Grandpa's Monster Movies (Amvest Video, 1988). [Category: Commercial]

Al Lewis as Grandpa Munster hosts this compilation of trailers from classic horror films. Grandpa makes the weakest of hosts for this sort of tape. His jokes are lame and he overplays them shamelessly. And there's way too much of him––he appears between almost every trailer. He does have one of the more interesting "Igors", though––one that is almost as swishy as Locar. The trailers are mostly from classic Universal horror films of the 30s, 40s, and 50s. If you're a fan of those great old films, then you might find this tape at least a bit interesting––the film quality is quite good considering their age. Unfortunately, the trailers in and of themselves are not very interesting––they're pretty straightforward and dull. The tape gets 5 extra points for listing the trailers in order on the package, but gets docked 5 points for having Grandpa announce at the beginning of the tape that they're going to be showing "bad" movies––these old Universal horrors are classics!

Highlights:

• The typefaces in many of these trailers are great––especially the ones in Dracula's Daughter, Dracula, and Black Friday.
  
• Most of the trailers are from a Screen Gems rerelease and they end with an utterly plain title card with the movie title in block letters sans articles, i.e. "FRANKENSTEIN MEETS WOLFMAN". This is ever-so-slightly strange.
  
• House of Dracula features a hunchbacked nurse! Now that's scary!
  
• Gimmick Alert! The trailer for Black Friday claims Bela Lugosi was hypnotized in order to give a more realistic performance!
  

Ratings: Camp/Humor Value: **. Weirdness: **. Historical Interest: **. Overall Rating: **.