Review of Spirits of the Dead (1968) by Jacob S — 26 Jul 2009

Felllini, Malle, and Vadim each adapt a lesser known Poe story in this omnibus film that feels less like a coherent whole and more like three completely distinct entities. Each of the film's is entertaining and well-directed in its own way, but Fellini's segment far outshines those by Vadim and Malle.

Vadim's "Metzengerstein" features Jane Fonda as a debauched and sadistic baroness who delights in orgies and torturing the population. Fonda sports alluring, space-age hippie, designer versions of historical garb, and Vadim loads his short film with opulence, color, and heavy doses of eroticism. Plus, seeing Jane Fonda pine after Peter Fonda is rather amusing. But ultimately, Vadim's film is little more than fluff--good looking fluff but fluff nonetheless.

Malle's adaptation of Poe's "William Wilson" fares a little better. Willliam Wilson is a doppleganger story akin to Dostoevsky's "The Double" and it is especially entertaining to watch Alain Delon square off in a card game against Bridgette Bardot. Ultimately, Malle does little that is interesting with the double plotline, but there are some surprising moments of cruelty and torture that add to the piece's overall "charm.".

Fellini's short film, "Toby Dammit" ( a "liberal" adaptation, to use Fellini's term, of Poe's "Never Bet the Devil Your Head") is another matter entirely--it is a brilliant masterpiece of short film that manages two feats that the other two shorts cannot: 1. It is genuinely stylish and original and 2.) it is actually creepy in parts. Fellini creates a surrealistic, carnivalesque atmosphere surrounding a British actor with a drinking problem's arrival in Rome to film an Italian film that reimagines the life of Jesus Christ as a Western. Including the most bizarre film award ceremony ever and a hallucinogenic Ferrari race through the nighttime streets of Rome, "Toby Dammit" never reveals whether its horrors are rea or merely the delusions of a drunkard. Still, it is a staggering forty minutes of cinema that shouldn't be missed by horror fans, Fellini fans, or fans of cinema in general.l.