Stumbling about in the featureless mist you soon lose your sense of direction, even the ground seems to have become smooth, like marble, or glass.
Just then you think you can hear a faint sound in the distance, something vaudevillian, something from those old seaside towns in their heyday, is that an organ?
You must have turned north in the mist and reached the northern coastline of the island, perhaps there’s a resort town here. Not for the first time you wish you’d done some research before coming to this nightmare of an island.
Following the sound a pink glow soon appears in the distance and then you can make out the silhouette of a man, sat at a gaudy magenta pipe organ, the instrument giving off an ethereal glow.
You call out to the man but he doesn’t seem to hear you, the music is very loud now as you approach still calling out ineffectually over the tremendous volume. Reaching out you place a hand on the man’s shoulder. Cold, hard, like metal.
The music stops and the metal man’s head rotates towards you. His head is spherical, his features simplistic like a child’s drawing, something both infantile and terrifying at the same time.
The lifeless eyes stare at you, stare through you, and without turning back to the organ, he begins to play.
A pretty interesting film this time. Certainly not one I was aware of until fairly recently, but staring the legend that is Vincent Price and quite likely an influence on a certain James Wan and his Saw franchise.
Don’t expect extreme levels of violence or grit from this campy early 70s movie though, it’s ridiculous over the top madness all the way through.
Nine Killed You! Nine Shall Die! This time I’m reviewing 1971’s The Abominable Dr Phibes
I feel like this is going to be another one of those films where the spoiler section outweighs the initial review. There are so many parts to this film where I want to say “How crazy was it when…” or “What was (Insert strange event) all about?” but I’m going to have to hold off and give you something more general first.
The events of the film follow the Titular character Dr Anton Phibes who is plotting and performing elaborate revenge on the doctors who couldn’t save his wife. He himself was badly injured and presumed dead after a car crash which claimed his voice, leaving him to speak using some kind of phonograph attached to his neck by a cord. Yeah you kind of have to see it.
So basically, we watch on as Dr Phibes kills off his Wife’s Doctors in a series of ever more ridiculous events. It’s brilliant and I’ll certainly go through them in the spoilers section. He’s ably assisted by the beautiful, but mute Vulnavia and of course his mechanical band, oh did I not mention he’s a Dr of Music…and Theology…there’s a reason I medically had to watch this film once I saw the trailer.
Dr Phibes is played by horror legend Vincent Price in what must have been a pretty odd acting experience. It is technically a speaking part but Phibes speaks through the phonograph so doesn’t move his mouth at all while speaking and Price’s voice is dubbed over the top. This results in a wonderful example of physical acting as Price compensates by exaggerating the character’s gestures, it’s very effective.
This film is strange…very strange. There is a coherent storyline, the aforementioned revenge spree, but in between Dr Phibes is just doing bizarre stuff, mostly involving dancing, organ playing, and clockwork musicians. If I had to describe this film as being at all like any other film (Other than the sequel) I would have to say Barbarella, it’s certainly that level of camp.
The deaths in the film are all very varied, I won’t go into detail here, I certainly do that later, but masks, ice and a menagerie of creatures all play a role. There’s plenty of ingenuity on show and it leaves you clamouring for the next crazy contraption or scenario. I guess it’s slightly reminiscent of how I felt watching Seven only a lot less horrific.
This is not a scary film, its far more of a black comedy than anything else, with a few bits here and there which would be fairly nasty without the over the top silliness slathered on top of it all. This is the kind of horror film you can watch multiple times and still be happy to watch it again just to show other people how ridiculous it is. I doubt this film is going to have many hailing it as a masterpiece but there really is something to be said about a film that’s pure entertainment rather than hugely affecting like many horror films can be.
