The new Blu-ray disc release of Hammer’s 1958 Dracula (aka Horror of Dracula) has been a long time coming – the film was first restored by the BFI in 2007 for a theatrical re-release, but failed to emerge for home viewing. Frustrating as that was at the time, it’s proved to be a blessing in disguise. While this version was remastered and restored, with cut scenes replaced from the US version and the original title once again in use, it still missed the legendary – and, many thought, mythical – extra scenes from the Japanese cut.

‘Stronger Japanese cuts’ were the stuff of legend for horror fans growing up in the 1970s and beyond, with rumours of extra gore scenes shot by Hammer for the bloodthirsty “Japs” seeming to be as much a racist stereotype as anything authentic. Certainly, no such scenes had emerged… until 2012, when a battered print of Dracula was found in Tokyo. Incredibly, this did include extra footage – though the reality of the situation seems to be that the film was cut by censors for the prudish Brits more than expanded for the Japanese market.

Restored scene

This new footage was painstakingly restored (the Blu-ray includes the unrestored footage, which is possibly the most damaged film print I’ve ever seen) and added to the BFI edit. It’s two scenes – an alternative version of Dracula’s seduction of Mina (replaced in the UK release by the same shot from a less salacious angle) and more of the Count’s disintegration at the film’s climax. To placate completists (and possibly learning from the backlash over the Blu-ray of The Devil Rides Out and the digitally altered effects), the 2007 BFI cut with the alternative seduction scene is also included (neither scene is exactly sexy, but we are talking about 1958 British morality here). These new additions can be easily spotted – while the restoration is remarkable, the footage is still softer than the rest of the film.

Restored scene

As for the movie as a whole – it looks stunning. Complaining about Hammer Blu-rays seems to be some sort of national sport these days, and some people have claimed that the colour palate of this version is ‘too blue’. Given that none of these people were around to see it when it played cinemas in 1958 (and if they were, their memory of a viewing 55 years ago might not be reliable), we should ignore these complaints and be willing to accept that this is the palate as originally intended.

The restoration has been done with reference to original materials and notes after all, so I think Hammer probably do know better than someone making a comparison to the version they saw on TV or VHS tape.

The film itself remains an obvious early high point in the Hammer oeuvre. While The Curse of Frankenstein was the first of their full-blooded gothics, that film feels like a dry run – this is where it really begins. A fast-paced, dramatic, exciting and serious work that immediately nails the lie that Hammer films were somehow ‘camp’. Memories of Bela Lugosi’s stilted performance in the equally stilted Universal Dracula are swept away by Christopher Lee’s Count, switching from urbane gentleman to snarling animal in the blink of an eye, and he’s more than matched by Peter Cushing as cinema’s most dynamic Van Helsing. It’s a film that rattles along and ends with what is still one of the most breathlessly exciting climatic battles ever seen in a horror movie.

The Blu-ray pulls out all the stops in terms of extras too. As well as the two versions of the film, there is an entertaining and informative commentary from Marcus Hearn and Jonathan Rigby that avoids the dry lecturing found in most ‘expert commentaries’ – these chaps know the film well and have a lively conversation about it.

Watch the ‘Censoring Dracula’ featurette:

There’s also 30 minute featurette about the film, a 20 minute piece about the restoration and a 10 minute documentary about the censoring of the film. On top of that, there’s the 30 minute The Demon Lover: Christopher Frayling on Dracula, the afore-mentioned unrestored Japanese reels, a World of Hammer episode, the film’s former child star Janina Faye reading a chapter of the original novel, an image gallery and the original screenplay on PDF.

All in all then, an essential edition of one of the genre’s most important films.

Buy this definitive Blu-ray disc from Amazon.co.uk

Reviewed by David Flint

The Devil Rides Out, released as The Devil’s Bride in the United States, is a 1968 British Hammer horror film, based on the 1934 novel of the same name by Dennis Wheatley. It was written by American writer Richard Matheson and directed by Terence Fisher. The film stars Christopher Lee, Leon Greene, Charles Gray (The Rocky Horror Picture Show), Patrick Mower (Incense for the Damned) and Nike Arrighi.

The powers of good are pitted against the forces of evil as the aristocratic Duc de Richelieu (Lee) wrestles with the charming but deadly Satanist, Mocata (Grey), for the soul of his friend, Simon Aron (Mower), who has been associating with Mocata and his coven. Set in 1920′s England, the Duc and his friend, Rex van Rijn (Greene), soon find more and more evidence of ritual sacrifice, black magic and the Dark Arts, with not only Mower but respectable members of society and a young girl called Tanith (Arrighi) having been lured into Mocata’s inner circle. The film develops as the Duc, van Rijn and their far more sceptical friends, Richard and Peggy Eaton (Paul Eddington and Rosalyn Landor), realise the gravity of the situation, interrupting a forest-based Satantic mass, attended by Satan himself. Mocata manoeuvres to bring Peggy under his spell, finally unleashing the full force of the Left Hand Path upon the group, who rely on all the Duc’s knowledge and white magic to save them.

Lee had been stamping his feet for a long time for Hammer to bring flesh to Wheatley’s words but there was understandable reticence on the part of the hallowed British production house. Eleven of Wheatley’s novels are steeped in Satanism, the practices and the history, which though lending itself to Hammer’s already rich history of storytelling, brought with it very real threat of Britain’s head censor, John Trevelyan cutting it to ribbons, if indeed he allowed it to exist at all. Hammer had already brought the first of Wheatley’s novels to the screen earlier in 1968, the Devil-less fantasy film The Lost Continent.

The rights to filming Wheatley’s book had belonged to Michael Staiver-Hutchins (who was also responsible for the film’s special effects) and an early attempt to make the book acceptable for the screen was made in 1963 with American writer John Hunter (Never Take Sweets From a Stranger) penning a treatment. though the producer, Anthony Hinds, declared it ‘too English’ for mass appeal. As such, the celebrated American, Richard Matheson (I Am Legend, many episodes of Twilight Zone) was approached at the end of the decade, charged with thinning out the lengthy descriptions of Satanic lore and picking up the pace somewhat.

