Freddy's 31 Days of Horror Day 7: George A Romero Presents John Harrison's Tales From the Darkside The Movie
In the late eighties and into the early nineties, there was a great anthology show run by horror maestro George A Romero called Tales From The Darkside. At the same time George and his usual crew were also working on getting together a third Creepshow film. With the popularity of the show they opted to simply call the third Creepshow the Tales from the Darkside movie since they were both anthologies anyway. Within the movie not only do we have many Romero regulars but also tons of then up and coming actors especially out of the independent circuit! There are three segments with a wraparound story. The Wraparound story concerns a witch (Blondie's Deborah Harry) who has kidnapped a little boy and is preparing to cook him for dinner, but the little boy distracts her by telling her three tales of terror from an old book to try and buy himself more time in the land of the living. This whole movie was the first big project for John Harrison as he started directing music videos and worked his way up in directing in the Tales From the Darkside show.
The first segment is entitled Lot 249 written by Michael McDowell who had previously given us Beetlejuice and it's based on a story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle the creator of Sherlock Holmes! Lot 249 concerns a poor college student named Bellingham (Steve Buscemi) who works at the local museum and is cheated out of a scholarship by a wealthier student Lee (Robert Sedgwick) and his girlfriend Susan (Julianne Moore) who planted evidence that he had been stealing from the museum. Lot 249 itself is a sarcophagus complete with mummy that Bellingham has acquired. Everyone's mutual friend Andy (Christian Slater) knows how Susan and Lee cheated Bellingham, as he is Susan's brother, but keeps his mouth shut and even helps Bellingham inspect the mummy as they find a scroll inside the mummy with an incantation. Bellingham reads the incantation and resurrects it to do his bidding and exact his revenge. Bellingham gives Steve Buscemi a great opportunity to play one of the creepiest characters of his career with little morality left in him as the world has hardened him and he's dedicated his life coldly to the pursuit of riches. Andy is the only character in this segment with any morality and is at a quandary with what to do seeing as how his loved ones have screwed over a man who doesn't deserve the grief. In the end it's Andy vs Bellingham in a fight over control of the mummy! 
The second segment is one of the most spine tingling and eerie! It's called the Cat From Hell and it's written By George A Romero based on a story by Stephen King! The three big stars of this segment are David Johansen (The Ghost of Christmas Past from Scrooged!) who plays Halston, William Hickey (Whose been in everything but my personal favorite is his character from the Arnold Schwarzzenegger directed Tales from the Crypt episode!) who plays Drogen and of course the Cat From Hell himself! Drogen is a wealthy old man living alone in a mansion. His entire fortune comes from a drug on the market he created that is highly addictive and all of the testing was done almost exclusively on cats. He brings in Halston,who is an expert Hitman, to take care of a problem for him. He reveals that there used to be four other inhabitants in the house and they've all died in freak accidents all involving a little black cat. Drogen leaves Halston in his mansion alone to kill the cat whom he claims has killed his friends and is now after him! Through the night Halston believes this task laughable and easy but as the night progresses the cat seems to become more sneaky and devilish, possessing almost supernatural abilities as if he was sent from hell to exact revenge for all of his fallen brothers and sisters. The color palate in this segment is particularly well done, the flashbacks to the murders are done in darkish blues and we are treated to scenes where we see the cats vision in black and white with a purple circular hue. The scenes with Halston are buried in darkness building tension and anticipation as we feel Halston's fear of the cat. When the cat reveals it's true power, we are treated to a beautifully horrific scene masterminded by KNB FX group. This is the segment tailor made for animal lover's as they get their revenge on the tortures pharmaceutical companies can inflict, this narrative has Romero written all over it as it attacks the big rich establishments with the supernatural, an idea that nature will have it's revenge. 
The final segment is one of the most talked about and delivers us some of the best monster FX and original story seen in a movie. A cautionary tale of love. This segment is called Lover's Vow and it is also written by Michael McDowell. It stars James Remar as a struggling artist named Preston who has just been dropped by his agent and told his work is going to get trashed so he spends a long night in a bar getting completely hammered. As he is leaving the bar with the bartender, a giant winged beast brutally kills the bartender in a gruesome limb for limb slaughter. The beast pins Preston to the wall and says it will let him live on the condition that he never talk about what he's seen and never draw the beast or acknowledge it exists to anyone. Preston agrees and the beast slashes him across the chest saying, "Cross your heart." Preston flees in fear and runs into a girl on the street named Carola (Rae Dawn Chong) who he begs to let him help her get home fearing the beast is near, but he does not tell her directly why he's afraid. They go to his apartment and they madly fall into the throws of passion and fall in love. Both seeming to hide something from the other. However their love conquers all their problems as they build a beautiful family together and Preston's work makes tons of money. Preston's life with Carola becomes perfection, until the day he reveals the story about the beast. The ending to this segment is one of the best and most heart wrenching moments in horror history as their love is built up perfectly and the ending carnage and FX are some of the best work seen in a movie since American Werewolf in London.
The movie as a whole has Romero written all over it with the meek rising up against the grain or supernatural forces doing it for them, with plenty of devilish charm and winks to the audience with the FX and especially the dark humor of the wraparound story. The combination of both KNB FX group with consultation by the legendary FX artist behind the Exorcist, Dick Smith, makes this one of the best practical FX engines of that decade. Production being headed by longtime collaborator of Romero and producer of the Tales from the Darkside Show, Richard P Rubinstein assured that no penny was spared in bringing this love letter of horror to life. The musical score is so perfect for every scene and is also a staple in Romero films just as in Carpenter films. I could go on and on but this flicks just fun as hell and builds the excitement with each segment! Especially the ending to the wraparound! Wait til you see what little Timmy has to do to escape the witch whose trying to cook him!
24 Days til' Halloween Halloween!
24 Days til' Halloween! Silver Shamrock!
