The Last Breath Illuminated by Cold and the Moon
Black Sabbath (1963)
directed by Mario Bava
rating: 3 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from Netflix
Only an Italian could begin his three-part trick-or-treat with a dubbed introduction by Boris Karloff hoping the good people in the audience aren't in attendance alone (wink wink), and then segue into a half-hour, killer-on-the-telephone approximation of what's going through the head of every adolescent Genoese male in the theater. Pity the date he's goosing, wondering if this kind of Friday night endurance test is the best young love can offer. For my money, it isn't the rubber rigor mortis face in the third act that I'll be seeing in the windows this winter, but a haunted, haggard Karloff dressed in long hair and beard, wrapped in Bavarian animal furs, stalking the churchyard of his rural highland farm. The sudden appearance of Boris's profile in the foreground of a blue set looks just like the severed head pitched on a post in the farmer's front yard. If you're sitting close enough to the television, there's a twisted and disheveled face on a rope in your room.
The movie's last moments of artifice are perfect for ghost stories; as the crew laughs and the electric lights spin like a bonfire, the darkness - ignored - creeps in and consumes.
directed by Mario Bava
rating: 3 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from Netflix
Only an Italian could begin his three-part trick-or-treat with a dubbed introduction by Boris Karloff hoping the good people in the audience aren't in attendance alone (wink wink), and then segue into a half-hour, killer-on-the-telephone approximation of what's going through the head of every adolescent Genoese male in the theater. Pity the date he's goosing, wondering if this kind of Friday night endurance test is the best young love can offer. For my money, it isn't the rubber rigor mortis face in the third act that I'll be seeing in the windows this winter, but a haunted, haggard Karloff dressed in long hair and beard, wrapped in Bavarian animal furs, stalking the churchyard of his rural highland farm. The sudden appearance of Boris's profile in the foreground of a blue set looks just like the severed head pitched on a post in the farmer's front yard. If you're sitting close enough to the television, there's a twisted and disheveled face on a rope in your room.
The movie's last moments of artifice are perfect for ghost stories; as the crew laughs and the electric lights spin like a bonfire, the darkness - ignored - creeps in and consumes.
posted by NPK at 9:30 AM
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