TALES FROM THE HOOD (1995)

Studio:       Scream Factory
Director:    Rusty Cundieff
Writer:       Rusty Cundieff, Darin Scott
Producer:  Darin Scott
Stars:     Corbin Bernsen, Lamont Bentley, De’aundre Bonds, Rosalind Cash, Anthony Griffith, David Alan Grier, Brandon Hammond, Wings Hauser, Michael Massee, Sam Monroe, Joe Torry, Clarence Williams III, Tom Wright

Review Score:

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Summary:

A mysterious mortician tells four horror stories of corrupt cops, domestic abuse, a racist politician, and gang violence.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

WELCOME TO MY MORTUARY – Gangbangers Bulldog, Ball, and Stack come to Simms Funeral Home to retrieve a hidden drug stash being held by mortician Mr. Simms. Over the course of the evening, Mr. Simms takes the trio through the house and tells them tales involving several of the corpses.

ROGUE COP REVELATION – Rookie police officer Clarence witnesses white cops Strom and Billy viciously assaulting civil rights activist Martin Ezekiel Moorehouse during a traffic stop. Clarence considers taking action, but is talked out of it by his partner Newton. Strom and Billy later murder Martin and disgrace his legacy by framing him to look like a drug abuser.

Following Martin’s death, Clarence quits the force as his guilt propels him into a spiral of drinking and depression. Hearing a voice in his head telling him to bring the cops to Martin, Clarence arranges a confrontation with Strom, Billy, and Newton at Martin’s grave in the cemetery.

To taunt Clarence, Strom urinates on Martin’s tombstone. Strom then forces Billy to do the same. As Strom and Newton prepare to execute Clarence, Martin’s arm suddenly pulls Billy into the ground. Martin rises from his grave holding Billy’s beating heart while Billy’s body takes Martin’s place in the coffin.

Strom and Newton flee in their patrol car and Martin follows. Martin pulls Strom’s head off his body. Newton fires at Martin and seemingly destroys him when the police car explodes.

Martin reappears before Newton and uses drug needles to supernaturally crucify the cop to a memorial mural of Martin. Newton melts into the wall and becomes part of the painting.

Afterward, Martin confronts Clarence over not preventing his murder. Clarence ends up in a straightjacket in a padded cell, having been institutionalized for killing the three cops.

BOYS DO GET BRUISED – Schoolteacher Richard Garvey discovers bruises on new student Walter Johnson. Walter claims a monster beats him, although Richard comes to suspect someone in his home is abusing Walter.

Walter draws a picture of the monster as well as a picture of class bully Tyrone. Walter tells Richard that he believes he can defeat the monster by destroying an illustration of it. Walter crumples the picture of Tyrone and Tyrone suddenly falls down a staircase at recess, breaking both arms and both legs.

Richard goes to Walter’s house to speak to his mother Sissy about Walter’s monster and the drawing. Walter’s stepfather Carl comes home, interjects in the discussion, and curtly dismisses Richard from the house.

Carl goes upstairs to Walter’s room and angrily confronts the boy about having drawn him as a monster. Sissy tries protecting Walter, but she is beaten and whipped by Carl. Richard hears her screams from his car and rushes back inside.

Richard and Carl fight in the kitchen until Carl ends up beating the teacher. Sissy moves to stop Carl again, but he wrests a frying pan away from Sissy and prepares to strike her with it.

Walter begins folding and crumpling his drawing of the monster. Carl’s body contorts until he collapses into a broken mess on the floor and dies. After Sissy asks what they will do about the body, Richard has Walter burn the crumpled picture on the stove. Carl’s broken body becomes a charred corpse.

KKK COMEUPPANCE – Community leaders protest against former Ku Klux Klan member Duke Metzger, a candidate for governor, for running his campaign out of the notorious Wilkes Manor plantation house. Duke explains to his image consultant Rhodie Willis that original owner Nathan Wilkes massacred all of his slaves upon hearing news that they would be freed following the end of the Civil War. Legend has it that, to put the slaves’ spirits to rest, voodoo woman Miss Cobbs transferred their souls into small dolls that reportedly remain somewhere in the house.

While rehearsing strategy, Rhodie trips over a doll on the floor and dies after tumbling down a staircase. Duke begins seeing the doll all over the property, and notices that one of the dolls is missing from a mural of Miss Cobbs with her creations.

