I DRINK YOUR BLOOD 1971 Review

 I DRINK YOUR BLOOD 1971

 

“I Drink Your Blood” is a movie that came out in 1971, and is a “hippie exploitation film”. I started to watch the movie on Fawesome, but for some reason, the night I tried to, the website wouldn’t load it completely. I ultimately switched to Tubi, and while the picture quality was better than what was on Fawesome, the audio was much worse. I guess that means there are multiple cuts and edits to this film, that even streaming websites have. 

 I’d been recommended the film in the past, since it has apparent influence from The Manson Family. Within the first 12 minutes of the film, this was clear. There are mannerisms that seem like clear nods towards the sheer craziness the Manson Family would do, such as traveling as a ragtag group of questionable hippies, beating up various members of said group, hanging out naked, and inhabiting abandoned places. The opening scene shows a “Satanic Ritual”, and a chicken is actually killed for the film. In general, it looked like actual animals were killed for the movie, though the only confirmation towards this was the chicken. There were some rats later, but those were apparently already dead, and painted brown to look like they were alive. Though, I question where they found those dead rats to begin with. At the end of the film, a dead goat is seen, though I couldn’t find any trivia on whether that animal was killed for the film either. 

Maybe I’m the hippie here, but I don’t approve of hurting or killing animals for the sake of a movie. Movies are fake. But death is real. 

The hippie satanic cult used buzzwords that were commonly referenced about the Manson Family. There seems to be this mixture of The Church of Satan and The Manson Family referenced, between the Satanic hand poses used at the rituals, and talks of “I will die for him”. Considering how the film came out only 2 years after the Tate-LaBianca murders and the release of “The Satanic Bible”, I can definitely see why a horror movie would be influenced by both, as it was an odd time to be around in for sure. Of course, while the film was being written, the Tate-LaBianca trial was all over the news, which had proven a great influence to this. 

One of the problems with the film, is that I really had no idea what was going on at first. There’s no real story line at first, then it picks up a bit, but the “story’ is loose at the end.

A young woman is assaulted by the hippie in the beginning, too shocked to say anything at first. Her grandfather later gets it out of her, and he goes over to where the hippies are staying, which was an abandoned old hotel, which in real life, was about to be demolished before the film. The grandpa goes to the hippie’s hideout, and they break his glasses, and one of the women give him LSD. His grandson, Pete, shows up to try and save his grandfather, and after a struggle, they let the two go and they return home. In one scene, the granddaughter Silvia, tells her brother that Grandpa was “doped” with LSD, “which makes you crazy.”. I thought that this was a funny scene, because the actors nearly looked straight at the camera when saying this. I think it was definitely a sign of the times, as the public opinion of hippies and drugs, LSD especially, was at an all time low. 

The movie starts to act like it was going to turn into a revenge plot film against the hippies, like as if the grandson and grandfather would have done some sort of redneck justice towards the group of thieves. But this doesn’t really pan out. I thought it would have been interesting though, to have seen the film turn out this way, I know it would have been pretty satisfying to many in the general public, to see annoying evil hippies “get their due”. I wonder if this idea might have later inspired Quentin Tarantino later. 

Even still, what ends up happening is that Pete shoots a rabid dog, and the next morning, he extracts the blood from said dog, and injects it into some meat pies at the local bakery he seems to work at. 3 of the hippies come in and buy the pies, and there’s a scene where the group as a whole is eating them. Mostly. Only one person, Silvia’s boyfriend, doesn’t eat anything, and a pregnant hippie takes a taste, but she doesn’t finish her pie. For some reason, the main hippie, Horace, calls the pregnant lady, who seems to be his baby mama, “Fatso”. What a horrible thing to call a pregnant woman. 

Later on, the hippies turn rabid rather quickly, and that’s when the real plot starts to come out. Of course, in real life, rabies doesn’t affect people immediately, but obviously they had to do this for the sake of the film. Apparently, the idea for the rabies plot came from a real life story that the director read about, where a school of children in Iran became infected with rabies. 

