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Rating: 
Summary: Long Live Vincent Price
Review: As an avid horror fan, I must say Vincent Price is the long-standing king of horror. When I think of horror movies, he immediately comes to mind. Finally, a book that specializes in the work of a true master who truly loved his work. Having recently purchased this, I look forward to mulling through its contents and watching the many films of "The Master of the Macabre." Long live Vincent Price!!!
Rating:
Summary: Long live Vincent Price!
Review: I just finished reading this excellent book on Vincent Price. It concentrates just on his work in the horror film genre which is primarly what he is remembered for. Denis Meikle follows Vincent's career chronologically film by film, giving details of the production as well as what was going on in Price's life at the time. While this is not an exhaustive work on this wonderful actor, it makes a great companion piece to his daughter's book "Vincent Price: A Daughter's Biography" which covers his personal life and Lucy Chase Williams' excellent "The Complete Films of Vincent Price" which covers all his film output. All together, these tell the story of one of the last true renaissance men. Recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Notes of a Longtime Price Fan
Review: True fans of Vincent Price don't really care whether or not we're watching something badly made like SCREAM AND SCREAM AGAIN or some auteur-approved masterpiece like TOMB OF LIGEIA. As long as Vincent Price is in it, hamming it up and acting all others right off the screen we are in hog heaven. It's a strange, fervid fraternity and way back when someone started calling us The Price Club and the name just stuck.
Denis Meikle has given us a book that clears up some of the myths surrounding Price's career, but he seems determined to create a new one, based somewhat on Victoria's great book. His thesis is that the McCarthy hearings and the "graylist" of which Price was the victim made him scared that he would never work again, so that afterwards, from the mid 1950s on, he consented to appear in any piece of schlock if the "price was right." Again and again he evinces this theory to explain, for example, why VP appeared as "Egghead" on TV's BATMAN. Price himself often stated that he wanted money to but more modern art with, but Meikle discounts this simple explanation.
I am the proud owner of a signed copy of Price's awesome book THE ART IN MY LIFE and I think that he indeed loved art and that he wasn't just "running scared" from the HUAC police.
But everyone deserves a forum for their views and Meikle makes a good case for his.
Rating:
Summary: No one like him! Wonderful Tribute to the Master of Menace
Review: Vincent Price came into horror films by way of the studio system. His body of work is amazing, and he showed a fine sense of comedic timing in His Kind of Woman, with Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell, playing an OTT hammy actor. Later this tough for droll comedy would show in two gems - The Raven and The Comedy of Terrors. However, he really gathered attention in 1952 with House of Wax. After that wonderful performance, it was non stop fun all the way. Many of his films were for William Castle or Roger Corman, and often considered Drive-In fodder - such as The Fly, The Bat, House on Haunted Hill. It was the series of Poe movies that firmly linked the word horror to Price - and I think it was a term he enjoyed completely. At the time the Corman-Price-Poe series of movies - The Pit and The Pendulum (with Scream Queen Barbara Steele), House of Usher, Tomb of Ligeia, Masque of the Red Death, Haunted Palace (which was really Lovecraft not Poe, but what the hey...) were often dismissed. But looking back, you will see finely crafted horror films that are still a pleasure to what now, with many of Price's wonderful performances. Even later, he continued to seek out this same spotlight with the campy Theatre of Blood and the Dr. Phibes duo of films or the more serious Cry of the Banshee and Conqueror Worm (one of his most underrated performances). He scared us with a gentle boo, mesmerising with that voice, thrilled us with the wondrous menacing laugh, enchanted us with his devilish twinkle in his eye...he entertained us cooking fish in his dishwasher on Johnny Carson. His legacy lives and this is wonderful tribute to the master! Loaded with pictures, it is a must for Price fans.
Rating:
Summary: No one like him! Wonderful Tribute to the Master of Menace
Review: Vincent Price came into horror films by way of the studio system. His body of work is amazing, and he showed a fine sense of comedic timing in His Kind of Woman, with Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell, playing an OTT hammy actor. Later this tough for droll comedy would show in two gems - The Raven and The Comedy of Terrors. However, he really gathered attention in 1952 with House of Wax. After that wonderful performance, it was non stop fun all the way. Many of his films were for William Castle or Roger Corman, and often considered Drive-In fodder - such as The Fly, The Bat, House on Haunted Hill. It was the series of Poe movies that firmly linked the word horror to Price - and I think it was a term he enjoyed completely. At the time the Corman-Price-Poe series of movies - The Pit and The Pendulum (with Scream Queen Barbara Steele), House of Usher, Tomb of Ligeia, Masque of the Red Death, Haunted Palace (which was really Lovecraft not Poe, but what the hey...) were often dismissed. But looking back, you will see finely crafted horror films that are still a pleasure to what now, with many of Price's wonderful performances. Even later, he continued to seek out this same spotlight with the campy Theatre of Blood and the Dr. Phibes duo of films or the more serious Cry of the Banshee and Conqueror Worm (one of his most underrated performances). He scared us with a gentle boo, mesmerising with that voice, thrilled us with the wondrous menacing laugh, enchanted us with his devilish twinkle in his eye...he entertained us cooking fish in his dishwasher on Johnny Carson. His legacy lives and this is wonderful tribute to the master! Loaded with pictures, it is a must for Price fans.
Rating:
Summary: If you love Vincent Price you will love this great book
Review: When I was a kid way, way back in the late sixties to the early
seventies I never failed to catch a great Price film on the late night Creature Features. This book is hard to put down.
Dennis Meikle does'nt white wash the Master of Menace, nor present him in any unfavorable light. All of Price's successes
and failings are told here in a very respectful manner. As a
matter of fact there were some parts of Price's life I did'nt want to know. This is the story of a great actor the likes of whom we will never ever see again. Well illustrated. A really
excellent book.
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