Episode 4: Only Sin Deep

Episode 4: Only Sin Deep

Original Airdate: June 14, 1989

Written By: Fred Dekker

Directed By: Howard Deutch

Starring: Lea Thompson, Britt Leach, Brett Cullen, Pamela D'Pella

We've talked about greed. We've talked about death. We've event talked about murder. But combining the three is soon to be commonplace for our episode synopsis/reviews, and it all starts with "Only Sin Deep." Just walking the streets at night can be a dangerous enough experience, but for Sylvia Vane (does this count in our pun-o-meter?), it's her job. Vane (Lea Thompson) is a beautiful streetwalker and call girl looking to escape the mundane, filthy streets for a life of luxury.

But coming from street rat routes to upper class royalty isn't the easiest endeavor. After all, Vane is a 21-year-old teetering on the brink of the bourgeois and hasn't given herself too many friends in life, save for her street-walking associate Raven (Pamela D'Pella). She spends most of her time in the mirror perfect her youthful good looks; the only trait that she seemingly is concerned about in life. The proof is in the behavior that she doesn't get it when it comes to what men really want, so she's willing to do anything to find out. 

"What's she got that I ain't got?" -Sylvia Vane

Sooner rather than later, Vane shows her true colors when she picks up a local hood for business. He may identify himself as her business partner, but this pimp is far off the beaten path when she robs him and shoots him to death. A woman of no morals nor inhibitions, she's so hard up for cash that her recent indiscretions don't seem to affect her in the least. Vane is the perfect unlikable, but that fleeting hint of innocence left within the spirit makes her just a girl living in this crazy-mixed-up-world. 

When she takes her deceased boss' valuables to the local pawn shop, the broker in charge (Britt Leach) scoffs at the items and recognizes the means by which she acquired them. He's seemingly uninterested in her lies and her jewelry, but instead admires her beautiful face and offers her a much more displeasing deal. He'll pay her a devilishly large sum of money for something you can't put a price on: her beauty. Vane smacks her gum and gleefully accepts, feeling she makes off like a bandit in the process. But that's only half the story of this moralistic "preachie."

"But I can see you got something that's worth a whole lot more." -Pawnbroker

The idea of selling something that is immeasurable for a large sum of money doesn't just play on the morals and values of high society. It strikes right at the black heart of greed and consumption. The bombastic nature with which an already seedy pawn broker is interested in a woman's "beauty," not necessarily her essence or personality but her mere appearance, is frightfully unsettling. Lea Thompson plays the role of Sylvia Vane so masterfully that you're rooting, almost from minute one, for her to learn her lesson after it's already too late. 

Thompson accepted the role of Vane in the midst of a huge breakthrough of her career, wherein she was recognized for playing various incarnations of Lorraine Baines (or McFly) in the Back to the Future series. After working so heavily with director Robert Zemeckis, it seemed only natural he bring in Thompson to guest star in one of the first episodes of a series that had yet to fully take off. In Back to the Future, Lorraine exhibited tendencies of a wannabe bad girl that was simply to wholesome to be corrupted...lest it be by her own misplaced son's hand. 

That idea is more than just a scratch on the surface in Tales from the Crypt. The Sylvia Vane character is full-blown into the bad girl ideal, sacrificing common sense and basic knowledge for more money, power, and riches than one can imagine. And the idea that she's willing to sacrifice an intangible is even more hungry for extrapolation. If these are the lengths she will go to in order to have security, to what lengths will she assume to get it all back?

"There a people who play with a full deck, then there's you." -Sylvia Vane

In Sylvia's universe, she is the all-knowing and all-powerful center. But this story is much bigger than Sylvia Vane, as is proof when she leaves the pawn broker's store with $10,000 and a new lease on life. He's captured her beauty in a mold of her face, which, in all honesty is just a formality. The backroom of the Pawn Shop contains an awful lot more, including the remains of the broker's wife under heavy preservation. More on that a little later. 

Back on the streets, Sylvia is out to make herself a wealthy trophy wife. All she needs is the right pigeon and the sting can begin. Sure enough, she finds him in the form of Ronnie Price (Brett Cullen), a high-rise yuppie with eyes for our lead character. His early advances do little to wow Sylvia, but it isn't due to lack of interest. She's playing him for all he's worth, and soon, that's exactly what it takes. Ronnie showers Sylvia in the lap of luxury day in and day out. Only trick is, Sylvia notices more and more anomalies on her face that indicate she's aging rapidly. 

"What is this, the makeup counter at Macy's? You're a knockout for Christ's sake, what do you need all this junk for?" -Ronnie Price

Sylvia's attempts to delay the process are all for naught. As Ronnie leaves town on a business trip, Sylvia's on the prowl to figure out what has happened to her. Her visits to the dermatologist render old memories of the Pawn Shop and make her believe (rightfully so) that the broker has something to do with her transformation. When he rebukes her request for a refund of her beauty (the deadline had passed), she begs for him to name a price. $100,000 may seem like a steep bargain, but to Vane, who has yet to learn any of the errors in her ways, she's well on her way there. 