Right before the tallest member of the hippies goes on a killing spree, one of the other members is seen shuffling through a tarot deck. I found this interesting, because she pulled a card that said “Death”, when in traditional tarot, that same card would have been called “The Ten of Swords”. I don’t know if they created the tarot deck specifically for the film, or if it was some really bad “reimagining” of tarot. Either way, the ten of swords/death card was used to symbolize how just a few seconds later, the tall hippie would stab one of the other members, killing him, and lopping his foot off. 

Once the hippies start to turn rabid, the film really comes out as a hokey and corny film, that was pretty gross to look at-at times. I personally I cannot stand looking at people eat, and the foam coming from everyone’s mouths was almost too gross for me to look at. That’s just a “me” thing, I know, but I had to look away sometimes. 

There is a scene in the film where one of the locals gets into a fight with the main hippie, and during this, the local man’s dentures falls out. This was apparently unintentional, and something that happened in real life, and they left it in the film. I actually think this was a great choice. 

Late in the film, there’s a scene where the pregnant lady hurts herself in the stomach, which I found nuts. I’m surprised that this was allowed to stay in the film. I do question, did she actually have rabies though? She never foamed at the mouth, nor attacked anyone. Was her and baby’s death completely unneccesary? I think so. But I guess for the sake of the plot, they had to do something with her, so that there wouldn’t be any loose ends. 

The movie has similar vibes to “Let’s Scare Jessica To Death”, but is no-where near as serious. It was very clearly influenced by other popular films of time, such as “Night of The Living Dead”, while also having this Scooby Doo type chase music. Some of the music is in the same vibe as the synth soundtrack on “Jessica” too. In many ways, this film just made me want to watch Jessica’s movie again. 

You can really tell the influence that the 1950’s still had on this film. There were a lot of lingering elements to it in the movie, where many of the cars, hairstyles, and mannerisms were reminiscent of that time. I was a treat in a way, to see this. You can see how in certain parts of America, the hippie movement really didn’t seem to affect much.

I don’t understand why the rabid hippies started to turn on each other, but the fight scene between the tall guy and the cult leader was interesting. I think this was partially done to pad out time. The ending was unsatisfactory and stupid, not making the movie worth the watch time. I don’t know why there are so many movies that shoot for the 1 hour and 30 minute runtime, when a 1 hour film would have been just fine. 

Overall, I didn’t care for the film, and found it stupid. 

I couldn’t find any actual reviews for the film, just ads and summaries for the plot, when it came out in 1971. Of course, “I Drink Your Blood” was paired with “I Eat Your Skin”, a movie that had actually been made in 1964, but was shelved. The director to this movie simply bought the rights to that one, and renamed it, setting up the two to play together in theaters, typically. The scary looking face used on ads for the film has nothing to do with the movie, apparently coming from a British film that was created years before this one. The movie had a lot of “thrifting” to put it together. 

I wonder how many films this one influenced though, because in many ways, I can see a resemblance between “I Drink Your Blood”, and “28 Days Later”. 

I rate the film a 0.5 out of 5. 


My video: https://youtu.be/cms1MZfH2II

Let’s Scare Jessica To Death 1971 Review

 Let’s Scare Jessica To Death 1971

 

“Let’s Scare Jessica To Death” is a film that came out in 1971, and can be described as more of a psychological thriller, more than anything else. Looking up some of the history to this film after watching it, it was apparently marketed as a vampire film. I find this odd, as the only dialogue about vampires is in passing, and virtually insignificant. 

The plot to the film is that Jessica moves into a new home with her husband their friend Woody, to fix up an old farmhouse with an apple orchard in Connectcut. Jessica had just been released from a mental hospital after a 6 month stay, and her husband Duncan felt that she would do better, living away from New York City. 

