BLACK SABBATH
(aka The Three Faces of Fear)
Italian
1963; distributed in the U.S. in 1964
Directed by Mario Bava

Ready for one of the most chilling sequences in all of horrordom? Witness “The Drop of Water,” the third of three fine tales from this masterful Italian horror trilogy featuring Boris Karloff, who introduces each segment and stars in “The Wurdulak.” In “The Drop …” we meet a nurse (Jacqueline Pierreux) whose greed comes back to haunt her in the form of a dead woman whose ring she’s stolen. Director Bava’s talent for lighting and composition lends the story its spooky, gothic atmosphere. But it’s the dead woman’s twisted, grimacing face that elevates the tale to the stuff of nightmares. Particularly chilling is a scene in which the nurse closes the woman’s eyes, only to turn back moments later and find them open again. Bava purists may cry heresy, but the American-International release of the film—which added a new soundtrack and score (by Les Baxter) plus new intros by Karloff, and re-ordered the segments and drastically re-edited “The Telephone” (see below)—actually enhances the spook-factor of “The Drop…” Sound effects (ghostly wails, water drops) play a major role in the nurse’s final, fatal encounter with the dead woman, and the revised, American soundtrack is simply more convincing.
“The Telephone” is the film’s least interesting segment, and also it’s most markedly altered for U.S. release. In Bava’s original rendition (which placed the segment first), a party girl (sexy Michele Mercier) receives repeated phoned-in death threats from her deranged ex-boyfriend Frank after dumping him for a female lover. Predictably, AIP balked at the lesbian subtext, turning the women into rivals for Frank’s affection. But the distributor also turned madman into a ghost, calling from beyond the grave. Thus, a seamy, giallo-esque tale becomes a straight ghost story, perhaps more in keeping with the supernatural theme of the other two segments, but, unfortunately, decidedly less edgy.
Black Sabbath’s centerpiece is “The Wurdulak,” in which Karloff stars as the ghoulish, vampiric Gorka. Again, Bava’s knack for eerie atmosphere—all mist, primary colors and shadows over gnarled trees and ancient, stone structures—comes to the fore. And Karloff’s performance is a knock-out, perhaps his last great work. The introduction of Gorka, who defiantly limps home after a five-day hunt for a bloodthirsty killer, is one of the film’s most powerful moments. Trouble is, the rest of his family suspects that he, like his prey, has become a wurdulak—a fiend that lusts after “the blood of those it loves best.” Bava plays the family’s dilemma for all it’s worth, as the grisled Gorka—the very picture of evil—calls for his young grandson to sit on his lap. (Stanley Kubrick would later pay homage to the scene, with similarly chilling results, in The Shining.) Gorka doesn’t keep the family waiting long, however, as he begins picking them off that very night. And when a traveling nobleman (Mark Damon) attempts to flee with Gorka’s super-foxy daughter Sdenka (Susy Andersen), we find that blood really is thicker than water.
Reported to be Bava’s favorite of his own films, Black Sabbath has become something of a classic among horror buffs, and is probably the director’s second-best-known work (after Black Sunday). It’s also the inspiration behind the moniker of the heavy-metal genre’s premiere band. But that, ladies and gents, is another story entirely.

–Undead Ned