Titreenp SERIOUSLY. This is what the crap Hollywood still puts out?

Palaest recommended

Ariella Broughton It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

Sarita Rafferty There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

Stephen Bird What in the name of sanity did I just watch? Basically "Trilogy of Terror" is a film with a very short runtime (1 hr 12 mins) that is broken up into three separate short stories, the main character in each is played by Karen Black. As the name suggests, these short stories are horror, or meant to be horror anyway, I found nothing from any of the stories to be particularly frightening, very camp and very lame is what they are. The first story, titled "Julie" is about a high school kid asking his English teacher out, she agrees to go to the drive-in movies with him, only to be drugged and photographed, then blackmailed..., this story takes a clever turn towards the end, if another word for clever was lame.The second story is about feuding sisters (both played by Karen Black, neither sisters share a scene together to get around that one), in what felt like a poor rip off of "Whatever happened to Baby Jane?", anyhow in the end with the help of some voodoo, the one sister is able to kill the other off, yawn, boring. The final story is the most famous one, as for how it's become so famous is absolutely beyond me..., is this pathetic tribal doll meant to be scary or something? The story and the 'fear-factor' is so camp it made me cringe, the first three quarters of the story is boring and nothing happens other than 'suspense building', you only get to see the doll in action for the last couple of minutes of the film, waste of time, and anything but scary!It's an awful film, or film's, or whatever you want to call it, B-movie horror films, probably C-movie actually..., this is obviously where the Simpson's drew their inspiration for the Treehouse of Horror episodes from, only the Simpson's long running versions are far superior than this load of tripe.

yjudith I watched this when i was 9 back when it first came out and really did scare the heck out of me!! It was so bad that I'd even relive the whole experience while playing with my friends and become scared inside. The only movie of the trilogy I remember is Amelia. Karen Black is not a good actress, Im sorry she's not, but she is just perfect for this role. I'd been telling my sons about this movie for years and Im impressed that I remembered it very accurately. Amelia purchases this doll from Africa and is told that there is an evil spirit trapped inside and that the key to keeping it in the doll is to NEVER remove the chain. She doesn't but somehow the chain falls off on its own. The rest of the movie is the doll trying to kill Amelia and like Chucky, Jason and Michael Myers this doll wont die. At the end the spirit is no longer in the doll, but in Amelia and she calls her mom (who she doesn't get along with) inviting her over for dinner. The final scene is of Amelia squatted down, razor teeth and all, with a huge knife in her hand, stabbing the floor with a wicked twist. Ha ha....good stuff!!!

loomis78-815-989034 Dan Curtis directs this TV movie with 3 stories from Richard Matheson and all three starring Karen Black. The first story is about a prudish school teacher named Julie (Black) who is blackmailed into an affair with a scheming student (Burton) of hers. At first Julie seems dominated and completely controlled until a final twist shows she had the upper hand all along. Black is terrific but the story is a bit slow moving and very TV quality. "Julie" is watchable but not entirely engaging. The middle segment is "Millicent and Therese" has Black playing a dual role as a woman with a severe split personality. The twist ending can be seen from the beginning and even though the cast is good, this one is pretty weak. The third story is "Amelia" and is the segment that has reached true Classic status. This terrifying tale traumatized many young horror enthusiasts on late night TV for decades. Black plays the title character who has bought a fierce looking doll known as a Zuni Fetish Doll for her boyfriend's birthday. The evil looking doll has the spirit of a native hunter being held within it by a gold chain. When the chain slips off the doll literally comes to life armed with a spear and a large kitchen knife. The doll chases and attacks Amelia all around her apartment in a struggle of life and death that reaches horror highs. This classic tale has suspense to burn and is relentless in the doll's bloody rampage. This thing just won't stop and the audience is in for the same terror the character goes through. Curtis sets up the final shot of the short and movie in chilling fashion. Amelia is believed to have defeated the doll and invites her mother over to her apartment. When she gets off the phone, we see that Amelia has been possessed by the doll's spirit and is waiting for her mother! This final image of Black banging a large knife into a wooden floor is the best moment in the entire film and chills the viewer long after. The overall anthology is uneven with the first two segments being watchable but unspectacular. But the final tale makes this must see viewing for any Horror fan.

poe426 Richard Matheson's PREY happens to be another of my favorite short stories (it's right up there with THE BIG SURPRISE, which was done as a fairly effective segment of NIGHT GALLERY, with John Carradine), and it makes one humdinger of a closing act in this trilogy. Every kid I knew could talk about nothing else the day after it aired; we relived the experience over and over. And we weren't the only ones who loved it: when the makers of GREMLINS needed inspiration, they fell back on Matheson's mini-masterpiece. It's understandable: it still holds up, after all these years... though I should point out that the score I've given this telemovie is for the PREY segment alone; the other two segments were less notable, in my ever-humble opinion. (Note: as a cabbie, I had a "regular" who tried to convince me once that she was someone else- her "twin sister," in fact- by donning a wig and acting differently, but I blew her cover when I asked to see her ID when she used a credit card to pay her fare. They're out there, folks...)