Review – Black Sabbath

Sorry, kids. No Ozzy. This is an Italian anthology piece narrated by (and partially starring) Boris Karloff. Act One reminds us that if we’re charged with prepping the body of someone named Madame Zenovia (or really Madame Anything) for burial, it might be better not to steal jewelry from the corpse. Act Two pits a woman against the disembodied spirit of her dead brother, who keeps calling her up. In addition to more phone ringing than anyone should have to sit through in the course of an evening, we also get dialogue like “You’re dead! Don’t you understand? You’re dead!” Ah, but then we get Act Three, in which a family is devastated by a wurdalak, a Central European vampire that can only suck blood from loved ones. Karloff’s presence starts out as a plus, but then he has to deliver lines such as “Woman, can I not fondle my own grandson?” Overall this is another one of those inept productions that steadfastly eschews every possible opportunity to be clever or interesting. At least it helped spare us from the spectacle of songs such as “Iron Man” and “War Pigs” being performed by a band called Earth. See if desperate