Satanic Cinema Movie of the Month

The Abominable Dr. Phibes

Color, 1971, 94 mins. Directed by Robert Fuest  / Starring Vincent Price (Dr. Phibes), Joseph Cotten (Dr. Vesalius), Virginia North (Vulnavia), Terry-Thomas (Dr. Longstreet), Sean Bury (Lem Vesalius), Peter Jeffrey (Trout), Susan Travers (Nurse Allen), Hugh Griffith (Rabbi), Ian Marter ( 3rd Policeman), Caroline Munro (uncredited, Victoria), David Hutcheson (Dr. Hedgepath), Edward Burnham (Dr. Dunwoody), Alex Scott (Dr. Hargreaves), Peter Gilmore (Dr. Kitaj), Maurice Kaufmann (Dr. Whitcombe), Derek Godfrey (Crow), Norman Jones (Sgt. Schenley), John Cater (Waverly), Alan Zipson (1rst Police Official), Dallas Adams (2nd Police Official),  James Grout (Sergeant), Barbara Keogh (Mrs. Frawley), Aubrey Woods (Goldsmith), Alister Williamson (1rst Policeman), Thomas Heathcoate (2nd Policeman), Julian Grant (4th Policeman), Charles Farrell (Chauffeur), John Franklyn (Graveyard Attendant), WalterHorsbrugh (Butler), John Laurie (Darrow) / Written by James Whiton and William Goldstein / Music by Basil Kirchin and Jack Nathan / Cinematography by Norman Warwick Format: DVD - MGM, VHS  - MGM, (Letterboxed (1.85:1) (16x9 enhanced) / Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono

With these words, vaudeville organist Dr. Anton Phibes (Vincent Price) vows revenge on the doctors he holds responsible for the death of his beloved wife, Victoria. And such stylish revenge it is, based upon the plagues visited upon Egypt in the Book of Exodus. The Plague of Frogs - one victim fitted at a fancy dress ball with a frog mask equipped with a vise that gradually tightens around and crushes his skull. The Plague of Hail - a victim frozen solid by an ice machine in the backseat of his car. The Plague of Blood - Terry-Thomas is slowly bled dry, pint by pint. And then there's the assisting nurse, covered in brussel sprout syrup and then eaten alive by a Plague of Locusts (yum)!

Inspector Trout of Scotland Yard is called in to investigate after a doctor is found bitten to death by a swarm of bats in his bedroom, with yet another stung to death in his library by a swarm of bees (The Plague of Boils). No sooner is victim #2 carted off to the morgue than victim #3 gets his skull crushed and a fourth gets bled dry while watching a blue movie. With no clue to a killer or motive, Trout tries to piece together the evidence, eventually being led to one Dr. Vesalius, who recalls only one case in which he worked simultaneously with all four victims, that of Victoria Regina Phibes. Yet Victoria Phibes died on the operating table, her husband, Dr. Anton Phibes, was in a fiery car crash en route to the hospital, and their remains are now interred, or so everyone thinks. Someone died in that wreck, but not Phibes, and his wife's body is safely stored in a sub-cellar of his house on Maldine Square. From here, Phibes, horribly disfigured and using an acoustical device plugged into his neck to speak, orchestrates his revenge on the surgical team who worked on his wife that fateful night, assisted by the beautiful, mute, mysterious Vulnavia.

As Trout and Vesalius struggle to discover the identity of the killer, the bodies continue to pile up. Victim #5 is found frozen in his car "in the bloody middle of nowhere." Victim #6 is skewered by a brass unicorn head (The Plague of Beasts) even as he is taken into protective custody. (And oh, what a time they have getting him unscrewed from the wall!) Victim #7 crashes his plane while being eaten by the Plague of Rats as Phibes watches through his telescope and applauds. By the time the police come to the incredible conclusion that Phibes is very much alive and responsible for the killings, only Vesalius and his nurse are left alive. Yet even police guards throughout the hospital cannot save her from Phibes's revenge, as Trout learns when he checks in on her and finds her locust covered skeleton lying on the bed. Vesalius believes himself safe since only the Death of the First Born is left, and he has an older brother. Only too late does he realize that the first born in danger is not himself but his own son.

