Moustroll Good movie but grossly overrated

Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Fleur Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

super marauder When I found out this was a Clive Barker story I expected a lot of sex and gore, so I was prepared. What I wasn't prepared for was a good story.It takes place in the late 1700s or early 1800s in a non-specific place in early America. A grieving gentleman speaking old English very well comes to a house to see a woman who is rumored to be a necromancer. He begs her to bring back his wife from the dead, but she tells him to be sure that's what he really wants. After he says yes, she agrees if he would sit down and listen to her story about Ernst Haeckel.Ernst is a physician who believes in science above all else. Not only does he want to save lives, he wants to bring people back from the dead. (There is a great Frankenstien reference here!). After hearing that his father is dying, he begins a journey to be by his side. He spends the night at an older gentleman's cottage only to find that he has a beautiful younger wife.I'm skipping some broad strokes here because this because I feel this a very warm story about true love with a horror element.As a movie it is very well acted, the costumes and sets give it that old world feel. And yes! There is sex in it but I myself don't feel it's trashy and done only for shock value. It has a point.In the end, for me it's an old fashioned campfire story that that I enjoy. And coming from the mind of Clive Barker, I'm very surprised! There is a good story here.

Vic_max The first 2/3 of this movie is really well done. It plays out like any solid fantasy/horror movie would. When it has to wrap things up, it starts to falter. Given the state of horror movies these days, however, having a good first 40 minutes seems like a significant accomplishment.The story is about a man who goes to an old woman (a "necromancer") in an effort to raise his recently deceased wife. She warns him that before she does so, she must hear a story about a medical student named Haeckel from many years ago. The movie then picks up with the story of Haeckel.Everything is done really well - the atmosphere, acting, storyline, etc. Unfortunately, in the last 20 minutes the story tries to inject more horror elements. It doesn't work and the story gets progressively worst and the characters less believable. (In fairness to Clive Barker, I'm willing to believe story probably worked well in print).Many horror fans will find this step above most horror movies because of the nice setup - see it if that is good enough for you.

ThrownMuse John McNaughton's MOH entry is one of the more disjointed ones. It concerns a man who goes to witch doctor to see if she can revive his dead wife. She tells him the tale of a man named Haeckel, a Frankenstein type who was obsessed with making life out of death. That is, until one day he's traveling to visit his dying father and ends up staying with a woman with zombiephilia. It's refreshing to see an episode that's a period piece, but the lack of a cohesive story structure really hinders it. I would have liked to have seen more Clive Barker (who wrote the short story one which the episode is based) and less Mick Garris (who adapted it.) It is a fairly nasty episode and there are a few effective scare scenes. The ending is really gross and silly in a good way, but perhaps I only took at as that because everything that came before it was somewhat dull.

julian kennedy Masters of Horror: John McNaughton: Haeckel's Tale: 7 out of 10: Can one justify seeing a rather pedestrian one hour episode simply because a gorgeous woman has one of the most bizarre and erotic sex scenes near the films "climax"? I'm certainly going to try.First the pedestrian stuff. This is an historical horror movie, all horse drawn carriages and talk of electricity. It's nice for a change of pace and is well done here.The films main character is that old chestnut "a man of science". He is trying to replicate Victor Frankenstein's experiments and is instead setting corpses on fire. The movie takes a very unexpected turn as he is summoned to his dying father and precedes on a leisurely peregrination kind of like that the gay character takes in As Good As It Gets.On his jaunt he runs into a Necromancer that raise people from the dead for a fee who is very well played by Coen favorite Jon Polito (A cheap talented Danny DeVito). Man of science is curious but disparages the hocus pocus mystical explanation of the necromancers skills.The movie continues to meander much like the main character until he ends up at the house of a weird old man and his too young and beautiful wife. This is where my patience with the film paid off.Leela Savasta made such an impression on me I immediately want to see the rest of her films… both of them. Heck I want to buy an office block in Vancouver. (She sells Canadian real estate as well as acting and modeling). Yes I turned from bemused viewer to gushing fan boy almost immediately.So in conclusion movie is decent albeit slow and Savasta will make a man leave his wife and travel a continent and buy a small affordable Canadian strip mall. Or at the very least see that new Black Christmas remake.