Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1965)

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General		Extras
Category	Horror	Main Menu Audio Audio Commentary-Freddie Francis (Director) Audio Commentary-Allan Bryce (Darkside Magazine Editor) Trailer-The Amicus Collection
Rating
Year Of Production	1965
Running Time	94:15 (Case: 93)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (65:23)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Freddie Francis
Studio Distributor	Amicus Productions Umbrella Entertainment	Starring	Christopher Lee Max Adrian Ann Bell Michael Gough Jennifer Jayne Neil McCallum Bernard Lee Roy Castle Peter Cushing Alan Freeman Peter Madden Kenny Lynch Jeremy Kemp
Case	PUSH-1 (Opaque)
RPI	$24.95	Music	Elisabeth Lutyens Tubby Hayes Kenny Lynch

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.30:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	Yes
Subtitles	None	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Dr Terror's House of Horrors is a portmanteau film consisting of five stories with a linking story. Five men enter a train carriage in London bound for Bradley, and are joined by a sixth, the mysterious Doctor Schreck (Peter Cushing wearing a beard and false eyebrows). Schreck is the German word for terror, hence the title of the film. It was also the surname of the actor who played the title character in the vampire classic Nosferatu in 1922.

    During the journey, the good doctor breaks open his pack of Tarot cards and proceeds to reveal the destinies of each of the travellers. This provides the framework to tell five horror stories.

    The first story concerns an architect, Jim Dawson (Neil McCallum), who travels to a Scottish island to alter the house of Mrs Biddulph (Ursula Howells). By coincidence, this house was previously owned by Dawson's ancestors. Venturing down into the cellar, he finds a fake wall behind which is the coffin of Count Valdemar. Valdemar had sworn a curse against the descendants of the Dawson clan and to reclaim the house stolen from him. The coffin has sculptures of the heads of wolves on it, and soon Dawson realises that lycanthropy is involved...

    The second story has Bill Rogers (Australian-born disc jockey and original Top of the Pops host Alan Freeman) and his family returning from vacation to discover a fast-growing vine has installed itself in the garden. When the plant seems to respond violently to attempts to cut it down, Rogers goes to the Ministry, where he gets advice from a couple of boffins (played by Bernard Lee and Jeremy Kemp). It soon turns out that the plant has read The Day of the Triffids and harbours homicidal tendencies towards any threats to its existence.

    Story three is the intentionally humorous one. Biff Bailey (Roy Castle - a low grade Tommy Steele, if such a thing is possible) is a jazz musician who accepts a gig in the West Indies, and foolishly steals a tune from a local voodoo ceremony. When he tries to use the tune as a melody in a jazz tune back in London, there are dire consequences. Mainly for the viewer. Castle was a last-minute replacement for Acker Bilk, who had suffered a heart attack, but who ironically has survived Castle by more than a decade - must have been that voodoo stuff.

    Next up is the tale of Franklyn Marsh (Christopher Lee), an art critic who seems more concerned with his own devastating wit than art itself. Eric Landor (Michael Gough) bears the brunt of one of Marsh's tirades, but gets even by humiliating the critic publicly. When Landor takes it too far, Marsh responds in violent fashion causing Landor to lose one of his hands. Marsh is then tormented by the disembodied hand, which seems immune to fire as well as possessing the skills of Houdini.

    Lastly, Dr Bob Carroll (Donald Sutherland) returns to his home in America with his new French bride Nicolle (Jennifer Jayne). Soon there is evidence that a vampire is on the loose, and Carroll seeks the aid of his colleague Dr Blake (Max Adrian).

    The multi-story horror film generally traces its roots back to a British film called Dead of Night, made in 1945, but still further back there were such films in the silent era, notably Waxworks (1924). The horror tale had also flourished in the short story form, mainly in American pulp magazines like Weird Tales (1923-1954) and Strange Stories (1939-1940). By the late 1950s such stories had again become sufficiently popular in Britain for several long-running series of paperback books to be devoted to them, including The Pan Book of Horror Stories (30 volumes) and The Fontana Books of Great Ghost (20 volumes) and Great Horror Stories (17 volumes). There were numerous other series and single anthologies into the mid-1980s, showing that horror in the short form was quite popular in Britain.

    Portmanteau films, those containing multiple complete stories often by different directors, appeared regularly during the 1950s. Never particularly popular in the US (O. Henry's Full House being one exception in this period), this type of film gained some prominence in England with a series of Somerset Maugham adaptations and especially in Italy, where many such films were made during the next two decades, often with directors of the ilk of Fellini, Visconti, Antonioni and De Sica. The portmanteau horror movie was resurrected in America in 1962 by Roger Corman (Tales of Terror) and in Italy in 1963 by Mario Bava (Black Sabbath), both films linked by the presence of Boris Karloff. This effort from Britain's Amicus was their first of this type, and they followed it with numerous similar films. And it remains one of their best, even if not all of the stories are of consistent quality. The best episodes are those with the werewolf and crawling hand, the former because of the spooky atmosphere it develops and the latter because of the excellent performance by the star and fast pacing of the story. The one with the rogue plant is a little silly and does not really have an ending, though the supporting cast helps keep it going. The vampire story has a daft ending while the voodoo tale is the worst of the lot, with an annoying lead and not much substance. The framing story is pretty obvious too, though anything with Cushing in it has some value.

