A teenager receives a videotape in the mail he didn't order. He calls up friends looking for an active evening, but multiple attempts fail because most are busy. So he tears off the wrap to the tape and pops in the VCR. A hall with running human parts (upper torso, arms and head in motion) embedded in the walls leads to a room where Vincent Price awaits, ready to introduce the anthology of tales which make up about an hour. Price returns at the end to close it out. Clearly, Price was approached for a quick payday and couldn't resist."A Little Fishy" deals with a guy fishing at a lake, eyeing an apple that draws his appetite, taking some bites, finding, much to his alarm, a hook line which drags him by the throat (he swallowed it while chewing into the apple) into the water. What set this in motion is not known. The fisherman becoming the fish, with the apple tossed out in the hopes of luring another human to the lake. "Coffee Break" has this speeding delivery van driver lost in some backwoods rural community of Harmony, pulling up to an old timer's home for directions. Because his van blares loud rock music and temperament is rude and harried, the kid doesn't exactly ingratiate himself to the local who tells him he should slow down and have a nice cup of coffee up the road at Harmony Café. Undeterred, the kid takes varies roads in front of him with the same results: he returns to Harmony seemingly unable to escape this neck of the woods. If he'd just stop and have that cup of coffee… "Who's There?" follows a plump jogger taking the scenic route who walks upon a woody area with creatures having escaped from a wildlife preserve somewhere nearby. Is his life in danger or are they not as dangerous as it seems? "Jonah's Dream" features a prospecting widow toiling away in the hopes of that gold find on her mountain. While the locals in the nearby town think she's wasting her time, nonetheless, the widow continues on. Well, one night a noise from her barn sparks interest, and the widow finds a peculiar spaceship having crashlanded on her property, leaking fuel and steam, seemingly about to explode. But through this the widow just might find her gold… "Think Twice" has thief encountering baggage bum in urban squalor, stealing the man's diamond which glows at his breath, providing him what he so desires. The thief doesn't realize that the diamond isn't meant for him, paying a price for crossing the bum and taking what was his. Matthew, the teenager watching the video tape, is actually addressed by Price after the tales are over from the television screen. Matthew looks at the box and sees his name introduced under Price's, with a nightmare featuring several of the characters he just watched. Matthew can't just turn Price off…he won't allow it. Price, in postal uniform, giggles because another "customer" will be chosen for his "wall".The tales did little for me, I must admit. I didn't necessarily mind any of them. I was just rather underwhelmed. Price's involvement, especially at the end, is fun if slight. "Escapes" won't have me forgetting what Price done much better in "From a Whisper to a Scream" a year later. The 80s didn't offer Price anything of particular significance, but his appearances give those few films he was a part of some rub just because of the value of his name and association attached to them. He offers a sinister laugh at the end of "Escapes" but you see him for perhaps approximately seven or eight minutes, not enough to salvage uneventful stories with little in the way of thrills.

I have a soft spot in my heart for Escapes, mostly because it was filmed around my hometown of Sacramento and also because it's a horror anthology (and what horror film buff doesn't love a good ol' cheesy anthology once in a while). I first saw it around the time it came to video and watching it reminds me of the countless happy hours I spent in mom and pop video stores (so sad they're all gone now!) where a curious movie lover could find the most obscure and wondrous garbage imaginable on those dusty video shelves. Especially horror movies. Escapes is a wraparound tale (with intro and outro by Price) involving a young guy who gets a video tape in the mail, which happens to be exact same Escapes tape the viewer is watching (how meta!). Each of the stories is basically Twilight zone/Tales from the Darkside type stuff. There's one about a fisherman who gets the surprise of his life. Another about an obnoxious young deliveryman who ignores the advice of a local while trying to find his way home. And another about a jogger who is menaced by creatures that may have escaped from a scientific laboratory. I think there's one or two more but I can't remember. Anyway, these are really good. But they have special meaning to me because when i watch the video it reminds me of where I grew up. Good times.

Actually, the only mystery that engages me is how I came to be credited as the actor playing "Large Creature"! I didn't have anything to do with this picture, and from the sound of it, I'm glad I wasn't. Very strange. Hmm, 1986? I was playing a singing King Mark in a dopey Equity-waiver musical production called "Knightly Pursuits", during which I met my wife-to-be, Emilie, to whom I've been happily married to for 18 years now. I asked her about my ever playing a Large Creature. She just smiled.Meanwhile, the other IMDb listing for me is correct: I do co-star in the Ralph Bakshi/Frank Frazetta 1983 production of "Fire & Ice" which has just been re-released on DVD. (Yay!) Included on the disc is a special feature in which I narrate from a personal diary I kept during filming. The producer of the special feature dug up production stills of me on the set that I had never seen before. That was a treat. Anyway, "Fire & Ice" is sort of my "I Was a Teen-Age Werewolf". Not a great film, but my own. Sean Hannon --- a.k.a. Nekron, the evil Ice Lord

It is sad to see the previously great Vincent Price attach himself to the front and back end of this amateurish production of silly & sad non-spooky shorts. He's in there briefly at the front, and briefly at the end, but the stuff inbetween was made by hacks.