There was also the need to change the plot slightly; in the book, Mocata’s diabolical plan is to start a World War by seizing the Talisman of Set (a mummified phallus, always check before you seize anything). This involved budget-worrying plane chases and even more special effects, so this was jettisoned. In the novel, Aron’s character is Jewish, lending the book an entirely different tone, which again is omitted in the film. The dialogue is very snappy, brevity lending an urgency and mystery to the proceedings.

Lee’s passion for the source material, as well as his close association with Wheatley meant he was always going to bag a lead role, here playing the hero to magnificent effect. Well versed in the ways and history of Black Magic himself, Lee throws himself into the role and clearly relishes every minute, delivery one of his greatest screen roles. Mower (later seen in Incense for the Damned and Cry of the Banshee) is also very believable as the naive young man in well over his head. Matching Lee’s performance is Charles Grey (best remembered as Bond villain, Blofeld but also playing key roles in Theatre of Blood, Rocky Horror Picture Show and The Beast Must Die, amongst many others), magnificent as Mocata, quietly oozing evil and seduction, without resorting to histrionics or cliches, as much Matheson’s triumph as the actor’s. His eyes stare through the screen offering mere suggestions at the carnage he can make possible.

Paul Eddington, later known for his comedy roles in the The Good Life and Yes, Prime Minister, is an effective ‘everyman’, understandably doubtful as to the accusation of sorcery and witchcraft going on. Less effective is Arrighi, slightly alluring but distant even considering her dazed and hypnotised state in character. Worse still is Greene, not only looking like he’s wearing a stuffed suit but bumbling through, getting in the way and doing that dreadful thing horror films often lapse into, giving the impression he’s never heard of the devil/vampires/zombies etc as if that’s the norm. The icing on the cake is that his voice is dubbed by Patrick Allen, which would be just about ok, if only Allen didn’t have one of the most recognisable voices in British television.

Production designer,  Bernard Robinson, does an amazing job with the sumptuous, grand set-pieces in the stately home settings and the film’s climax, working to a tight budget yet delivering sets of great style. The relocation of the filming from Hammer’s traditional home of Bray to Elstree studios gave him much more space to explore the Satanic sabbath and indoor scenes. Fisher, entering the twilight of his career (only Frankenstein Must be Destroyed and Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell followed), allows the actors to work with Matheson’s script without distraction, with plenty of close-ups and tightly-framed shots showing the fear and concern on the actors’ faces.

The Satanic Mass itself is a rather staid affair, a bit of dancing in frocks being about as shocking as Fisher dare venture without risk of Trevelyan involving himself unnecessarily. It does however give us the chance to see a rarely-glimpsed sight of the Devil himself in a horror film, referred to here as Baphomet or most famously, ‘The Goat of Mendes’. Easy to make ridiculous, the depiction is actually extremely startling, a slight smile on his goaty lips and an element of fear even on Mocata’s face. The Dark Lord was played by the famous stunt performer, Eddie Powell, who also served as Lee’s double in 1958′s Dracula.

Less impressive, effects-wise are the scenes towards the climax of the film where our heroes entrench themselves in a holy circle to fend off attacks from a giant spider an the Angel of Death himself. Both suffer from a lack of budget, the spider clearly clawing at a glass pane and the Angel’s horse rearing up again and again on a crudely edited loop. The horse was no actor, wings or no wings, possessing only one lung and wheezing after the slightest exertion (incredibly, not a joke). Digital intervention for the recent Blu-ray release attempted to fix some of these flaws and achieved this to some extent, removing many of the matting issues. There is, however, charm to the creakiness and overall detracts little if at all from the tone and action.

James Bernard’s score is of the highest calibre, delivering instant dread and threat whilst remaining hauntingly beautiful, one of the greatest ever scores for a horror film. Costing a mere £285,00, the film did reasonable business, though despite pleasing Wheatley himself immensely,  did not lead to further excursions for the Duc. Renamed The Devil’s Bride in the USA, so as not to confuse cinema-goers into thinking it was a Western, the film stands up extremely well, the 1920′s setting lending the film a timelessness and one of an almost historical document for the ages.

One of Lee’s favourite films, he is an advocate for the film being remade to redress the special effects issues, though, sadly his wish to play the Duc once more seems more than slightly unlikely. To quote Mocata’s most famous line: “I shall not be back… but something will”.

Daz Lawrence, Horrorpedia

1968 was an epochal year around the world in horror films and for Hammer it was no different. After covering Mummies, vampires, yetis and reptilian women, there was one  evil being that had yet to be filmed. The Devil Rides Out is a terrific film it it’s own right but the score is something else. There are no holds barred in the film, no twists in the tail, if you pardon the pun – it really is the Horned Beast being dealt with, and composer James Bernard wrote accordingly. It is, perhaps, the definitive horror score up to that point in history. Everything about it screams…well, it just screams. The opening credits are enough – a five-note refrain builds to a particularly satisfying crescendo – except the crescendo just keeps going and going. Five times this is repeated getting ever higher until the orchestra simply run out of notes and the strings spiral downwards. It’s exhausting and the film has barely begun.

As, most famously with 1958′s Dracula, the five notes spell out the film’s title in musical syllables. There is an almost constant rumble of drums, particularly timpani, in the background of the score, sometimes keeping their distance, sometimes thrashing their way to the front, either indicating a threat or imminent ritual. It’s the string section that really get a workout though, regularly trilling like nails down a blackboard, one imagines they were on footballer-like bonuses to keep up. The tension does not relent for the whole score, nearly thirty cues, even the love theme suggesting a whispering threat. On ‘The Baptism Begins’, gongs, cymbals, xylophones and a braying horn combine to almost sickening effect, the main theme again signalling ultimate evil.