Once they get to the house, which is at least 3 levels with a giant spire attached, they turn on the lights and someone is seen running on the second flight. Jessica is heard talking to herself and seeing things throughout the movie, so there’s times where it’s implied that she might see things that aren’t there, while some of these things are there. The person seen running is proven to be real, as her husband confronts them, a red headed hippie woman named Emily, that was squatting in the house. Emily was basically homeless, living in the abandoned house. 

Instead of being scared and weirded out, the group allow Emily to stay and live in the house with them. Emily ends up seducing both men in the house, sleeping with both at various points in the movie. 

It’s implied that Jessica is starting to relapse into her mental illness, though it could also be from whatever mystical things that Emily is doing to her. Emily turns out to be the undead spirit of one of the former people that lived in the house. Potentially implied to be brought out in a seance done early in the film, where they ask for a sign from any of the spirits that ever died in the house. 

In the attic/spire of the house, there are a bunch of old items, one being a 19th century photo of a man and two women, one of them who looks just like Emily. The woman that looked like Emily had drowned in the cove behind the house, the day before her wedding. 

The movie never goes on to describe why Emily was haunting the house, let alone torturing Jessica’s mind, which I wish that it did. There is a sort of debate about whether the events in the movie are all supernatural, or just in Jessica’s mind, though I feel like it’s honestly both. Emily is definitely the drowned spirit, and she’s seen by the other 3 main characters in the film. There is a girl Jessica sees through the film, who is seen by Jessica’s husband Duncan also; if these were all just in Jessica’s mind, wouldn’t she have been the only one to see Emily and the girl?

The ending of the film doesn’t make much sense to me, and I found it pretty dumb. The townspeople, all men, turn out to have all of these slashes on them, which seem to imply that Emily must have cut them at some point. Early in the film, one of the characters states that the old men in front of the VFW look like “remnants of the civil war”. I suppose that’s a nudge towards them being vampires, really from that time period? But nothing really makes that concrete. This is never truly addressed. 

At the end, Jessica runs out of her home, and tries to escape on a paddleboat, when a hand starts to come out of the water. She ends up stabbing the person in the back with a giant hook, killing the person, who turns out to be Duncan. In the distance, the people, including Emily, are seen looking at Jessica in the boat. 

I think the film was interesting, but it’s plot was pretty bad to me. I liked the idea of the “unreliable narrator”, as it’s clear that Jessica was going through some problems mentally. You see that Duncan does love his wife, but even he is growing tired of having to help her through her episodes. In many ways, it is clear that Jessica isn’t completely there, and needs help. 

On the other hand, you can literally say that they invited the spirit of Emily in, with the seance. But this idea isn’t explored, and apparently the seance scene was a remnant from the original script to the movie. 

I find the filmography to be beautiful though, despite the weak writing in the film. The sound track was good too, and surprised me, as it used a synthesizer. The film seemed ahead of its time for this, almost seeming like something from the mid 80’s. Reading more about the movie, they did spent quite a bit of money on it, though it bombed in the box office. 

I think the advertising to this film, and it’s title are the major reasons why it did so bad. The movie itself isn’t terrible, despite what I found to be a weak story, the acting, the music, and camera shots were all very good. I knew nothing about this film before watching it, and I went into it blind. From the title, I would have assumed that Jessica was perhaps some young woman in her early 20’s that would have been pranked, and it went all wrong. Like some zombies actually come to eat her or something, but that’s not the case. 

I think that the movie disappointed the people when it first came out, because it turned out to be nothing like it was marketed as. In 1971, it was talked about as a vampire film, as seen in some reviews. One example is from The Evening Sun, where the author talks about how when Jessica’s husband joining a “colony of vampires”, no-one even cares. They stated that the movie promised more than it delivered, and I agree. If you paid money thinking the film was going to be about blood suckers, and you barely see any, I’d be disappointed too. 