Scoring this one was particularly difficult. It was great fun, and Vincent Price is excellent as always, I don’t really have all that much bad to say about it, but I also can’t bring myself to put it up there with the likes of Alien or The Orphanage. That’s not to say that a campy film can’t be a 5, this just wasn’t quite there, for me it would have benefitted from a little more structure at times, yes its surreal nature is part of its charm but there’s definitely parts where it feels like a lot of scenes playing out in no particular order and we consequently don’t feel like we’re watching a coherent film. In that respect it has some similarity to The Wizard of Gore from a year earlier but it’s SO much more fun, so I’m giving The Abominable Dr Phibes 4 Locusts out of 5.
**WARNING** SPOILERS BELOW **WARNING**
Welcome to the spoiler section. This is the part where I can bring up some specific parts of the film which I’d like to talk about more, whether they be good, or bad.
A lot of very odd things happen in this film. Dr Phibes is using, roughly at least, the G’Tach, the 10 Plagues of Egypt as a basis for his revenge spree, I’m actually just going to go through them all rather than cherry picking. The order is different to the Biblical account.
The first plague, Boils, occurs offscreen and is only mentioned by a detective. The victim was stung to death by bees and he comments that they looked like boils.
The second is Bats where the Doctor is mauled to death by some very cute looking bats.
The third, and probably my favourite, is frogs. This one seems to provide a clear influence to the Saw films and is one of the stranger but actually quite nasty deaths. The victim is at a masked ball and is given a metal Frog mask. Phibes helps him to fasten it at the back and a ratcheting system slowly tightens the mask until presumably the man’s head is crushed. It’s all fairly silly until he starts screaming and blood squirts from the frog’s mouth.
Fourth is Blood. After a hilarious scene where our horny doctor is furiously cranking a projector to watch 1920’s porn, Phibes and Vulnavia tie him down and draw out all of his blood whilst for whatever reason he never cries out or puts up much of a struggle, he’s been drinking fairly heavily beforehand but he looks fairly aware of what’s happening and certainly doesn’t seem to be into it.
Fifth is Hail. After knocking out the victim’s driver a fairly preposterous machine is used to lower the temperature in the Doctor’s car to 100 degrees below zero. Freezing him to death.
Sixth is Rats. Our man is having a jolly good time flying his plane, dressed like Biggles when suddenly his plane is full of rats which attack him and cause him to crash. Meanwhile Phibes is watching through a telescope whilst Vulnavia plays the violin, standard.
Seventh is Beasts. A short one this and pretty normal really. A brass Unicorn is launched from a catapult and impales the victim…
Eighth is Locusts and is ridiculous. Dr Phibes cooks up a batch of green goo, which seems to be made of Brussel sprouts. He then sneaks into the hospital where victim number 7 is under police guard, but obviously completely alone in a room where they can’t see her. Using an oddly detailed outline of a woman’s body to work out where her head is in the room below, he then then pours the Sprout goo all over her head through a hole he cuts in the ceiling. Oh yes I forgot, she’s taken sleeping pills so she doesn’t wake up when the goo goes on her face…and then the locusts Phibes release eat her entire head down to the bone! Seems plausible…
OK, here we go, number nine. If you felt the frog mask was too tenuous a link to Saw then how’s this. Number 9 is ‘Death of the Firstborn’ so the victim is actually the head surgeon’s son. Phibes kidnaps him and tells the father to come to his home where he has the boy. By the way, bit of a side note but the boy comes across as far older than he’s supposed to be. Either he is, or they dubbed his voice or something, either way he just seems a bit odd. So anyway, the Father arrives at Phibes’ home and discovers that his son has been locked onto a table under a shower head contraption that will cover him in acid if the Father doesn’t get the key in time. A key which has been surgically implanted next to the Boy’s heart. That’s Saw as fuck! Or really, Saw is Dr Phibes as fuck!
Oh yes, there’s ten plagues. Number ten is Darkness and the victim is Phibes himself. Having completed his task (Well the boy survived but Phibes has already left by this point) he lays down next to his dead wife in a secret chamber, swaps his blood for embalming fluid and seals them in.
I think covering the plagues will about do for the spoilers, it really is a film where mere descriptions of the weirdness will not do it justice.
Is that furious cranking I hear? Time for another film…
Summerisle 