15 Best Anthology Horror Film Segments
8. The Drop Of Water (Black Sabbath, 1963)
"She looks completely contorted in fear... almost as if she's been frightened to death."
A recently deceased occultist is prepared for burial by her nurse, who has taken a fancy to the ornate ring on the dead woman's finger. Once the nurse surrenders to the impulse to take it for herself, she begins to notice a series of strange little occurrences. Perhaps there really was something in the old woman's practices after all.
The repulsive, haggard and inhuman appearance of the old woman's corpse is what everyone remembers from Black Sabbath. Even those who haven't seen the film have likely come across a still of her twisted face glaring wide-eyed at the camera. It's such a striking and bizarre design - one would think it might have been easier, and more frightening on paper, to choose a face more convincing as a fresh corpse.
The unnaturally rubber-Halloween-mask look that Bava opted for shouldn't work, but does. In fact, she more closely resembles a wrinkled little girl than an elderly lady, which makes her all the more uncannily terrifying. I must say, I've imagined her staring down at me from the foot of my bed a fair few times before. Shudder.