Filming had already begun by the time Barnard became involved, Hammer executives concerned that the early rushes were leaning rather too much towards the comedic. Riddled with disconcerting tritones and minor seconds, the score is hugely influential and is perhaps the most effective suite of music written for any horror film. Tritones are a common technique for creating unease in music, employed to disturbing effect in the likes of Blood on Satan’s Claw.

Bernard’s use of clashing chords was a common trick used and would utilised far more often from this point forth; unfamiliar notes and sounds adding to the tension on-screen. An ethereal-sounding vibraphone is used in combination with a piano to add to the undercurrent of strangeness.

There is slight redemption in the finale, the final cue reflective, more controlled but without the soar away happily-ever-after satisfaction given to most films and, inevitably, a variation on the main theme used throughout the film to represent the devil, here ending in a major key for the first time, with bells added to the mix.  Both author Dennis Wheatley and Bernard more than suggesting that messing with things you don’t understand can never end with redemption, both good and evil being very much two sides of the same coin.

Daz Lawrence

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Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter is a 1972 British horror film. It was written and directed by Brian Clemens (The Avengers), produced by Albert Fennell and Hammer Film Productions and was belatedly released on 7 April 1974. It stars Horst Janson in the title role, along with John Carson, Shane Briant and Caroline Munro. The original music score is composed by Laurie Johnson. It was originally the pilot for a planned television series.

When his village is plagued by mysterious deaths marked by highly accelerated aging, Dr. Marcus calls in his old army friend, Captain Kronos, and his companion, hunchback Professor Hieronymus Grost, two professional vampire hunters. Grost explains to the initially skeptical Marcus that the women are victims of a vampire that drains not blood but youth, and that there are “as many species of vampire as there are beasts of prey.” The finding of another victim confirms Grost’s explanation.

Grost and Kronos’s companion Carla prove via a mystical test the presence of vampires, but their proofs are contradicted by an eyewitness who claims to have seen “someone old, very old”, while a youth-draining vampire should appear as youthful. Marcus visits the family of his late friend, Lord Hagen Durward, and speaks with the Lord’s son Paul (Shane Briant) and his beautiful sister Sara (Lois Daine) but has to leave without seeing the bed-ridden Lady Durward. In the woods, Marcus has an encounter with a cloaked figure that leaves him shaken and with drops of blood on his lips…

Wikipedia | IMDb

” … it’s hard not to be charmed by Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter to at least some extent. If nothing else, it stands among the most determinedly peculiar horror films Hammer ever released, and it represents a then-unique attempt to do something new and different with vampirism.” 1000 Misspent Hours and Counting

“Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter has a goofy title and none of their usual players, so I wasn’t expecting much, but it’s actually one of their best vampire movies, and a must-see for any vamp OR Hammer enthusiast. ” Horror Movie a Day

Image courtesy of Iver Film Services website

Vampire hunting kits first appeared in the mid-Victorian era, around the year 1840. They became even more common post-1897 with the publication of Bram Stoker‘s novel Dracula, appealing to both the Victorian’s passion for highly decorative conversation pieces and their keen interest in the supernatural. They have been located in countries across Europe, including England, France and Romania.

They were usually housed in portable wooden boxes, with locking systems to prevent keep both the contents safe and secure and to prevent them from falling into the ‘wrong hands’. Though the contents varied according to the whims of the manufacturer or the owner; they variously contained:

1. A wooden mallet

2. A wooden stake

3. A rosary

4.  A crucifix

5. A stake (sometimes more than one, allowing for bad shot and multiple foes)

6. Pliers (presumably to assist with the removal of coffin nails and fangs

7. A pistol

8. Vials of various liquids and potions; holy water, sulphur, powdered flowers of garlic, flour of brimstone, holy earth

9. A Bible or sacred texts

10. Rope to bind the limbs

Although reproductions have appeared from the 1920′s right up to the present day, original kits, often with their contents completely intact, have found their way onto the general market, commanding high prices. Below is a kit acquired by the Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds, England, purchased at a major auction house for £2000.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-18367300

Although suspected to be a late 20th Century copy, it features a handwritten note which says:

Luke 19:27, But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.

Daz Lawrence

The Stranglers of Bombay is a 1959 adventure/horror film directed by Terence Fisher for Hammer Films dealing with the British East India Company‘s investigation of the cult of Thuggee stranglers in the 1830s. The movie stars Guy Rolfe (Dolls; Puppet Master films) and Jan Holden. Unlike most Hammer films, Stranglers of Bombay is somewhat historically accurate in describing the religious cult of Kali and the deaths of thousands — some believe millions — at the hands of the Thugs (also known as thaga, pronounced “tahg”). Using modern methods, the British succeeded in wiping out the cult, which may have originated as far back as the 6th Century. It has been suggested that this film influenced Steven Spielberg‘s Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984).

Captain Harry Lewis (Guy Rolfe), of the British East India Company, is investigating why over 2000 natives are missing but encounters a deaf ear from his superior, Colonel Henderson, who is more concerned with the local English merchants’ caravans which are disappearing without a trace. To appease them, Henderson agrees to appoint a man to investigate and Lewis believes it will be him. However, he is sorely disappointed when Henderson gives the job to the newly arrived, oblivious Captain Connaught-Smith.

Lewis believes a gang is murdering both the men and animals of the caravans and then burying the bodies. He presents the haughty new man with his evidence, his theories, and later his personal experience of actually seeing the cult but the captain is antagonistic and derisive towards Lewis who eventually resigns his commission in frustration to investigate on his own.

