Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library on kick-ass portable DVD player.
The anthology film is its own thing. While I may be wrong, it seems like most anthologies are of the horror variety. Horror lends itself to a shorter format well. All you need is a good couple of scares over the course of 20 minutes or so and everyone walks away happy. The problem with anthology films is that even good ones tend to be a little uneven at best. Take Creepshow for example; while a couple of the stories are really fun, a few are weaker and drag the film down a little. With Mario Bava’s I Tre Volti Della Paura (technically The Three Faces of Fear but distributed as Black Sabbath), we don’t have that problem. We get three pretty good little spook tales, all roughly the same length and about the same amount of fun.
It helps that there are only three stories here, so each one is given enough time to work up a good scare without overstaying its welcome. We start with a little opening monologue from Karloff, who tells us that ghosts and spirits are real. Specifically, he talks about vampires, saying that they may well be in the theater with us, since they look just like us and like to feed on those whom they loved during their lives. It’s fun and cheeky, and probably served to get a few theater goers to snuggle up closer to each other, or to eye each other a little more warily.
