Body Bags - Corpi estranei

BODY BAGS is a lot of fun until the unrelentingly grim final segment directed by Tobe Hooper, which is the best thing Hooper has done since Texas CHAINSAW MASSACRE 2. The other two segments are directed by John Carpenter, who also appears as a Crypt-Keeper-like character, and demonstrates why he has spent most of his time behind the camera.

Overall, I like the movie very much. The first segment is good, but also the weakest of the three. It also feels oddly out of place, as the next two stories both deal with medical horror, while it is simply a 50's style slasher-on-the-loose yarn. Despite the slight subject matter (and a poor performance by Alex Datcher in the lead role), it's a solid chiller with some good scares. David Naughton, Robert Carradine and Peter Jason are all good in supporting roles, while fellow horror directors Sam Raimi and Wes Craven have creepy cameos.

The second segment is great, and, unlike the other two, is an out-out comedy. Stacey Keach turns in one of his very best performances as a middle-aged man who dreads the prospect of going bald, and decides to try out a new experimental technique developed by scientist David Warner. It leads up to a great finale that is as disturbing as it is funny. Singers Deborah Harry and Sheena Easton have supporting parts.

The final segment is the polar opposite of the second. As stated earlier, it's directed by Tobe Hooper, and he shows a sense of the macabre here that he hasn't displayed since his CHAINSAW/FUNHOUSE days. A veteran baseball player is in a car accident which results in his eye being poked out. A surgeon suggests an experimental eye transplant. Unfortunately, the donor eye belonged to a homicidal maniac, and Hammill begins having nightmarish hallucinations and bouts of uncontrollable rage. The climax of the segment is unbelievably cruel and grim, recalling Hooper's early work. It's a genuinely unsettling and horrific little flick. Twiggy, Charles Napier, as well as horror icons John Agar and Roger Corman appear.

Carpenter's antics as the narrator are uncomfortably flat, and things don't get any better when an irritating Tom Arnold and a clueless Hooper show up in cameo roles as well. Despite the weak wraparound, I recommend this anthology to horror fans, particularly fans of the two directors' work.

Three short stories in the horror genre: The first about a serial killer. The second about a hair transplant going wrong. The third about a base ball player who receives a questionable eye transplant.

The sad truth is that giving this film as high a rating as I did really comes down to one thing: the endless supply of guest stars from the horror genre (and beyond). Who can dislike a film with Wes Craven, Sam Raimi, John Carpenter, Tobe Hooper and more? That is incredible.

As for the film itself, it is about average. The acting and directing are fine, and the gore really starts to add up in the third segment. But the script was really nothing special, and I am not shocked that Showtime declined to turn this into a regular series (any given episode of "Masters of Horror" is better).

The disc from Scream Factory makes this average film a little something more, with plenty of insight from Stacy Keach, John Carpenter and producer Sandy King. Horror fans may think the movie is average, but you are bound to learn a few things from the commentary.

Body Bags is a horror anthology film that was intended as a pilot for a Tales from the Crypt knock-off TV series. Thankfully, that series never came to pass. Now it serves as a curiosity for fans of the two big directors attached, John Carpenter and Tobe Hooper. Both Carpenter and Hooper were past their primes by the time this film aired, though Carpenter had substantially more gas left in the tank than Hooper. Body Bags provides further proof of this fact. It features three stories; the first two directed by Carpenter, the last directed by Hooper.

Right from the start, the obvious attempt to mimic Tales from the Crypt is evident as we are greeted by a ghoulish-looking coroner who presents the film's stories. The coroner is played by John Carpenter himself, who tries his cackling best to emulate the Cryptkeeper from Tales. Carpenter's acting here is atrocious and it would come as no surprise to me if the TV execs who watched this pilot turned it off within minutes due to this opening.

"The Gas Station" is about a new attendant (Alex Datcher) on the night shift at a gas station who is stalked by a escaped killer. The second story, "Hair," is about a man (Stacy Keach) obsessed with his thinning hair. So obsessed he is willing to try an experimental treatment. It works too well, however, as his hair won't stop growing. The last story is called "Eye." It's about a baseball player (Mark Hamill) who loses his eye in a car accident. He's given a new eye in an experimental surgery and, you guessed it, the eye belonged to a murderer. And what's this? Now the killer's spirit is taking over his whole body and making him want to kill! This was such an original story....in the 1920s or '30s. The film ends but not before Carpenter does some more schtick as the coroner character, including a bad twist.

The first story is easily the best and has touches of classic Carpenter. The second story is passable despite the lame twist ending that is telegraphed early on. The third story is another derivative Hands of Orlac story. It was done many times before 1993 and at least a few times since. Hooper seems more concerned with shock scenes and gore than building any kind of suspense. Truly a mess. The movie's only merits are in the Carpenter segments. Good score, tense direction, fun cameos from the likes of Wes Craven. The best I can say about the Hooper segment is that Mark Hamill did a decent job. Overall, it's a mixed bag film that gets worse as it goes along.

This was a pilot episode for a possible series on Showtime. Showtime wanted to spend less money on it, so the idea was aborted and John Carpenter continued to make feature films. All three episodes are packed with guest appearances and cameos by many great actors and horror directors. Performances in all of them are excellent and each episode has a different tone and style. The first is somewhat of a slasher. The second is a bizarre comedy with sci fi elements. Both of those were directed by John Carpenter. The third is the darkest and is directed by Tobe Hooper. Body Bags has a lot of actors that are very talented, but very underrated that normally don't get to do this type of stuff like Robert Carradine and Mark Hamill. Stacy Keach is always excellent as well and does great here. As far as I am concerned the Tales From The Crypt series on HBO is the best anthology horror there is. Body Bags would have made a good series and could have been able to compete with it if it could maintain this sort of quality. John Carpenter is the host of this show and has the right delivery and the right hair to keep up with The Cryptkeeper.

Three stories courtesy of John Carpenter and Tobe Hooper, sounds like it can't miss, right? The results are mixed, but pretty interesting all the same.

The Gas Station is vintage Carpenter. Here he maximizes the effect from a truly simple premise and creates a genuinely scary story. It's simple, but the final minutes are riddled with tension and general uneasiness. The best of the bunch.

Hair is a truly funny story with a terrific performance by Stacy Keach. It goes way over the top towards the end, but still, it's highly amusing for the most part.

Eye, the weakest of the three, due to it's complete and utter predictability and complete failure of generating any real chills. It's fun to see Hamill and it's pretty gory but that's about it.

One terrific story, one pretty good and one pretty bad, all in all, it's worth watching but it's nothing spectacular.