Deadtime Stories: Volume 1

George A. Romero Presents Deadtime Stories Volume 1 (2009) is currently available on Amazon Prime. This picture is comprised of three short stories that are presented and concluded with narration by legend George A. Romero. The three short stories are about headhunters, mermaids and werewolves. Each segment in this film has a different director - Michael Fischa (Death Spa), Jeff Monahan (Corpsing) and Tom Savini (Night of the Living Dead, 1990). This picture stars Marty Schiff (Dawn of the Dead), Antone Pagán (Stripes), Kristin Slaysman (Skincare), Bingo O'Malley (Out of the Furnace) and Nick Mancuso (Under Siege). These three short films are all fairly mediocre but they do get better as the film progresses. The head hunter story was fairly straight forward with some cool special effects but bad CGI. The mermaid film was entertaining and fun to watch unfold. They did a good job creating the mermaids. The werewolf film was probably the best with a smart storyline and great ending. Overall this is a below average addition to the genre but not a waste of time completely. I would score this a 4/10 but recommend seeing it once.

Deadtime Stories 2 has a few highlight moments, but the presentation has a 'made in my high school film class' feel to it. I'd recommend this to someone who has run out of horror movies to watch, but otherwise it's a pass. In the first story, I really liked the idea they presented. It's genuine and creepy, and is something that if done properly is quite terrifying. However, the presentation was way to simple, visually it looks like a spoof film or some amateur attempt. The scene with the bat is just laughable, and not in a good way. One thing that really stands out in these short movies is how much time and money they spent just on the gore effects. The effects are not very realistic, but unsettling nonetheless. The second story was by far the most terrifying. I don't understand the strong motives for the girl to kill herself, seemed like an unrealistic jump, but it made for some spooky/scary reveals in the classroom. I had a good time watching this one. The third story was a failure. Bad story (mars dust that cures cancer? what?) which inevitable turns into a zombie movie at the end. Not great and I'm not a big fan of throwing sex/nudity in there just to spice up an otherwise useless movie. Overall I rated 4/10. Worth the first 2 stories if you've seen everything else already.

I characterize George Romero's post-Creepshow output the same way that I do Lucio Fulci's post Manhattan Baby output, except that, you know, I actually like some of what Fulci did. His films feel like a man struggling for relevance, falling back on outdated tropes and the same old, same old one more time. But man, as rough as Fulci's life got, he never started a middling anthology film off with absolutely dreadful dialogue like ""Now I lay me down to rest, but there's a goblin upon my chest. He's grey and ugly and very gory and he wants to tell me a deadtime story." For shame. The first film has three stories: Valley of the Shadow, in which a woman takes people into the jungle on a cursed trip to find her missing husband); Wet, the story of digging up a mermaid and Housecall, which has a doctor visit a boy who claims to be a vampire. At least Tom Savini directed the last story and tried. The rest of this, put together by Michael Fischa (My Mom's A Werewolf) and Jeff Monhahan, who appeared in Romero's films Two Evil Eyes and Bruiser, made me question just how bad movies can be and I just spent a week watching every Bruno Mattei film I could get my hands on. I really hope that Romero at least got some money for these films, because I see no reason that he should be involved in these pictures. I struggled to get through these. Don't make the same error that I did.

Trailer—Deadtime Stories