Meanwhile, the merchants decide to band together and create a super-caravan whose size will discourage the bandits, they believe. Ram Das, Lewis’ houseboy, believes he has seen his brother, Gopali, who disappeared some years ago, and receives permission to search for him. Lewis learns that Ram Das has been captured by the Thugs when his severed hand is tossed through the window of his bungalow. Soon after, the Thugs compel Gopali Das, a new initiate of the cult, to kill his brother, the dismembered Ram. The hidebound Captain Connaught-Smith leads the caravan and foolishly allows the stranglers in the guise of innocent travellers to join them. That night, the Thugs strike with their usual success.

Wikipedia | IMDb

“As befits its origins at a studio most strongly associated with horror, The Stranglers of Bombay is an atypically dark and morbid adventure movie, and remains well worth seeking out despite a few clunky performances and an ending that proves unsatisfying in bad ways as well as good.” 1000 Misspent Hours and Counting

“What is highly unusual about this film is not only its exotic set up (Thugees were rarely ever given centre stage in a movie before), but also its bleak approach to the subject matter. When Lewis gets stone walled he may ultimately be able to expose the cult, but fails to prevent a single attack and instead is faced with a freshly dug mass grave and a prime villain still at large.: Holger Haase, Hammer and Beyond

Hands of the Ripper is a 1971 British horror film directed by Peter Sasdy for Hammer Film Productions. Produced by one of the few female members of staff at Hammer, Aida Young, who had previously worked on the likes of One Million Years B.C., She, Taste the Blood of Dracula and Scars of Dracula, the film employs many stars of period BBC drama as opposed to the usual faces regularly seen in their films.

Poor young Anna (Angharad Rees from TV’s Poldark) witnesses the brutal slaying of her mother at the hands of her father, who happens to be Jack the Ripper. Catching sight of the flames in the background, she is psychologically scarred (or maybe possessed) and commits terrible acts herself in her adulthood whenever flickering lights are present or she is kissed.

Taken in as an orphan by local camp medium Mrs Golding (an always barking Dora Bryan) she is rescued from a life of prostitution by kindly sceptic, Dr Pritchard (Eric Porter, best known on television from 60′s sensation The Foryste Saga). Denied the opportunity to sample Anna when she stabs Bryan to death, permanently shocked-looking Mr Dysart (Derek Godfrey from The Abominable Dr Phibes) is jointly accused of being prime suspect by Pritchard, who rather than informing the authorities prefers to study their motives and behaviour having become an student of psychoanalyst, Sigmund Freud.

We are introduced to Pritchard’s son, Michael (Keith Bell, Island of Terror) and his blind fiancée, Laura (an unconvincing Jane Merrow) who live a carefree life of high society and handkerchiefs but meanwhile, Anna is increasingly being exposed to flashing lights and 15 years on from her father’s murder sprees around London’s East End, is playing catch-up numbers-wise. Despite Dysart’s pleas to let the noose be her judge rather than science, Pritchard continues to support Anna and find an answer to her condition (despite her decimating his staff) until she becomes a threat to his son and his beloved and the climax leads to a tense resolution in the Whispering Gallery of St.Paul’s Cathedral.

Buy Hands of the Ripper on Blu-ray + DVD combo from Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

Shot at Pinewood studios and utilising sets from James Bond productions and exteriors from Billy Wilder’s The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, Hands of the Ripper is less typical Hammer horror and more gruesome period drama, the actors slotting into the period setting seamlessly. Featuring considerably less nudity than early 70s audiences had become used to (especially considering it played the lesser of a UK double-bill with Twins of Evil) the film is nevertheless tightly plotted and features one of Hammer’s most gruesome killings, with shouty prostitute, Long Liz (Lynda Baron, best known as Nurse Gladys Emanuel from TV comedy, Open All Hours) receiving a handful of hat-pins to her eye, a scene that was trimmed significantly by the British Board of Censors and entirely by their counterparts in America.

Director Sasdy, a Hungarian, also helmed the fun Taste the Blood of Dracula, the not-really-fun-at-all Countess Dracula and the highly regarded Stone Tape television play, a medium in which he eventually stayed. Both he and Young had a very particular vision, leaving behind the previous Ripper films which had focused on the mystery of the Victorian slayer’s identity (indeed, even the killer seen in the film’s prologue is played by a still unknown actor) and homed in on the tragedy and lives affected by such tragedies. As he often did, musical director, Phillip Martell took a chance on a previously unknown composer, Christopher Gunning, who supplies a score which is all sweeping period drama and less stabbing booms of dread.

The film suffers slightly in tone, the over-the-top camp of the fake clairvoyants and grizzled prostitutes being at odds with the demure Anna and ultra-serious Pritchard, the two worlds, whilst clearly a very real Victorian Britain, sitting uneasily together onscreen. The sets are superb, a perfect backdrop for mystery and murder; even faced with a flat refusal by St.Paul’s Cathedral to film inside, the sneaked shots of the interior are faultlessly used as a projected backdrop for the film’s resolution.

The numerous killings are well-executed and shown in pleasingly graphic detail. The downbeat nature of the film is tied up nicely with a suitably gloomy finale, though the lack of a major horror star hampered its commercial appeal at the time, and it only retrospectively became something of a fan favourite.

Daz Lawrence, Horrorpedia

Wikipedia | IMDb | Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk | Related: The New York Ripper | Ripper Street

Buy Hands of the Ripper + The Monster + The Uncanny on DVD from Amazon.co.uk

Buy The Hammer Story book from Amazon.co.uk

The Mummy is a 1959 British horror film, directed by Terence Fisher and starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. It was released on 25 September 1959. It was written by Jimmy Sangster and produced by Michael Carreras and Anthony Nelson Keys for Hammer Film Productions.

Though the title suggests Universal Pictures‘ 1932 film of the same name, the film actually derives its plot and characters entirely from two later Universal films, The Mummy’s Hand and The Mummy’s Tomb, with the climax borrowed directly from The Mummy’s Ghost. The character name “Joseph Whemple” is the only connection with the 1932 version.

