I’ve blogged a fair few Roger Corman films by now, many of them excellent. But this is his finest achievement by far.

Scream and Scream Again! (1970)

“That bloody chicken wasn’t killed- it died of old age!”

 This is an odd film, not at all what the marketing, title and poster lead us to expect, but unexpectedly a rather good one.

The film's selling point is, of course, that it can boast the holy horror trinity of Vincent Price, Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing in the same horror film. But instead we get an utterly bonkers science fiction conspiracy thriller in which Cushing has but a brief cameo and the other two are not exactly in starring roles.

This is a gritty, realistic police procedural with slickly gritty direction, naturalistic acting and a basis in the more down-to-Earth end of science fiction. The plot may be utterly mad but pays off well, with the two apparently unrelated subplots- people being kidnapped and having their limbs surgically removed, while a sinister man with apparent superpowers commits a series of murders to climb up the greasy pole in a dodgy, unnamed, military dictatorship.

This all works rather well, as does the "A" plot of the pursuit of a serial killer with vampire-like attributes who kills girls whom he meets in nightclubs, which takes up an awful lot of the film. The film is, I suppose, rather disjointed, but it doesn't feel like it and is all drawn together in an effective climax. The overall effect is of a film which defies expectations in hat type of film it turns out to be, but in fact turns out to be surprisingly good.

House on Haunted Hill (1959)

"I haven't poisoned it..."

"It's always good to know that."

SPOILERS

Well, that was very good indeed, and not at all what you'd expect from what on the surface of what looks like a typical late 1950s low budget horror flick which does, after all, star Vincent Price at his camp best. Instead we get a fourth wall-breaking, immaculately plotted (well, there are a few holes on reflection bt let us not be churlish: how did Annabelle and Trent know that Loren would hand out guns?) and, above all, gloriously witty.

This is, in the end, a murder mystery without any supernatural elements. Well, other than the heightened sense of reality, but it just about manages to skirt the line. In the Lorens we have one of cinema's most gloriously acidic couples, appropriate considering where one of them ends up, with each cheerfully wanting to murder the other. There's what looks like an unpleasant note of feminine hysteria in the treatment of Nora but this is partly explained. This is far from the square-jawed 1950s Hollywood I'm used to seeing.

Most refreshingly surprising, though, is the witty fourth-wall breaking and the cheerful use of haunted house tropes throughout to heighten the atmosphere and drama. A gloriously fun way to wind down of a Tuesday evening and the best Vincent Price performance I've seen to date.

The Pit and the Pendulum (1961)

"Do you know where you are, Bartolome? I'll tell you where you are. You are about to enter Hell, Bartolome, HELL!... The netherworld. The infernal region, The abode of the Damned... The place of torment. Pandemonium. Abbadon. Tophet. Gehenna. Naraka. The pit... and the pendulum!"

One of the first films I did for this blog was Roger Corman's House of Usher; I didn't expect it to be quite as long until the next one of his Edgar Allan Poe films which happens, coincidentally, to be the second one made. I seem to have accidentally managed to do them in order so far.

This is a far superior film to its predecessor, with the use of a blurred and tinted picture for the flashbacks being a particularly inspired directorial flourish and Vincent Price being superb. Only the very end of the film is faithful to Poe's (very) short story with a plot invented to sound vaguely Poe-like, utilising many of his tropes, not least of which is premature burial. It works, and the plot is superb with a fantastic twist.

This is a profoundly gothic film in which the sins of the past- both before and after the twist- threaten to destroy the well-meaning but helpless present generation with the sheer weight of their evil. In this case it is the tortures of the recent Spanish Inquisition which weigh oppressively on the present, and the acting and superb direction Jane this a genuinely powerful and disturbing film. I'm left to ruminate that gothic horror is fundamentally progressive: it is fascinated by the past but all too aware that bad things happened there.

I was expecting a bit of campy fun with this film but instead, in spite of John Kerr's dodgy acting, I found a genuinely excellent film. Highly recommended.

Theatre of Blood (1973)

"Critics all make errors. We're only human."

"An opinion I find myself incapable of sharing!"

Before I'd even watched a frame of this it was abundantly clear that it was spiritually a second sequel to The Abominable Dr. Phibes; Vincent Price plays an eccentric craving revenge and drawn to carrying out a series of grotesque murders upon a particular theme. In this case, with Edward Lionheart being a bad Shakespearean actor (I wonder how Price reacted to being offered the part of a ham actor...?), the theme of the murders is Shakespeare, the Titus Andronicus one naturally being the best, the play being just as Grand Guignol as the film itself.

Such a premise cannot fail and, indeed, it doesn't. Unlike the Dr. Phibes films this is set in the present day, but otherwise it feels much the same and follows the same template. The plot may be predictable but it's all about the spectacle. Diana Rigg is superb as Lionheart's daughter and accomplice and the murdered critics include the likes of Arthur Lowe and Dennis Price. We even get a scene, Avengers fans, in which Diana Rigg and Ian Hendry are in a car together.

It may not be big, it may not be clever- although it certainly appeals to the Shakespeare geek- but it sure is fun.

Witchfinder General (1968)

"They swim! The mark of Satan is upon them! They must hang!"

It's clear why this film by Michael Reeves, who sadly died so very young, has achieved cult status: it's so incredibly violent, even sadistic, with one very memorable scene showing a poor young lady being lowered into the fire and slowly burned. It's an unashamedly sensational take on Matthew Hopkins which deals with the legend, not historical accuracy (the real Hopkins was only about 27 when he died of natural causes) and is anchored by a splendidly evil and charismatic performance by the one and only Vincent Price.

