Gallery of Horror

Oh this is bad, really bad, Even Lon Chaney Jr and John Carradine cannot save this movie.

The segments are okay and the acting is finem in parts, but it is all so clunky, even for the 60s, I don't know what kind of budget this movie had, but it does not look like much. The set are so fake looking for even back then and the scenes that are supposed to be scary just...aren't, But I have a love for these films, they are so much a part if my childhood, This is one of the more entertaining ones with five interesting stories that would have been better if the acting and effects were better. This is a curiosity and fun to watch if you don't mind its faults.

I don't know how to rate this (see below). Certainly this is one of the all time bad movies. A the same time its also unintentionally funny (I least I think so, but I'm not sure since several actors seem to be laughing on screen). This is one of those movies thats so enjoyably bad as to make you wonder why Ed Wood is king of bad movies when there are others more deserving of the title.

This film is a collection of five short horror film introduced by John Carradine. Each one runs about the same amount of time and ends with a twist ending.

The first is The Witches Clock and concerns a clock left in a castle a young couple has just purchased. Carradine appears in this story as a traveler who shows up at the castle when the clock is restarted.

King Vampire is about a vampire on the loose in Victorian London thats hunted by the police.

Monster Raid concerns a man who was fed an immortality drug returning from the grave to get revenge.

Spark of Life has Lon Chaney as a doctor trying to return the dead to life.

Count Dracula is a fast retelling of the Dracula story with a twist ending.

They play as if EC comics Tales from the Crypt or Vault of Horror became bad TV shows. Worse are the twists that end every story since they come at point not where logic would dictate they should be, but rather where a strict running time demands they be.

The acting is uneven and bad, with only Carradine the only one turning in anything close to a performance. The sets are dreadful as is pretty much everything else. Best of all (?) the movie was recently released on DVD in full widescreen so that the film can now be seen in its full cinematic glory (and I use the term lightly).

If you like bad movies this is a film to search out. If you want an actual "good" movie then I suggest you look elsewhere.

For Bad Movie lovers: 8 out of 10 For those who need good movies: 1 out of 10

I've had a ball with this film since WPIX started running it on Chiller Theatre. This film has more great gaffs and laugh lines than ANY Ed Wood picture. To begin, John Carradine in his rented tux with crooked tie really sets the proceedings - especially with him standing in front of a blue screen that is only one-half matted with a still frame from a Roger Corman castle! After Carradine babbles for about 5 minutes, we get to the first Tale - Starring J.C. Roger Gentry as the husband and Vic Magee as "Doctor Varnsely Finchley" give performances that can only be described as indescribable. Soon we get to Chaney's scene. He is a medical professor in Scotland in the 1880's. Unfortunately, the Westrex desk phone rings, Lon looks at his wristwatch, and he rushes off to classes while Ron Doyle and Joey Benson contemplate reviving Murderous Magee (Old Vic), an executed killer. Don't let this one get away. And have a bottle of port handy. And a couple of cheap cigars.

Of course "Dr. Terror's Gallery of Horrors" is no classic, but I'm fond of David Hewitt's films and everyone seems to be having fun here. John Carradine, in full evening wear, introduces five not-very-scary tales; he also stars in one, while Lon Chaney Jr. stars in another. Other familiar faces include Roger Gentry ("The Wizard of Mars", also directed by Hewitt and co-starring Carradine) and Joey Benson (Al Adamson's "Horror of the Blood Monsters" and "Blood of Ghastly Horror"). Among the highlights of the movie are Carradine's fantastic booming voice, the dreamy soundtrack, and the cheesy, $1.95 special effects. There are some unintentionally funny moments, too, like the extended scenes of a horse-drawn carriage barreling down a dirt road (very obviously taken from Roger Corman's "The Raven"), and the vampire who is trying his hardest to speak with a Hungarian accent but ends up sounding like a Mexican bandito from some cheap western. Every time I watch something like this, I can't help but wonder whatever became of the people who made all those no-budget horror flicks of the '60s and '70s. They worked under such primitive conditions, and I'm sure they would have been doing something else if they'd had their druthers, but they almost always turned out an entertaining product. Now they've disappeared. Mr. Hewitt, Mr. Gentry, Mr. Benson...where are you? :)

Look, I'll be brief. If you have ANY taste for the so-bad-they're-great classics (Plan 9, Robot Monster, Brain That Wouldn't Die), hunt down a copy of this, the most overlooked member of the club. Amazingly, this was put out in letterboxed form; but anyway you can find it, WATCH THIS MOVIE. It is fantastic