@William said:
This supernatural anthology approach was to some extent a British specialty, since it started with the great "Dead of Night" that was the inspiration for countless later productions.
It was; but actually take the production company Amicus that did Asylum. They were a couple of Yanks based in nothing more than a shed over at the Hammer complex. I think it was the Hammer complex. [*-)] - but it was definitely a shed.
Erik reminds me of Vinnie - haha. Vincent Price reinvented himself and no one could ham it like VP. One of the interesting features (including the great fun of Dr Phibes which we loved watching in the cinema when we were .......young) was the part Vincent Price played in a film called Witchfinder General. Shot over in Suffolk it's a great story in itself on the director (who was about 24) and the cast. The director didn't want Vincent - he actually wanted Donald Pleasance in the role. But in the end VP did the bizz as they say. Strange film.
Round that time he did another one with Diana Rigg. Forget the name but it was a sort of portmanteau of horror with a lot of humour. The humour aspect is very important otherwise any film can be mind bendingly boring. Even the most serious subjects - like say, WW1 had enormous amounts of humour in reality - so why not portray that in a film? Even Psycho is full of humour - albeit Hitchock's particular brand of personal weirdness.