Tales That Witness Madness
| Tales That Witness Madness | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical Film Poster | |
| Directed by | Freddie Francis |
| Written by | Jennifer Jayne (as Jay Fairbank) |
| Produced by | Norman Priggen |
| Starring | Donald Pleasence Joan Collins Kim Novak Jack Hawkins |
| Cinematography | Norman Warwick |
| Edited by | Bernard Gribble |
| Music by | Bernard Ebbinghouse |
Production company | World Film Services |
| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
Release date |
|
Running time | 90 minutes |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
Tales That Witness Madness is a 1973 British anthology horror film produced by Norman Priggen, directed by veteran horror director Freddie Francis, written by actress Jennifer Jayne.
The film was one of several in a series of
Plot
In the Clinic link episodes, Dr Tremayne (
In Mr Tiger, Paul (Russell Lewis) is the sensitive and introverted young son of constantly bickering parents Sam (Donald Houston) and Fay Patterson (Georgia Brown). Amid the unhappy domestic situation, Paul befriends an "imaginary" tiger.
In Penny Farthing, antique store owner Timothy (
In Mel, Brian Thompson (Michael Jayston) brings home an old dead tree, which he lovingly calls Mel, mounting it in his modern home as a bizarre piece of found object art. He increasingly shows unusual attention to Mel, angering his jealous wife Bella (Joan Collins).
In Luau, an ambitious literary agent, Auriol Pageant (
In the Epilogue, Tremayne watches as manifestations of the patients' histories materialise. Nicholas cannot see the manifestations and has Tremayne declared insane, apparently for believing the patients' bizarre accounts. Nicholas enters the patient holding area, and is killed by "Mr Tiger".
Cast
- Segment "Clinic Link Episodes"
- Jack Hawkins - Dr Nicholas
- Donald Pleasence - Dr Tremayne
- Charles Gray - Nicholas (segment "Clinic Link Episodes") (voice) (uncredited)
- Segment "Mr Tiger"
- Georgia Brown - Fay
- Donald Houston - Sam
- Russell Lewis - Paul
- David Wood - Tutor
- Segment "Penny Farthing"
- Suzy Kendall - Ann Beatrice
- Peter McEnery - Timothy
- Neil Kennedy - 1st Removal Man
- Richard Connaught - 2nd Removal Man
- Beth Morris - Polly
- Frank Forsyth - Uncle Albert
- Segment "Mel"
- Joan Collins - Bella
- Michael Jayston - Brian
- Segment "Luau"
- Kim Novak - Auriol
- Michael Petrovitch - Kimo
- Mary Tamm - Ginny
- Lesley Nunnerley - Vera
- Leon Lissek - Keoki
- Zohra Sehgal - Malia (as Zohra Segal)
Production
Tales That Witness Madness was filmed at
Kim Novak broke a four-year hiatus from films with her appearance in Tales. She replaced Rita Hayworth shortly after production started.[3]
Francis said "we made this film which I took it as far away from horror as I could, because it really wasn't a horror film." However when Frank Yablans, who financed, saw it, he said "well it's not a horror film. I said well it wasn't a horror script. He said oh Jesus I don't read scripts. So I don't know where you go from there. So we then had to shoot for another few days to try and make a non-horror film into a horror film. It still wasn't a bad film though."[4]
Evaluation
The Encyclopedia of Horror writes that the film "avoids farce and develops a nicely deadpan style of humour which is ably sustained by the excellent cast in which only Novak appears unable to hit the right note."[3] Kim Newman in Nightmare Movies calls the film "unreleasable".
References
- ^ Ed. Allan Bryce, Amicus: The Studio That Dripped Blood, Stray Cat Publishing, 2000 p 93
- ^ Binion, Cavett. "AllMovie | Movies and Films Database | Movie Search, Ratings, Photos, Recommendations, and Reviews". AllMovie.
- ^ ISBN 0-7064-2771-8p 284
- ^ "Interview with Freddie Francis". British Entertainment History Project. 1993–1994.