The film, shot largely on location, looks gorgeous and convinces as the Suffolk of the late Civil War. The ubiquitous Ian Ogilvy is splendid as our hero, Richard. The plot is functional but exciting as we gaze somewhat titillatingly on to the cruelties perpetuated by Hopkins and his dimmer yet more evil sidekick, Stearns. There is, I think, something more than a little creepy in the film's voyeuristic glee at the torture and execution of comely young women, that can't be denied. But Price's sheer charisma draws you in as you watch agog at one of the most evil characters in cinema.

A violent and, at times, extremely disturbing and misogynistic film that it is impossible not to be riveted by. Dark, edgy, uncomfortable in its sadistic use of the male gaze, but no one can accuse this of failing to be compelling viewing.

Dr. Phibes Rises Again (1972)

"What kind of fiend are you?"

"The kind that wins, my friend."

What a disappointing sequel, especially as The Abominable Dr. Phibes was so damned entertaining. How can what is pretty much the same bunch of people come up with such a desperately disappointing follow-up?

Part of the problem is that the set-up is not so much fun- instead of a series of amusingly outre murders we get a plan to use Egyptian mumbo-jumbo to rejuvenate the good doctor and his wife- yes, undiscovered ancient secrets in an early '70s film. Erik von Daniken, anyone? There's a trope for you right there.

On top of this the celebrity cameos are dull. Yes, the splendid Beryl Reid gets to chew the scenery for her brief scene, but Peter Cushing (prominently billed) gets a dull and functional cameo role. Still, at least we get to see a young John Thaw being horrifically killed.

The relationship between Peter Jeffrey's  Inspector Trout and his apoplectic boss, so funny in the previous film, is taken too far here- why should a police superintendent follow one of his inspectors on a jaunt to Egypt?

I suppose there area couple of entertainingly grossly deaths, the best of which involves scorpions, but this really is a film that can safely be avoided.

Edward Scissorhands (1990)

“Drop your weapons!”

Finally getting to see this film, after so many years, was an interesting pop culture experience: although I’d never seen the film I distinctly recall seeing Rob Newman riffing on it in The Mary Whitehouse Experience all those many years ago. It turns out that those sketches were, well, pretty accurate, but this is nevertheless a superb and surprisingly deep film.

It’s smalltown America during some strange timeless amalgam of the 1950s and the 1980s. On the hill is a blatantly out-of-place spooky castle straight out of a Roger Corman flick, which makes the casting of Vincent Price highly appropriate. But the style, particularly Edward himself (Johnny Depp, of course, in his breakthrough role), is unmistakably Tim Burton, immune to the passing of the years. The fact that Edward always wears a gimp suit in spite of all narrative logic is the most stylistically Tim Burton thing ever, as well as partly symbolising the theme of the film: stultifying small town nosey conformity and snobbery vs. the freedom to pursue alternative lifestyles.

There’s an obvious parallel, I suppose, with the Garden of Eden (which here is a creepy horror film castle!) and the corruption of the world (which, pleasingly, is represented by 1950s conservative values), especially as Edward is shown to be a brilliant gardener, if highly unconventional. I like the dinosaur.

Edward’s “fall” is down to the corruption of this environment by means of Winona Ryder’s love interest, and the final scenes are very reminiscent of James Whale’s Frankenstein, except for the fairytale ending. Ah yes, that word “fairytale”. It keeps coming up in my reviews of Tim Burton films, doesn’t it?

There’s a nice structural trick revealed at the end (the elderly narrator is Winona Ryder), and the film is both visually brilliant and powerful in its message. Any film that has its innocent protagonist be largely based on Freddy Krueger has got to be a classic.

The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971)

“A brass unicorn has been catapulted across a London street and impaled an eminent surgeon. Words fail me, gentlemen.”

This is the last review I’ll be doing in this strange, alcohol-fuelled, work-free interregnum between Christmas and New Year and, indeed, my last review of 2011. In 2012 I’ll go back to the usual schedule, continuing with the Buffyverse and (mostly) a film on Saturdays. I’ll also be reviewing certain programmes pretty much as they air in the UK- Doctor Who, obviously, but also, starting next week, Sherlock. In the meantime, here’s a fun little movie review that I didn’t have to think too hard about.

This is the perfect movie to watch if you have a certain sense of humour and you don’t want anything too heavy; it spends ninety minutes doing nothing but mocking its own tropes. Phibes (played, with the expected brilliance, by Vincent Price) has an absurd lack of any real motive for his ridiculously over-theatrical crimes, and that every little intricate little thing goes to plan is utterly unrealistic, but all of this is gleefully thrown in our faces; the film knows exactly what it’s doing. That Phibes is just a take on a certain archetype is shown near the end as he reveals his true, horrifying, Lon Chaney-esque face, and starts playing the organ in an obvious reference to Universal’s silent version of Phantom of the Opera. Yep, this is more of that metatextual fun that I love so much.

The police are hilarious, too; nice, decent, but with all the plodding incompetence that tradition leads us to expect from the Yard. For all that Trout (a great performance from Peter Jeffrey) is a thoroughly decent, put-upon chap (his interactions with his superior are the funniest thing about the film, mainly because his superior is only saying what the audience thinks!), he cocks every single thing up at every single opportunity.

All of the surgeons are subject to a certain amount of mockery too, and none more so than Terry-Thomas’ lecherous old man.  This is not a film that exactly treats authority figures with respect; in fact the gleeful grotesqueness of the various methods of dispatch is the film’s main selling point, as the audience has fun trying to guess how the theme of the Ten Plagues of Egypt, revealed quite earlier on, will show itself in the murders. The chap being impaled by a brass unicorn is the best, but many of them are quite horrific, especially the frog mask. Given the otherwise light tone of the film, there’s something particularly nasty about this one.

Still, it’s a superbly entertaining, and rather undemanding, piece of entertainment. One thing, though; who was Vulnavia?