Black Sabbath

(1963) director Mario Bava
viewed: 10/31/10

The title of Mario Bava’s Black Sabbath, as it is known in its English language release, served as a good inspiration for Ozzy Osborne to re-name his rock band, but the film’s original Italian title I Tre volti della paura, more literally The Three Faces of Fear in English, is perhaps a little more apt.  The film is a compendium of three short films, horror or thrillers, and there isn’t a witch’s meeting among them.

A few years back I watched Bava’s Black Sunday (The Mask of Satan) (1960), which had really impressed me.  But for whatever reason, it took me this long to get around to watching another of Bava’s horror films.  As it turned out, this was my Halloween night feature.

The first segment, “The Telephone”, is more of a thriller.  Shot in bright colors, it has a different feeling from the other two segments.  It’s setting and story are more modern, whereas the latter two stories are more gothic and classically in the horror style and genre.

Like Black Sunday, the second segment, “The Wurdalak”, is adapted from a story by Nikolai Gogol.  This segment stars the near-ubiquitous Boris Karloff, who also introduces and closes the film.  It’s a Russian vampire of sorts, and is probably the most effective of the sequences.

The final segment, “The Drop of Water” evoked Rod Serling’s Night Gallery perhaps (or perhaps vice versa).  Actually, the whole film had a little of Night Gallery about it.

I have the vaguest memory of having seen this film as a kid, but with no real memories, per se.  I recall not really enjoying it, which kind of makes sense.  It’s a more sustained and adult sort of film, with the horror more suggested and cumulative (and with the segments being short), the stories fly by a little quickly and don’t have the impact that they might in a fuller build and duration.

What’s interesting, though I don’t have much to derive from it, is the final shot, showing Karloff bidding the audience adieu as they head out into the spooky night.  He does this while “riding” a galloping horse, which the shot, as the camera pulls back, it’s revealed that the horse is not at all real, nor are the background.  The shot reveals the whole artifice of the cinema, and with the set decorators rotating as they hold branches of trees, it has a distinctly Fellini-esque sensibility to it.  It’s funny and playful, but it’s significance is hard to fully apply.

Still, some pretty good fun.

Black Sunday (The Mask of Satan)

(1960) dir. Mario Bava
viewed: 11/05/07

The second feature of what would have been my Halloween night fright fest was another fantastic choice (sound of self being patted on the back).  In fact, my only regret is that I didn’t actually watch them on All Hallow’s Eve or however you put it.

Mario Bava’s first feature film, Black Sunday in initial U. S. release but also released as The Mask of Satan in both English and Italian is a iconic film from the Italian film industry, a well-crafted, beautifully-shot near-masterpiece of high Gothic horror and the father or grandfather of so many films hence.

The story is adapted from a Nikolai Gogol short story, though I do not know how much it resembles the original.  The opening sequence is at the crucifixion of two witches/vampires in the 16th century in rather bloody effects.  The female vows vengeance on the family of her persecutor and then has a “mask of Satan” (with nails pointing inward) hammered onto her face.  The story picks up 200 years later with the reviving of the two witches/vampires and their played out revenge on the family that killed them.

The most striking thing by far is the cinematography and framings of shots.  The black-and-white film is gorgeous, in its elements of shadow and the crumbling ruins of abbeys and graveyards.  Bava’s camerawork and the film’s edgy gore and violence (for 1960) is tremendously effective.  The film would have been an excellent compliment to The Old Dark House (1932), which I meant to play it directly after.  It’s the classical type of horror film, but this one with more genuinely supernatural elements.

The commentary on the DVD was quite good from what I listened to (about 20 minutes or so), by film historian Tim Lucas, elucidating much of Bava’s work and influence as well as some critical points that could be interesting on further investigation.  I’ve been pretty put off by commentaries and only sample them when I am inspired by curiosity.  All in all, this is a very good horror film, well worth its reputation and only corny on occasion.