Wikipedia | IMDb

Introduction:

In Egypt in 1895, archaeologists John Banning (Cushing), his father Stephen (Felix Aylmer) and his uncle Joseph Whemple (Raymond Huntley) are searching for the tomb of Princess Ananka, the high priestess of the god Karnak. John has a broken leg and cannot accompany his father and uncle when they open the tomb. Before they enter, an Egyptian man named Mehemet Bey (George Pastell) warns them not to go in, lest they face the fatal curse against desecraters. Stephen and Joseph ignore him, and discover within the sarcophagus of Ananka. After Joseph leaves to tell John the good news, Stephen finds the Scroll of Life and reads from it. He then screams off-screen and is found in a catatonic state.

Three years later, back in England, Stephen Banning comes out of his catatonia at the Engerfield Nursing Home for the Mentally Disordered, and sends for his son. He tells him that when he read from the Scroll of Life, he unintentionally brought back to life Kharis (Lee), the mummified high priest of Karnak. He was sentenced to be entombed alive to serve as the guardian of Princess Ananka’s tomb as punishment for attempting to bring her back to life out of forbidden love. Now, Stephen tells his disbelieving son that Kharis will hunt down and kill all those who desecrated Ananka’s tomb…

Guest Review:

The Mummy is a remake -– the result of Universal making a fortune with Hammer’s Dracula and throwing their archives open for the company to plunder in search of new material. However, Sangster’s screenplay dips liberally into Universal’s entire, mostly lamentable Mummy series, cherry-picking the bits that work and discarding the rest. Most notably, it rejects most of the original film, which only featured the bandaged title character in the opening scenes. By the time this film was made, audiences had a good idea of what a mummy movie should feature, and central to that was a marauding mummy.

The Mummy aims for a more epic feel than Hammer’s Frankenstein or Dracula, eschewing the gothic trappings for an atmosphere that is perhaps closer to later fantastical costume dramas like She. This attempt to bring a touch of class to the film is only semi-successful – the lengthy flashback sequence at the centre of the story certainly tries to be grand, but the budget really doesn’t allow for it, and the funeral procession feels rather scant, truth be told, with props that look decidedly unsolid. Luckily, the rest of the film more than makes up for it. Uniquely in the Mummy genre, this is a film that throttles along, with three or four impressive action set pieces and a story that defies its own thinness. Terence Fisher’s solid, if unimaginative direction keeps the action moving and overcomes the wordiness of Sangster’s screenplay.

Central to the success of the film is Lee’s portrayal of The Mummy. For audiences used to seeing Lon Chaney Jr shuffling along in pursuit of people who could escape him simply by walking at a steady pace, this must have been a revelation. We first see Kharis as he emerges from a swamp, covered in mud and glistening in the moonlight, and right away it’s an imposing sight. It’s not just Lee’s height and stature, though of course this is impressive – no hunched over figure here. More significantly, this is a Mummy who moves at speed and has immense physical strength – seeing him tear out the bars of the asylum windows, smash through locked doors and more or less run across the room reveals this to be, uniquely, a mummy that seems a genuine threat. It must have had the same impact as the first time people saw zombies run.

But there’s more to Lee’s performance than sheer brute force. While being buried under monster make-up again must have felt like a step back after Dracula and The Hound of the Baskervilles (and perhaps the flashback scene was also a sop to Lee allowing him dialogue and a regular appearance), his performance here is remarkable. Simply through his eyes and his physical stance, Lee is able to display determination, malice and pathos – his Mummy is, in the end, a tragic figure more than the mindless killer we see in other films. It’s easy to believe that this role could be filled by any stuntman (a belief Hammer clearly shared, given the casting in subsequent films in the series, Curse of the Mummy’s Tomb and The Mummy’s Shroud), but Lee’s performance here shows how wrong that is.

Cushing, conversely, has very little to do for much of the film. While he gives his usual committed performance, John Banning is a fairly bland character who spends much of the film spouting exposition. There is none of the fire and intensity of a Dr Frankenstein, Van Helsing or Sherlock Holmes in this character, sadly, though we get touches of it in the scenes where he battles Kharis one-on-one – these moments are not up to the dramatic climax of Dracula, but they’re not far short and show the chemistry and physicality that Cushing and Lee brought to the roles.

As the real villain, Pastell is suitably evil, though his character is at least allowed to be more rounded than you’d expect. When he argues with banning about the ethics of tomb robbing, you can’t help but think that – murderous mummy rampage aside – he might actually have the moral high ground. Yvonne Furneaux is very beautiful, but is given little to do other than let her hair down (apparently, neither Banning nor Kharis can recognise the resemblance to Ananka when it’s tied up!) and then be carried off, swooning, by the Mummy.

Although generally considered the lesser of Hammer’s original trilogy, The Mummy remains a fantastic film – pacey, dramatic and exciting, it is uniquely the only Mummy movie from either the Hammer or Universal series that can be called great (I’m not counting Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb here, of course!).

Blu-ray Disc review:

This new UK edition is a long-overdue high quality release for the film. As well as a fantastic new transfer that looks astonishing – even if it does sometimes expose the cheapness of the sets – the disc comes with extensive extra content. There’s a half hour ‘making of’ that is very much in line with similar, entertaining entries on other hammer discs, plus documentaries about Bray Studios and Hammer’s ‘rep company’ – the supporting players who turn up in several Hammer films. There’s also a World of Hammer episode about Cushing, a lively commentary from Marcus Hearn and Jonathan Rigby, and more. But the most impressive extra is the 1952 Hammer film Stolen Face.

