If you're creepy and you know it, clap your hands!
Are you feeling the creeps?
The temperature has dropped, nights are longer. I have Autumn garlands up, pumpkins and bowls of candy everywhere. Gray gauze sheets hang over the living room curtains and a wax Hand of Glory sits on the coffee table, in case I need it.
Now let me tell you about something unusual I just saw: Karen Black doing a good job.
Trilogy of Terror
I'd never seen it before, but this is the movie that scared the beejeezus out of The Giant when he was a small lad just the size of a lamp post. I actually have a piece of artwork by James Owens based on this movie in my house, because when The Giant saw it he told Owens that the movie had traumatized him. And he wanted the print. Spoilers ahead.
I expected crap, though that's not a deal-breaker for me, I don't turn my nose up at crap as long as it's entertaining. It had all the great hallmarks of crap: a 1975 horror starring Karen Black and directed by Dan Curtis of Dark Shadows, a prime year in the careers of both. And it clocks in at just an hour and twelve minutes, which means made-for-tv crap!
I was surprised to see that all the stories were from Richard Matheson, and all the actors were very good character actors that you'd recognize if you watch old movies. It is a trilogy of stories (truth in advertising), with Black starring in each. First, as a dowdy college teacher who attracts the attention of a handsome student who keeps pressing her for a date. Nowadays his ass would be bounced out the doors, but 50 years ago his insistence was meant to be a compliment. He does turn out to be a predator, but Black gets to turn the tables, which is really what makes her happy. Interesting that the actor, Robert Burton, was Black's real husband at the time of filming.
Story two is predictable. A dowdy woman (again with the dowdy) invites her sister's handsome boyfriend over to warn him that the beautiful woman he's into is controlling him through witchcraft. He doesn't like what he's hearing and storms out. When we finally meet the sexy sister, she's brazen and wearing a cheap wig, and the same woman that warned off the boyfriend. She's being treated for a split personality.
The boyfriend is barely recognizable as a slim and blonde John Karlen, Cagney's chubby husband in the 80's Cagney & Lacey.
The third story, based on Matheson's Prey, is by far the stand-out because it's the craziest. A woman arrives at her apartment with an old box, which she opens. She pulls out a carved warrior standing about a foot tall with a set of teeth like a piranha and a spear. She sets it on the table and makes a dreaded call to her mother to tell her she can't make their regular night together as it's the new boyfriend's birthday. The carving is for him. She pleads with her mother to just let this one night go, but mom won't be put off and the woman is finally berated into canceling with the boyfriend. The woman hangs up and goes to take a shower, as we all do after fighting with Mom.
When she comes out, dressed in a bathrobe, she notices the carving isn't on the table and cheerfully hunts for it. Yes, she's alone, the thing isn't where she left it, and she giggles as she looks under the furniture.
G'head, guess what happens.
That little bastard chases her all over the apartment and gets in some deep bites, leaving her a bleeding mess as she races from room to room. She manages to barricade herself in a room while the carving pokes under the door with a knife. But she's never safe for long, because this supposedly antique Zuni warrior carving (which looks nothing like actual Zuni work) goes hilariously berserk before it attacks, shaking like a paint-mixer and making a noise very similar to a Tasmanian Devil. Black is doing some admirable acting, but that blood-hungry wooden carving steals the show.
They end up in the kitchen, where Black triumphs by throwing the warrior into the oven and slamming the door. He howls as he catches fire, then goes silent. Black is surrounded by smoke coming from the oven but she's too curious and opens the door to look. She's hit in the face by a black cloud.
She calls her boyfriend and tells him to come over. Turning towards the camera, she smiles and her teeth are like a piranha's. She squats down by the front door, banging a large knife on the floor while she waits.
Spooky Booky
Compulsion
by Meyer Levin
1956
Two brilliant eighteen year-olds, Judd Steiner and Artie Strauss, having graduated from the University of Chicago already, are bored and looking for something interesting to do with themselves. They're the sons of millionaires and live a life of luxury in a wealthy area of the city, and though they are close, there are differences. Artie is one of the most popular boys on campus and has a reputation with the girls. Many see his relationship with Judd as one of pity for the small, weird boy whom no one else likes.
