If horror comedies and horror anthology movies are not your thing, skip the Creepshow (1982). Otherwise, check it out. This cult classic is lurid fun.
Why is Creepshow less heralded than it deserves? The film’s rep, I wager, dimmed after its weak sequels. And—after the so-so HBO series, Tales from the Crypt, and its botched movie franchise—the movie may now seem tame. But sequels don’t have to negate their predecessors. A movie like Creepshow could be too thin for a hardcore horror fan or jaded film critic. In 1982, many folks dismissed it as a gross, pre-Exorcist throwback.* But the movie wants to be that. Director George Romero and screenwriter/novelist Stephen King aim for a modern version of a gruesome 1950s comic book.
With lots of dark humor and a complete lack of archness, they succeed.
Creepshow depicts five stories of scum getting their due. Just like with William Gaines’s E.C. line of horror comic books, we savor the distance between us and the gruel at hand. The movie deals in shallowness but attacks it mercilessly. Joyfully, even. Each half-jokey vignette plays on a primal fear (e.g., of being buried, or eaten, alive). And each vignette pricks the conscience most of us have when doing something taboo. Creepshow believes people are petty and no-one gets away with anything. Knowing this, we root for karma (in all its various manifestations) to be the biggest, baddest bitch on-screen, and that’s what we get. We grin at the movie’s construction, its sense of values. The outrage we have toward the jerks depicted meets with a creepy and sick justice. King & Romero aren’t even really trying to scare.
“Father’s Day”: In Creepshow, the shot composition matches the way Gaines and co. would panel the beats of an E.C. screamer. For the juicy bits, Romero uses a bold color scheme and a synthesizer on par with John Carpenter soundtracks of the same era. As a result, the movie seems unified, even though it’s clearly stitched together. “Father’s Day” milks King’s habit of turning nasty and abusive relatives into outsized villains. This episode is a semi-harrowing glance at a rot-rich family. Daddy’s voice sounds like the grave distorted his larynx through crinkling cans of soda. I also like how—before dying in a parody of the suddenly helpless, inexplicably immobile victim-of-death scene—Ed Harris does the funky chicken. Grade: A-
“The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill”: This one’s a nod to H. P. Lovecraft’s “The Colour Out of Space” and Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “It Came Out of the Sky.” A country bumpkin, Jordy (a well-cast King), discovers a meteor in his yard. However, before he can cash it in, he suffers a sad, green demise. It made me think of Jeff Goldblum’s fate in David Cronenberg’s The Fly. Grade: B+
“Something to Tide You Over”: The greed motif appears again, but King & Romero aren’t trying to stick it to upper crustaceans. They just want to stick it to the one Leslie Nielsen plays, a cuckold who gets even with the couple that betrayed him. The way Nielson’s character lures his wife’s lover (Ted Danson) into a sand trap stretches credulity; but I find this tale of vengeance colorful and inventive. Who doesn’t like sea zombies? Grade: A
“The Crate”: King & Romero drag this episode out. King, perhaps, loved the story too much (it’s based on a short story he wrote). Also, Hal Holbrook and Adrienne Barbeau never convince as a genuine couple. She plays the world’s loudest nag. He plays a college prof who seethes. Frankly, it’s absurd that they should want to be together. (Do total opposites attract? To the point of marriage? I guess money and/or a low self-esteem could be involved.) Masterpiece Theater, this isn’t. We’re meant to count the spokes on the grisly wheels set in motion. Despite its length, though, the episode ends on a question mark, which feels like a cheat. Holbrook’s character never gets his. It’s implied that he does, but… “The Crate” is a misfire. The Creepshow formula loses steam here. Grade: B-
“They’re Creeping Up on You”: A fitting end, only because it’s hard to top. As a rich germophobe who sees people as bugs to do his bidding, lest a garbage chute suck them down, E.G. Marshall is ten kinds of smarm. His buying the bug farm is gnarly. Grade: B
The Creepshow Collector’s Edition from Scream Factory is a stunning, two-disc 4K UHD and Blu-ray combo pack. Scanned for 4K from the original camera negative in Dolby Vision, with a new Dolby Atmos track, Creepshow has never looked sharper. Both the 4K and Blu-ray discs have audio commentary by Romero; make-up FX maestro Tom Savini; cinematographer Michael Gornick; composer/first assistant director John Harrison; construction coordinator Ed Fountain; actor John Amplas; property master Bruce Alan Miller; and make-up effects assistant Darryl Ferrucci.
The 4K UHD disc includes Mondo Macabre (a look at Mondo’s various Creepshow posters); Collecting Creepshow (a bit about the original props from the film); The Colors of Creepshow (an interview with Gornick); and Into the Mix (an interview with sound re-recordist Chris Jenkins). This disc also has still galleries (behind-the-scenes shots, color stills, movie posters, posters and lobby cards, and make-up FX stills).
The Blu-ray disc includes Terror and the Three Rivers (a 2018 roundtable discussion); The Comic Book Look (an interview with costume designer Barbara Anderson); Ripped from the Pages (an interview with animator Rick Catizone); Horror’s Hallowed Grounds (a tour of the original filming locations); and Savini’s behind-the-scenes footage. You also get deleted scenes, radio and TV spots, and theatrical trailers.
*Creepshow isn’t original. In a boom time for horror, it helped revitalize an old format. The best early examples are the classy Amicus portmanteaus from the early ’70s (Tales from the Crypt, Vault of Horror, Asylum), and the ‘40s gem, Dead of Night. I also like Tales from the Hood (1995) and Trick ‘r Treat (2009).