One review from the Asbury Park Press stated that the film threw a bunch of different horror elements into the film, hoping that they’d hit, and I can see why they said that. The movie combines various esoteric/psychic type ideas, though there is no clear system being talked about here. This review actually states that the movie borrowed scenes from lesser known films such as “The Carnival of Souls” and “Daughters of Darkness”, I haven’t seen those films, but I’m curious if that’s true. This review states that “Jessica” is a great film to watch around Halloween, and I’d have to agree. 

I couldn’t find anymore reviews in the newspaper archives after 1971, though it was definitely advertised for many years after. 

Overall, I find the movie to be interesting, and quite beautiful to look at. The quality of the camera shots is what I enjoyed the most. I think that this film would be enjoyed by people who like movies in the same lane as “Silence of The Lambs”, it’s close to that sort of “Thriller” vibe. 

3.5/5 stars

My video: https://youtu.be/ULIVOO31Xvs

THE OTHER SIDE OF MADNESS 1971 Review

 THE OTHER SIDE OF MADNESS 1971

 

“The Other Side of Madness” is a niche art film that was released in December 1971. It starts off with a disclaimer that the events of the movie were recreated based off of the news articles and broadcasts available to the public at the time. Because of that, it’s important to note that there are many things depicted in this film that weren’t completely accurate, though that’s before Susan Atkins, Vincent Bugliosi, and Tex Watson’s books were published. 

The movie is mostly without dialogue, being more of a visual experience. Mostly in black in white, very few scenes of the film are in color. Stylistically, this is a great choice in my opinion, as much of the film is based off of recollection and memories. I imagine that using black and white allowed for higher quality cameras, as much of the film has very clear shots of the actors, scenery, and ideas. There are shots used in the movie that I felt were quite modern, something I’d expect to see in films from today. I do give credit to the director for being artistically creative. 

There are problems with the film, one of the main contentions being that very little is explained. Despite all of the literature I’ve read about the Manson family, I still found myself confused as to who was supposed to be who. Nearly none of the characters in the film are named. Only a couple of the actors were obviously playing certain characters, such as Charlie, Susan Atkins, and Tex Watson. 

Though I know that this film came out before most of the books on the crime, it’s clear that they had to inference a lot with depictions of The Family. “The Gathering” scene in the movie seemed out of place with how The Manson Family have typically been depicted. In books from members, The Family weren’t having gigantic parties like in the movie. The group was large, yes in real life; but The Family was more intimate and closed off than that. 

What I found strange about the movie, was that despite the creators claiming that they used news articles about the crime, there is little dialogue incorporated from it. They did a lot to recreate the scenes of the crimes, but many pieces are still missing. One of the most important things they should have put in the film should have been Jay Sebring’s last words before getting shot by Tex Watson. In real life, Jay said, “Can’t you see that she’s pregnant?!” when he was defending Sharon Tate. The movie completely glosses over the fact that Jay Sebring defended sharon with his life. This is something that would have been available to read when this was being created, as Susan Atkins had talked to the Press before the trial even began. 

Some of the depictions of the deaths are slightly out of order, like some of the things with Voytek Frykowski. Abigail Folger’s death is nearly completely wrong, as she is seen just wrestling with Patricia Krenwinkel’s character, who doesn’t appear to stab her. In the movie, it was just one blow in the stomach (I assume) from Tex Watson. In real life, Abigail’s death was much bloodier, and gruesome. In the movie, her character passes out then come back, to run out of the house. Her famous last words aren’t depicted here either, where she told Tex Watson, “I give up, you've got me. I’m Already Dead.”. 

Sharon’s death is also incorrect, and they had her character in the movie only plead for the life of her baby once. Even news article from the time, it was known that Sharon begged, multiple times. I found it gross that this movie didn’t give much light, info, or anything about the victims. The movie focuses nearly entirely on the criminals, and thinks nothing of those that were murdered. Steven Parents’ death isn’t completely accurate, he is only shot in the movie, none of the stabbing depicted. 