This pre-horror melodrama tells the story of plastic surgeon Phillip Ritter (Paul Henreid), who falls in love with concert pianist Alice Brent (Lizabeth Scott) during a holiday. But she is secretly involved with another man (Hammer regular Andre Morrell) and runs away to Europe. Heartbroken, Ritter does what anyone would do – he remodels the scarred face of habitual criminal Lily Conover (Mary McKenzie) to be the double of Alice, as part of a dubious attempt to rehabilitate convicts who he believes are driven to a life of crime by their damaged appearance! But Ritter soon sees the folly of such dodgy ideas after marrying Lily, only to find that once a thief, always a thief. Meanwhile, Alice has ditched her fiancé and is now back on the scene.

A slight but entertaining thriller, Stolen Face mixes elements of Film Noir with straightforward melodrama and also looks forward to Fisher’s later work with another obsessed surgeon, Dr Frankenstein. Curiously, it also mirrors the plot – often in rather precise details – of the later ‘greatest film ever made’ Vertigo. I wouldn’t possibly suggest that the Hitchcock film is a copy of this obscure hammer quickie, but it’s certainly interesting.

Stolen Face is a film worth picking up by itself, so it’s inclusion on this disc is most welcome. If, for some bizarre reason, you were still unsure about this new edition of The Mummy, then this substantial extra should be the tipping point.

David Flint – Guest reviewer from Strange Things Are Happening

Black Park is a country park in Wexham, Buckinghamshire, England between Slough and Iver Heath. Covering 530 acres of woodland, heathland and grassland,  the park includes an imposing avenue of mature pine trees, and a lake (dug in the 18th century as a reservoir for a local farmer).

Adjacent to Pinewood Film Studios, Black Park has been used as an outdoor location for many film and television productions. The woods and lake featured prominently in the Hammer Horror films from the late 1950s to the 1970s, such as Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966). In the Hammer films the location was often used to represent Transylvania.

The park has also been used in other film productions such as the James Bond franchise Goldfinger, where it was used for a nighttime car chase scene, and the 2006 version of Casino Royale, and the Monty Python film And Now For Something Completely Different, plus several Carry On films, Batman, Sleepy Hollow, the Harry Potter film series‘, Captain America, The Bunker and the chillingly-effective Eden Lake.

For television, Black Park, together with its lake, was used extensively in location filming for the planet ‘Alzarius’ in the Doctor Who serial Full Circle (1980) which featured the memorable, albeit cheap-looking, Marshmen monsters.

Thanks to Seat at the Back for the Curse of Frankenstein image

In the mid-1970s, as Michael Carreras struggled to keep British company Hammer Films afloat, they announced a number of projects that never went into production. With promotional advance sales artwork by Tom Chantrell and to be filmed in India, Kali Devil Bride of Dracula was one of these. Artwork on the Tom Chantrell website, shows that at some point this project was also known as Dracula and the Blood Lust of Kali.

Other film projects that never got beyond the drawing board included an adaptation of the American Vampirella comic, Nessie (obviously about the Loch Ness monster), Stone of Evil, Victim of His Imagination, and Zeppelin vs. Pterodactyls.

We are grateful to Boobs and Blood! for most of the images above.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories – and the ongoing industry spun off from them – have a curious connection to the horror genre. The image of the master detective, stalking the fog-bound streets of London, seem to be as much a part of the Victorian horror world as Dracula and Jack the Ripper, and it is no surprise that enterprising filmmakers and writers have chosen to pit Holmes against these infamous monsters.

But the original Holmes stories only occasionally flirted with the supernatural, and even then, a rational explanation for events would be uncovered by Holmes in the end – like Scooby-Doo, Sherlock Holmes always found an altogether human cause for seemingly demonic forces.

The most famous of the Holmes stories is one such horror tale, The Hound of the Baskervilles. Originally serialised in The Strand magazine between 1901 and 1902, it is one of only four novel-length adventures for Holmes that Conan Doyle wrote. It remains the most popular and widely adapted of the Holmes stories, even though for a large part of the novel, Holmes is absent, leaving his companion and assistant Dr Watson to carry the story. This tale of greed and murder sees Holmes and Watson investigating the death of Sir Charles Baskerville, apparently at the hands (or paws) of a gigantic supernatural hound, part of a family curse. It is down to Holmes to protect Sir Henry, the Baskerville heir, while unmasking the killer from a collection of suspects and red herrings.

This is the most widely adapted of the Holmes novels, the story for some time being the ‘go to’ Holmes adventure for filmmakers. With the current trend to bastardise the Holmes character and use original (or barely recognisable) stories, the frequency of film and television adaptations has slowed, but with Sherlock Holmes being as popular as ever (albeit in modernised and unrecognisable forms), it can’t be long before another film or TV version of the tale appears.

The first Hound… film appeared from Germany in 1914. Conan Doyle’s creation was hugely popular with German readers, and this first film was a four part silent movie based on both the novel and Der Hund von Baskerville: Schauspiel in vier Aufzugen aus dem Schottischen Hochland. Frei nach motiven aus Poes und Doyles Novellen (“The Hound of the Baskervilles: a play in four acts set in the Scottish Highlands. Freely adapted from the stories of Poe and Doyle”), a 1907 stage play. As you might expect, it played fast and loose with the original story. Three further German adaptation appeared in 1920, and Richard Oswald, who had shot the third and fourth parts of the 1914 version, had another go in 1929.

The first British film based on the story was made in 1921 by Maurice Elvey, and it would be subsequently filmed again in 1932 in what would be the first ‘talkie’ version of the story. Edgar Wallace worked on the screenplay.

1937 saw another German version of the story, and in 1939 the first American version was shot. This version, made by Sidney Lanfield, is still regarded as one of the best adaptations of the book, and was the first of fourteen Holmes movies starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce. It’s a fairly faithful adaptation of the novel, but – bizarrely – due to copyright reasons, it is absent from the DVD box sets of the Rathbone Holmes movies.

