For some inexplicable reason the filmmakers saw fit to jazz up the tried and tested formula of the horror anthology, made popular in the 60's and 70's by Amicus, with jarringly bad modern pop songs for a 1980's audience in between ghoulish tales. Vincent Price is as reliable as ever and can pull off any bad situation with his camp, over the top, charismatic repartee and just about saves this effort.
Roy Ward Baker is a Hammer veteran who had previously directed the anthology movies Asylum (1972) and Vault of Horror (1973) for Amicus and with a great cast assembled this should have worked just as well but sadly it doesn't. Amicus producer Milton Subotsky comes on board for this one but somewhere along the line the decision was made to make it feel trendier for a younger audience but fails dismally and is embarrassing and unnecessary. However the three sinister stories that form the bulk of the running time based on R. Chetwyn-Hayes novel are rather good, it's just a shame they are top and tailed by silly nonsense that diminishes the movie as a whole and takes you out of the mood and atmosphere that they create.
You can tell the film was made by an older generation of filmmakers out of touch with a modern audience because by 1981 things had moved on especially in the horror genre as audiences were getting more attuned to seeing explicit gore and realistic shocks with the likes of Halloween and Friday the 13th. The Monster Club does have a warm charm and appeal especially if you've enjoyed previous anthology movies but the horror is tame and the comedic interludes are not funny so it never really hangs together. Vincent Price and John Carradine are like fish out of water here in a nightclub setting where monsters like to rock to the sound of UB40 and B. A. Robertson.
If you can fast forward past the inane pop songs then this would be 5 maybe 6 stars because the stories are nicely told and sufficiently creepy but it gets dragged down by the feeble attempt to modernise it in the wrap around sections, something the writer hated. This was veteran director Roy Ward Baker's last movie.
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