Theatre Of Blood (1973)

Vincent Price playing a hammy theatre actor, delivering Shakespeare monologues, right before taking revenge on a critic who’s wronged him, played by a gallery of great British character actors (Harry Andrews, Robert Morley, Jack Hawkins), and the bloody murder has some thematic tie to a Shakespeare play. And then you have Diana Rigg playing Price’s […]

The City Of The Dead (1960)

It’s a simple but effective trick. Works for rock shows, and it certainly works for old, black-and-white horror movies. If you don’t have the budget for set design, just pump in the smoke machine! The City Of The Dead (1960; aka Horror Hotel) gets a lot of atmospheric effect through its one major street set […]

Sweet Home (1989)

As a Japanese horror movie, Sweet Home (1989) has a cult following because it was released with a tie-in horror computer game from Capcom, which became the inspiration for the original Resident Evil video game. As an entry in director Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s filmography, it’s different to the disturbing, eerie horror movies that would make his […]

Trouble Every Day (2001)

When it comes to Claire Denis, the word I think of is “elliptical.” The opening of Trouble Every Day (2001) begins with a couple kissing in a car at night, a couple who are not even characters in the film. We also see the Seine river at night, the water lapping under street light. A […]

The Old Dark House (1932)

All I knew about The Old Dark House (1932) was its director, James Whale, and star Boris Karloff, were together again after the success of Frankenstein. Based on a novel by J.B. Priestley, the story concerns two parties of debonair British people – one group is a married couple (Raymond Massey and Gloria Stuart – […]