The Revenge of the 31 Days of Cheese Day 9 - The Abominable Dr. Phibes

Ah Vincent Price – not as big a ham as say Bela Lugosi, he still needed a lot of mustard to cover him. But one of the best things he ever did was 1971’s black comedy horror movie The Abominable Doctor Phibes.

Someone is killing medical folk in 1920’s London in bizarre ways – one is killed by a Mechanical Frog mask – another is killed by vampire bats (inside his own house hard to do). Then Terry Thomas is drained of blood. The Scotland yard man on the case Inspector Trout under a lot of pressure from his not very bright superior to solve the crimes uses a clue found at the blood draining crime to discover that 1) the crimes are all linked in theme to the biblical plagues of Egypt and that everybody who was killed all worked on the same operation –which resulted in the death of Victoria Phibes. However the most obvious suspect Mr. Phibes is dead – burned to death in a car crash.

Well not really of course – Phibes is alive but horribly burned – he puts make up so that he looks like well Vincent price but he can speak only with the help of a loudspeaker and he eats through a hole in his neck. inside his home he plays the organ while his beautiful assistant Vulnavia plot the deaths of the members of the surgical team. The only real mystery in this is who is Vulnavia – no real explanation is given she just helps out with the murders.

And die they do one after the other in elaborate and comically gruesome ways with the not quite hapless Inspector trout arriving just in time to see the result of Phibe’s handiwork. Trout is not stupid – that would be cheating and this movie – directed and per the IMDB vastly re-written by Robert Fuest who also directed some of the later Avengers TV shows doesn’t cheat like that. It’s all handled with a lot of British understatement and everybody body plays it dead straight which makes all the funnier. A comically grim highlight is where one of the victims has been killed by a brass unicorn head that has projected from across the street by a catapult (trust me here – Phibes would never be so common as to shoot someone). While trout and the rest of the police discuss what to do next we see the other side of the door. And the protruding unicorn horn. Which has a twist a bit like a corkscrew so to remove the body from the door they have unscrew the horn out – so there Trout and the officers, there is a creaking sound and then you see the legs spin about the edges of the door. Just Fantastic.

In the end all the folks are dead and there are only two plagues of Egypt left – one is the death of the first born and the other is darkness. Then in a scene that must have been in the back of the mind of the folks that created the Saw series – Phibes presents the chief surgeon with a challenge – he has chained his son to an operating table – the key has been surgically implanted near the boys’ heart. The Surgeon has 5 minutes to get the key out before an infernal machine pours acid all over the boy and gives him face like Phibes.

I won’t give away the ending – you really need to see this film. But it works very well.

There was a sequel a few years later but alas they were unable to catch lightning in a bottle again and while okay is not as wonderful as the first.

Enjoy with some toast and honey (watch the film you’ll understand)