Freddie Francis' 1965 Dr. Terror's House of Horrors is a first-rate example of a British portmanteau horror film. The film revolves around five men travelling in a train compartment. They make room for a sixth man, Dr. Schrek (Peter Cushing), who can read people's futures through the a deck of tarot cards, which he calls his House of Horrors. One by 
one, each of the men have their futures foretold, all of which end in death. Of the five tales, my personal favorites are "The Killing Vine," in which a family returns from vacation only to find a truly invasive vine taking over their garden, and "The Disembodied Hand," with Christopher Lee as an art critic terrorized by the severed hand of an artist that he ran over, causing him to lose his rather vengeful hand. Also of note is "The Vampire Story," starring Donald Sutherland as a young doctor who unwittingly marries a beautiful French vampire. The other two stories are, in my book, only mildly entertaining. In "The Werewolf Story," a real estate agent is called back to his family's estate where the current owners have a rather nasty surprise in store for him, and "The Voodoo Story" tells the tale of a jazz musician who rips off an ancient voodoo hymn with disastrous results for himself. But what are truly the best parts of the entire movie are the scenes in the railway coach. There's real atmosphere here. The train is travelling by night, so all you can see 
out the windows is blackness and smoke. The scenes are claustrophobic. And Peter Cushing plays the evil Dr. Schrek with just the right combination of mildness and menace.
one, each of the men have their futures foretold, all of which end in death. Of the five tales, my personal favorites are "The Killing Vine," in which a family returns from vacation only to find a truly invasive vine taking over their garden, and "The Disembodied Hand," with Christopher Lee as an art critic terrorized by the severed hand of an artist that he ran over, causing him to lose his rather vengeful hand. Also of note is "The Vampire Story," starring Donald Sutherland as a young doctor who unwittingly marries a beautiful French vampire. The other two stories are, in my book, only mildly entertaining. In "The Werewolf Story," a real estate agent is called back to his family's estate where the current owners have a rather nasty surprise in store for him, and "The Voodoo Story" tells the tale of a jazz musician who rips off an ancient voodoo hymn with disastrous results for himself. But what are truly the best parts of the entire movie are the scenes in the railway coach. There's real atmosphere here. The train is travelling by night, so all you can see 
out the windows is blackness and smoke. The scenes are claustrophobic. And Peter Cushing plays the evil Dr. Schrek with just the right combination of mildness and menace.Let me tell you straight up that this is not a great movie. Come to think of it, few horror movies are "great." But some of them are great fun. This is one of those. The casting is unbelievable. Hollywood would pay a fortune to get all of these men back in front of the camera for a second go around. And they play their parts well, each of them starting off jovial and non-chalant, each ending up fearful. The sets are not bad, and the special effects are good considering the time period and the budget. The five short stories are pretty good, even if they have plot holes in them. All in all, this is what I would call a good movie, if I use Roger Ebert's definition, which is that a good movie does what it sets out to do. Dr. Terror's House of Horrors sets out to entertain us and, maybe, give us a tingle. It accomplishes that quite well, and so it is a good movie. Could it have been better? Of course, but the same can be said for many movies. This happens to be the first horror movie I ever saw. I was five years old at the time and living in Germany with my f
amily. My mother and my aunt decided they wanted to see it, so they went and took us kids with them. I was probably scared witless at the time, though I don't really recall. But I did recall the images from the film. They stuck with me for the rest of my life. So much so, that I sought out this film. You could say that it formed the basis for my love of horror films. Not gorefests, but real, old-fashioned horror films. This is just such a movie. Check it out if you're ever in the mood for some good, old-fashioned entertainment.
amily. My mother and my aunt decided they wanted to see it, so they went and took us kids with them. I was probably scared witless at the time, though I don't really recall. But I did recall the images from the film. They stuck with me for the rest of my life. So much so, that I sought out this film. You could say that it formed the basis for my love of horror films. Not gorefests, but real, old-fashioned horror films. This is just such a movie. Check it out if you're ever in the mood for some good, old-fashioned entertainment.Dr. Terror's House of Horrors is unrated. It's not available on DVD. Hopefully, somebody will restore it and issue it on DVD soon. Until then, you can only get it on fuzzy VHS or through NetFlix.
No comments:
Post a Comment