Death Bed: The Bed That EatsOnce upon a time there was a beautiful maiden who dwelt in a great old house. A demon who was enamored of the maiden became a gentle wind that enveloped her. He then took the shape of a man and built a bed upon which the two would consummate their love. But the maiden died and the demon's eyes shattered in grief, spilling tears of blood upon the bed. From that blood there sprang a life, and from that life a hunger. Such is the premise behind George Barry's Death Bed: The Bed That Eats, one of the queerest and most bewitching jewels to be found in all of cinema. A most literary film, Death Bed is divided into four chapters entitled Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner and The Just Dessert. Breakfast introduces the bed, a great canopied affair. It rests in the brick cellar of the old house. On a nearby wall hangs a drawing of the bed, behind which is imprisoned a comely young man. A couple who have walked a long a time in the forest reach the seemingly vacant house and gain entry. They light a candle, spread their provisions (two apples, a bottle of wine and a bucket of fried chicken) upon the bed and proceed to make love. An unnoticed foam arises from the bed, engulfing the food and dragging it down into impossible liquid depths. Still hungry, the bed turns its attention to the young lovers. The spurting blood of the girl extinguishes the candle. Death Bed is filled with such poetic images. A human skull rests in the bowels of the bed. Now it is in the yard, beneathe the ground. A rosebush blooms above it. A flower picked from the bush will later adorn the picnic basket of two of the bed's future victims. The pages of a book become mirrors reflecting flames. During Lunch, the man behind the drawing narrates the history of the bed. He shows us some of its previous meals including a priest, a Henry Miller paperback, an old lady reading a porno magazine, a teddy bear (that bleeds) and a group of orgiasts. Lastly, he relates his own tale and it is here that we recieve the clues from which we may discern his identity. It seems that the man behind the drawing is none other than Aubrey Beardsley, the great English illustrator. The date of his death is right, and he is seen to be surrounded by Beardsley's drawings for the banned Salome of Oscar Wilde. Beardsley came to this place to die. The bed devoured him but then, perhaps out of loneliness, it resurrected him behind the wall. It gives him the rings of the people that it eats and other gifts as well. Beardsley castigates the bed as a "greedy imbecile" and a "foul monster" and complains about its snoring. "Dreamlike" is a word often used to describe a particular film, which is quite natural as all cinema is inherently oneiric to one degree or another, but perhaps no film has come so close to a perfect transcription of a dream as Death Bed: The Bed That Eats. The characters behave as though dreaming. When a man has the flesh of his hands eaten by the bed, his reaction is not shocked horror but simple dismay at being left with skeleton hands. Within this dream are other dreams. The bed induces nightmares in two of it's victims and it even has a dream itself - of being in the city, where food is plentiful. Another aspect of the film is the comedy, which is decidedly of the goofy variety. The bed yawns, belches and, as a young woman disrobes, pants lasciviously. It also drinks a bottle of Pepto-Bismol. When it dreams of the city, we see a newspaper headline reading "Strange Munching Heard In Night". Usually, this type of humour in horror films is anathema to me; I insist that the supernatural be handled seriously or not all. However, through some miracle (later performed by Michele Soavi with Cemetery Man), these moments do not undermine the earnest intentions of the film one bit. The DVD includes an introduction by Barry in which he tells of the film's history. It was completed in 1977 but never officially released until 2003. Barry also states that he doesn't consider his film to be particularly odd and, despite the fact that it is in fact staggeringly bizarre, it's easy to believe him; the film's weirdness seems so effortless. Death Bed is a film that I have little doubt will be met by most who see it with derisive laughter. The majority of people are simply too cynical to allow a film of such preposterous ideas to work it's strange spell. However, to those who possess the requisite sensitivities to appreciate this singular masterpiece, I can promise enchantment.
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