Tales from the Hood (1995)

"This isn't a funeral home...this is HELL!"

From 1991-1994 I lived in Earlington, KY. A strange town actually. You were either white and had money, or you were black and didn't have much; this resulting in the "E-Town gangs" happening at the time. Well, I was white and didn't have the amenities that my white peers had. I wasn't destitute, but the richies didn't want me hanging around. Besides, I was a weirdo; that was a double whammy. Needless to say, I fell in with the black kids and related to them more than the white kids. I was a metalhead hanging out with gangsta rap girls. I was accepted by them and would even find myself getting into things that they were into - including early '90s gangsta rap. Yep. I'm guilty of owning The Chronic and Doggystyle, even getting in trouble with my friends by Mrs. Shockley while rapping Gin and Juice in the library. Memories...!

When Tales from the Hood came out in late '95, I had already developed a love for blaxploitation flicks and all forms of black entertainment. Though this movie does not necessarily fall under the category of blaxploitation, it's close enough for me. It's blaxploitation mixed with a little horror comic influence and you have yourself a nice anthology film that maybe even Hammer and Amicus would enjoy. Or at least take notice. Directed by Rusty Cundieff, whose resume includes Chappelle's Show and writer for the second segment of House Party, also co-wrote the script and stars in the second segment Boys Do Get Bruised. Executive produced by Spike Lee, this film was definitely a product of its time and makes the perfect time piece for someone like me who enjoys everything that went into making this entertaining gem of a movie, which was often lambasted by critics with harsh, negative reviews. Eh. What do they know?

The title of the movie is reminiscent of Tales from the Crypt and shares the same impetus which is basically a horror anthology where assholes get their comeuppance and tons of people die, or are already dead. The movie begins with Welcome to My Mortuary - three gangsta dope dealers arrive at Simms Funeral Home where they're looking to get "the shit" from Mr. Simms himself. Mr. Simms is an odd fellow, perfectly portrayed by Clarence Williams III, and instead of getting down to business, he starts showing these three guys random bodies in their caskets and tells their stories. Thus, we have our movie...

Rogue Cop Revelation 

A black cop rookie on his first night on the job witnesses the wrongful murder of Martin Moorehouse (Tom Wright), a black rights activist who promoted the cleanup of city streets from drug dealers and police malfeasance. While the white cops are beating Moorehouse to death, Clarence who has just ran a scan on his licence plate numbers tries to stop them and informs them of who Moorehouse is. This scene is rough. Not only is it reminiscent of the horrible Rodney King beatings, but a song plays softly in the background to heighten the depressive mood - Billie Holiday's Strange Fruit, a song about lynchings with disturbing lyrics such as "black bodies swinging" and "bulging eyes and twisted mouths". A fitting song but very unsettling. Later in the car, Clarence tries to tell his partner that the other two cops should be reported for what they've done. Thinking that they're escorting Moorehouse to the hospital to get help, Clarence finds that they are actually driving him to a pier to place him back into his car to inject him with heroine, making it look like Moorehouse was a hypocritical heroine addict. Ultimately they rig his car to go into the water, and off they go like nothing happened.

A year later, Clarence has bottomed out as a drunk with the heavy burden of guilt over what happened. As Clarence is out one night, he passes a mural of Moorehouse on the side of a building and he speaks to Clarence saying, "Bring them to me!". And so he does, leading the three cops into the cemetery where Moorehouse is buried. While pissing on his grave, one of the cops gets pulled down onto the headstone by his dick and his head is bashed in. Cool. He is then pulled down into the ground and a few seconds later the coffin bursts open revealing the cop's dead body. Moorehouse stands over the grave with the cop's beating heart in his hands. Cool.

Next is an awesome chase scene where Moorehouse is keeping up with the cop car as they're fleeing away from the cemetery. Wings Hauser, playing one of the culprit cops, gets his head pulled off and the car crashes. Cool. The other cop is losing his mind and wanders into the alley where Moorehouse's mural is painted. As he's trying to get away from the vengeful corpse he starts to yell, "WE KILLED YOU!!". Heroine needles start to jump off the ground into the air and penetrate him as he's running. Soon he is pinned to the mural painted wall and a needle goes into his mouth, causing him to become part of the mural. As Moorehouse questions Clarence why he wasn't there for him that night, the story comes to a close. We see Clarence mumbling to himself in a straight-jacket and orderlies locking him up in a padded cell.

Boys Do Get Bruised 

After the first story, Mr. Simms direct Stack, Ball, and Bulldog (the three dope dealers) to the next story which is a tale of a little boy named Walter Johnson (Brandon Hammond) living in an abusive household and telling his school teacher Mr. Garvy (Rusty Cundieff) that a monster is causing the bruises on his body. Mr. Garvy is not only concerned over Walter's household problems, but he takes notice to Walter suffering from a bully at school. While class is at recess, Mr. Garvy speaks to Walter about "the monster" and his school bully. Walter draws Tyrone, the bully, and tells the teacher that he was once told to draw the things that bothers him, so he does. While he crumples up the picture of Tyrone we hear a scream and the scene cuts to the young boy being carried away on a stretcher due to his arms and legs being broken. Though he fell on the stairs, the teachers think this is a bizarre tragedy.

