TCM, 6:45 a.m. ET
Television always pulls out its inventory of scary movies on Halloween, and TCM has so many of them, it’s rolling them out early. So early, in fact, that one of the best of them shows up just after sunrise, when Tod Browning’s Freaks is shown at 6:45 a.m. ET. What a perfect way to start this particular day…
Epix, 8:00 p.m. ET
In 1965, Roman Polanski directed Repulsion, a creepily claustrophobic film about a young woman (played beautifully by Catherine Deneuve) descending into madness. Three years later, he directed this adaptation of an Ira Levin novel, and this time cast young Mia Farrow as a woman who thinks she’s imagining things and being paranoid, and maybe even going insane. But, in this case, maybe she’s not…
TCM, 8:00 p.m. ET
James Whale directed this superb sequel to his Frankenstein movie in 1935, allowing Boris Karloff to reprise his starring, mostly grunting role as Frankenstein’s Monster – but also allowing the sequel to be stolen by Elsa Lanchester, in the dual role of Mary Shelley (the actual author of the original Frankenstein novel) and, when brought back from the dead, as the punk-coiffed Monster’s Mate.
NBC, 9:00 p.m. ET
The one-non-Halloweeny offering mentioned in tonight’s Best Bets is this new final-season episode of The Good Place, titled “A Chip Driver Mystery.” But perhaps, given the hellish twists and turns this Michael Schur sitcom has served up so far, maybe it fits the night’s theme, and mood, after all.
AXS TV, 9:30 p.m. ET
This is my favorite ghoulish movie on TV today – and one of my favorite movies ever, because it’s sort of like a murder-spree cross between Shakespeare and
A Fish Called Wanda. And it’s educational, too: This 1973 Vincent Price movie is where I first learned about
Titus Andronicus, Shakespeare’s over-the-top bloodbath of a stage drama. The plot has Price, as a has-been Shakespearean actor, returning from seeming oblivion to wreak revenge on his hostile former drama critics – by dispatching them in ways borrowed from the Bard. Oh, and his chameleonic partner in crime? His devoted, beautiful daughter, played by Diana Rigg. Yesterday, despite all the other creepy competition,
Theatre of Blood made my Best TV Tomorrow video…
TCM, 12:30 a.m. ET
And here’s Vincent Price again, to cap off the evening – and, maybe, lop off a head – in this 1961 movie version of the classic Edgar Allan Poe short story. Barbara Steele co-stars (Price certainly knew how to pick his leading ladies), and look who’s working behind the scenes: Roger Corman not only produces, but directs – and the screenplay is an adaptation by that wonderful writer, Richard Matheson, whose other screen credits, large and small, include The Incredible Shrinking Man, the Nightmare at 20,000 Feet episode of The Twilight Zone, and the telemovies Duel and The Night Stalker.