Tales from the Hood

A tribute to movies like "Dr. Terror's House of Horrors" and "Tales from the Crypt", "Tales from the Hood" presents some horror vignettes centering on life in the black ghetto. Some drug dealers go to a funeral home to pick up their stuff, only to have the eccentric owner (Clarence Williams III) tell them about the fates of some recent customers...with a twist at the end. At once a fun horror flick and also warning about getting mixed up with the wrong people, this is a cool one. A particular scene in the fourth vignette appears to be a tribute to "A Clockwork Orange". All in all, a real credit for director Rusty Cundieff and executive producer Spike Lee.

Featuring Tom Wright (the hitchhiker in "Creepshow 2"), David Alan Grier, Corbin Bernsen and Rosalind Cash (in her final role).

An interesting, at times totally innovative take on the horror film genre. Three young black hoodlums go to a funeral home where a bizarre mortician (an eerie Williams) takes them on a tour and shares four terrifyingly twisted ghost stories. The first involving corrupt cops is routine and obvious; the second is a unique take on child abuse that is creative and fairly creepy; the third involving vengeful voodoo dolls is at times shocking, at times corny, but eerie and crafty in its own right; the fourth about gang violence and rehabilitation is highly imaginative and something to marvel at; the film's unique amalgam of horror and social commentary isn't always on target, but the special effects are convincing, and the performances rock solid, making this a fairly impressive showing for all those involved. **½

Not really scary of a movie, but this movie really did serve a good purpose. I noticed that the four stories in this movie touched on four topics in today's society: Domestic Violence(David Alan Grier, Brandon Hammond, Paul Jai Parker, Rusty Cundieff), Police Brutality(Anthony Griffith, Tom Wright, Michael Massee), Racism(Corbin Bernsen, Art Evans, Roger Guenveur Smith) and Black-on-black crime(Lamont Bentley, Joe Torry, De'Aundre Bonds, Samuel Monroe Jr., Ricky Harris). There is basically a message in all of them but the 4th story in this film was probably the best one. Not an unpredictable movie but not at all bad, and the ending was fantastic as well...

Tales From the Hood, another horror anthology film dripping with EC comics-style ghoulishness, strings together four stories told by a wild-haired, macabre funeral director (Clarence Williams III) to a trio of gangbangers seeking their missing drug stash in a mortuary. Virtually all of the tales are familiar -- walking corpses and voodoo dolls are staples of the format -- but director Rusty Cundieff makes every effort to inject the proceedings with social morality. Child abuse, racism, and police brutality each get a pretty heavy-handed treatment, but the last story, involving a voluntary "behavior modification" technique for an unrepentant killer (ala A Clockwork Orange) explodes off the screen. In the film's most powerful sequence, Cundieff serves up a quickly cut montage of unsettling images culled from a number of state historical archives depicting vicious, stomach-churning lynchings meant to deter the rapacious young killer from wanting to harm any more people. It's potent stuff, and makes one wish the rest of the film had this kind of intensity.

Yes, it's flawed, and it's cheesy, and it's over-the-top. It's equal parts clever satire, straight-up homage, and occasionally even a parody. There are many horror, exploitation, and black humor elements sprinkled throughout the movie. I just can't understand why this movie isn't beloved by more people. Maybe it's because the cast is mostly black, and the stories revolve around inner city, black youth? Well, as a white guy from the suburbs, I absolutely loved this movie. It's flawed, of course, but when it works, it works better than most other movies of this type.

If you're not familiar with it, this is a horror anthology highly influenced by Tales from the Crypt, an old 50s horror comic book series that birthed several spin-off movies and an influential TV series. It also takes ample inspiration from the Twilight Zone, Tales from the Dark Side, and Creepshow franchises. If you're a fan of any of these, I'd have to highly recommend Tales from the Hood, especially if you're also into Blaxploitation, from which it also takes some inspiration.

In the time honored tradition of horror/exploitation movies everywhere, the guilty are punished with gory deaths and lessons are learned (frequently too late). Is it preachy, didactic social satire? Perhaps, at times. But it's also entertaining as hell. It has a great cast, some really cheesy, over-top-the-top acting, and was produced by Spike Lee. For me, that makes it almost required viewing.