After this flurry of Hound activity, it would be a decade and a half before the next version of the story, another German adaptation. But in 1959, Hammer films added The Hound of the Baskervilles to their series of gothic horror movies that had begun in 1957 with The Curse of Frankenstein. Starring Peter Cushing as Holmes and Christopher Lee as Sir Henry, the film was a rather loose adaptation of the story – there is more drama and the horror elements are (unsurprisingly) emphasised. Yet thanks to Cushing’s performance (many consider him the definitive Holmes) and the sheer quality of Terence Fisher’s film, this remains a much loved version of the story.

A decade later, Cushing would reprise the role of Holmes in a BBC TV series, taking over from Douglas Wilmer. The Hound of the Baskervilles was adapted as a two part story in 1968. This was more faithful than the Hammer version, but the tight schedule and reduced budgets of TV showed in the production values. Nevertheless, for fans of Holmes and Cushing, it remains well worth seeking out.

Proving the global popularity of the story, the next version appeared in 1971 from the Soviet Union. Another Russian version appeared a decade later, as part of a TV series based on Holmes. This 147 minute adaptation adds some ill-fitting humour to the story and while handsomely mounted has some eccentric performances (Vasily Livanov’s Holmes is rather too laid back while other characters chew the scenery).

1972 saw a US TV movie version of the story, with Stewart Granger making for an unconvincing Holmes in a fairly lacklustre movie that co-starred William Shatner! But the worst was yet to come.

In 1978, Paul Morrissey made a disastrous attempt to make a British comedy version of the story, with Peter Cook and Dudley Moore starring alongside a host of well known British names — Denholm Elliot, Joan Greenwood, Hugh Griffith, Irene Handl, Terry-Thomas, Max Wall and Kenneth Williams — none of whom could save the film. Crass, bad taste humour that was mishandled and sheer self-indulgence all round – it feels essentially like a vanity project for Cook and Moore – made this one of the worst comedy films you could imagine, devoid of laughs or any sort of coherent story. It even includes a parody of The Exorcist…

1982 saw a four part British TV adaptation, with a rather miscast Tom Baker as Holmes, and a year later another British TV film adapted the novel.

This was the first of what was planned as a series of Holmes TV movies to be co-produced with US producer Sy Weintraub. Unfortunately for him, the Holmes stories slipped out of copyright and Granada TV announced their own series with Jeremy Brett. Only this and The Sign of Four were eventually shot. With Ian Richardson as Holmes, it’s a solid though unremarkable effort from director Douglas Hickox (who was going for the visual feel of Dario Argento’s films) and suffers from Martin Shaw’s Sir Henry being obviously and unconvincingly re-dubbed by another actor.

The Granada TV series that had scuppered the planned film series eventually adapted 42 of the 60 Holmes stories, and finally got around to The Hound of the Baskervilles in 1988. While critics praised Brett’s nervy performance, the series was often overly stagey and perhaps a little too faithful to the stories to always work as drama.

Also in 1983, Peter O’Toole voiced the character in the animated version Sherlock Holmes and the Baskerville Curse, and this would be the last version for some time. Holmes and the Hound eventually clashed again in 2000, in one of four Canadian TV films with Matt Frewer, who was hopelessly unsuited to the role.

Equally unsatisfactory was a dull BBC version from 2002, with Richard Roxburgh as Holmes. This version again made changes to the original story, but was ultimately rather flat and lifeless.

The most recent – and possibly most annoying – version of the story appeared in the second series of the BBC’s overly smug Sherlock. Titled ‘The Hounds of Baskerville’, it throws out Conan Doyle almost entirely, to tell a story of secret military research into mind-altering drugs. While Mark Gatiss’ screenplay retained the horror elements, it made the worst mistake possible when changing a familiar story – namely, that if what you come up with isn’t better than what existed to begin with, why bother? The end result of this is a version that is just as much a slap in the face as Paul Morrissey’s ‘comedy’ adaptation.

It’s to be hoped that someone will make a more faithful, full blooded horror version of The Hound of the Baskervilles soon. While the story might seem to have been done to death, there are always new generations unfamiliar with the story. And after so many ineffectual – or downright insulting – versions, we deserve a new version to match the Rathbone and Hammer versions. Meanwhile, the story still inspires writers, artists and others in a series of novels, comic books, video games and even music… as you can see in the rather unusual version of Black Sabbath’s Paranoid below!

Article by David Flint, Horrorpedia

Sphere horror paperbacks were published in the UK during the 1970s and 1980s. They were hugely popular and many – such as Lust for a Vampire, Blind Terror, The Ghoul, Squirm and Dawn of the Dead – were movie tie-ins and novelisations. The initial novels chosen for publication focused on the occult. Sphere published pulp fiction novels by famous authors, such as Richard Matheson, Ray Russell, Colin Wilson, Graham Masterson, Clive Barker and Robert Bloch whilst also providing a vehicle for British career writers such as Guy N. Smith and Peter Tremayne, plus many lesser known writers whose work received a boost by being part of the Sphere publishing machine. Occasionally, they also published compilations of short stories and “non-fiction” titles such as What Witches Do. In the early years, like many other opportunistic publishers, they reprinted the vintage work of writers – such as Sheridan Le Fanu – with lurid cover art.

The listing below provides a celebration of the photography and artwork used to sell horror books by one particular British publishing company. For more information about each book visit the excellent Sordid Spheres web blog.