When the young son of another neighbor is found murdered and stuffed in a drainage pipe, Artie can't stop himself from taking part in the investigation. He leads newspaper reporters to the clues, even blurts out how he would have done it. He knows everything because he and Judd committed the murder. The arrest and trial of the two boys reveals their bizarre relationship and the fact that they murdered for no other reason than to have the experience and see if they could get away with it.
This is an account of the Leopold and Loeb murder case of the 1920's, when two wealthy boys murdered another local boy. Levin, a former war correspondent and newspaper reporter, had worked on the actual case. They were defended by Clarence Darrow, represented here as the character of Jonathan Wilk. This fictionalization of the true crime delves into the minds of the young murderers using the languages of psychology. There's also some surprisingly graphic language and images, considering this book was published in 1956.
Levin wrote from the perspective of Sid Silver, a classmate of the killers and cub reporter to one of the major newspapers. The book has a tone of both sympathy for the waste of three lives while giving the honest facts of the callousness of the murderers.
Scare Scale: 2.5. The writing is so engrossing and makes this one highly recommended. It's long, but you won't be sorry.
The Grey Lady Ghost
In Evansville, Indiana stands the Willard Library, the oldest public library in the state. It's a Victorian Gothic of red brick and white trim, the perfect home for what is believed to be at least one ghost, the most famous ghost in Indiana, so this story has a lot going for it. The specter appears to visitors and employees alike as an older woman dressed in grey Victorian clothing. People have reported that she's accompanied by the unpleasant odor of heavy perfume and cold spots. She pulls books out, turns bathroom faucets on, plays with the elevator and makes lights flicker. But sometimes she just walks up and down the stairs scaring the crap out of people.
Willard Carpenter, originally from Vermont, was a successful businessman in the real estate market and was instrumental in the first railroad service to the town. Since he was casual enough to put his first name rather than last on his library, we'll continue to call him Willard here. Feel free.
Willard had dreams of founding a Willard College, but he wasn't filthy rich, just regular rich, so he set his sights on a public library. The timeline goes by quickly: construction began in 1877, Willard died in 1883, construction finished in 1884, and the library opened to the public in 1885. He had decreed that the library be open to everyone regardless of gender or race. But Willard was known for being both civic-minded and remarkably stubborn. While his home was a stop on the Underground Railroad, he left the majority of his money to the library rather than his three children. His middle child, Louise, incurred her father's wrath by marrying a man Willard didn't like. Louise had inherited her father's stubbornness but would rather have had the cash. She sued the library's Board of Trustees for a portion of the library's holdings and the property, claiming that her father wasn't of sound mind when he built the library. She lost the case and it infuriated her.
You might expect Willard himself to be the ghost of his own library, especially since he actually helped in the construction, which may have triggered the stroke that killed him, but it seems that when Louise the Furious died in 1908 at the advanced age of fifty-five, she decided she would occupy the property she felt she'd been cheated of as a final act of revenge. Yes, Louise is the most likely source for The Grey Lady, proving that rage is a great source of energy.
The first reported sighting was by a custodian working in the basement in 1937. Over a course of days he saw a woman dressed in grey clothing standing in the basement with him. After several sightings, he quit his job. Since then The Grey Lady has been spotted all over the library, though she shows a clear preference for the children's areas. And she's retained her powerful personality. Patrons have reported being touched by an invisible hand, with one librarian saying that her hair was brushed aside, while in the 1970's, the head librarian, a woman named Margaret Maier, had an even worse incident. The library was undergoing renovation and Maier stopped by to have a look at the progress when she found herself looking at The Grey Lady. Maier fled, but the next day she reported that The Grey Lady had appeared to her son in the Maier home.
The Grey Lady is by far the most famous of the library ghosts, but she isn't alone. There are reports and video footage of something called “The Dark Mass” that seems to move as a shadow.
The Willard Library installed ghostcams in several areas years ago. You can check in any time and see if you spot its ghostly inhabitants, as several viewers have caught something roaming the building.
Willard website with cams:
https://www.willardghost.com/
Tour around the library and listen to the librarians tell you what The Grey Lady has gotten up to: