the CITY OF
MOVIE REVIEW |
||||||||
|
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Support This Site When You Buy My Books E.C. McMullen Jr. PERPETUAL BULLET ![]() - John Grant, Infinityplus E.C. McMullen Jr. WILLOW BLUE ![]() - Jeffrey Reddick, Creator of FINAL DESTINATION IN OTHER BOOKS E.C. McMullen Jr.'s short story CEDO LOOKED LIKE PEOPLE in the anthology FEAR THE REAPER ![]() - Amazon Review HORROR 201: The Silver Scream ![]() featuring RAY BRADBURY, JOHN CARPENTER, WES CRAVEN, TOM HOLLAND, E.C. McMULLEN Jr., GEORGE A. ROMERO, and many more. Also IN CINEMA E.C. McMullen Jr. Head Production Designer ![]() (Starring: JOSEPH CROSS, BRIANA EVIGAN, ALEX MERAZ) Dept. head Special Effects Make-Up (SFX MUA) ![]() GUNFIGHT (MICHAEL MADSEN & JOHN SAVAGE). Production Designer ![]() (DOUG JONES, D.B. SWEENEY, GARY GRAHAM) ART DIRECTOR ![]() (COLIN CUNNINGHAM, GARY GRAHAM) |
"Superstition, fear, and jealousy" Right off the bat, I gotta tell you; if you be into that there Wiccan stuff, you sure as hell ain't gonna like this movie. For one thing, it paints all witches as them whats in league with the DEVIL! For another thing . . . well, no... there is no other thing, that's pretty much it. The flick starts off in ancient times, about 1680 or so, and some nervous jittery folk are about to burn themselves a witch! Then we see that the whole thing is a historical tale being told by kindly Professor Alan Driscoll (Christopher Lee: THE WICKER MAN, SLEEPY HOLLOW, THE LORD OF THE RINGS). He is teaching an extracurricular course in witchcraft and devil worship out of his house in Massachusetts. One of Alan's students, a comely young thing named Nan Barlowe (Venetia Stevenson: ISLAND OF LOST WOMEN), is headstrong and independent. Back in the late fifties early sixties, such women were bound to get themselves into trouble (remember Janet Leigh in PSYCHO?). Her friendly professor appreciates her singular personality and helps her with her thesis on devil worship and witchcraft. He does this by giving her an address in the old witch burning town of Whitewood. It's an address to a hotel see? A possibly Haunted hotel. With friendly teachers like this you don't need enemy teachers! So the young and lovely blonde (brunettes in this movie are inherently evil and in league with the DEVIL!) goes to Whitewood, checks into Raven's Inn and merry mishaps occur.
On the other hand, it's also hard not to draw comparisons between this movie and its contemporary, PSYCHO. Remove Norman and Mother and you pretty much have the same story of a young blonde woman who goes out to parts unknown, checks into a hotel, and meets her fate. Like PSYCHO, the rest of the movie concerns itself with those family members like her brother Richard (Dennis Lotis), and friends like Patricia (Betta St. John: DANGEROUS MISSION, CORRIDORS OF BLOOD) she left behind, who are trying to unravel the mystery of her disappearance. Both movies were in production at the same time, but the movie industry was well aware of what Alfred Hitchcock was up to long before he began production on his film. With 10 years of growing success behind him, nobody doubted that whatever his next movie would be, it would be a smash hit as well. Amicus made sure to release THE CITY OF THE DEAD on the same month and year as PSYCHO. American censors were appalled by some of the dialog, however, and it took two years before its American release, then retitled HORROR HOTEL. Unlike PSYCHO, HORROR HOTEL is riddled with gaffs. At one point, a character empties his gun shooting at a witch, who just stands there unafraid. Good Lord! They are bullet proof! In his frustration, the character then throws the gun at the witch and the witch ducks! "Hey! Watch where you throw that gun! Somebody could get hurt!" What the hell? Though HORROR HOTEL was made on a very low budget, the production values were quite high and even with some of the cheapo video production houses like, for example, Diamond Video, the quality of both picture and sound is passably clear: as clear as regular VHS. The end of HORROR HOTEL is really what kills this flick. So mind boggling stupid is it, so ridiculously easy are the evil doers overcome, that you'll be asking yourself, "That was the most obvious thing! Why the hell didn't anyone ever do that first???" Those of you who saw SIGNS will know what I mean. Because, at turns, this film is creepily great, and the aforementioned mind-boggling stupid bit, I give HORROR HOTEL 3 Negative Shriek Girls for being so Bad It's Good!
|
|
![]() Copyright 1997 - 2020 by E.C.McMullen Jr. FAIR USE - PRIVACY POLICY - OWNERSHIP - CONTACT All images and text belong to E.C.McMullen Jr. unless otherwise noted. All fiction stories belong to their individual authors. |