Let's be realistic.

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Five men in an office building take take an elevator to the ground floor, only to find themselves ending up in the sub basement with no way out. To pass the time, all five tell a tale about their dreams in this poor follow up to Amicus's Tales From The Crypt. None of the stories told in this anthology measure up to the ones in the afore mentioned "Tales", although there are a few that I enjoyed. The first story, in which a murderous brother goes to visit his sister, where he ends up meeting a fitting end,and the third in which a man and woman on vacation in India debunk a magician, and then murder a rope charmer,and must deal with the dire consequences. This story also has what will probably be the WEIRDEST fight scene ever recorded. The best parts of the fourth story are where they show a vintage "Vault Of Horror" comic book, and a scene in where the main character is reading a novilization of the "Tales From The Crypt" movie! As is in most British horror movies of the time, the gore here is at a bare minimum. So if you're a gore hound, you're probably gonna walk away disappointed. What little gore there is, is quite obviously red paint or tomato juice. And despite the title.of the movie, there really isn't much horror in this movie. "The Vault Of Weird" would have been a more appropriate title. Unlike the previous production of Tales From The Crypt, most of the storied presented here just don't work.

Five stories taken from the old 1950s horror comics "Tales from the Crypt" and "Vault of Horror" with an excellent cast. This was originally R rated but has been cut to a PG now...and it hurts. The first is "Midnight Mess" starring brother and sister Daniel and Anna Massey. It involves vampires and has a funny (if gruesome) ending that is cut down to a freeze fame for the PG. The second is "The Neat Job" with Terry-Thomas driving wife Glynis Johns crazy--literally! A murder in this is also cut down to a freeze frame. Next up is Curt Jurgens in "This Trick'll Kill You" in which he pays dearly for killing and stealing a rope trick in India. Then we get "Bargain in Death" about a man being buried alive. Last is "Drawen and Quatered" with Tom Baker as an artist using voodoo to get his enemies. They're all well done with good actors but they're a little slow, the stupid editing is noticeable and hurts and the best one is the first--it's downhill after that. This was a followup to "Tales from the Crypt" which was a HUGE hit in 1972. This didn't replicate its success though. Horror fans will like this one.

Five men trapped in the basement vault of an office building share visions with each other of their demise. Stories revolve around vampires, bodily dismemberment, east Indian mysticism, an insurance scam, and an artist who kills by painting his victims' deaths....These sort of movies were ten-a-penny in the seventies, and in the US, this was released as a sequel to 'Tales from the Crypt'.As usual with these films that are stories that are really striking, and others that pale in comparison. The first and last stories are the strongest here, funny for all the wrong reasons (the vampire teeth, and Bakers beard), but still eerie enough to give you a chill.But this is where the problem lies, the three stories in the middle, while still good, pale in comparison, and you find yourself waiting for the next chapter.Thankfully, it has enough camp elements, even in the more slower stories to keep the viewer entertained. The segments between the stories are entertaining with the main characters giving each other a bit of 'hell',and the final speech, with Jurgens breaking the fourth wall, makes the film that little bit better.

An interesting horror anthology, with a more original approach than other similar movies."Midnight Mess" is a slightly odd story with a fun vampiric twist."The Neat Job" sticks out from all five for the simple reason that it doesn't have an evil protagonist who snuffs it, hence the only real flaw TVOH has. Terry-Thomas gets killed by his wife, his only "sin" having been that he occasionally lost his temper when she misplaced things around the house or wasn't neat enough. That's hardly a reason to throw him in the same egg-basket with the other four guys.An (un)intentionally amusing bit was when Terry-Thomas's "young wife" shows up. None other than Glynis Johns! Aged 50 anno 1973. Terry-Thomas was 62 years old, i.e. not exactly a large age difference (especially in movie la-la-land), thereby certainly not a case of a dirty-old-man plucking an innocent dyevochka straight from her crib. It's bizarre that we were set up for a young, trophy wife (or something of that nature, after all it's his friend's daughter he's married), but then we get this woman way past her youthful days. My question to the producers/writers: did you do this as a gag, or did you actually believe Johns, cute as she was even at that age, could possibly pass off as "young Eleanor"? Goofier yet, she is referred to as "young" by a man nearly half her age, and this is done without a speck of sarcasm."This Trick'll Kill You": Curt Jurgens, an evil magician, kills in order to get a magic Indian rope. Solid story, somewhat unusual."Bargain In Death" is a more straight-forward story of insurance fraud, with one predictable twist and one that is less predictable."Drawn & Quartered" is yet another voodoo tale, but fun. The inclusion of this story is somewhat puzzling. The artist does murder three people, but he does it out of revenge. No reasonably-minded intelligent down-to-Earth non-pacifist could possibly blame him for taking out those three guys, hence why the artist doesn't quite belong to the same "category of evil" as the narrators of the 1st, 3rd, and 4th stories.The "we're all dead and in Hell" end-twist isn't particularly original, as it's been done at least once, in a similar vein in "Dr.Terror's House of Horror" for one thing, but it neatly wraps up the movie. Well, "neatly" would be the word if it weren't for the obvious fact that the narrator of story 2, Terry-Thomas, wasn't a wicked murderer at all, and that narrator no.5 only acted out of (very justifiable) revenge, not greed. Don't three people who deliberately destroy the livelihood of one man (story 5) deserve to die? Not according to Christian and Marxist hypocrites they don't. Those left-wing film-makers and their twisted sense of morality, won't they ever stop with their claptrap.