After the murders at Cielo Drive, the scene was of Tex being confronted by the couple whose water hose he was drinking out of. It wasn’t completely accurate either, with the scene ending with him acting like he was going to shoot the husband of the house. In real life, he walked back to the van with the girls, and they drove off. The movie makes it seem like Tex threw the gun last minute, but in reality, he was driving the van and gave the gun to Linda Kasabian, who threw the clothes and gun out the window. Small inacuracies like this really bother me, as it makes the entire picture as a whole appear barely credible. 

The film ends with the group going to Waverly drive, but it doesn’t depict the murders there. The movie ends with a card saying that four of the defendants were found guilty, and then warned about the unregulated use of drugs. 

Overall, I found the film to be interesting to look at, artistically beautiful in a way, but aggravatingly innacurate. Looking at the history of the film, apparently the creators weren’t able to name any of the defendants, because of legal issues, as much of the film was made during the Tate-LaBianca trial itself. Though I understand this, watching this movie decades after its creation makes it hard to follow. As said before, though I know the details of the actual crime, without any indication of anything, it makes it hard to follow. Because of this, I find the film to be very niche; I don’t see this appealing to anybody other than those who have spent years reading about Charles Manson, such as myself. 

Despite seeming like a film that focuses only on Charlie, he’s really not that much a part of it. The film would have scenes where the group would be driving on the road, and you’d hear people chanting along with Charlie, or hearing one of Charlie’s so called “sermons”. But the things said in the film weren’t ever things I recall reading about in any of the books. I don’t even recall any of it in the original news clippings either. For example, the chant of “Kill all White Mothers” was said, but what news article wrote that? It’s clear that the movie was just an exploitation of the murders, for the director to get some cash. 

This is proven, with articles I found about the movie, dating back to when it came out. For example, the Star Tribune posted in 1971, that the film “deals in grisly detail with the Sharon Tate murder orgy”. First of all, there is nothing of the sort in the movie, and second of all, there was nothing like that in real life! 

Another article, from the Sunday Mirror in 1971, stated that the film showed “in bloody detail the killings of Sharon and four other people at her Hollywood home. It also features a horrific ritual dance in which Manson and his “family” worship Satan.”. Once again, there was nothing like that in the film, nor, in real life. I suppose the closest thing to an “orgy” is the “The Gathering” scene, where a bunch of the people got naked while an Acid Rock band was playing. There wasn’t anything Satanic in the film at all! 

The article stated that Wade Williams claimed that the killings in the movie were done “with restraint and good taste”. 

I find the advertising to the film to be gross. It just goes to show how many people tried to make a quick buck, and get 15 minutes of fame off these brutal deaths, that weren’t even depicted accurately. While many things are technically right, there is still a lot wrong too. 

I give this movie 2/5 stars. I don’t hate it, but I cannot stand how a real life tragedy was watered down to make the criminals look “cool”, whether that was the intention or not. I don’t recommend this to anyone that knows nothing about the Manson case, it would be too confusing to watch, and make no sense. I guess that proves how exploitative this film is, they obviously didn’t think about whether or not anyone in the future would even be able to follow this. 

If you’re deep into the Manson rabbit hole like me, I’d say to watch the movie once, but that’s it. Nothing more. 

2/5

My video: https://youtu.be/iW-JO7TqYEM 

BLOOD ON SATANS CLAW 1971 Review

 BLOOD ON SATANS CLAW 1971

 

“The Blood On Satan’s Claw” is a British Folk Horror movie that is credited as being a pioneer in the genre. Release in 1971, it appears to have a cult following who seem to enjoy the movie very much. On letterboxd, the average rating is 3.3 stars, so I figured that I would try it out. I was also interested in the movie because it has been the inspiration for at least a few songs in music, to say the least. 

The idea is that a corpse is discovered in a field on a farm, and eventually the whole town becomes in league with Satan, slowly falling into creepy evil behavior, and in the movie itself, being labeled as devil worshipers. Despite the idea to the plot being interesting and having a lot of potential, I found the execution of the movie to be boring. I feel bad about that, in a way, considering how it seems so beloved in the decades since its release, but I just found myself bored while watching it. 

