Peter Cushing is a kindly(?) antique shop owner whose morally bankrupt clientèle gets more than they bargain for with each purchase in this moody, heavily psychological Amicus anthology. Directed, with varying degrees of success, by Kevin Connor.
THE GATE CRASHER: David Warner buys a mirror for a lot less than it's worth and pays for it when the ghoul living in it uses him to do his bidding. Featuring a very creepy séance and a standout performance by Warner. It's the scariest of the lot.
AN ACT OF KINDNESS: Ian Bannen gets involved with father/daughter act Donald and Angela Pleasence and they prove more than helpful in disposing of his shrew wife (Diana Dors). Bannen is excellent and the Pleasences are really outré. Dors, looking bloated and very blowsy, is a hoot as a lower class housewife.
THE ELEMENTAL: In the most comic of the group, Ian Carmichael finds he has an evil spirit (an "elemental") attached to his shoulder. He hires kooky clairvoyant Margaret Leighton to exorcise it. His wife, Nyree Dawn Porter, shows patience and a whole lot more. Carmichael is terrific and Leighton steals the show in very atypical performance. Normally the most restrained of actresses, she's seems to be channeling both Margaret Rutherford and Cruella DeVil at the same time.
THE DOOR: The dullest episode features Ian Ogilvy and Lesley-Ann Warren dealing with an especially intrusive ghost living behind the ornate door Ogilvy purchases from Cushing.
THE GATE CRASHER: David Warner buys a mirror for a lot less than it's worth and pays for it when the ghoul living in it uses him to do his bidding. Featuring a very creepy séance and a standout performance by Warner. It's the scariest of the lot.
AN ACT OF KINDNESS: Ian Bannen gets involved with father/daughter act Donald and Angela Pleasence and they prove more than helpful in disposing of his shrew wife (Diana Dors). Bannen is excellent and the Pleasences are really outré. Dors, looking bloated and very blowsy, is a hoot as a lower class housewife.
THE ELEMENTAL: In the most comic of the group, Ian Carmichael finds he has an evil spirit (an "elemental") attached to his shoulder. He hires kooky clairvoyant Margaret Leighton to exorcise it. His wife, Nyree Dawn Porter, shows patience and a whole lot more. Carmichael is terrific and Leighton steals the show in very atypical performance. Normally the most restrained of actresses, she's seems to be channeling both Margaret Rutherford and Cruella DeVil at the same time.
THE DOOR: The dullest episode features Ian Ogilvy and Lesley-Ann Warren dealing with an especially intrusive ghost living behind the ornate door Ogilvy purchases from Cushing.