One of eight horror portmanteau films that Amicus made over a fifteen year period. None of them are anywhere near the class or quality of Ealing's Dead Of Night, but they all manage to charm greatly.
The truth of the matter is that they're all a little campy nowadays, often in ways that wasn't originally intended. Sure, 1973's Vault Of Horror with its voodoo artists and vampire cafés was bordering on spoof, but the perversely-named Torture Garden is quite a serious work at heart.
The question is, over forty years later, how seriously can you take telepathic psychotic cats, haunted killer pianos, android actors and "the shears of fate"? The best elements of the film are Burgess Meredith's musings on the nature of time and the final segment with Palance and Cushing as obsessive Poe collectors. In all, not something you'd watch to be genuinely scared, but something you'd watch with a friend and a glass of wine to enjoy in an affectionate way... a film very much of its time.
The truth of the matter is that they're all a little campy nowadays, often in ways that wasn't originally intended. Sure, 1973's Vault Of Horror with its voodoo artists and vampire cafés was bordering on spoof, but the perversely-named Torture Garden is quite a serious work at heart.
The question is, over forty years later, how seriously can you take telepathic psychotic cats, haunted killer pianos, android actors and "the shears of fate"? The best elements of the film are Burgess Meredith's musings on the nature of time and the final segment with Palance and Cushing as obsessive Poe collectors. In all, not something you'd watch to be genuinely scared, but something you'd watch with a friend and a glass of wine to enjoy in an affectionate way... a film very much of its time.