The Ten Plagues of Christmas

At this magical time of the year

I feel a small frisson of fear

I was scared as a child

By the voice, soft and mild

Of a gentleman ever so queer.

It’s true — a Hogmanay screening of THEATRE OF BLOOD so terrified me as a kid, I couldn’t walk into a room for months afterwards without imaging the severed head of Arthur Lowe waiting for me. I think it was the fact that he’s murdered in bed, the place of childhood safety, and in a slow, methodical, surgical manner…

I once had a flat mate similarly traumatised, but by Robert Morley’s demise in the same film, choked to death on a cream-of-poodle pie rammed down his throat through a funnel. She couldn’t eat chicken pie ever again.

So this time of year often makes me think of Vincent Price. And since it’s near the climax of the Vincentennial, the blogospheric celebration of his hundredth blood-curdling year, it seemed mete to sing his praises.

I limbered up with this little rhyme, then decided to indulge in a ten-lim marathon celebrating each of Phibes’ phiendish phorays.

Thus: The Wreckalogue.

A further entry in the Vincentennial, dealing with the gripping WITCHFINDER GENERAL, is here. And make sure you check out everyone else’s rhymes! A big thankyou to Hil for having me.

The Cut-Ups

Weird how Terry Gilliam’s animations for Monty Python’s Flying Circus always seemed a bit scary, but his titles for CRY OF THE BANSHEE, a Vincent Price horror flick, are mainly just funny.

Weird also how the movie, which is part of AIP/Tigon’s series of period horrors including also WITCHFINDER GENERAL and BLOOD ON SATAN’S CLAW, is so unlikable. The earlier WITCHFINDER benefited from a realistic approach with no supernatural elements and an admirable seriousness of purpose by its director. The later CLAW has a thoroughly goofy narrative but again tackles it with sincerity and verve — the writer had been influenced by accounts of the Mary Bell case, in which a little girl murdered a little boy: the idea of evil infecting children was taken seriously, even if the filmmakers don’t bring much in the way of sensible ideas to the situation.

BANSHEE is really just a parade of nastiness, most of it directed at young women. The only really interesting thing after the opening credits is the ending, which to my mind was swiped by THE LONG GOOD FRIDAY, which could be seen as an unofficial remake in gangster form of BANSHEE. Bob Hoskins may seem an unlikely replacement for Vincent Price, but really he’s not.

Wishing he was back with the Ken Campbell Roadshow.

Sound and Fury

The landscapes of BLACK DEATH are the highlight — photographed by Sebastian Edschmid, they drizzle and waft with just the right blend of impressionism and tactile grit. As for the rest, what Dario Poloni’s script and Christopher (CREEP) Smith’s direction offer is the narrative shape of APOCALYPSE NOW transplanted to a medieval world influenced by Bergman and Verhoeven. But it critically lacks any sense of a climax, and gets dragged down by a prolonged postscript. Characters are, for the most part, regulation thugs, and although Eddie Redmaybe as the novice monk is clearly differentiated from the crew of bullies surrounding him, neither he nor they have any convincing relationships. It’s a film where you don’t believe anybody gives a crap about anybody else, or anything. Sean Bean is forceful as the fanatical knight leading the expedition to investigate a village suspiciously free of pestilence, and Carice Van Houten (BLACK BOOK) is good and mysterious, with her unplaceable non-accent, as the cult leader they find. All the cast are good, in fact, but none make much impression.

Basically, when the film isn’t wowing you with scenery or waaah!ing you with bloodshed, it’s a bit of a flatline. Unlike Michael Reeves’ WITCHFINDER GENERAL, which seems like another obvious influence, the film seems fatally uncertain of its overall point. Reeves’ exploration of the destructive, infectious nature of cruelty and violence was very much from the heart — it’s questionable whether the director of SEVERANCE has such deep feelings on the subject. The movie is utterly devoid of humour, but doesn’t seem deep-down serious either.

Needless to say, it makes me worry about what my own horror movie scripts might be doing wrong…