The doll continues tormenting Duke until Duke pins it to a dartboard and destroys it with a rifle. Duke revisits the mural in the house and sees that even more dolls are missing.

The first doll reconstitutes itself and attacks Duke again. Duke sees that all of the dolls are gone from the painting as he is swarmed by a horde of them that bite and devour his body. Miss Cobbs disappears from the painting and materializes in the room to oversee Duke’s death.

HARD CORE CONVERT – Jerome ‘Crazy K’ Johns is wounded in a shootout with three rival gangbangers. Police arrive and have a gunfight with the shooters. Jerome survives the encounter, but goes to prison for life.

Dr. Cushing has Jerome transferred to a secret lab where she conducts a social experiment. Jerome is hooked up to a gyropsychomodulator machine and forced to look at imagery of murdered black men. He then begins confronting bloody visions of the black people he murdered. Dr. Cushing challenges Jerome to acknowledge the violence he committed against his own race, but Jerome remains resolutely defiant.

It is revealed that Jerome hallucinated the entire ordeal while bleeding to death from his gunshot wound. Bulldog, Ball, and Stack are revealed to be his killers.

WELCOME TO MY MORTUARY (continued) – With their crime exposed, Bulldog pulls a gun on Mr. Simms and demands he take everyone to the stash. Mr. Simms brings the trio into the basement where they confront their own corpses in three caskets. Mr. Simms explains that Jerome’s crew killed Bulldog, Ball, and Stack in retaliation for Jerome’s murder. Mr. Simms welcomes the three gangbangers to Hell before morphing into a demon.

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Review:

With its practical effects, matte paintings, and stop-motion animation, the production values of “Tales from the Hood” definitely date the movie to the era in which it was made.  Its content on the other hand, most certainly does not.

Director Rusty Cundieff and producer Darin Scott co-wrote their socially conscious horror anthology under the influence of Rodney King’s beating, Jesse Helms’ reelection, and rising gang culture issues that deeply impacted black communities at the time.  Now I am writing this review in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement, Donald Trump’s presidency, and a staggering homicide rate that has Chicago on its heels.

It’s ridiculously depressing to compare those parallels and realize names change, but stories remain the same.  The scariest thing about “Tales from the Hood” is that despite being two decades removed from its 1995 theatrical debut, its subtext about corrupt authorities, domestic abuse, racist politicians, and urban violence is as relevant now as it was then.

“Tales from the Hood” isn’t just crafty about fashioning a fright film from timely topics that could be taboo to tap for entertainment.  While striking the necessary notes for its wide range of commentaries, “Tales from the Hood” pays equal attention to spanning an extensive scope of horror hooks that include monsters, murder, a mad scientist, vengeful ghosts, even killer dolls.  Cundieff and Scott have their fingers on the pulse of the public as well as on the entire genre itself.

Clarence Williams III plays horror host Mr. Simms, a mysterious mortician telling tales of the corpses adorning his funeral parlor to three wayward hoodlums.  Williams’ weirdly wide-eyed stare and Shatner-esque rasp set the overall atmosphere right off the bat.  “Tales from the Hood” is serious about its stories, yet there is a tinge of campiness squaring its style in an EC Comics tone.

The first standalone segment, “Rogue Cop Revelation,” involves white cops beating a civil rights leader to death, and a black rookie riddled with guilt over not doing enough to stop it.  The film’s Gaines/Feldstein influence is in full effect here, culminating in a climax featuring a comeuppance courtesy of a wronged zombie and a final twist ensuring an unhappy ending for the protagonist too.  This is textbook “Tales from the Crypt” storytelling and “Tales from the Hood” has it down pat.

Cundieff and Scott’s screenplay is made brilliant by how broad it is thematically.  “Tales from the Hood” has much to say about black social issues specifically, yet it isn’t superficially focused solely on racial divisions.

“Boys Do Get Bruised” concerns Walter, a battered boy who insists a monster at home regularly beats him, although his teacher suspects someone human is to blame.  The tale takes place in an urban setting, except its topic of a dysfunctional family in a broken home is accessible outside of the environment depicted.  This particular problem isn’t determined by race.  It’s a community issue that is widely relatable.

