Tales that Witness Madness (1973)

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: Four tales of terror.

Directed by legendary cinematographer Freddie Francis, the film revolves around four stories where the protagonist is perceived as having gone mad, but in actuality it’s evil from another dimension that gets them to see or do odd things and in reality they’re the sane ones. The connecting element is Donald Pleasance who acts as their psychiatrist who keeps them at his clinic in an effort to improve their mental state. In the first story we have a boy named Paul (Russell Lewis) who boasts about having a live tiger in his room even though his parents (Donald Houston, Georgia Brown) don’t believe him. The second story deals with Timothy (Peter McEnery) an antique collector who’s able to ride an old Penny Farthing bicycle that allows him to go back into time and inhabit another man’s body. The third tale deals with a man (Michael Jayston) who brings home a dead tree and mounts it in his living room much to the annoyance of his wife (Joan Collins). The final story is about a rich socialite (Kim Novak) who courts a younger man only for him to have show more interest in her beautiful daughter (Mary Tamm).

This Review Contains Spoilers!

The first story is pretty weak mainly because you presume going in that there’s probably, despite the long odds, some sort of tiger present because after all this is a horror movie dealing with the supernatural, so seeing the parents getting attacked at the end isn’t surprising, or even shocking and you’re pretty much just waiting for it to happen from the get-go. Director Francis makes the mistake of attempting to film the attack as it happens by editing in stock footage of a tiger and mannequin parts with red paint standing in for the parent’s bodies, but it all looks quite fake. Since the tiger figures in again at the very end of the movie a better idea would’ve been to keep it a mystery whether he existed, or it was just a homicidal child that had killed his mom and dad. When the parents walked into the son’s room the camera should’ve remained outside in the hall and the viewer hearing their screams, which would’ve been scarier than anemic special effects that we ultimately do see.

The second story is limp as well as it features a picture of ‘Uncle Albert’ whose facial expressions and eyes are constantly moving and changing, which has been parodied in many other films making this one seem more campy than scarry. The third tale is dumb too as anyone who brings a dead tree into their living room and wants to keep it there is mentally ill and the wife would’ve been smart to have left him versus fight for his affections. The twist here is no surprise either as I saw it coming right from the start though Collins does give a good performance and the viewer gets treated to a shot of her breasts although I suspect it was done by a body double.

The fourth segment is the only one that merits any type of mention as it features the bad guys not only killing the daughter, but slicing her up and then serving her to the mother as a piece of ham during a Hawaiian-style luau. The audacious idea deserves some points and Novak’s performance is fun as is Tamm’s in her film debut, who you also get to see nude from the backside, but it fails to make up for the rest of it, which isn’t up to par with the other British Anthology horror films from that period.

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Released: October 31, 1973

Runtime: 1 Hour 30 Minutes

Rated R

Director: Freddie Francis

Studio: Paramount

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, YouTube