Unicorns & Hats & Masquerades, Oh My!

The Abomindable Dr. Phibes is one of those cult classics that seems to inspire a whole lot of passion from the not necessarily huge component of film lovers who have seen it.

I am now proud to be one of them.

Quick Plot: A Phantom-esque mystery man conducts his own personal house band made up of man-sized wind-up instrumentalists in kooky zip-up masks.

Within the opening two minutes, I have already dubbed this to be The Greatest Movie of All Time.

Some might say I like to leap to big sweeping superlatives when it comes to cinema, but ladies and gentlemen, some are often wrong.

Very. Wrong.

Meet Dr. Anton Phibes, a concert organist/super genius doctor (of something or another) played with magnificence by a fully in-the-moment Vincent Price. Dr. Phibes, we learn, is working on an elaborate (and awesome) plan of vengeance using the fabled ten plagues of the Old Testament as inspiration to murder the team of surgeons and nurses responsible for the death of his beloved wife some years earlier. 

Here's what this means for us:

-We watch a kickass masquerade where a dude dons a giant frog head mask and gets masked to death

-We witness an adorable horde of bats bat a man to death

-A man is stabbed, Cabin In the Woods style, by the unicorn horn of a brass statue catapulted into action

I haven't even mentioned the locust face-eating, outstandingly elaborate hat-wearing, or old timey snake porn-watching. 

Directed by Robert Fuest (he of the wonderfully restrained And Soon the Darkness and amazingly awful The Devil's Rain), 1971's The Abominable Dr. Phibes is one of those fantastically 'alive' films that seems compelled to be something unlike anything you've ever quite seen. From the colorful visual style to the fact that Vincent Price is romantically speaking through a hole in his throat, this is a special movie.

We've got recurring word jokes, bumbling detectives...

creepy dolls that do nothing but appear creepy, 

Vincent Price drinking champagne through a hole in the back of this throat, and a credit sequence set to Somewhere Over the Rainbow that lists its cast in terms of "The Protagonists" and so on. There's both absurdity and heart, and the combination makes for a truly unique cinematic experience.

High Points
Did I mention HATS?

NOTE THAT THERE ARE PLURAL HATS!

Did I mention DEATH BY CATAPULTED UNICORN HORN?

Did I mention that the band, Dr. Phibes' Clockwork Wizards, is the greatest assembly of musicians ever put on a bizarro art deco soundstage dream theater?

DID MENTION THIS MOVIE KICKS ASS?

Lessons Learned
Even when they're eating someone's face off, bats in closeup are pretty darn adorable

Never put down the brandy

No one holds a grude with quite the same dedication as a super genius concert pianist doctor

Rent/Bury/Buy
I was lucky enough to find a double disc of this and its sequel through the Midnight Movies release at the famed Kim's Video in downtown Manhattan. Now on Instant Watch, this is a truly wonderful watch, the kind of strange genre treat that somehow manages to be funny, scary, sweet, gorgeous, and ridiculous all at the same time. See it.

MaskMaker In the Woods

So, here’s the thing about MaskMaker: 

Have you seen Cabin In the Woods?

If you haven’t, then you should probably skip down to the Rent/Bury/Buy section for a summary that doesn’t spoil a seemingly unrelated masterpiece to this decently made but minor slasher. But for the smart ones here who have already seen Drew Goddard and Joss Whedon’s horror comedy, you’ll understand that it’s hard to view such standard dice up the pretty people fare without thinking about The Ancient Ones.

Quick Plot: A young college couple majoring in economics takes a drive to a secluded old farmhouse for Jennifer's birthday weekend, where the perky coed learns the musty but antique-filled homestead is now hers. Some guys buy flowers, others, engagement rings. Evan, on the other hand, paid $10,000 for some property and put the grant in his lady love's name. Sure, the local hardware store is run by Michael Berryman and the only other customer offers ominous warnings of the house’s backstory, and yes, the remote location offers little to no cell phone coverage (as pointedly remarked upon to silence audience objection before it starts) and oh fine, there’s a dead pig’s head chilling out in the vintage refrigerator with what can only be genetically mutated Panem-bred superflies, but hey, a deal’s a deal!

Despite their misgivings, Jennifer and Evan settle in, inviting two more frisky couples along for a weekend of bonfire guitar strumming, aged wine drinking, and role playing fornication that oddly enough, fits right into the soon-to-be-awakened killer’s MO.

See, amongst the creepy relics Jennifer discovers is a leather-bound diary of the previous tenant, a French maid (not like THAT! except, well, kind of like that) who raised her monstrous son Leonard with witchcraft and a lack of discipline. As Jennifer reads the artistically rendered script---

Fine. I can’t ignore it anymore either. Yes, Cabin In the Woods fans: the MaskMaker of the title could easily have been hanging out inside one of the elevator’s rotating cubes. And yes, among our pretty young people are scholars, whores, fools, virgins (eh, close enough) and athletically built young men whose death and pain would easily sate the appetities of some old hungry demons. 