There is a lot of reference to British witch hunting which I appreciate, and nods towards old superstitions of yore. I did find this interesting, but much of the dialogue and acting detracted from what could have been an interesting movie to me. There are some parts that I enjoyed, but overall, I found that the movie was too long for how boring it was. The movie is one hour and 36 minutes long, but I stated looking at the timer after the first 30 minutes. I repeatedly found myself just waiting for the movie to end. 

I didn’t feel any connection with any of the characters. I just felt like a viewer, watching random things happen. The acting and dialogue is laughable, though the soundtrack and filmography is great! It’s strange how a movie can look this good, while being so bad. I suppose that the campy-ness is something that others would like, and usually, I would too; but I just couldn’t get into this one. 

What really bothers me about the dialogue, is how it was written with so much emphasis of being “of the time”, which was to be the 18th century, or 1700’s. “Thou” is constantly used, which is anachronistic. I thought I was being a stickler by finding this annoying, but when I looked this up, it turns out that “thou” was not  commonly used in the English language, especially when speaking to one another. Upon further research, it turns out that it was used in a derogatory sense. It makes sense to me then, that the actors seemed to speak the dialogue unable to make it sound real. That’s simply because it wasn’t!

The movie has a disappointing ending, where there’s a Sabbath, and the main evil lady, Angel, ends up impaled. The devil, we presume, is held at swordpoint, and we assume that he is burned in the fire. 

I find this movie incredibly disappointing, and booed when it finally ended. I personally don’t want to watch this movie ever again. It was a waste of time, and not interesting. Looking up the movie on wikipedia, it was partially inspired by the Manson murders, which is interesting to me. I can see a slight resemblance, though this still isn’t enough for me to want to watch it again. 

My video: https://youtu.be/0cXw8vhUv_8 

THE HOUSE THAT DRIPPED BLOOD 1971 Review

 THE HOUSE THAT DRIPPED BLOOD 1971

 

 

“The House The Dripped Blood” is a horror anthology movie that was released in 1971. It’s on the longer side, but it includes 4 stories about how different people met their fate in what seems to be a cursed house. The movie starts off with an inspector from Scotland Yard being tasked with solving the disappearance of a missing movie star, that had recently rented the house. We see the home owner/landlord(?), named Stoker, talking to the inspector, about the house’s history. The way the movie works, is that the landlord tells the inspector of what happened to each previous renter, as likely examples of what happened to the initial missing film star. 

While I like the idea of this, and found the concept amazingly fun, the way it was executed wasn’t the best, to me. I think part of this might have just been British film making, where it’s a lot more subtle than American or Italian. I wish as a viewer, we would have had a little more indication of the beginning of a new story when they’d start. When the first story ends and the second one begins, the movie itself just keeps going, and I had to go back to make sure that I didn’t miss anything. The movie is more dialogue driven when it comes to the stories and their segues, with it going to the police station briefly for a few lines of dialogue between the inspector and landlord, before the next story starts. With the movie being described as an anthology, I don’t think it would be bad to just show a title on screen when a new story starts.

For reference, all of the stories in the movie were originally written by author Robert Bloch, who also helped write the movie, if I understand correctly. Bloch wrote many short stories that would be featured in pulp publications such as Weird Tales.  

The first story is “Method For Murder”, which is about how a horror story writer and his wife rent out the house so he can gain inspiration to write his latest story. It was funny to see that this trope of a writer escaping the city for inspiration was used in movies even back then, and how this is still used today. There are so many movies that use this trope, and it always makes me shake my head; not because it’s bad, more like, the amount of people who have stolen this idea is hilarious to me. 

The author, Charles, was into writing about murder, and had apparently written multiple stories about various serial killers. Once at the house, he starts to write about a serial killer named Dominic, who chokes people out after stalking them through the window. Charles starts to see Dominic in the house and around the area, thinking that he’s losing his mind. He goes to a psychiatrist, who tells him that it’s just his mind playing tricks on him; that it was the manifestations of his stories coming to life. In a way, this was true. 

