From 1944 to 1955, EC was the biggest name in comics. Founded as an educational comic company by comic book pioneer and DC co-founder Maxwell Gaines, the company found its calling when Gaines' son Bill turned it into a genre powerhouse The biggest of its titles were his horror and crime comics, most famously Tales from the Crypt, The Vault of Horror, The Haunt of Fear, and CrimeSuspence Stories. Despite the overwhelming popularity of these books (and others like Weird Science), their brutal depiction of crime and violence caused controversy, and eventually, activists like Dr. Fredric Wertham even got the Senate Subcommittee on Crime involved. The Comics Code Authority was formed in the aftermath, with rules cartered specifically to prevent EC from publishing their most famous books. They were left with their humor comic, Tales to Drive You MAD, which is still around today, though you may know it by the name it took after becoming a magazine in 1955: Mad Magazine. Despite being so short-lived, EC proved to have staying power in popular culture. You may have recognized some of the titles I mentioned earlier from movies and TV shows, and those were adapted from or influenced by EC. Similarly, an entire generation of children grew up with the books, including artists inspired by their style. Two of those were George Romero and Stephen King. Friends for a while (King making a cameo in Romero's 1981 film Knightriders), they decided to use their shared affection for old EC horror books to make a film. King already had two major film adaptations of his wrk at that point (Brian De Palma's Carrie and Stanley Kubrick's The Shining), but this was the first screenplay he wrote, adapting two of his stories ("Weeds" and "The Crate"), and wrote original material for the film. Veteran EC artist Jack Kamen did the in-film comic artwork (which delighted me when I found out, because I noted that inbetween scenes with the comic and some filmed scenes resembled his art style most of the EC artists I have knowledge of), as well as the cover of the Creepshow tie-in comic (though Swamp Thing co-creator Bernie Wrightson did the art for the book itself). The film was shot in an empty all-girls school near Pittsburgh. It made $21 million on a $8 million, and has a cult following to this, spawning two sequels.
The film is an anthology, exploring different stories with different casts. The framing device has Billy (Joe King, son of Stephen and later known as author Joe Hill) being chastised by his father Stan (Tom Adkins, playing every father from every 80's metal video) for reading the horror comic Creepshow. After Stan throws the book away, Billy fantasizes of the undead host of the book (apparently named "The Creep") coming to his window, and he starts the film off by retrieving the comic from the trash, and giving us the tales within it. The first story, "Father's Day", sees a wealthy Grantham family, including Sylvia (Carrie Nye), Richard (Warner Shook), Cass (Elizabeth Regan), and Cass' husband Hank Blaine (Ed Harris) waiting for their aunt Bedelia (Viveca Lindfors) to arrive. Several years earlier, Bedelia killed her father Nathan (Jon Lormer) on Father's Day in the culmination of years of anger at him for his demanding and demeaning nature. Thus, every Father's day, Bedelia stops at his grave to continue her anger. However, this Father's Day, Nathan might have his cake (and eat it too. I made that joke a lot during this segment.). The next segment is "The Lonesome Death of Jody Verrill", which sees the title character (Stephen King. Yep, that one), an incompetent farmer, discovering a meteor. While trying to keep it to make money, it breaks, and starts to spread plant-like aliens around. Including on Verill himself. "Something to Tide You Over" sees wealthy Richard (Leslie Nielsen) take vengeance on his cheating wife Becky (Gaylen Ross) and her lover Harry (Ted Danson), by burying them on the beach, and having the high tide drown them. However, he finds that some people are just durable. "The Crate" has a college custodian (Don Keefer) find a crate with the label "Arctic Expedition, 1834". He calls upon Professor Stanley (Fritz Weaver) to see and open the crate. What they find is quite hungry. Finally, in "They're Creeping Up on You," which sees ruthless businessman Upson Pratt (EG Marshall) trying to maintain a sterile apartment, whilst cockroaches seem to keep popping. As he makes cutthroat deals, the cockroaches keep coming. And coming. And Coming.
I loved the style of this film. The animated scene transitions make you feel like you're reading an old Comic book, ads and all, and give you a sense on how the film feels. The film is also shot to emulate a comic book panel. Not just shots that show comic panels directly, but the way the film is lit and shot resembles the way old comic books would emphasize actions where reality couldn't. I think my complete enjoyment of this film can from that style, how it so captured the feeling of reading old EC books (I myself own a collection of EC Weird Science issues), and how much fun it could inspire. I love superheroes movies, but very rarely do they invoke the spirit of the comics they originated from the way this film does for horror comics. Similarity, it is legitimately terrifying. Each segment has a terrifying moment, one which jumped me out of my seat. The more comic book inspired look of the film actually made some scenes scarier than they would've been. The last segment, especially if you hate cockroaches, like I do, will haunt you. The effects helps, with surprisingly realistic resurrected dead (which still look very much like ones from old horror comics), and some good creature designs. The acting all around is good, with Stephen King of all people giving a strong comic performance. Each segment works as it's own story, and each hold up.
