Cast:
Wraparound segment: Deborah Harry (Betty) and Matthew Lawrence (Timmy)
"Lot 249" segment: Steve Buscemi (Edward Bellingham), Julianne Moore (Susan Smith), Christian Slater (Andy Smith), Robert Sedgwick (Lee), Donald Van Horn (Moving Man), and Michael Deak (The Mummy)
"Cat from Hell" segment: William Hickey (Drogan), David Johansen (Halston), Paul Greeno (The Cabbie), Alice Drummond (Carolyn), and Dolores Sutton (Amanda)
"Lover's Vow" segment: James Remar (Preston), Rae Dawn Chong (Carola), Robert Klein (Wyatt), Ashton Wise (Jer), and Philip Lenkowsky (Maddox) Directed by John Harrison.
Review:
Well, when you have a good film going for you, why not do a television series? The success of Creepshow in 1982 led to the creation of Tales from the Darkside with a pilot (as written by show creator George A. Romero) in 1983 and a syndication run that started the following year, which ran until 1988 in displaying stories of sci-fi or fantasy that adapted various authors such as Stephen King or Harlan Ellison to go with narration, that, well, "Man lives in the sunlit world of what he believes to be reality. But ... there is, unseen by most, an underworld ... a place that is just as real, but not as brightly lit. A darkside." I went on a lark and watched the DVD boxset of the series roughly four years ago. It was...decent if not very wavering in quality, but somehow, I found myself comparing it to the other show that followed the lead of EC Comics in Tales from the Crypt, which started its run on television almost immediately after the end of Darkside. Perhaps it makes perfect sense that the show's success would inspire a feature film in 1990. This was the feature film debut for director John Harrison, who had started in film as a first assistant director on Creepshow (1982), which he also composed the music for. He also wrote and directed a handful of episodes on Darkside. Richard P. Rubinstein (who also produced Creepshow) and Mitchell Galin (who produced with Rubinstein the Darkside spinoff Monsters) produced the film.
Oh, but what anthology isn't worth mentioning unless it has a framing device? The wraparound (taking up eleven of the 93 minute film) is a suburban housewife...and modern-day witch preparing a dish made of a kid she has locked up in her house, but the kid tries to stall by reading three stories from, well, "Tales from the Darkside". Needless to say that the story goes better than it does for the main characters of the real three stories, although I could do without the 4th wall moment at the end. "Lot 249" (28 minutes) is based on a short story by Arthur Conan Doyle first published in 1892 that saw Michael McDowell (a novellist and also most notably the writer of Beetlejuice) serve as screenwriter. The ending of the story is the most changed from the original and likely for the better, since it involves more than just being on the run. Besides, the story wisely lets the one we like the most mostly off without a hitch. Buscemi makes a suitable presence to strike revenge upon such confident jerks that come with Slater (a moderately convincing goof), Moore (this was her film debut), and Sedgwick. The mummy stuff is decent for a yarn, but yeah, go with gore. "Cat from Hell" (23 minutes) is based on a 1977 short story of the same name by Stephen King with Romero as screenwriter. The premise is as such: a man hires a hitman to kill a cat that apparently led to the deaths of three people. A good chunk is spent on telling said story of the cat, but it is at least spent with a darkly amusing Hickey, talking about a cat that seems like an assassin due to the nature of his work (drugs affecting poor little black cats). Besides, the conclusion of what happens when cat meets the mouth is a nice and grisly conclusion to see play out. "Lover's Vow" (29 minutes) is based on the Japanese folk story "Yuki-Onna", as originated by Lafcadio Hearn, which you may recognize because that story was adapted into Kwaidan; McDowell wrote this story with gargoyles taking the helm, in this case one that happens to strike on a bunch of drunks that have an artist survive and swear his life on not telling what happened. Remar is at least where on expects him to be when it comes to being good for middle material, which contrasts against the bare minimum of mystery provided by Chong for a story that, well, can only go one way, I guess. It's a decent story but somehow it feels lacking in that build to the inevitable, although the final moment is at least somewhat poignant. As a whole, the film is basically about on par with the show that it arose from: halfway entertaining if not exactly a great successor to Creepshow. It is basically a notch above Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983), to put it bluntly. The stories are decently handled with a few recognizable names, but one would be hard-pressed to say just which story is the real showstopper when it comes to such varying tones. It has a few fun moments for being an ordinary anthology that would probably fit just fine in the latter recommendations for any October, so take that for what it's worth.
Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.
Next: A John Carpenter film - 25 years later!
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