Creepshow
Featuring: Leslie Nielsen, Stephen King
Directed by: George Romero
An angry father throws his pre-teen son’s comic book into a garbage can on the curb. The narrator comes to life, bringing with him the five stories within the book. The golden age of horror comics meet with a Stephen King screenplay from the top of his game. Cockroaches, menaces from outer space and good old fashioned monsters deliver the scares. This is good, clean horror fun.
You will almost never see better across-the-board casting in a single film. Every single performer fits his her her role, no matter how serious or silly the job is. Visually, Creepshow beat films like Dick Tracy or Sin City to capturing a comic book appearance on film. Is it scary? The filmmakers capitalized nicely on the variety of stories and moods to use a wide variety of scare tactics. If you’re afraid of anything at all then Creepshow has something for you. All the while, John Harrison’s score keeps the pace going with relentless affection for creepy camp.
The camp can take its toll. The monster in The Crate can look particularly silly at times. Worse, the movie seems to lose its rhythm when eschewing camp to tell an otherwise wonderful story.
I’m not a Stephen King fan. Most of his settings and characters are so bland that they become offensive. That makes me even happier to give him praise as both a screenwriter and a thespian in regards to Creepshow.
Weighted score: 7.5 / 10.
Sinister cinema with a smile. Best enjoyed with an ice cold glass of orange juice and a huge box of organic raisin bran.
Other thoughts and notes:
- The John Harrison Score is one of my three favorite horror movie scores.
- Leslie Nielsen (Airplane!) plays in nearly the same story as Robert Hays (Airplane!) in Cat’s Eye. It would be interesting to learn where King’s prolonged fascination with infidelity and revenge came from.