I felt the segments should've been of roughly same length. Like I said, none of them are bad, but some feel longer than they should be. Those segments did have a payoff, but it took a while, and some scenes could've been cut. Also, to keep with the atmosphere, I felt the horror host ought to have been narrating film, instead of a background figure flipping the pages, using some sort of snearky dialogue. It's fine as is, but having an active horror host would've helped.
I honestly loved this film. It is a joyride of fear and euphoria, simultaneously fun and terrifying. This is a great homage to EC Comics and their output, but holds up on its own as an individual horror film. I highly recommend this for horror fans as a fun nighttime romp, or for a brief Halloween scare.
Next film is Monkey Shine.
The film is an anthology, exploring different stories with different casts. The framing device has Billy (Joe King, son of Stephen and later known as author Joe Hill) being chastised by his father Stan (Tom Adkins, playing every father from every 80's metal video) for reading the horror comic Creepshow. After Stan throws the book away, Billy fantasizes of the undead host of the book (apparently named "The Creep") coming to his window, and he starts the film off by retrieving the comic from the trash, and giving us the tales within it. The first story, "Father's Day", sees a wealthy Grantham family, including Sylvia (Carrie Nye), Richard (Warner Shook), Cass (Elizabeth Regan), and Cass' husband Hank Blaine (Ed Harris) waiting for their aunt Bedelia (Viveca Lindfors) to arrive. Several years earlier, Bedelia killed her father Nathan (Jon Lormer) on Father's Day in the culmination of years of anger at him for his demanding and demeaning nature. Thus, every Father's day, Bedelia stops at his grave to continue her anger. However, this Father's Day, Nathan might have his cake (and eat it too. I made that joke a lot during this segment.). The next segment is "The Lonesome Death of Jody Verrill", which sees the title character (Stephen King. Yep, that one), an incompetent farmer, discovering a meteor. While trying to keep it to make money, it breaks, and starts to spread plant-like aliens around. Including on Verill himself. "Something to Tide You Over" sees wealthy Richard (Leslie Nielsen) take vengeance on his cheating wife Becky (Gaylen Ross) and her lover Harry (Ted Danson), by burying them on the beach, and having the high tide drown them. However, he finds that some people are just durable. "The Crate" has a college custodian (Don Keefer) find a crate with the label "Arctic Expedition, 1834". He calls upon Professor Stanley (Fritz Weaver) to see and open the crate. What they find is quite hungry. Finally, in "They're Creeping Up on You," which sees ruthless businessman Upson Pratt (EG Marshall) trying to maintain a sterile apartment, whilst cockroaches seem to keep popping. As he makes cutthroat deals, the cockroaches keep coming. And coming. And Coming.
I loved the style of this film. The animated scene transitions make you feel like you're reading an old Comic book, ads and all, and give you a sense on how the film feels. The film is also shot to emulate a comic book panel. Not just shots that show comic panels directly, but the way the film is lit and shot resembles the way old comic books would emphasize actions where reality couldn't. I think my complete enjoyment of this film can from that style, how it so captured the feeling of reading old EC books (I myself own a collection of EC Weird Science issues), and how much fun it could inspire. I love superheroes movies, but very rarely do they invoke the spirit of the comics they originated from the way this film does for horror comics. Similarity, it is legitimately terrifying. Each segment has a terrifying moment, one which jumped me out of my seat. The more comic book inspired look of the film actually made some scenes scarier than they would've been. The last segment, especially if you hate cockroaches, like I do, will haunt you. The effects helps, with surprisingly realistic resurrected dead (which still look very much like ones from old horror comics), and some good creature designs. The acting all around is good, with Stephen King of all people giving a strong comic performance. Each segment works as it's own story, and each hold up.
I felt the segments should've been of roughly same length. Like I said, none of them are bad, but some feel longer than they should be. Those segments did have a payoff, but it took a while, and some scenes could've been cut. Also, to keep with the atmosphere, I felt the horror host ought to have been narrating film, instead of a background figure flipping the pages, using some sort of snearky dialogue. It's fine as is, but having an active horror host would've helped.
I honestly loved this film. It is a joyride of fear and euphoria, simultaneously fun and terrifying. This is a great homage to EC Comics and their output, but holds up on its own as an individual horror film. I highly recommend this for horror fans as a fun nighttime romp, or for a brief Halloween scare.
Next film is Monkey Shine.
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