When it comes to horror films, I like the old ones with actors like Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Vincent Price, etc. I am not at all a fan of the ones like Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street, etc. I am a fan of Edgar Allen Poe. When I saw this title and that it was based on Poe's stories as well as having Christopher Lee and Bela Lugosi, I had to watch it.
This is a series of 5 individual stories. It is not one continuous movie. Each story is narrated by a different person and each one has its own animation style.
The first one is The House of Usher narrated by Christopher Lee. I was immediately enthralled. My heart was pounding a bit harder and I was holding my breath just a bit throughout the whole first story. I really liked the animation style they used. The choice of Christopher Lee was perfect. He did an amazing job of telling the story and the story was written well. The whole thing was so good, that I was ready to give this a 10 rating.
The second was The Tell-Tale Heart. This one had Bela Lugosi doing the narration. Another reviewer pointed out that they used an old recording of Bela Lugosi and that you can hear the scratches. I agree with this reviewer that this was also perfect. If they had cleaned up the recording it just would not have been as good. I was not as pleased with the animation on this story. However, at this point I was still ready to give this a 10 rating.
The third story is The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar which was narrated by Julian Sands. I liked their choice of narrator and I was pleased with the animation for this story. I thought that the story was well written and everything flowed well. A 10 rating was still available at this point.
The fourth story was The Pit and the Pendulum. The Pit and the Pendulum story I remember was the one with Vincent Price, so I was really quite surprised by this one. Perhaps it has just been way too long since I saw the Vincent Price movie but I did not recognize this version of the story. However, the animation and the narration was done well. I feel that the choice of narrator was good. Because I was a bit confused by this version of the story (and perhaps this is actually more true to Poe's story), I down-rated it to a 9 1/2.
Then came the final story. The Masque of the Red Death. This was supposed to be narrated by Roger Corman, but he actually only said one line. The entire thing was just animated story without any actual narration. I felt quite lost throughout this one. I liked the animation, but I felt that it would have been a lot better if they actually had a story for the narrator to narrate.
Throughout the entire movie, there were short bits where Death and Poe were talking. I again agree with one of the other reviewers that they should have chosen a different actor to do the voice of Poe. The conversation between Death and Poe was okay, but nothing really gripping.
Because of the lack of any story narration in the 5th story and because they could have done better with the conversation between Death and Poe, I ended up giving this an 8/10. It's too bad, because for a great deal of this movie, I was ready to give it a 10.
This is a series of 5 individual stories. It is not one continuous movie. Each story is narrated by a different person and each one has its own animation style.
The first one is The House of Usher narrated by Christopher Lee. I was immediately enthralled. My heart was pounding a bit harder and I was holding my breath just a bit throughout the whole first story. I really liked the animation style they used. The choice of Christopher Lee was perfect. He did an amazing job of telling the story and the story was written well. The whole thing was so good, that I was ready to give this a 10 rating.
The second was The Tell-Tale Heart. This one had Bela Lugosi doing the narration. Another reviewer pointed out that they used an old recording of Bela Lugosi and that you can hear the scratches. I agree with this reviewer that this was also perfect. If they had cleaned up the recording it just would not have been as good. I was not as pleased with the animation on this story. However, at this point I was still ready to give this a 10 rating.
The third story is The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar which was narrated by Julian Sands. I liked their choice of narrator and I was pleased with the animation for this story. I thought that the story was well written and everything flowed well. A 10 rating was still available at this point.
The fourth story was The Pit and the Pendulum. The Pit and the Pendulum story I remember was the one with Vincent Price, so I was really quite surprised by this one. Perhaps it has just been way too long since I saw the Vincent Price movie but I did not recognize this version of the story. However, the animation and the narration was done well. I feel that the choice of narrator was good. Because I was a bit confused by this version of the story (and perhaps this is actually more true to Poe's story), I down-rated it to a 9 1/2.
Then came the final story. The Masque of the Red Death. This was supposed to be narrated by Roger Corman, but he actually only said one line. The entire thing was just animated story without any actual narration. I felt quite lost throughout this one. I liked the animation, but I felt that it would have been a lot better if they actually had a story for the narrator to narrate.
Throughout the entire movie, there were short bits where Death and Poe were talking. I again agree with one of the other reviewers that they should have chosen a different actor to do the voice of Poe. The conversation between Death and Poe was okay, but nothing really gripping.
Because of the lack of any story narration in the 5th story and because they could have done better with the conversation between Death and Poe, I ended up giving this an 8/10. It's too bad, because for a great deal of this movie, I was ready to give it a 10.