One night, Charles is in the house with his wife, when he sees Dominic come up behind her and start choking her. He runs up to help, but Dominic vanishes, and Charles’ wife tells him that he was choking her. He goes back to the psychiatrist, who doesn’t seem to even care that he choked out his wife? After this, the psychiatrist ends up dead, being choked out. I’m not sure if Charles or Dominic did this.

Later, it turns out that Dominic was real, and the secret lover that Charles’ wife had. He dressed up as the character Dominic, and their idea was to frame Charles for murdering the psychiatrist, so that the wife would inherit all of Charles’ royalties from his stories, solely. The guy who dressed up as Dominic ends up being crazy, or crazier than originally thought, and he messes up the plan by killing Charles. The wife was like, “You weren’t supposed to kill Charles, now the police will be looking for a killer.”, and then she gets choked out herself. 

I thought that this story was funny, though silly. I’m not sure if that’s the way it was originally written, or if it was partially adapted when made for the movie. In general, the movie isn’t really scary, though it has a lot of spooky and slightly creepy elements to it. Each story has different factors of creepiness to them, with that British dry humor. I actually appreciate this, because you’re not freaking out with anxiety just to watch the movie. I view all of the stories similar to ghost stories told around a camp fire, if you were out late at night with friends. 

For an opening story, I think it’s alright. The way it was filmed drew me in way more than the actual writing did. Ironically, the writing to the story about the writer was rather uninteresting to me. Maybe it’s just that in the decades since, this type of plot has been played out, so I was too jaded by the time I came across it. Granted, if the story was fleshed out a bit more, I think that it could be a valid movie all on its own. 

—

The second story is “Waxworks”, and the inspiration of the poster art for the movie. The main character is played by Peter Cushing, one of the horror film greats. Cushing’s character moves into the house, and not long after, comes across a wax museum. In it, he sees this wax figure of a woman who he can’t stop looking at. The owner of the museum is a freaky dude, and talked about how the wax woman was his wife, and she killed someone, and she ended up being killed. Either way, it’s clear that something freaky is going on in the wax museum. 

Eventually, Cushing has a friend over at the house, and the two end up at the wax museum. The friend becomes enthralled with the wax woman, and Cushing forces him to leave the museum with him. The friend acts like he’s not going to go back, but then he does, and his head is turned into wax. Cushing’s character suffers the same fate after returning to the museum after finding out his friend’s fate. The end of the story shows a young guy becoming enthralled with the wax woman, implying that the cycle would start again. 

I found this story okay, though relatively weak. When it comes to the idea of the house being some type of haunted, I don’t feel like this story fits in with it. What does a wax museum in another building in the city have to do with the evil house everyone loves to rent out? Looking back, I don’t think that this story really fit in with the idea of the movie. 

—

The third story is “Sweets To The Sweet”, and definitely my favorite in the film. Christopher Lee is in this story, playing the overprotective father of a young girl named Jane. They move into the house, and not long after, a caretaker is hired, Anne Norton, a widow. Mrs. Norton was previously a school teacher, and she comes to really care for Jane, who is isolated from other children, not even allowed to have toys.

Ms. Norton asks Jane’s father if she can buy the girl toys, and he allows it, but once he sees a baby doll she bought for the girl, he freaks out and throws it into the fireplace. Jane is afraid of fire, and we, the viewer, are left wondering why. 

Of course, Jane’s mother isn’t in the picture, and it’s revealed that she died in childbirth. When asked if he missed his wife, Lee’s character states that he was glad she was dead. Later, we see Jane secretly reading books about witchcraft, when her father and Ms. Norton are sleeping at night. 

One night, there’s a storm, and Lee’s character goes to grab some candles, when it’s revealed that there’s only 4 left. He goes up to his daughter demanding to know what happened to the rest of them, but she doesn’t say anything, so he smacks her. Jane runs to her room after this. 