There’s a harbinger--

And shock of shocks, he’s not actually played by Berryman but Bernie himself!

We’ve got a torture room...

Mythology...

A relic (in this case, a big ol’ magic stick thingy) that resurrects the past

Unmarried sexual encounters...

And in case you were worried about the future of mankind, plenty of death in the order The Ancient Ones require.

Mask Maker has about as much originality as an accountant’s lunch order, but it does what it’s expected to with better skill than most of its contemporaries. Though the idea of the killer is nothing special, Leonard himself looks menacing and quite eerie when wearing his victim’s cleanly extracated faces on his own. Some viewers might find the young cast’s talkiness annoying, but I appreciate the script’s insistence on giving its victims’ some individuality, something helped by the energy of its actors. We don’t necessarily like them, but at least they’re more interesting than the garden variety camp counselor or drunk teens. Director G.E. Furst (he of a few Asylum titles) shows some skill in establishing their chemistry as friends and lovers.

But...but...they’re STILL hard to think of as anything other than than The Whore(s), The Virgin, The Athlete(ishes), The Fool(s) and Scholar. With that in mind, I’d rather attend a party thrown by Bradley Whitford and Richard Jenkins.

High Points

You can’t argue with the impressively done gore, complete with drippingly fresh face maks and big ol’ fashioned axings

(MINOR SPOILER) There is a small effort to play a little with the death order. It’s not revolutionary, but one kill did happen far earlier than I expected, making it land quite effecitvely

Low Points

I rarely speak ill of anything involving Treat Williams, but the flashbacks of Leonard’s childhood story are easily the weak link of MaskMaker. Filmed in an undefined gray sheen, they just never evoke anything of the scandal or supernatural I assume they were going for

Not sure who decided it was a good idea to throw in a weirdly homophobic electrician, but I suppose one low point of the film would have to be the weirdly homobophic electrician

Lessons Learned

If horror movies have taught me anything, it’s that when a bloodthirsty killer has me straight in his aim of a knife or spear throw, it’s really easy and instinctual to just wait til the last minute to duck or roll over and avoid the death blow

In 2012, male college professors can totally say things like “just like a woman to compare investing to cooking” and get away with it

Some people are into being puked on

Look! It’s...

One of the London Twins (can people really tell them apart?) popping up for the final scene with an adorably strained Louisiana accent. I hope they didn’t spend too much money on that

Credits Curiosity

Ever see a film’s tagline plopped under its title in the opening credits? Me neither. Until now.

Rent/Bury/Buy

For what it is—a direct-to-DVD slice ‘em up about pretty people being hunted by a silent madman—MaskMaker is slightly above average. The acting has spunk, the makeup mostly looks great, and kill count is high and messy enough to not leave you feeling cheated. It does absolutely nothing new in terms of the genre, (even borrowing the basic monster design from Leatherface’s closet and a key plot resolution from Friday the 13th Part 2) but if you’re in the mood for a slick piece of modern American horror, it’s serviceable. Not special, but good enough in an unambitious way for a lazy Instant Watch while you're alphabetizing your DVDs or separating Lucky Charms marshmallows from the boring rice crisps. 

Cabin In the Woods WaaOooOooOooh

You. Yeah, you. No, not the bobblehead on your desk or dog at your feet: you. 

You the human being with $15 in your pocket. You the creature with feet that can walk you or wheels that can wheel you to a movie theater. You the homo sapien with one index finger that can operate a touchscreen, or one mouth that can speak to a cinema employee containing more than one finger to ring up a single ticket order. 

Yeah, YOU.

Go see Cabin In the Woods. Now. Go.

Why are you still here? Can you not read? If so, I'm sorry for insulting you but OH YEAH NO I'M NOT SINCE YOU WOULDN'T KNOW THAT I DID SINCE YOU SAID YOU CAN'T READ.

SeewhatIdidthere?

I hope not. I hope you didn't see it because I hope you're currently sitting in a pleather theater seat with some poisoned popcorn grease staining your jeans as you stare up at a movie screen, a movie screen cycling through some overinformative trailers. I hope you're not even reading this on your iPhone since that should already have been turned off. 

Do you hear me?

I hope not.

Go. Go open your wallet to boost this movie’s box office return. Tell your friends to make them happy. Mace a bootlegger hocking the burned DVD in the hopes of creating a bigger demand. Do what you have to do. 

Just see the movie.

And watch out for unicorns. Our race wiped that out for a reason.