Terror in the Aisles


Terror in the Aisles is a 1984 American documentary film about horror films, including slasher films and crime thrillers. The film is directed by Andrew J. Kuehn, and hosted by Donald Pleasence and Nancy Allen. The original music score is composed by John Beal.

Plot

Director Andrew J. Kuehn excerpted brief segments of terror and suspense in a wide variety of horror films and strung them together with added commentary, as well as some enacted narrative, to create a compilation of fright-inducing effects. Halloween actor Donald Pleasence and Dressed to Kill star Nancy Allen provide the commentary on topics such as "sex and terror", loathsome villains, "natural terror", the occult, cosmic terror and spoofs. In one segment of the anthology, legendary filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock presents his concepts of how to create suspense in a clip from Alfred Hitchcock: Men Who Made The Movies. The advertising specifically refers to the movies that the clips are taken from as "terror films" instead of "horror films", and some of the movies used here, such as Marathon Man and Nighthawks, are not considered horror films but were included because their respective villains, Nazi war criminal Dr. Christian Szell and global terrorist Wulfgar Reinhardt were considered horrifying. The most recent movie used for the 1984 release was Videodrome, which David Cronenberg brought to theatres in February 1983; the efforts of getting rights to and assembling clips was so extensive that no movies released after that were considered for usage by the documentarians.

Release

The movie was released wide theatrically in the United States by Universal Pictures on October 26, 1984. The movie grossed $10,004,817 at the box office.

Reception

Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave the movie zero stars out of four, explaining, "Scary movie scenes work best when they're set up by some expository foreplay, which is why this compilation of horrors doesn't really work." Vincent Canby of The New York Times thought the commentary from the hosts was "pretty dumb" and concluded, "Because Terror in the Aisles is composed entirely of climaxes, it has none of its own." Variety called the movie "poorly conceived and executed", adding, "Applying the rapid editing and juxtaposition techniques to a feature-length project results in simply ruining many classic movie sequences rather than preserving them." Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times thought the movie was "often fun" but criticized the "cornball, patently phony audience reaction shots." Richard Combs of The Monthly Film Bulletin called it "The That's Entertainment of horror movies—in other words, its dexterity at pasting together clips from a selection of scaries, old and new, is not matched by a glimmer of the historical awareness, or even filmic appreciation, that would make the exercise worthwhile."

Home media

The movie was released on VHS and CED Videodiscs by MCA Home Video in 1985. On September 13, 2011, the movie was released to digital format as a special feature on the 30th Anniversary Edition Blu-ray of Halloween II. On October 15, 2012, Universal Pictures Home Entertainment released the movie on DVD as part of its Universal Vault Series.
The movie's DVD and Blu-ray release is presented in the same 1.85:1 aspect ratio of its original theatrical release, which also cropped any segments from other movies that were originally produced using the anamorphic process. The number of terror, suspense, horror and thriller movie clips that are featured and shown from in this documentary totaled to seventy-eight clips.
On October 13, 2020, the movie received its own Blu-ray release courtesy of Scream Factory. As with the previous releases, it was presented in its original aspect ratio; unlike the earlier releases, the Blu-ray includes all-new bonus features, including a new interview with Nancy Allen and the alternate broadcast television edit of the movie.

Archival appearances

Films shown

Dracula Bride of Frankenstein The Ghost Breakers Hold That Ghost The Wolf Man Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein Strangers on a Train Scared Stiff Creature from the Black Lagoon This Island Earth To Catch a Thief Tarantula! The Incredible Shrinking Man The Deadly Mantis The Fly Psycho Konga King Kong vs. Godzilla What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? The Birds Wait Until Dark Rosemary's Baby Night of the Living Dead Klute Play Misty for Me Frogs Frenzy Sisters The Thing with Two Heads The Exorcist The Texas Chain Saw Massacre Phantom of the Paradise Bug Jaws Grizzly The Food of the Gods The Omen Marathon Man Carrie Suspiria The Car The Fury Jaws 2 Eyes of Laura Mars Midnight Express Dawn of the Dead credited but not in Final CutThe Silent Partner Piranha Halloween The Legacy Invasion of the Body Snatchers Alien The Amityville Horror The Brood Prophecy Dracula Nightwing When a Stranger Calls Friday the 13th The Fog The Shining Dressed to Kill Alligator Scanners The Howling The Funhouse Ms.45 Friday the 13th Part 2 The Postman Always Rings Twice An American Werewolf in London Halloween II Nighthawks Saturday the 14th The Seduction Vice Squad Cat People Poltergeist The Thing Alone in the Dark