The Film (4/5)

    1995's Tales from the Hood came out in the middle of a cycle of urban comedies, and as such was marketed similarly to capture that audience. I remember that well, as being a dedicated horror fan, I chose to pass the film up in theaters, and only caught up with the film months later on a weekend video rental after being convinced by a friend that it was actually quite a good horror film. I am glad he did me that service, because Tales from the Hood is not only the best anthology horror film of the 1990's, but is certainly in the ranking of best American horror films of that decade PERIOD.

    Tales from the Hood pays homage to the Amicus anthology horror films of the 1960's like Doctor Terror's House of Horrors, Vault of Horrors, but most notably 1972's Tales from the Crypt. At the same time, it manages to capitalize on the success, and style of the TV show Tales from the Crypt (both from the same EC Comics source material of the 1950's) that was running on HBO at the time, and had been an epic success throughout the early portion of that decade. Also, like many of the great iconic horror films it tackles social issues that were relevant of the period, and sadly, are still relevant today.

   The film is compromised  of 4 stories tied together by a wraparound story that ties into the fourth story (no spoilers, other than to say that they were paying attention to their Amicus anthologies). The wraparound story involves 3 guys attempting to rob a funeral home run by Mr. Simms (Clarence Williams III), who would rather take them to the basement and tell them the stories of the corpses who dwell in the coffins there then take their robbery threat seriously.  The first story is called Rogue Cop Revelations, and  tells the tale of a group of cops who murder a popular District Attorney, one of the cops feels an immense sense of guilt, leaves the force and becomes an addict. He also swears to help the dead DA get his revenge. A few years later he calls his fellow officers to the cemetery where the attorney is buried, where the dead man rises, and gets his revenge. 

     The second story entitled Boys Do Get Bruised follows a young boy who tries to cover up the abuse he suffers at home while he is at school. As it turns out his Father hits him over the drawings the boy does.  Fortunately, the boy gets his revenge, and not in a Home Alone way. The third story KKK Comeuppence sees a racist senator move into a former slave plantation house only to be haunted by the witch doctor that used to dwell there. It turns out that the witch doctor left some wooden dolls in the house to do his bidding.  The senator tries to face off against the dolls, but they'd rather just tear him apart. The fourth and final story Hard-Core Convert sees a lunatic named Crazy K nearly get killed by rival gang members for his outrageous behavior. He is then taken to a treatment center where he is healed, but forced to go through a Clockwork Orange-esque therapy to reform him from his violent ways.  

    Tales from the Hood's stories are occasionally derivative of some stories from other anthology films. The third story feels like a riff of the Zuni Fetish Doll story in Trilogy of Terror while the first story feels like an update of the Poetic Justice segment of Tales from the Crypt. That being said, director Rusty Cundieff and writer Darin Scott manage to make these 5 stories their own and update them for the 90's. The performances in each are quite solid, but the show is totally stolen by Clarence Williams III who owns every on screen moment as Mr. Simms. The fact that this was not sequelized is a tragedy just in the fact that we did not get more of Simms.

Audio/Video (4/5)

    Scream Factory does great work bringing Tales from the Hood to Blu-ray in a 1:85:1 1080p AVC encoded Blu-ray. Colors are well represented, detail is quite solid, and blacks are nice and deep.

    Audio is presented with a DTS-HD MA 5.1 track in English. Everything here is audible from the film's score to the dialogue, and I could not detect any issues.

Extras (2.5/5)

    Scream Factory have put together a solid extras package for Tales from the Hood.  There is a 56 minutes making of called Welcome to Hell: The Making of Tales from the Hood that details the films production and interviews the cast and crew behind the film. We also get a vintage making of, trailers, TV spots, and a stills gallery.

Overall

    Tales from the Hood is one of the most neglected horror films to come out of the 90's, and Scream Factory is doing some solid work to remedy that. The Blu-ray looks and sounds great, and includes a decent, but limited slate of extras. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.