So I do love this movie and consider it a classic, but I also have kind of mixed feelings on it too because I only love two of the four stories as well as the memorable little wraparound with Dan Ackroyd as some kind of chatty monster. I see what they were driving at but I really don't like Kick the Can by Spielberg because I find it horribly sappy and sentimental to the point of being cheesy, despite the earnest warm acting of the late great Scatman Crothers, and the one with the racist man I don't like for several reasons, one of which is probably obvious to anybody that's heard of this movie's horrible tragedy that for some makes it something of a lamentable movie and fair enough I can see why, but I don't feel like that, I prefer to enjoy the movie for the parts of it that I feel genuinely hold up and are more than enough to make it a good anthology. It's a real tie for me between the third and fourth stories but I do especially get a kick out of Joe Dante's tale, I think it's some of the best work he ever did, I just love that wonderfully offbeat and sinister tone and how the surrealistic aspects of the story start out small and gradually grow more alarming as the tension just rises as you along with Helen wonder just what the hell is going on with this bizarre strained family and their not-quite-right household! The visuals and set design are so excellently eerie and unnatural, like there's something artificial about it all, with the overly colourful lighting styles, deep shadows and odd angles of the twisted house and the downright creepily 'happy' family, setting such a great mood that I just love a lot. It builds up the atmosphere very well with creepy little touches until we eventually get to the nightmarish lunacy of freakish cartoons made flesh!! I love Nancy Cartwright as the scowling, chubby and very unfortunate indeed Ethel who tries little all-powerful Anthony's patience and finds herself condemned to terrifying cartoon hell for eternity, perhaps ironic or something given the real path her career went in! They all turned on poor Ethel so fast!! I really loved the performance of the kid who played Anthony, he had just the right note of vulnerability yet ominousness to him that a child who wielded such an unfathomable reality warping power would probably have. He may have taken a group of strangers prisoner to act as his fake family but at heart he's not an evil boy, he just wanted someone to love him and dare to tell him no, and I love the sunny ending and the way the mood changes as he uses his amazing powers in a more positive way. A Terrific and wonderfully weird short that I find absorbing from start to finish. And then there's the final segment, a remake of Nightmare at 20,000 Feet which I love just as much but in a totally different way. The music score sets such a perfect mood and atmosphere as the wickedly playful violin themes drive everything along at a brisk pace that captures both the creepiness of the situation and the rising panic of the lead character. John Lithgow was so great in this, his sweating pale face and crazy expressions really say it all and he's often intense and hilarious at the same time and I find him captivating to watch as he makes the part of the movie memorable and awesome almost all by himself. The weirdness in this story comes from some of the more oddball passengers, particularly a scene-stealing little girl who was really funny. Can't be forgetting that awesome monster though, the effect of him still looks fantastic as you only really get one good clear look at it near the end, where it's almost cartoonishly malevolent as it as it gives that wry little smirk and finger wag that so clearly says that it would love to have fun with him and mangle him with its freaky clawed hands that can rend steel like butter, but just doesn't have the time as the plane nears civilization. I love the little sheen of slime that it leaves on his face after it lets him go, nice touch, also eww.. Whether it was a creature of nature or some kind of demon is tantalisingly unknown but it certainly had a nasty idea of fun! I do like the closing revelation but I don't know if it was a good idea to reveal the damage the creature did to the plane at the end, as the clear claw marks leave no argument that Mr Valentine just went mad with his own irrational fear of flying, the ambiguousness could have been more creepy. So in closing I love this movie and I think it deserves to be remembered for its best parts despite the real life tragic accident, it is an effective anthology that does justice to the classic series. X.
