Three B/W Films on Tubi
Tubi is my favorite streaming app. It’s free and reminds of the old PBS local station programming or UHF, you never know what will be on Tubi and it’s often grindhouse oriented stuff. So from time to time I like to recommend stuff on there because things don’t always stay on Tubi long.
The first recommendation is the Curse of the Demon from 1957. It’s a somewhat faithful adaptation of MR James’ The Casting of the Runes. This film is a wonderful example of mid 20th century horror that actually still is effective as horror. The old universal films are fun and campy now, same for most of the hammer films. You can see their greatness in acting and craft but they don’t work as horror really anymore, they feel so dated and almost cute. But this film doesn’t feel like that, you still get its seriousness. It’s probably not going to terrify anyone today but it is effective and creepy.
The next recommendation is by the Lovecraft society. They make some incredible stuff, mostly audio drama adaptations of HPL available on Audible. As far as I know they’ve only made two films and their first one was an adaption of HPL’s most famous story: The Call of Cthulhu. This isn’t a full feature, it doesn’t quite hit an hour. And it’s a silent film. They are trying to make something that felt period appropriate for when HPL was still kicking around. It’s quite fun and very well done.
The last recommendation is the only other film the Lovecraft society has made. This one is a feature adaptation of The Whisperer in Darkness. It goes quite a bit beyond the original story though. It’s faithful up till the halfway mark then it gives quite a bit more than HPL did. It’s also a lot of fun. Not silent like Cthulhu but still feels like it has more in common with that era than modern films.
These movies would make an epic movie night for fans of Horror, retro vibes, and good movies. Check them out while they’re still on Tubi.