Rated 3 out of 5
The Evil Eyes are crossed---but it’’s still good stuff.
I have to confess: I was thrilled beyond words when I heard Blue Underground was releasing this 1991 collaboration between two of my favorite horror masters, George Romero and Dario Argento. I bought the DVD sight-unseen, having only seen a few snippets of sequences from the second story in this two-movie collection, Argento’’s adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’’s "The Black Cat". I had seen those snippets as part of a larger Argento documentary called "Dario Argento: an Eye for Horror"---and they were ghoulish indeed! Harvey Keitel impaled on a stake? Mewling, hairless baby cats walled up with a gore-caked corpse, ’’Cask of Amontillado’’ style? The gruesome final finishing touch---death by merciless, razor-sharp pendulum---that even Poe himself had shied away from?
I had to have it, just for the Argento work alone! As for the Romero adaptation of "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar", well how could you lose, with the evil mastermind behind "Night of the Living Dead" helming up a short movie about a miser left in hypnosis after death?
Blue Underground has done an excellent job with their Limited Edition DVD: the DVDs themselves are nicely decorated with two of the more chilling sequences from the film, and the material on the bonus DVD (including---hey!---a tour of make-up guru Tom Savini’’s home!)is worth the price of admission alone. It’’s a handsome DVD, and a nice addition to any horror movie aficionado’’s collection.
As for the movies---well, they’’re not what I had expected, highly uneven, and not the best examples of either Argento or Romero’’s work. But they’’re enjoyable, gory, ghoulish fare, with Romero’’s piece more subtle and stylish and Argento’’s entry an over-the-top assault on the senses that pays tribute to some of the nastiest of Poe’’s nuggets, including "The Black Cat", "Lenore" (ah yes, her lovely 32 teeth! nice touch, Dario!), "The Pit and the Pendulum", "The Cask of Amontillado", "The Tell-Tale Heart", and even a glib nod to "The House of Usher".
Taken together, the two pieces that comprise "Two Evil Eyes" give the film a "Creepshow"-like feel, not surprising given that Romero helmed that movie. Romero’’s piece here has been unfairly savaged, and while it seems sedate in comparison to Argento’’s gory Italian Grand Opera, it’’s a stately, stylish little chiller. Adrienne Barbeau plays the crafty youngish wife of financier Valdemar (played to the hilt by Bingo O’’Malley, who gave me the creeps!---he also shows up as Stevie King’’s dad in the Meteor episode of Creepshow), who plots with her hypnotist lover to get rid of the sick old man and abscond with a fortune.
Not surprisingly, things don’’t go as planned; look for an opening shot right out of "Night of the Living Dead" and a scene-chewing contest by movie veteran E.G. Marshall and Barbeau (who holds her own).
But it’’s really Argeno’’s sanguine little number you should check in for. Ostensibly an adaptation of "The Black Cat", it features Harvey Keitel as a demented crime photographer whose lifestyle and pre-occupations would make his "Bad Lieutenant" character cry for his mommy. It’’s not Dario at the height of his game, but it’’s wicked, depraved, gory stuff.
All told, these two shorts make a jolly, gory little evening of Poe-vian goodness. Break out a nice cask of Amontillado from your cellar (don’’t mind the knocking from the other side of the wall), open up a tin of caviar for your trusting black cat, put a blanket over your pet raven’’s cage, and enjoy two horror masters having some fun with their medium.