Mr. Garvy goes to Walter's house to speak to his mother, Sissy (Paula Jai Parker) and while he's there Sissy's boyfriend Carl comes home. I have to interject here and say that Carl is played by the usually hilarious David Alan Grier, but in this role he is an ASSHOLE and does a great job of making "the monster" believable. Complete with a tattoo on his arm reading the word "monster". After Mr. Garvy is basically told to leave, he sits in the car and sees Carl's shadow beating both Walter and Sissy. Mr. Garvy goes back into the house and shit hits the fan, especially for the monster. Walter grabs the picture of the monster that he drew and starts bending, folding, crumpling, and twisting the image around causing Carl's body to end up in the floor as a twisted mass of flesh. Sissy stomps on the drawing, Walter burns it, and the mangled corpse is burnt.

Gotta love the effects in this one when David Allen Grier is getting his comeuppance!

KKK Comeuppance 

Corbin Bernson plays Duke Metger, a former KKK member running for senate. His campaign is designed to forget and forgive him for his past and to show the public that he has moved on from his old ways though the African and Jewish communities have protested that he is still a racist based on his office being set up at an old slave plantation which is said to be haunted by the souls of slaves and Hoodoo witch Miss Cobbs. Legend has it that she transferred the souls of the dead slaves to homemade dolls that she made. There is even a large painting still looming over the main room at the plantation and Duke can't resist calling the dolls "negros". He even says this to his assistant who is black. Ummmm..what a fool.

While putting together new promotions for his campaign, his assistant falls down the stairs to his death. Later while reviewing the tape, Duke finds that there was a doll at the head of the stairs which caused the fall. He destroys the doll but it does no good as it comes back and brings a legion of other dolls with him. As the dolls appear in physical form, they disappear from the painting on the wall. And after every doll has made it off the painting, so does Miss Cobbs. She sits in her rocking chair holding the first doll we saw while the rest of the dolls attack and kill Duke.

Reminiscent of the Amelia segment in Trilogy of Terror but definitely holds its own. There are some dragging parts in this episode, but it pays of in the end.


Hard-Core Convert

The final, and my favorite story tells of a gang member named Jerome "Krazy K" Johns violently played by Lamont Bentley. In the beginning of this segment we see Krazy K have a shootout with three guys in a car that he has just chased down. He gets shot and as the cops arrive he says to himself, "saved by the motherfucking cops". Saved? I guess...

Enter Rosalind Cash in her final movie role as Dr. Cushing. Nice name! Her goal is to basically go all A Clockwork Orange on his ass and show him just how fucked up he is. Her techniques are pretty amazing. As he waits to be "tested", she places him in a floor cell next to a white supremacist covered in white power tattoos. After he points out to Krazy K that they both kill black people, Dr. Cushing's motives are starting to become pretty clear. She wants to point out that Krazy K is doing just that - killing other black people and acting as if he is a black supremacist if you will.

Once Dr. Cushing has Krazy K strapped to her contraption she flashes images of black and white pictures of actual black lynchings and modern gangsta shoot outs. It's pretty disturbing and to top it off is Spice 1's song Born II Die playing (video at the foot of this blog) as the images splash across the screen. After this torture, Krazy K starts to have visions of the people he has killed and they're all asking him why he killed them. He starts to unravel and lose his mind and he refuses any remorse for his actions. Dr. Cushing warns him that this is what is doing him in - lack of emotion. Because of his resistance to healing himself, he is then back where he was in the beginning on the ground and getting shot by the three men who we then see is the three dope dealers hanging out in Mr. Simms' funeral home.

After this story is told, our pivotal tale with these three and Mr. Simms that we know as Welcome to My Mortuary comes full circle when Mr. Simms takes them to their reward which waits deep in the mortuary. He leads them to three closed caskets and they each stand by one opening them to reveal their own bodies inside. Mr. Simms tells them that some of Krazy K's boys came and shot them in retaliation. As he perfectly recites the lines, "This isn't a funeral home...this is HELL!" he transforms into Satan himself and flames engulf the three young men.

Unfortunately for me my VHS copy from when I taped it off HBO back in the day has long been gone and my DVD copy of this was stolen, so I have to be happy with a DVD burn of it. Hopefully there will be a decent official release one day with some cool bonus features on it. If you've never seen it, then seek it out somehow, some way. If you have seen it but it's been a while, then pay it a revisit. It's one that I enjoy from time to time, especially for Rosalind Cash's performance! And on that note, I will end this blog with a couple of my favorite pictures of her.

Here's Rosalind looking creepy in 1971's The Omega Man 

And here's Rosalind just simply looking beautiful 

And as promised...