Tales from the Grave, Volume 2: Happy Holidays (2005)

Tales from the Grave, Volume 2: Happy Holidays (2005)
Director: Stephanie Beaton
Stars: Felicia Lambreton, Leo Fenwick and Thomas Crnkovich

I have a couple of books containing short stories centering on the holidays. For the most part they’re pretty much a mixed bag. One story will be great followed by one that’s just okay followed by a complete stinker.

When it comes to Horror Anthology movies, this is often times the same case. Well I didn’t have that problem with this film; you see ALL the shorts were so inept they were equally as bad as the first and everyone to follow. I actually had a sigh of relief when the credits rolled I didn’t think I could take much more.

Tales from the Grave, Vol.2: Happy Holidays is a shot on video horror anthology that tries very hard to pay homage to, or outright rip off Tales from the Crypt. The movie starts out with our narrator “The Old Crone.” I’m guessing this is supposed to be like the Crypt Keeper, I truthfully can’t tell you though because these scenes are so poorly lit The Old Crone’s face is obscured by darkness.

What I could tell is that, audio was latter dubbed in at a different time. This is painfully obviously as the lip movement is so out of synch with the audio that sounds off camera.

The Old Crone setups the stories with a little witty commentary then we are jetted away to the segment by viewing into her crystal ball via a video effect that looks like it was achieved using analog video equipment 10 years older than the release date of this movie.

The segments themselves are a few notches better in production value than the Old Crone scenes used to frame it all. Unfortunately the stories written for each segment are so poorly unimaginative and lack any kind of real atmosphere, chilling effect, “gotcha moments”,   or even feeling of nostalgia often felt in episodes of Tales from the Crypt.

This particular volume is paired with Tales from the Grave vol.1 on a totally misleading DVD titled: “Grindhouse Double Feature: Horror - Tales from the Grave/Tales from the Grave 2.” I say misleading because these craptastic SOV collections don’t have a damn thing to do with Grindhouses or even the New Wave of Grindhouse features being churned out.

Final thoughts, I thought the idea was smashing. A Horror Anthology based around Holidays, but good or even decent execution is totally lacking in every department. Not exactly how I envisioned the kick off to my Schlocktober Fest Halloween marathon, but you take the good with the bad.