David Alan Grier, known best at the time for his comedic contributions to “In Living Color,” is excellently cast against type as an abusive powder keg who longs to have his fuse lit.  One of the anthology’s strong suits is its smart sense of how to layer humor without undermining horror, a technique well evidenced here.  Grier’s attacks are reprehensibly awful, but an air in the approach of how he is played and how Cundieff directs him permit occasional laughs to relieve the tension.

This is also the case for “KKK Comeuppance.”  Corbin Bernsen’s racist politician, an ex-Klansman running for governor, is irredeemably vile.  His hate is in every self-assured sneer and the spittle of each unflattering epithet.  However, Cundieff has Bernsen give him a buffoonish tint that makes him a comically appealing caricature.

“Tales from the Hood” is neck deep in hard subject matter that can come across far nastier in another context.  What you come to realize is that conceits and effects that initially appear cheesy are actually constructed to let you laugh and to cheer without becoming mired in the material’s darkness.

If animated puppets didn’t bite at Corbin Bernsen’s flesh, tone would be far less enjoyable and far more terrible.  If a reanimated corpse didn’t have a glowing green crack pipe in its ribcage when taking revenge on abusive cops, the brutality of racially motivated murder would consume the mood.  “Tales from the Hood” knows it needs a little levity, and it hones that edge expertly.

Every anthology has a lesser entry, and “Hard Core Convert” fits that bill here.  “Tales from the Hood” tackles black on black crime in this story of an unrepentant gangbanger forced to face the long history of murdered men to which he helped contribute.

“Hard Core Convert” doesn’t quite know what message it means to impart with its payoff, seemingly satisfied to identify the issue and then not truly evolve a character or story around its concept.  The greater purpose appears to be setting up a transition back to the wraparound to tie everything together.

The strength of the other three stories and the demented delirium of the framing device give “Tales from the Hood” leeway to indulge in one underwhelming effort.  As a total package, the anthology is top of the line in tone, intent, and enjoyment.

Rusty Cundieff, Darin Scott, and a visibly committed cast created something special, and it’s a small shame that their film didn’t birth a perennial series.  Though the greater shame is that a chief reason “Tales from the Hood” ages so well is because society isn’t moving fast enough to improve the complex issues the film addresses.

Review Score:  85

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Scream Factory Collector’s Edition: Scream Factory’s reputation for outstanding high-definition transfers makes discussion of presentation moot.  If anything, the Blu-ray looks ‘too good,’ as seams in effects or the space between a pulled punch and a flopping actor are more visible because of crisp video.

Packaging earns additional kudos for its reversible cover.  As excellent as Joel Robinson’s colorful collage is for the updated art, it’s nice to have the option of flipping over to the distinctive poster image of a gold-toothed skull in sunglasses.

Welcome to Hell – The Making of Tales from the Hood: An all-new hour-long mini-documentary is the highlight of the disc’s Special Features.  There isn’t anything by way of behind-the-scenes footage, however.  Supplemented by contextual clips from the film, “Welcome to Hell” edits together a series of sit-down interviews with director Rusty Cundieff, producer Darin Scott, a handful of FX people, and actors Corbin Bernsen, Wings Hauser, and Anthony Griffith.  This means most of the minutes are weighted toward “Rogue Cop Revelation” and “KKK Comeuppance,” as there aren’t any other cast members on hand to dish about the other two stories or wraparound.

It’s disappointing that we don’t get to catch up with folks like Clarence Williams III or David Alan Grier.  But several secrets are shared about the various makeup teams that worked on each segment, along with interesting insight about the true story behind “Boys Do Get Bruised,” among other anecdotes.

Audio Commentary with Director Rusty Cundieff: The box mistakenly mentions that commentary also includes producer/co-writer Darin Scott, but Scott actually isn’t on the track.  Cundieff goes it alone for 98 minutes and frankly, it’s a dull director’s commentary.  It’s too bad because Cundieff becomes visibly animated several times when paired with Scott in their “Making Of” interview.  He’s missing that energy on his solo audio track however, leaving his commentary to trail off in a monotone that is light on essential trivia or revelatory information.

Additional Special Features: Aside from standard inclusions such as a trailer and TV spots, a five-minute vintage featurette is the only notable bullet point here.  It’s mostly made up of clips and too short to have replay value.  But it’s the closest thing there is to on-set footage and brief reflections from Williams, Grier, executive producer Spike Lee, and others.

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