We see Jane doing things in secret, such as saving the hair from her father’s razor after he shaved, and stabbing something with pins and needles. We see her father in multiple scenes scream out in pain, though when he goes to the doctor, the doc has no idea what’s wrong; in fact, he tells Lee’s character that it was “probably indigestion”! I found this hilarious, because how does something like constipation or gas explain the shooting pain someone’s arm?! As said before, I appreciate the British humor in this film. 

Eventually, it’s revealed that Jane’s mother was a witch, and Jane is the same. The girl took the extra candles to make a voodoo doll of her father, and she was stabbing him over and over with the pins and needles. Her father ends up in bed incredibly sick, and someone takes the voodoo doll of wax, throwing it into the fire. It’s implied that Jane’s father dies because of this. 

By far, I thought that this was a great story, and would have been amazing to see as a film on its own. The concept is a great idea for a potentially really scary horror movie. This one sticks out to me, and makes the movie worth watching. I feel like this one is the best out of all the stories in the film.

—
The fourth and final, story is “The Cloak”. The story was to tell about what happened to missing actor from the beginning of the film, Paul Henderson. The story was alright, but by the time we got to it in the film, I was ready for the movie to end. Henderson was supposed to be an annoyingly snooty actor who decides to go to a costume shop to find an authentic cloak for a vampire movie he was in. He ends up buying one, and it turns him into a vampire! This was the only time I’ve ever seen such a  concept, where a piece of clothing makes someone a vampire, and not the bite itself. In fact, Henderson wasn’t bitten by any vampires at all! 

He’d put on the cloak in front of a mirror, and have no reflection; he went to kiss Ingrid Pitt’s character in another scene but ended up biting her; and at midnight he puts the cape on and starts to fly in the air. 

It’s implied that the old man who sold him the cloak was a vampire himself, passing on the curse to Henderson. He brings Ingrid Pitt’s character back to the house one night and tries to show her, but when he puts the cloak on, nothing happens. It turns out that she switched it with a regular one. She then puts on the cloak, the real one, and reveals herself to be the vampire. Apparently a secret group of vampires had been watching Henderson, hoping to make him a part of them. I guess that irony about this was that Henderson had played vampires all the time during his acting career. 
—
The anthology ends, and we go back to the inspector from Scotland yard. He goes to the house to investigate what could have happened, and it’s revealed that Henderson was in the basement of the house, hanging out in a coffin like a vampire would. The inspector stabs Henderson with a wooden stake in the heart, another vampire trope. He’s then killed by Ingrid Pitt’s character. 

We see the house ready for rent again, the landlord Stoker is standing outside of it. He asks the audience if we figured out the mystery to the house, where it’s revealed that it reacts to the heart of the person renting it. So basically, all of the people who lived in the house had bad things happen to them, because they were bad people, I guess. The movie ends after this. 
—
Overall, I think that this a good movie, and I enjoyed it. There are  parts that dragged on a bit too much for me, and honestly, I don’t think that all of the stories really needed to be in the film. I think that we could have gone without the first or second stories, in order to save the interest of the audience. I think that Christopher Lee’s story was the best, and blew the main idea about the missing actor’s story out of the water. 

I actually recommend this film. I think that people would find it interesting, even with the parts that I personally didn’t like. It has some pretty big names in it, such as Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, on top of Ingrid Pitt, would later go on to be in The Wicker Man, a few years later in 1973! 

I liked how there was the implication of some sort of vampire theme, though I wish it was touched on a little more. The landlord’s name was Stoker, surely an ode to the author Bram Stoker. I couldn’t find any reviews of the movie, from news articles in 1971. I’m unsure why. I couldn’t find anything when I looked through articles from 1972 either.

I give this movie a 3.5/5 stars. 
Watched on fawesome.

My video: https://youtu.be/Evaiw6vgBdE