Christopher Lee disapproves of his daughter’s attachment to dolls in THE HOUSE THAT DRIPPED BLOOD.
BLOOD manages much more affect with only as much screen time.
The transfer of DR. TERROR’S... is essentially the en- hanced/letterboxed 2.35:1 version found on the Italian disc, with the title given as “Die Todeskarten des Dr. Schreck (Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors)”—the actual translation would be “The Death Cards of Dr. Terror”—and direc- tor credited as “Freddy Francis,” though the missing end credits have been tipped in from a much-lower quality source, prompting a jarring segue that muffs an atmospheric moment. As on all the titles in the collec- tion, the soundtrack offers a choice between the original (English) 2.0 Mono, a Dolby 5.1 remix and DTS sound, here augmented by two commentary tracks. This might be a case of over-egging the pudding since the two commentaries would
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play better if spliced together. Francis, in a disappointing showing, listens to interviewer Jonathan Sothcott’s descriptions of his own films with a vague puzzlement that rarely turns to actual reminiscence; it may be that Sothcott would have been better-advised to ask the direc- tor about the specifics of his choices rather than fish for an- ecdotes about people he can barely recall working with, in that Francis always seems to have concentrated on the day-to-day business of making interesting shots and scenes rather than having any great overview of genre. In the second track, THE DARK SIDE editor Allan Bryce makes a few errors we know he doesn’t mean (ascribing direction of NEVER TAKE SWEETS FROM A STRANGER to Francis) and moves from a promising discus- sion of this film’s actual quali- ties (a well-put footnote about
how non-widescreen versions haven’t represented it well) to rote biographies of people we’ve heard of (though British show- biz institutions Lynch, Castle and Freeman may be new to horror fans) and side-issues like his daughters’ tastes in horror and a personal wish that Jen- nifer Jayne had done a lesbian scene (!).
Peter Duffell’s THE HOUSE THAT DRIPPED BLOOD has the frame of a police inspector (John Bennett) investigating the disap- pearance of horror movie star Paul Henderson (Jon Pertwee, in a role Vincent Price was desper- ate to play) and coming across the tales of three other residents of the eponymous home who have come to the not-unex- pected nasty ends. With only four episodes, there’s space for a bit more character to flesh out ba- sic anecdotes (only “Sweets to the Sweet” is really satisfying as
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