Companion film to Amicus' omnibus Tales from the Crypt concerns five men who find themselves locked within a vault after an elevator leads them to it with no doors or exits, as they relate nightmarish stories about themselves which feel so vivid and real. The first tale concerns a psychotic brother, Rogers(Daniel Massey)who desires his father's fortune and will seek out his sister Donna(Anna Massey)to kill her for it. What he doesn't expect is to become the main course on the menu of a restaurant serving vampires! The second tale concerns a neat-freak who slowly drives his sweetheart wife mad with all his demands of everything around the house being as tidy and ordered as possible. The neat-freak is played expertly by Terry-Thomas with just the right touch of insufferable complaining, pressing so hard towards wife Glynis Johns figuring out how his house is to remain. The end result is a howler as she takes his lessons to heart, using his methods of tidiness to the extreme when he drives her over the edge. The third tale concerns a magician and his wife, Curd Jürgens & Dawn Addams who will kill to possess the basket rope trick of an Indian girl. They never expect that the rope has better ideas in store for them. The forth tale concerns Michael Craig's desire to collect insurance paid after his death faking it only to find that his partner plans to leave him buried alive. Thrown into the mix are anatomy students who plan to use his body as a tool of study! The fifth and final tale(..my favorite)concerns an angered artist, Tom Baker, betrayed by his agent(..played by Denholm Elliot)who "buys" voodoo in order to get revenge against not only him but the art critic who slandered his work and the art curator who claimed his work wasn't good enough to show the public. Through an ability given to him by the voodoo, Baker has the ability to harm his victims(..or objects)painted to his canvas. But, before receiving this power he had painted a portrait of himself and it is of the utmost importance that nothing comes in contact with it..sufficed to say, dire consequences are a result.
Like it's companion, each storyteller is corrupt in one way or another and pay for their sins, and their true fears are replayed to them, for each character to relive over again. Unfortunately, I think there was some post-production tinkering because it seems that certain scenes are tampered with like the attack on Massey in the restaurant as the vampires drain him of blood. Also, most of the tales pale in comparison to the superior, far more ghoulish stories in Tales from the Crypt. I found the third tale concerning the rope which can whip it's victim, rather hokey. The first tale concerning a diabolical killer who desires an inheritance that's not his unless his sister is dead, finding himself in a den of vampires with no escape, rather familiar and unexciting. The second tale concerning the neat-freak and the wife he drives bonkers with his ravings regarding "a place for everything and everything in it's place" rather amusing, especially the macabre ending. The fifth is the one I especially had fun with because it's so unique and menacing. The idea that a man can destroy his foes by harming their portraits after having painted them on canvas thanks to the power voodoo was a really nifty premise to see unfold. But, I didn't think there were that many great thrills or mind-blowing shock-sequences this time around. Maybe by 1973, the Amicus anthology was losing steam. Good cast, though. And, the film is filled to the brim with unscrupulous individuals who get their just desserts.
Like it's companion, each storyteller is corrupt in one way or another and pay for their sins, and their true fears are replayed to them, for each character to relive over again. Unfortunately, I think there was some post-production tinkering because it seems that certain scenes are tampered with like the attack on Massey in the restaurant as the vampires drain him of blood. Also, most of the tales pale in comparison to the superior, far more ghoulish stories in Tales from the Crypt. I found the third tale concerning the rope which can whip it's victim, rather hokey. The first tale concerning a diabolical killer who desires an inheritance that's not his unless his sister is dead, finding himself in a den of vampires with no escape, rather familiar and unexciting. The second tale concerning the neat-freak and the wife he drives bonkers with his ravings regarding "a place for everything and everything in it's place" rather amusing, especially the macabre ending. The fifth is the one I especially had fun with because it's so unique and menacing. The idea that a man can destroy his foes by harming their portraits after having painted them on canvas thanks to the power voodoo was a really nifty premise to see unfold. But, I didn't think there were that many great thrills or mind-blowing shock-sequences this time around. Maybe by 1973, the Amicus anthology was losing steam. Good cast, though. And, the film is filled to the brim with unscrupulous individuals who get their just desserts.