Saturday

Today's the local Big Chili Cookoff, but I've decided to skip it. Two hours of defending my vegetarianism seems tedious. It's 70 degrees and sunny out, and I've come to think of this as chilly, too. Ah, fall: when the outside's the same temperature I keep the AC. Last night, after midnight, I watched The Comedy of Terrors (1964),* featuring a roll-call of movie legends: Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff, Basil Rathbone, and Rhubarb the cat. Price plays Trumbull, a despicable drunkard who endures a loveless marriage just so he can wrest control of a small-town New England funeral home from the ageing Mr. Hinchley, who he attempts to poison daily. The Hinchley and Trumbull undertaking is proving less lucrative lately (due to mismanagement, of course), and so they've engaged in a number of shady practices: Trumbull routinely reuses their lone coffin, dumping the deceased out into the grave once the mourners have gone home for the day. Also, they have taken to midnight rides into the countryside, drumming up business by killing themselves a few new customers and conveniently returning to collect them the next morning. But a year's worth of back rent is due, and they must step up their efforts; they choose as their next future client the attorney who is to serve their eviction notice. Once they return to the mortuary with the lawyer in the prized casket, however, the comedy is on them: the man is a cataleptic and will not stay dead. Stagy and often very funny, this movie offers an array of swanning virtuosity from its charming cast. They cleverly chew through scene after scene of nicely-textured environmental mood provided by master director Jacques Tourneur. Price is excellent, waxing petulantly florid as the outlandish malefactor Trumbull. Just good, wicked fun. [Cavin]