| Lesbians, Vampiric Dads & Karloff!! |
|
| written by sfbabe |
April 3, 2004 - 2:42 PM PST |
|
1 out of 1 members found this review helpful
|
| The 1st story was my favorite. A strong lesbian undercurrent in this one. Sadly, one that may still be understood by dykes today. Still, a great story, interestingly done. A bit predictable at times, but fun all the way. Awesome sets, so rich with color. The ending credits with Karloff is a hoot! |
| Faces Of Fear, Colors of Darkness |
|
| written by mdraine |
February 20, 2003 - 10:03 PM PST |
|
6 out of 6 members found this review helpful
|
Once fodder for late-night TV broadcasts and bootleg video trades, the baroque, darkly erotic fantasies of Italian horror auteur Mario Bava (1914-80) are finally receiving the presentation they deserve. Charting a solitary path between the art film and the horror movie, Bava invested his work with a visual primacy that continues to influence such preeminent stylists as Dario Argento, Tim Burton, and David Lynch. This DVD presents the original version of a terror trilogy released in Italy as I tre volti della paura, (The Three Faces of Fear), retitled Black Sabbath for U.S. release by American International Pictures. Compounding the indignity of an American premier on a double bill with McHales Navy, AIP shuffled the intricate story sequence, gutted the soundtrack, and rewrote one episode to purge a lesbian subtext. This uncensored version restores the intended story order, original score, and a prologue with Boris Karloff, who appears in the best-known segment, The Wurdulak.
The opening act, The Telephone casts the sensual Michele Mercier as a high-class prostitute terrorized by a seemingly omniscient voyeur, anticipating the beginning of Scream. The title of the second tale, The Wurdulak, refers to a vampire which can only feed on the blood of those it loves. Karloff provides his finest performance of the Sixties as the patriarch of a Russian family. Massive, baleful, and rheumy-eyed, the 76-year-old actor radiates a malignance that transcends the dubbed Italian voice. The ghost story The Drop of Water, achieves mounting tension with an accumulation of disquieting details: a mewling cat at its owners deathbed, an overturned glass of water, a fly crawling on the ring finger of a corpse. The 16:9 enhanced transfer vividly captures the miasmatic greens and violets of the haunted world of Mario Bava. -- Michael Draine
|
|
|
Your cart
© 2006 All Media Guide, LLC. Portions of content provided by All Movie Guide®,
a trademark of All Media Guide, LLC.