    The stories were written by Milton Subotsky, one of the two partners in the Amicus company. He was something of a horror aficionado and was very hands-on in the filmmaking process, something which will be obvious from the director's commentary. The film was directed by Freddie Francis, who made a number of horror films for both Amicus and Hammer, but whose talents lay in cinematography for which he won two Academy Awards. His direction here is pretty good, and he manages in some of the stories to generate suspense. In others he is defeated by the script or the low production budget. It says something for the art director (Bill Constable) that he was able to make a virtue out of necessity, with some spooky settings built at the studio.

    In more recent times, inspired by the successes of slasher films like Halloween and Friday the 13th, the horror genre has been associated with blood, gore and the building up and releasing of tension through sudden shocks. While this is no classic, Dr Terror provides an hour and a half of horror entertainment of the old-fashioned thoughtful and atmospheric kind that this reviewer prefers. Good on Umbrella Entertainment for making these movies available in Region 4, though if you want this film you will have to buy the 6-disc Amicus Collection set that it comes in. A special note that this film should not be confused with a 1943 compilation of the same name, nor with Dr Horror's Erotic House of Idiots.

Video

    The film is presented in an aspect ratio of 2.30:1, close to the original 2.35:1, and is 16x9 enhanced.

    The transfer is taken from a German print, which has the title Die Todeskarten des Dr. Schreck and the English title below. The director is credited as "Freddy Francis". The end credits either did not exist on this print, or were in German, as end credits from what looks like a VHS edition of the film have been inserted. They look terrible, quite fuzzy and unclear, having been zoomed in to match the aspect ratio of the feature.

    Otherwise, this is a pretty good transfer of the print material. It is quite sharp and there is a good level of detail in close-ups. Perhaps in long distance shots there is a lack of detail, but there are not too many of these. The contrast is very good, with details revealed in dark areas of the image when the general lighting is bright. However, in darker sequences shadow detail drops away significantly.

    Colour is quite good, but seems to lack something. Perhaps the print material is slightly faded, as the colours are generally realistic but not especially vibrant or lively. Flesh tones seem to be well represented though.

    Blacks are spoiled by low level noise, a particularly bad example being at 15:52. There is some minor aliasing at times, and diagonal straight edges suffer from a faint jaggedness. Some edge enhancement has been applied as well, though this is only noticeable against light backdrops.

    There are numerous film artefacts, in the form of minor print damage, dirt and dust. At the very top of the frame, three-quarters of the way to the right, there seems to be a tiny white mark that changes shape during the film, possibly a result of a hair in the gate when the print was made. It is noticeable and therefore a little annoying.

    Despite all of the above, the film probably hasn't looked this good on any video format before.

    There are no subtitles. The disc is RSDL-formatted with the layer change placed at 65:23. It is somewhat poorly placed in the middle of a scene, though there is no movement or sound on screen at the time and so it could have been more disruptive.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The default audio track is Dolby Digital 2.0 mono. The only other audio tracks are commentaries.

    I had no trouble understanding any of the dialogue. The audio sounds very mono, with little in the way of dynamic range and is lacking in the finer tonal qualities in the upper range. It also tends to be a little boomy during some of the louder sequences. That being said, it is perfectly acceptable for a film of this vintage.

    The music score is by Elizabeth Luytens, and effectively adds the required atmosphere to the film through the use of some portentous orchestral music, often a little too loud for my liking. Some jazz music is included in the voodoo segment, supplied by Tubby Hayes, with songs by Kenny Lynch, both of whom also appear in this segment.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    The film comes with not one but two commentaries, both of which were recorded for the 2003 Region 2 release from Anchor Bay.

Main Menu Audio

    Some of Elizabeth Luytens' music for the film is heard when the main menu is displayed.

Audio Commentary-Freddie Francis (Director) and Jonathon Sothcott (Journalist)

    This commentary is moderated by Sothcott, who seems to know a lot about British horror films and has obviously done his research thoroughly. It should be remembered though that Francis was about 84 when the commentary was recorded in 2001. His most frequent answer to Sothcott's questions is "I don't remember", which gets annoying very quickly. Still, there is a reasonable amount of interesting information here, despite the occasional pauses. Note that the commentary continues for a few seconds with a dark screen after the film has ended.

Audio Commentary-Allan Bryce (Darkside Magazine Editor)

    Allan Bryce is the author of a book on Amicus and obviously knows a lot about the subject, even if the book has been criticised for a lack of depth. He is enthusiastic and delivers his material in something other than a drone, so the commentary is an easy listen. He admits that this is his first such effort, and perhaps in future he should learn to temper his witticisms.

Trailer-The Amicus Collection (3:28)

    Trailers for The City of the Dead, The Beast Must Die and And Now The Screaming Starts. The first two are letterboxed and look quite poor, especially the second, while the last is 16x9 enhanced and looks a lot better in comparison.

    This material was released in Region 2 in the UK in 2003, also in a set devoted to Amicus, though this set was a 5 film set (omitting The City of the Dead). It is also available separately. In comparison to the Region 2, the Region 4 misses out on:

• Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack
• DTS 5.1 soundtrack
• Detailed film notes by Jonathon Southcott
• Cast and crew biographies
• Photo Gallery

    By contrast, the Region 2 misses out on just the theatrical trailers.

    Given that the original presentation of the film was in monaural sound, I don't see anything to be gained by having the surround remixes. The other extras would have been nice to have in Region 4, but otherwise I cannot imagine anyone being displeased with the new release.

    A pretty good compilation horror film with some entertainment value.

    The video quality is quite good most of the time.

    The audio quality is satisfactory.

    Two audio commentaries are welcome extras, almost over the top for this sort of material.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall