The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971)

Vincent Price horror/schlock vehicle set in 1925 London finds the awesome voiced one playing Dr. Anton Phibes, who is not a medical doctor but rather a wealthy and famous organist who has doctorates in music and theology. Dr. Phibes is presumed dead in a car accident which followed shortly on the death of his beloved wife Victoria Regina Phibes (an unaccredited Caroline Munro, appearing only in photographs). But years after his suspected demise Dr. Phibes returns from the dead to murder the nine member medical team who failed to save his wife in surgery. He dispatches the team via elaborate executions inspired by the Biblical ten plagues of the Book of Exodus, such as having one doctor stung to death by bees, a nurse eaten by locusts, that sort of thing. (A very similar premise in structural conceit is followed by the 1973 Price film Theater of Blood, where failed actor Price kills hostile critics through elaborate tortures inspired by Shakespeare's plays.)

Scotland Yard Inspector Harry Trout (Peter Jeffery) suspects that there must be some kind of connection in regards to this recent spike in highly ideocentric deaths of medical professionals, and eventually he tracks things back to the Victoria Phibes case, and enlists the aid of the chief surgeon there of Dr. Vesalius (Joseph Cotton). Phibes, Trout and Vesalius eventually have something of a final confrontation but Dr. P gets away paving the way for a sequel Dr. Phibes Rises Again released the next year. In the end Scotland Yard only manages to save the life of one of the nine, so congratulations to inspector Trout on figuring things out, but you still leave a lot to be desired in your execution, or more precisely your ability to prevent them. Oh well, maybe next film.

My one huge nit about this movie has to do with Dr. P's beautiful but silent assistant Vulnavia (Virginia North). It is never revealed where she came from, or how it is Dr. Phibes knows her. Now we do know that Dr. Phibes is using Vulnavia as his public face, as it were, in carrying out his cryptic plans, and that the doctor somehow funneled a large portion of his estate into her name following his supposed death. But where did she come from? Dr. Phibes is suppose to be obsessively in love with his late wife, so how come he had a pliant babe so handy when he despaired from the world. This would be an important plot point to know, but it is completely and unsatisfactory dropped by the filmmakers, resulting in my writing this paragraph long rant. Otherwise this movie is a mildly satisfying piece of Price horror camp. **1/2