It wasn’t that long ago that I watched and reviewed George Romero and Stephen King’s Creepshow, and I liked what I saw. Horror anthologies are hard. They have to be scary over multiple stories, or at least consistent enough in tone to be entertaining. Creepshow managed that one. Afterwards, I had heard that 1990’s Tales from the Darkside: The Movie is seen by some as something of a spiritual sequel. I mean, one of the stories in this one is from a script by Romero based on a King story.
Granted, that’s no guarantee of the movie’s overall quality, but it helps.
Young paperboy Timmy (Matthew Lawrence) is about to be cooked as a roast by witch Betty (Deborah Harry), but he figures he can stall her for a bit by telling some scary stories from a book Betty left him to entertain himself as he’s chained up in her kitchen. He tells her three stories of varying tones and styles, starting with grad student Bellingham (Steve Buscemi) getting his hands on a mummy and using it to get back on various people who seem to be screwing with him, including the likes of young Christian Slater and Julianna Moore; then there’s a story of a rich old man (William Hickey) hiring a hitman (David Johansen) to kill his greatest nemesis, a black cat; and finally, an artist (James Remar) makes a promise to a living gargoyle, but he needs to keep that a secret from everyone, including his wife (Rae Dawn Chong).
The stories differ in tone and style, and director John Harrison, a frequent collaborator with Romero, actually handles each one fine. The first is an adaptation of an Arthur Conan Doyle short story and is arguably the weakest. It plays like a decent episode of HBO’s old Tales from the Crypt, complete with a lot of familiar faces in a story where the bad guys maybe get what they deserve at the hands of some supernatural thing. The second really hits the tone and style of Creepshow, appropriate given it’s the one with the Romero/King collaboration, playing itself out like a dark cartoon of some kind, the more, shall we say, animated faces of Hickey and Johansen helping there as a cat makes everyone in the story look like a chump, and it helps that these people, at least from the cat’s perspective, appear to have it coming. As for the final story, it actually plays out as a rather effective tragic romance, not bad considering it’s based on an old legend I remember reading about as a kid.
Oh, and of course, the framing device is basically the Hansel-and-Gretel story with only one kid.
So, for the most part, this movie basically does work. It’s not great or anything, but it works for what it is. That first story is mostly just kinda generic, and an anthology is only as bad as its weakest story, but the other two are both distinctive and fun in their own ways. Personally, I’m more inclined towards the cat story, given its more humorous tone and unique look, but the last story is just as effective in its own way. Ultimately, this was a fun movie, not all that scary, but with some really effective special effects for the era–seriously, that gargoyle looks good–I was pretty glad to check this one out.
Grade: B+
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