At his ransacked house, Vesalius receives a call, "The organ plays til midnight." He must meet Phibes at the house on Maldine Square, alone, if he wishes to save his son. Vesalius arrives, with Trout and the police close behind, to find his son on an operating table shackled to the wall, the key to the chains imbedded near his heart, and a vat of acid ready to spill on his face in six minutes, the same amount of time Victoria Phibes lived during surgery. Phibes is willing to give Vesalius's son the same chance his wife had. Vesalius has six minutes to remove the key from his son's chest and free him, for as Phibes reveals while removing his mask, "When the acid reaches him, he will have a face - like mine!"

Vesalius struggles to perform the surgery which will save his son while Vulnavia begins destroying Phibes' headquarters with an ax, the police begin to search the house, and Phibes retreats to the sub-cellar where he has built a romantic crypt for two to house himself and his Victoria. Trout arrives in the operating theatre just as Vesalius removes the key and frees his son, and it is Vulnavia who becomes horribly burned by the acid. As for Phibes, he has consigned himself to the tenth and final plague, the Plague of Darkness. Sealed within the crypt, he injects himself with embalming fluid and prepares for his long sleep alongside his wife. Vesalius and his son are rushed to the hospital and the police, finding no trace of Phibes, shrug their shoulders and head back to HQ to file their reports. But from within the crypt comes a knowing chuckle. Dr. Phibes shall rise again...

The Abominable Dr. Phibes was one of American International's best and most successful films, and one of Vincent Price's best and most popular roles. It not only spawned a sequel, Dr. Phibes Rises Again, but its plot formula was also used again in yet another Price film, Theatre of Blood, with Diana Rigg as Price's fanatically dedicated assistant and the gorier plays of Shakespeare replacing the Biblical plagues as the inspirations for the killings. The art deco designs and cinematography combined to make it visually stunning, and its soundtrack incorporated such classics as "You Walked Out of A Dream" and "One More for the Road." And in what could have been an act of revenge for the deaths of Oz's Wicked Witches, "Over the Rainbow" found a new life as the diabolical Phibes' theme song. Some controversy did erupt in the eighties between the estate of "Rainbow" composer Harold Arlen and AIP over use of the song in both Phibes movies, and while the instrumental version used in the first movie remains intact, the second movie is now devoid of Vincent Price singing the lyrics at that film's end. Those who have never had the pleasure of hearing this original ending may hear it on the Special Edition Soundtrack CD available from Roger's Basement

The tongue-in -cheek dark humor and outlandish situations which make Phibes so appealing are courtesy of director Robert Fuest, creator of The Avengers and co-creator of the Phibes character. Fuest was a member of Anton LaVey's magic circle in the early sixties and a founding member of the Church of Satan, and in fact based the character of the organ-playing, cultured, flamboyant Anton Phibes in part on the organ-playing, cultured, flamboyant Anton LaVey (thanks to Richard Canino of Radio Free Satan for that bit of info). Victim Dr. Kitaj was played by Peter Gilmore, a High Priest of the Church of Satan who took over its operations following LaVey's death in 1997. The Abominable Dr. Phibes, therefore, is a truly satanic film.

Various performers in the movie should prove familiar to fans of British film and television. Peter Jeffreys appeared in one of the Tara King episodes of The Avengers, and he, Norman Jones, Dallas Adams, Aubrey Woods, and Edward Bernham all appeared numerous times on the popular Doctor Who science-fiction series. Bit player Ian Marter went on to spend one season as one of the many time-travelling companions of the erstwhile Doctor, and wrote several Doctor Who novels before his untimely death in 1986 from diabetic complications. Uncredited Caroline Munro appeared the following year in Dracula A.D. 1972, and became one of the horror queens of the twilight years of the Hammer studios. She went on to join the ranks of the Bond girls in The Spy Who Loved Me, and was cast to play the Doctor's companion in an unproduced Doctor Who movie in the mid-eighties. Virginia North had been a Bond girl prior to Phibes, appearing in 1969's On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

Recently The Abominable Dr. Phibes has been presented on the American Movie Classics cable network in a fresh, restored letter-boxed version which is also available on the current DVD release. The film is due for re-release on VHS in July of 2001.