Tales That Witness Madness (1973)

Truly Dreadful Film

Absolutely the worst movie.

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

In his private clinic Dr Tremayne (Donald Pleasance) tells his old friend Nicholas (Jack Hawkins) about four cases of mental aberration he has sold before reporting his findings to the authorities.A six year old boy, Paul (Russell Lewis), invents an imaginary friend, a tiger, in order to deal with the stress of living with his rowing parents, Fay (Georgia Brown) and Sam (Donald Houston). When they confront him about it it turns out that his imaginary friend is only too real and mauls them to death.An antiques dealer, Timothy (Peter McEnery), under the influence of an old painting with supernatural powers, is transported back to Victorian times where he meets his girlfriend's double.Brian (Michael Jayston) discovers a weird, human shaped tree called Mel, which he takes home and his wife, Bella (Joan Collins), gets jealous when he spends more time with it than her. She attempts to destroy Mel, but it attacks and kills her. After burying his wife in the woods,Brian gets into bed with Mel.An American literary agent, Auriol Pagent (Kim Novak), and her young daughter Ginny (Mary Tamm) unwittingly fall victim to ancient rituals and human sacrifice on a South Seas island.When Tremayne has finished revealing his research to Nicholas, his old friend dismisses him insane and has the wardens drag him off to the asylum. But, Nicholas, believing there to be no danger enters the room of the young Paul and is attacked by - yes, you've guessed it! - that tiger.No, not one of the Amicus portmanteau horror films that were successful throughout the sixties and early seventies despite a star cast and director Freddie Francis at the helm. It is a World Film Services production, the studio responsible for The Creeping Flesh who gave Francis the go ahead to make this - a personal project for the filmmaker - as they were impressed with his work on that film. Originally titled simply Witness Madness, it was scripted by the actress Jennifer Jayne who had appeared in Francis' Hammer psycho-thriller Hysteria and his Amicus compendium chiller Dr Terror's House Of Horrors. She would also go on to script the director's disastrous rock-horror musical Son Of Dracula, which starred Harry Nillson and Ringo Star as Merlin the Magician. Witness Madness was not originally meant to be a horror film but, on its completion, the studio insisted it should be and the director was forced to go and "horrify" it much to his dismay. Tales was added to the title in a bid to capitalize on the recent success of Francis' Tales From The Crypt. In the early 70's, Francis had a run of bad movies - The Creeping Flesh and Tales From The Crypt being the only exceptions - and they continued after this one with Craze and the aforementioned Son Of Dracula. These experiences would see Francis give up directing and return to working as a Cinematographer winning his second Oscar for Glory in 1989 and his last film would be The Straight Story in 1999.Three out of the four stories here are utterly dismal; unworthy of the stellar cast involved and directed by Francis with much more style than they deserved. In particular, the spectacle of Joan Collins getting worked up and jealous over her on screen husband Michael Jayston's infatuation with a tree is just plain ridiculous for words and you will not be able to help yourself but laugh all the way through it. The forth story, however, starring Kim Novak (she replaced Rita Hayworth just a short time after shooting began) is excellent, unsettling and directed in Francis' best Gothic style. His visual flair here is simply dazzling thanks in no measure to Norman Warwick's sparkling cinematography - in fact, the entire film is well lit - and a number of the set ups were evidently specifically designed to favor its Hollywood star who most of us remember for her superb performance in Hitchcock's masterpiece Vertigo.

