Considering I am critiquing a film where the main character kills off his critics after they issued him poor reviews, I must confess I loved the film. (No, seriously, I did, and here’s why.) The work presents Shakespeare in a modern, however Gothic, light while Vincent Price, in his favorite role of his career, epitomizes the central concepts contained in a highly original, engaging screenplay laden with black humor.
Edward Lionheart (Vincent Price), having been denied The London Theatre’s Critic Award after pouring his heart and soul into an entire season of Shakespeare roles which fully merited their malicious reviews because Edward doesn’t house the critical acumen to understand, no less breathe new life into, the roles, confronts his critics before diving off the balcony of a high rise apartment building into the Thames. He is found, still clutching the award which he believed to be his birthright, by a group of homeless derelicts. After two years, being presumed dead even though his body was never found, Edward enacts his fatal season once again, this time he selecting only the scenes which involve grizzly murders, placing the London Critics at their core.
For those familiar with Shakespeare, you can look forward to scenes from Julius Caesar, Troillus and Cressida, Cymbeline, The Merchant of Venice, Hamlet, Richard III, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, Henry VI Part I, Titus Andronicus, and King Lear. For those disinterested in the Bard, the work might very well spark one’s curiosity because it depicts Shakespeare at his most wicked (which isn’t to say that gratuitous violence is the essence of Billy S. but that the imagination involved in creating such diverse, ghastly killings serves as an indicator as to what the playwright offered).
Now, there are obviously two manners in which to view the film. The head of the critic’s circle, Peregrine Devlin (Ian Hendry), states that only Edward would have the temerity to rewrite Shakespeare, which is what, in actuality, Anthony Greville-Bell does with his screenplay. Yet, the shear inventiveness in which Shakespeare is modernized is, at times, ingenious (especially when we see that Edward has yet to enact Titus Andronicus, the Bard’s bloodiest work, because there is a menagerie of murders he could select from and the one he does opt for is cleverly rewarding). I will hand it to Greville-Bell for realizing that by rewriting Shakespeare, he had the good sense to do so with tongue planted firmly in cheek, intentionally taking high-brow culture and bringing it down to the lowest common denominator, knowing that the work would otherwise come off as trite and pretentious if taken seriously. Thus, Greville-Bell eludes the criticism uttered by Devlin in a paradoxical, yet hilarious, manner.
There are two primary themes in the film: the critic’s duty and the ethics involved in the craft of criticism and the idea that the deaths contained in Shakespeare, or any work for that matter, would possess an entirely different import if they were literally enacted during the performance. Would anyone stop to notice the acting or merely anticipate the next death? Now, allow me to wax a little philosophical here for a moment and state that one could argue that this is exactly what happens in society: Everyone is too preoccupied with their own survival and well-being to bother noticing those extraneous figures which do not immediately involve them.
To return to the former theme, Edward lambastes one critic for taking his role too lightly because a reviewer serves as a social litmus in most cases in how to read and receive a work of art. As a consequence, artists are made and broken daily at the waft of a critic’s pen. Yes, the role of reviewer is an ethical one which, as highlighted in the film, perhaps far too many conveniently dismiss for the greater glory of being a writer. My humble opinion concerning this cannot be better stated than by the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius, “Pay no attention to what the critics say. Remember, a statue has never been set up in honor of a critic!” How many film critics readily come to mind? Roger Ebert, James Berardinelli, Tim Dirks, Leonard Maltin, and Horror Bob. Now, how many directors, actors, and screenwriters can you name without thinking? This is not to imply that criticism is the default resort for would-be or failed artists–film criticism can be an art form in and of itself. Rather, Theatre of Blood serves as a reminder that without art, the critic would not exist and, out of due respect, critics need to be aware of this at all times. Yet how many critics, even after watching a work such as Theatre of Blood, employ any form of reverence when engaging in the craft? Greville-Bell leaves the film on a highly cynical note for Delvin reiterates his initial evaluation of Lionheart in lieu of the fact that he narrowly eluded death due to his haphazard, abrasive assessments of Edward.
There are two notes I will add before closing. Yes, those that liked The Abominable Dr. Phibes will enjoy Theatre of Blood because the revenge premise and the lead (which has female assistants in both films as well) are the same yet the latter is more carefully thought out and better structured. Secondly, those who think Se7en was wholly original need to backtrack to this work, if not Phibes, which predated the Fincher masterpiece by twenty-two years and twenty-four respectively (for trivia purposes, the police agents assigned to their respective cases in Theatre of Blood and Se7en resort to condensed studies of the literary works involved in hopes of better understanding the murders).
The film is enjoyable because it prompts many, many ideas concerning art, houses Vincent Price at the height of his career, provides the narrative framework for some of the greatest works in contemporary horror, and revisits of one of the greatest writers of all time in a less-than-serious, yet highly creative, manner.
-Egregious Gurnow
- Interview with J.R. Bookwalter - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Andrew J. Rausch - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Rick Popko and Dan West - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Director Stevan Mena (Malevolence) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Screenwriter Jeffery Reddick (Day of the Dead 2007) - January 22, 2015
- Teleconference interview with Mick Garris (Masters of Horror) - January 22, 2015
- A Day at the Morgue with Corri English (Unrest) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Writer/Director Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned, Aftermath) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actress Thora Birch (Dark Corners, The Hole, American Beauty) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actor Jason Behr, Plus Skinwalkers Press Coverage - January 22, 2015
