PopHorror Let's Get Scared
Thursday: Theatre of Blood (1973) & Bitter Feast (2010)
It’s weird to say this as a writer for an online publication and a proponent of movie criticism, but I love movies about critics getting their lives ruined. This Thursday is going to be a celebration of the artists who put up with people like me with a one-two punch of Douglas Hickox’s Theatre of Blood and Joe Maggio’s Bitter Feast. What makes this double feature fun is that the premise is basically all these movies have in common. One is a classic, pure spectacle vendetta slasher with Vincent Price, while the other is a down-and-dirty indie flick with a lot of heart.
There couldn’t be much more to differentiate these movies, but at the same time, both involve artists (in Theatre of Blood, Vincent Price is a Shakespearean actor and in Bitter Feast, James Le Gros is a fine dining chef) using their art to torture and torment those that would dare to critique them. Theatre of Blood uses the tragic deaths of Shakespearean plays to create set-pieces that would make any Giallo and slasher fan happy. Bitter Feast uses food as a weapon of psychological warfare in ways that still gives me chills. This is a terrific double feature that should make Thursday’s dinner-and-a-movie perfect…or else.
