Terrifying Tales (1989)

This is a collection of 3 short films that appear to have been released together on a VHS tape in the late ‘80s.  The first short film shows a girl running away from home.  She is pursued by her father, who seems to be a nasty guy.  Though we never get to see him on camera.  The girl ends up hitching a ride with a stranger and then getting kidnapped by him.  Now I’m not sure if he is an alien or from the future.  But she is whisked away on their spaceship or time machine.  Again I’m not quite sure.  The second short is about a man who likes to hitchhike and then kill the ladies that pick him up.  We get to see him kill a woman and then make his escape.  Or so he thinks that he does.  Later an old man picks him up and takes him home for some chili.  Down the stairs comes the man’s daughter and you guessed it she is the spitting image of the woman he just killed!  Finally we get to see a short about a detective and a coroner investigating a murder.  The coroner immediately becomes obsessed with the victims roommate and keeps trying to convince the detective the one armed mentally handicapped man who is on the run from the army is the killer. 

I have a lot of issues with this “movie”.  First of all I have a hard time considering this a movie at all.  These are clearly 3 short films that were collected together for a VHS release.  You can tell this because after a very short splash screen with the Terrfying Tales title card we jump right into the first short.  Each has it’s own set of credits, both opening and closing.  When the final short finishes we get nothing.  So someone just tossed these together with minimal effort.  This is pretty typical of the hustlers that were trying to get things together for the early home video market, but it does surprise me that they did this so late in the game.

So onto my issues with this "movie".  In spite of being 3 different short films with 3 different directors, writers, and crews they do share a few things.  Of course these aren’t good things.  The acting is wooden and not at all convincing.  This isn’t helped by some clunky dialogue, especially in the second short about the roadside killer, which might have been handled okay by a more experienced set of actors.  I was also bummed by what is mostly a lack of any special effects.  There is a spaceship that is pulled off cleverly in the first short, but it is then ruined by the really badly done attempt to show the interior.  The sound and lighting in all 3 is also pretty bad.  But the worst thing about this “movie” and the shorts that make it up is that they are boring.  I seriously wasn’t the least bit interested in anything that was happening on screen.  How difficult is it to make a 20 or 30 minute long movie interesting? 

So if you haven’t guessed yet I’m not going to recommend Terrifying Tales.  So don’t waste your time or money tracking down a VHS copy of this one.  These tales are neither terrifying nor interesting. 

1 out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer

© Copyright 2011 John Shatzer