She destroys Ronnie's apartment looking for any cash to cover her debt, but when he returns home, he doesn't recognize the aging crone as his lover and calls the police to report a robbery. She shoots him down and takes what he has left to restore the peace, but finally meets the dilemma to end all dilemmas. The pawn broker accepts her offer but warns before completing the deal that she's wanted for murder...or at least...her young, beautiful face is. Even though he's been using women's beauty for years to preserve his wife as part of a voodoo ritual, he knows Vane can no longer damage that reputation for him. 

Stricken, she escapes with the mold of her face and attempts to piece together her life, until the mold shatters on the ground from a collision with her old (or should I say young) friend Raven. With the mold disassembled, Sylvia Vane sits in the street and mourns for all that she used to have, and all that she used to be. 

"Why don't you watch where you're going, you old, ugly, trifling bitch!" -Raven

Parallels to the EC Source Material: 

"Only Sin Deep" was originally published in the EC release The Haunt of Fear #24, though it was a story from the Vault Keeper's Vault of Horror. The lead's original name was Lorna Vanson, and much like Sylvia Vane, she too was a lady of the evening. Vanson's trip into the Pawn Shop leads to a similar offer (in the 1950's, it was $1000 for her beauty and a whole year on the deadline to return) and more impending doom. 

She picks up a bachelor by the name of Ronnie Altgeld III in the same manner as before and agrees to marry him. When she realizes her face is ravaging itself, she receives the counteroffer of $100,000 from the pawn broker and again, turns to murder. Instead of a gun, Lorna uses a brass statuette to do the job but finds herself in a similar situation, incapable of recapturing her beauty. 

Horror Alumni Roll Call: 

-Lea Thompson (Sylvia Vane) is best known for working with Crypt producer Robert Zemeckis on the aforementioned Back to the Future trilogy. She also made a name for herself in horror and science fiction with lambasted films like Jaws 3-D and Howard the Duck. More recently, she appeared in the theme park attraction short The Haunted Lighthouse written by children's horror author R.L. Stine.

-Britt Leach (Pawnbroker) has appeared in various television series since the 1970's, but his notable horror contributions included 80's pictures Night Warning and Silent Night, Deadly Night. He retired from acting in 1991.

-Brett Cullen (Ronnie Price) is still finding work in various films and television shows with varying role sizes. He was in the original V miniseries as well as an episode of Freddy's Nightmares and Alfred Hitchcock Presents. He even did an episode of The Outer Limits and most recently had a bit part in The Dark Knight Rises. In 1997, he was the star of the independently released horror film The Killing Jar.

-Burke Byrnes (Cop) had roles in Child's Play 3 and Witchboard as an officer of the law as well. He also played a part in the 1979 monster movie, Prophecy.

-Pamela Gordon (Old Crone) made a brief cameo in this episode of Tales, but has a long horror lineage overall. She's been in two sequels in the Subspecies series as well as episodes of The X-Files and the 80's version of The Twilight Zone. Prior to her appearance here, she was also apart of the cast of Poltergeist II: The Other Side.

-Howard Deutch (Director) directed another episode of Tales in season two: "Dead Right." He is probably best known for directing Pretty in Pink but also directed an episode of SyFy's Warehouse 13 in 2012.

-Fred Dekker (Writer) was previously discussed in our analysis of "And All Through the House." He directed 80's classics Night of the Creeps and The Monster Squad. This episode was his second writing credit for Tales from the Crypt. 

Number of puns delivered by the Cryptkeeper: Four (The name of the episode itself, included)

In Summation: In an episode of the television program The Simpsons (aptly titled "Bart Sells His Soul"), the indescribable value of a priceless "object" is examined in perhaps its most notable example. If no one person controls the very fabric and foundation of how they are created and what their personal makeup is, then how can one change so dramatically via the decision to part with such an object? "Only Sin Deep" contributes a stance to the argument that is justifiably disturbing. Once you have given it all up on a whim for the "grass is always greener" conundrum, it becomes completely irrelevant as to whether or not you go back. You've made a conscious decision to do reprehensible damage to your friends, family, and anyone that would get even remotely close to you. And once you've crossed that threshold into another dimension of life, it becomes nigh impossible to undo the process. Sylvia Vane wasn't just a character deserving of an attitude adjustment, she's an example of what can and will happen if that attitude is all-consuming. In Tales from the Crypt, you don't have to have death to be truly satisfied. Sometimes, a simple look at the misery of lost opportunity and rational thought is enough to create that schadenfreude. Better her than me, says the prostitute into her pocket mirror passing by.

-Benjamin M. Benya