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AIP
Horror-Comedy
Double Feature
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Terrors
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7 |
Raven
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8 |
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10 |
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| Guest
Review by Lyle
Horowitz |
Vincent
Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff and Basil Rathbone are all
beloved horror icons. In The
Comedy of Terrors and The
Raven,
which MGM has so graciously released on DVD, you get to see
two hilarious horror-comedies featuring these four veteran genre
actors letting their guard down and having a damn good time.
Comedy of Terrors:
After the positive response to Roger Corman's Tales
Of Terror (or most notably, "The Black Cat"
sequence, which is one of the most memorable performances of
both Vincent Price and Peter Lorre's career) AIP wanted to cash
in on the potential of a horror/comedy hybrid. Why not? In 1963
AIP had released Roger Corman's The Raven,
a horror-comedy featuring Price, Lorre and Karloff. The film
was a hit and AIP, naturally, was keen to emulate its success.
They put director Jacques Tourneur (Curse
of the Demon, War-Gods of the Deep)
at the helm of the project and tapped novelist and Twilight
Zone scribe Richard Matheson (who also wrote The
Raven) as screenwriter.
The cast was even more mouthwatering: Price, Lorre and Karloff
would return, with the added presence of Basil Rathbone. The
addition of Rathbone (Captain Blood,
Son of Frankenstein) as the landlord
who won't stay dead certainly spiced things up a bit. Vincent
Price plays Waldo Tremble (Oops! I meant Trumble, sorry...),
an undertaker who hasn't had a dead body in his mortuary in
quite some time. Pressed to pay his year's worth of rent to
Mr. Black (Rathbone), he and his partner, Felix (Lorre), start
to kill people to get new "clients".
I enjoy Comedy of Terrors
quite a bit, but it is not one of my favorite Price films. Although
there are some great gags in this, but compared to AIP's other
horror-comedies this one falls short. Joyce Jameson, who plays
Price's wife in the film, is incredibly annoying — although
it must be said that her character is supposed to be
annoying. Her singing is almost unbearable to the point where
I want to turn the film off! Joe E. Brown (of Some
Like It Hot fame) makes a wonderful cameo as the cemetery
keeper.
My
main gripe with the film is that it is just one big drawn-out
(and one-note) joke, followed by several cat and mouse chases
which tend to slow down the overall pace.
The Raven, not to be confused
with the 1935 film of the same name
(also starring Boris Karloff) and which features him
more prominently than Comedy of Terrors,
is a terrific horror-comedy partly due to Richard Matheson's
excellent script. Matheson took the classic poem by Edgar Allen
Poe — which features nothing more than the titular black bird
appearing ominously outside the narrator's chamber door — into
a wonderful story about dueling magicians which puts Harry Potter
to shame. Price plays Erasmus Craven, an amiable wizard who's
decided to abandon the craft. Lorre is the super-grouchy Dr.
Bedlo, another (much less talented) magician who comes into
Price's home asking for help after the evil Dr. Scarabus (Karloff)
turned him into a raven. After restoring him to human form via
an icky potion — ingredients include dried bat's blood, jellied
spiders and dead man's hair — the sorcerous
Good Samaritan is told by Bedlo that his supposedly dead wife
Lenore is actually alive and residing with Scarabus. Having
never truly reconciled himself to her demise, Craven accompanies
Bedlo to Scarabus' castle to find out the truth. Buxom Hazel
Court (Curse of Frankenstein)
and a very young Jack Nicholson have fun in their respective
roles as the scheming Lenore and Bedlo's loyal but unappreciated
son Rexford.
I absolutely love this movie. It's a fun, hilarious, tongue-in-cheek
horror/comedy/fantasy which never really gets dull — one of
my personal favorites among the many films of Vincent Price.
The chemistry between Price and Lorre is excellent, as they
are constantly playing off one another throughout. The sorcerer's
duel between Karloff and Price at the end is a lot of fun and
one of the highlights. Unlike the more restricted Comedy
of Terrors, The Raven has
large castle sets and some interesting optical effects are used
as well.
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MGM
packs some terrific extras on this disc. On Side A (Comedy
of Terrors) there is a short featurette titled Richard
Matheson: Storyteller in which Matheson talks about the production
and his experience with the actors and the director. Most importantly
he reports that a sequel to Comedy of Terrors
was planned but sadly, it never materialized. Also included is
the theatrical trailer. On Side B (The Raven)
there are two featurettes. Firstly, another episode of Richard
Matheson: Storyteller. Matheson
relates how much he enjoys the film and the great chemistry on-set
between Price, Lorre, Nicholson and Karloff. The second featurette
features director Roger Corman talking about various aspects of
the production. Another great extra is a promotional record for
The Raven, which features pictures
of the record sleeve and lobby cards of the film while the audio
track plays. The original theatrical trailer is also included.
Overall,
this is a must-have disc for any admirer of Price and his work.
There are some great extras on this disc, with beautiful widescreen
prints for both films. Since the DVD can be had for as low as
$10 in brick and mortar stores, there's no excuse to pass it up.
12/28/03 |
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