FANTASIA OBSCURA: Vincent Price Swaps Poe for Hawthorne in these Eerie Tales of Terror
There are some fantasy, science fiction, and horror films that not every fan has caught. Not every film ever made has been seen by the audience that lives for such fare. Some of these deserve another look, because sometimes not every film should remain obscure.
And sometimes, yes, ideas are exposed to be shattered and annihilated by contact with the practical…
Twice-Told Tales (1963)
Distributed by: United Artists
Directed by: Sidney Salkow
In 1963, Vincent Price was feeling burned out by doing all those movies in the “Poe Cycle” for Roger Corman at American International. He had been doing a whole set of film in period costume, doing loose adaptations of the stories of Edgar Allan Poe, and needed a change of scenery.
So he went with an outfit working with United Artists and…
…um, got in to period costume, to do loose adaptations of the stories from this guy…
Nathaniel Hawthorne was a contemporary of Poe’s, which meant that his works were also in the public domain. Which means we get:
This film was one of a number from the time that were “anthology films,” in that there were multiple stories collected in one movie. Before each tale, we get a pair of skeletal hands and arms opening a big book, giving us the title of the story being (not that faithfully) adapted for screen, starting with:
“Dr. Heiddeger’s Experement”
This adaptation of a story found in the collection Twice-Told Tales (which gives the film its title) opens with two aged friends, Alex Melbourne (Price) and Dr. Carl Heiddeger (Sebastian Cabot). They are celebrating Heiddeger’s birthday, lamenting the approach of death in their old age. This is actually something Heiddeger looks forward to, as he lost the woman he was going to marry, Sylvia, to a sudden illness 38 years ago, and hopes to spend eternity with her when it’s time.
Prompted by a crash they hear from Sylvia’s crypt, they discover that there is a drip in the vault. They find that the water coming through the crack has rejuvenating powers, as Sylvia’s corpse (Mari Blanchard) thanks to the water is as fresh (?) as it was the day it was laid to rest. So like any mad scientist, Heiddeger makes the cognitive leap to drink the water, which restores his youth. Soon Alex does the same, after which the doctor makes another cognitive leap: He inserts the water into Sylvia’s veins, bringing her back to life.
This proves to be awkward, as sins of the past that were buried for 38 years come back to the present, with complications and deadly results emerging before it goes so, so wrong…
“Rappaccini’s Daughter”
Taken from the collection Mosses from an Old Manse, we have in Padua a young medical student, Giovanni (Brett Halsey) who manages to spy walking in a closed-off garden adjacent to his lodgings the adorable Beatrice (Joyce Taylor). He tries to woo her, but she rebuffs him every time.
We find out why soon enough: Her father (Price), heartbroken over his wife having dumped him and his daughter, made Beatrice incorruptible by injecting her with extracts from an exotic plant. This keeps fly-by-nights from coming for her, although Beatrice isn’t too happy with the side effects, like her acidic touch that kills any living thing she touches…
Ultimately, with some guidance from his advisor, Professor Baglioni (Abraham Sofaer), Giovanni makes his deep intentions known to her. Her father, hearing these proclamations of love, welcomes him into the family… by drugging him so that he could put those extracts into Giovanni’s body! Unfortunately, this does not go well for anyone involved…
“The House of the Seven Gables”
Based very loosely on an extremely-slimmed down summary of Hawthorne’s original novel, we are given the story of Gerald Pyncheon (Price), who is down on his luck as he brings his bride Alice (Beverly Garland) with him to the family home, the above-referenced abode (which in the film looks nothing like the actual house Hawthorne was writing about). This doesn’t please his sister Hannah (Jacqueline deWit) who lives in the house and looks down on her ne’er-do-well brother as he barges in and claims residency.
Gerald believes that there is a deed to valuable land in Maine hidden in the house, a deed secured by the Pyncheons from Matthew Maulle back in 1691, and he wants it in order to rebuild his fortune. He doesn’t have much time, though, as Matthew’s spirit has a rep for killing all the male Pyncheons, and greedy devious Gerald is next on the list of victims…
The titular house, c. 1915
The main victim in the film, of course, is fidelity to the source materials. This is especially obvious in the “Seven Gables” segment, which departs most radically from the work, although the other two stories get decent interpretations in the script by Robert E. Kent. And Salkow’s direction serves the stories well enough, neither adding anything interesting to look at or detracting from what’s going on.
The cast, other than Price giving great work in all three roles as a troublemaker getting his just rewards, gets into their roles and try to keep up with Price’s villain(s). The best efforts are given by Cabot and deWit, who have the best chemistry with Price, while everyone else vary from half a length behind to a lap and a half.
The biggest weakness this film has to overcome, however, is the source material. Poe criticized Hawthorne’s work in print back then as being heavy-handed with allegory and morality, and it’s hard for readers of Hawthorne’s works to disagree with that. Modern audiences have even less patience for the lessons he tries to imprint, and Kent’s script makes no effort to avoid this trap. It even gives Price voice-overs at the beginning and end of each segment to hammer home the point, which feels more appropriate to a story from Rod Serling’s work over at CBS, which was airing when the film was in theaters.
There’s no indication, once production wrapped, that there were more Hawthorne tales being planned by Salkow or Kent, and so everyone scattered, including Price, who put this one behind him…
…and promptly ended up in another Poe adaptation…
NEXT TIME: We get a good look at the rivalry between larger than life figures, and see what drives them…
