“I hate natural causes! Give me a big stab wound to poke at and then I’m happy.”

Justin’s rating: All the freaks are in town

Justin’s review: Thus follows three incontrovertible facts about John Carpenter. First, he’s made some of the greatest cult movies of all time. Second, he’s a wildly versatile creator who directs, writes, composes, and acts. And third, the dude looks freaky as all get out.

All three of those facts were leveraged to make Showtime’s Body Bags, a horror anthology TV movie that was cobbled together from a cancelled series. Carpenter enjoyed a stint doing straight-forward spooky stories while also acting as the host — “The Coroner” — who is meant to be this film’s version of the Crypt Keeper, I guess.

For three short stories crammed into 90 minutes, Body Bags’ ratio of high-profile names is kind of staggering. In addition to Carpenter, there’s Mark Hamill, Tom Arnold, Tobe Hooper, Robert Carradine, Stacy Keach, Sam Raimi, Wes Craven, David Warner, Roger Corman, Charles Napier, and Twiggy. The last time I saw this kind of inexplicable horror convention, it was Sleepwalkers just a year earlier.

The Coroner’s late-night fascination with gruesome body bags leads to a trio of spooky tales sprinkled with some black humor. “The Gas Station” goes through the first overnight shift of a college girl who hears that a serial killer is on the loose. As strange and sometimes disturbing customers come and go, the audience is left to wonder who might be the murderer.

It’s a clever exercise in rising tension coupled with a mystery and a pared-down slasher film ending. I found that I was actually on edge for this one thanks to the surefooted direction and a soundtrack that jangled my nerves. And what did I expect? This takes place on the outskirts of Haddonfield, the town where Halloween took place.

In “Hair,” Stacy Keach gets to play against type as a slightly insecure middle-aged balding man who will do just about anything to get his follicles back. He flees to a hair clinic that promises results — quite a lot of it, it turns out. But there’s always a price to be paid for desperate actions.

This is the least “horror” entry in this anthology, more of a spoof with a tongue-in-cheek sense of humor. I’m used to seeing Keach as a bad guy, so this hair-obsessed vain dork threw me for a loop in the best of ways. But it’s a little long, dragging this silly premise out until the inevitable monkey paw pops up to make its great betrayal.

Admittedly, it is a bizarre reveal, but not quite worth the long trip it takes to get there.

The third story, “Eye,” is directed by Tobe Hooper instead of Carpenter, and stars Mark Hamill as a minor league baseball player who suffers a horrible facial injury in a car crash. One eye transplant from a serial killer later, and he finds himself with the need… for speedy slaughter.

This premise has been done in other movies, which saps a lot of its novelty. It’s not like Hamill can’t handle the material. It’s just that this anthology needed a home run to bring it all in but only managed a single. Being both unoriginal and gory didn’t help.

So how does Body Bags rate in the end? It’s not without its charms, especially with Carpenter himself hamming it up as the Coroner. But while the gas station installment was solid, the other two tales fell flat and left this production feeling bloated and gassy.

Intermission!

• Carpenter with a chainsaw to kick things off
• “I call them the arriving departed.”
• Hey maybe you should’ve put those keys in your pocket. That’s on you, college girl.
• That’s a fun bathroom doodle
• The truck going up on the lift was a creepy little moment
• Sam Raimi plays a good corpse
• This girl really loves turning her back to the killer, doesn’t she?
• The Coroner making the two heads kiss
• “In a year your head will look like a Christmas tree lot… in January!”
• How much goop she gets on her lips when she kisses his hair
• The little moving hairs can’t be a good sign
• “You earthlings and your vanity.”
• “What a bunch of stiffs!”
• Ah casette boxes in cars, that takes me back
• The ending bit is pretty fun