Okay, I saw this when I was a youngster, late Seventies, it wasn't new then, already an old movie, shown as a midnight show. But it isn't midnight show material at all, not that I remember having any thoughts about that fact, no Sir, I was much too taken with Mary Tamm's long, shapely legs, thank you. Not that I knew the actress by name then, it was just, wow, that implied-nudity scene with the girl stepping out of her dress, barefoot, the calves... But decades later I needed a refresher course, I remembered the title, that it was actually a bummer notable mostly for the ridiculousness of a man falling in love with a demonic obviously if perversely feminine tree om which somebody carved out apparently 73W but actually it's an upside-down MEL. Much to my surprise, doing the research, downloading that bit, turns out it's ol' Alexis Lady DYNASTY herself back in her heyday (and look at those legs! red-painted toenails even! I'd never have thought... witchy Alexis you glamour doll! ) getting territorial with a tree and coming in a poor second.Anyway, recently saw Suzy Kendall in an episode of THE PERSUADERS!, "The Man In The Middle" and I just had to see more of that lovely, lovely girl, and when I found out on Wikipedia she was in TALES THAT WITNESS MADNESS I decided to go for seeing this old title on DVD, even though I had no recollection of her, bad sign.Was I disappointed. Was I! Small part, and she isn't nearly as great as in that episode where she was agent Kay Hunter, dream-girl deluxe. Two years later, still beautiful, but the gloss is gone, :( oh bummer. That's life.Oh for crying out loud take that tiger bit and you know what you can do with it---! Ditto for the two watchers. The Penny Farthing bit is blandly executed, of interest only because it is Suzy Kendall after all, even if a poor excuse of her abilities. The Joan Collins bit is kind of a classic. Sort of a Collector's Item in the true sense of the term, though I prefer my prize golden moments more glamorous, me being that RavenGlamDVDCollector guy with an eye for the chicks, but okay, DYNASTY fans won't believe Joan was ever in such dreck. Kinda hilariously good dreck but dreck none the less. As for the cannibalistic Luau bit, with that creepy old troll guy, I needn't explain my fascination with that one. Mary Tamm (who I hear is with us no more) was beautiful. Do I wanna see the butchery bits? Of bloody course not. Mary Tamm should have been in a decent movie, like Raquel Welch's FATHOM, if you catch my drift. :) Not this cut-up in a suitcase mess. Yuck! Anyway that meat looked yummy. I'm just saying.As for the bit on Wikipedia stating the opinion that Kim Novak gave the only weak performance, I think it's based on the first sight of the character, who appears shell-shocked. She is supposed to be that way. So, unfair comment, by people that never even paid attention.Make no mistake that this is very very off-beat and in many ways an embarrassment to watch. Especially the tiger and old bicycle bit. The trunk bit is such a hoot anybody could be forgiven for stooping so low as to watch it. As for the disturbing last segment, Mary Tamm has nice legs so okay I won't pursue that one any further. But at least I can now, almost four decades later, appreciate her in instant replay, freeze frame and slow motion. Isn't technology grand?Absolute junk but still a treasure trove.

Tales That Witness Madness (1973) ** (out of 4) In a futuristic asylum, Dr. Tremayne (Donald Pleasence) is talking to another doctor (Jack Hawkins) about four of his most troubled patients. As they're each introduced we hear their story of how they went mad. Up first we have a young boy who has an imaginary friend who just happens to be a tiger but his mother doesn't believe him. Up next is a man who owns an antique shop and goes back in time due to a penny-farthing bike. The third story involves a man who finds a human-shaped tree and brings it home, which doesn't sit well with his wife. The final story involves a man who needs a human sacrifice to protect the soul of his mother. TALES THAT WITNESS MADNESS was directed by Freddie Francis and was just one of many anthology tales that were released during this era. While none of the four stories are awful, it's quite clear that none of them are very good either. The biggest problem is that all four stories just never reach a very interesting level and the majority of the time you're just sitting there not really caring what's going on. With that said, each story usually has at least one or two good parts no matter how bland the rest is. The fourth story is probably the weakest but there's a murder sequence that is quite brutal. The third story is laughable but there's a tree attack sequence that really seems to have been lifted by THE EVIL DEAD years later. The film does feature a pretty good cast, including Joan Collins but in the end not even they can save the material. There's no question that this was trying to get in on the TALES FROM THE CRYPT craze but it's too bad that the screenplay lets everyone down.

Creepy British movie has four scary tales about an invisible man eating tiger, a picture that comes alive, a tree that is alive and the last and worst one is about voodoo. Joan Collins is great as a woman fighting for her husband's affection over a tree! The tiger and the picture episodes are good too. Altogether a good creepy movie .