REVIEW: The Mortuary Collection

MAJOR SPOILERS BELOW.

The Mortuary Collection. In a town called Raven’s End. There is nothing more unsettling than a story that revolves around death. But it grows to be even more unsettling when it involves children. Take Samantha (Caitlin Custer) for example. She’s a bright young face who finds her way into a mysterious old funeral home. And like all horror stories, it has a creepy old man (Clancy Brown) to tell the tale of The Mortuary Collection. When you think of places like this, you think of some type of creepy caretaker. In this case, the stereotypes would be right.

Montgomery is the long-dead narrator of our story. Complete with a creepy voice, and creepy looks to match, he resembles that of an old-fashioned funeral homeowner from the 1900s. Similar to something out of Oliver Twist. And speaking of twists, through many tales of unrelated stories, our young Samantha turns out to be a child murderer and a cannibal.

The Mortuary Collection
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RLJE FILMS “The Mortuary Collection”

WHO IS SAM?

Ironically, she takes the teeth of her victims for her collection, leaving their remains to be found by the poor unsuspecting parents in their family ovens. Disturbing? Yes. Triggering? Kind of. I’ll be frank, being near a funeral home, or inside of one–or even on the same street as one creeps me out. And even more so after having been forced to go through two family funerals in one year.

Also weaved into the plot, is that Montgomery is stuck as the current caretaker. Similar to Jack Ferriman in Ghost Ship. A lifetime of sin has earned him this job. Instead of a boat, it’s a something hundred-year-old haunted building. Unfortunately, once you give up your job–you kind of explode in broad daylight. I’m not quite sure if he goes into the afterlife, or just straight to hell. Though my money is on hell if he’s anything like dear old Sam. It has an old campy feeling to it, similar to that of Dark Shadows with a backdrop of Haunting in Connecticut.

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Caitlin Custer as Sam.

EVIL VS. EVIL.

So, basically, all of the tales weave in that there is some kind of message to it. The usual one being, if you do bad, something bad will happen to you. Karma, in other words. The climax of the movie is when Sam reaches into one of her recent victim’s coffins (dear little Logan) and cuts out one of the corpse’s teeth. True to her serial killer nature, she stabs Montgomery but she is shocked to see a sticky embalming fluid where blood should be.

Instantly, the house comes alive and traps her inside. He uses his cane to bang the floor in an old library. Each book falls onto the floorboards, and finally–each of her child victim’s step outside of the pages and rip her apart. After she dies, they put their respective teeth back in their mouths, and head on back into the afterlife.

His final deed for the film was sewing her back together and also embalming her. Finally free, Montgomery steps outside, and you know the rest. The young newspaper delivery boy (who looks a lot like Hershel Rhee in The Walking Dead) sits in a chair, listening to Sam (who now has become the mortician, complete with the costume and all) tell her stories. Unfortunately, she tells him that she hasn’t had her dinner yet. And the door locks.

It just goes to show, good doesn’t always triumph over the bad. Sometimes, the bad wins.

Bye-bye, kid.

 

THE MORTUARY COLLECTION (Shudder/AMC) is available on HD/DVD & Blu-Ray 04/20/2021.

 

 RAVES

“creeptacular practical special effects…chill-inducing cinematography…a feast for the eyes” – /Film

 

“Clancy Brown is fantastic” – Screen Anarchy

 

“A twisted tapestry of grisly fun and endlessly inventive terror.” – Sam Raimi

 

 Director/Writer: Ryan Spindell  Starring: Clancy Brown, Caitlin Custer, Christine Kilmer & Jacob Elordi.

 

OFFICIAL SYNOPSIS: Set in the phantasmagorical town of Raven’s End, nothing is as it seems…. In THE MORTUARY COLLECTION, a misguided young girl takes refuge in a decrepit old mortuary. There she meets Montgomery Dark, an eccentric undertaker with more than a few skeletons in his closet. Montgomery chronicles the strange history of the town through a series of twisted tales, each more terrifying than the last, but the young girl’s world is unhinged when she discovers that the final story…is her own.

 

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