1970

John Blackburn – Bury Him Darkly

Robert Bloch and Ray Bradbury – Fever Dream

Robert Bloch – The Living Demons

Robert Bloch – Tales in a Jugular Vein

Angus Hall – Madhouse

Sheridan Le Fanu – The Best Horror Stories

Michel Parry - Countess Dracula
Sarban – The Sound of his Horn

Ray Russell – The Case Against Satan
William Seabrook – Witchcraft (non-fiction)
Kurt Singer (ed.) – The Oblong Box

Kurt Singer (ed.) – Plague of the Living Dead

Kurt Singer – (ed.) The House in the Valley
Robert Somerlott – The Inquisitor’s House

1971

Richard Davis (ed.) – The Year’s Best Horror Stories 1
Peter Haining (ed.) – The Wild Night Company
Angus Hall – The Scars of Dracula

Angus Hall – To Play the Devil – Buy on Amazon.co.uk
William Hughes – Blind Terror (Blind Terror film on Horrorpedia)

William Hughes – Lust for a Vampire (Lust for a Vampire film on Horrorpedia)
Ray Russell – Unholy Trinity
E. Spencer Shew – Hands Of The Ripper

Kurt Singer (ed) – The Day of the Dragon

David Sutton (ed.) – New Writings in the Horror and Supernatural 1

Alan Scott – Project Dracula

1972

Richard Davis (ed.) – The Year’s Best Horror Stories 2

Peter Haining (ed.) – The Clans of Darkness

Laurence Moody – What Became Of Jack And Jill?
Ronald Pearsall – The Exorcism

David Sutton (ed.) – New Writings in the Horror and Supernatural 2
Richard Tate – The Dead Travel Fast

Sam Moskowitz (ed.) – A Man Called Poe

1973

Richard Davis (ed.) – The Year’s Best Horror Stories 3
Stewart Farrar – What Witches Do: The Modern Coven Revealed (Non-Fiction)

Brian J. Frost (ed.) – Book of the Werewolf

Melissa Napier – The Haunted Woman
Daniel Farson – Jack The Ripper [non-fiction]
Raymond Rurdoff – The Dracula Archives

1974

Theodore Sturgeon – Caviar

1976

C L Moore – Shambleau
Guy N. Smith – The Ghoul

Robert Black – Legend of the Werewolf

Richard Curtis – Squirm

Ron Goulart – Vampirella 1:Bloodstalk

1977

August Derleth (ed.) – When Evil Wakes
Ron Goulart – Vampirella 2: On Alien Wings

Ron Goulart – Vampirella 3: Deadwalk

Vampirella on Horrorpedia

Ken Johnson – Blue Sunshine

Fritz Leiber - Night’s Black Agents
Robert J Myers – The Slave of Frankenstein

Robert J Myers – The Cross of Frankenstein
Jack Ramsey – The Rage

Ray Russell – Incubus
Andrew Sinclair – Cat

Colin Wilson – Black Room

1978

Ethel Blackledge – The Fire
John Christopher – The Possessors
John Christopher – The Little People
Basil Copper – Here Be Daemons

Basil Copper – The Great White Space
Giles Gordon (ed.) – A Book of Contemporary Nightmares

Peter Haining – Terror! A History Of Horror Illustrations From The Pulp Magazines

Peter Haining (ed) – Weird Tales

Peter Haining (ed) – More Weird Tales
Peter Haining (ed) – Ancient Mysteries Reader 1
Peter Haining (ed) – Ancient Mysteries Reader 2
Richard Matheson – Shock!

Richard Matheson – Shock 2

Richard Matheson – Shock 3

Stephen Marlowe – Translation
Michael Robson – Holocaust 2000
Peter Tremayne – The Ants

Peter Tremayne – The Vengeance Of She

1979

John Clark and Robin Evans – The Experiment
William Hope Hodgson – The Night Land
Robert R. McCammon – Baal

Kirby McCauley – Frights

Kirby McCauley – Frights 2
Jack Finney – Invasion Of The Body Snatchers
Graham Masterton – Charnel House

Graham Masterton – Devils of D-Day
Susan Sparrow – Dawn of the Dead

Gerald Suster – The Devil’s Maze
Peter Tremayne – The Curse of Loch Ness

1980

Les Daniels – The Black Castle
Gerald Suster – The Elect
Jere Cunningham – The Legacy
William Hope Hodgson – The House On The Borderland
Robin Squire – A Portrait Of Barbara

John Cameron – The Astrologer
Robert McCammon – Bethany’s Sin
William H. Hallahan – Keeper Of The Children

Ray Russell – The Devil’s Mirror

Roy Russell – Prince Of Darkness

1981

Basil Copper – Necropolis

M. Jay Livingstone – The Prodigy
Andrew Coburn – The Babysitter
Peter Tremayne – Zombie!

Graham Masterton – The Heirloom
Owen West [Dean R. Koontz] – The Funhouse
William Hope Hodgson – The Ghost Pirates

Graham Masterton - The Wells Of Hell
Graham Masterton – Famine
Marc Alexander – The Devil Hunter [non-fiction]
Guy Lyon Playfair – This House Is Haunted [non-fiction]
Robert R. McCammon – They Thirst

1982

Ronald Patrick – Beyond The Threshold

Peter Tremayne – The Morgow Rises

William Hope Hodgson – The Boats Of The Glen Carrig

Stephen Gallagher – Chimera
Marc Alexander – Haunted Houses You May Visit [non-fiction]
Michelle Smith & Lawrence Pazder – Michelle Remembers [non-fiction]
Dillibe Onyearma – Night Demon
Robert R. McCammon – The Night Boat

Ray Russell – Incubus

1983

James Darke – The Witches 1. The Prisoner

James Darke – The Witches 2. The Trial
James Darke – The Witches 3. The Torture

Basil Copper – Into The Silence
Les Daniels – The Silver Skull

1984

Peter Tremayne – Kiss Of The Cobra

Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 1
Clive Barker - Books Of Blood 2

Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 3
Graham Masterton – Tengu

George R. R. Martin – Fevre Dream
James Darke – Witches 4. The Escape

1985

Peter Tremayne – Swamp!

Peter Tremayne – Angelus!
Stephen Laws – The Ghost Train

Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 4
Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 5
Clive Barker – Books Of Blood 6
Rosalind Ashe – Dark Runner
James Darke – Witches 5. The Meeting
James Darke – Witches 6. The Killing

1986

Christopher Fowler - City Jitters

James Darke – Witches 7. The Feud
James Darke – Witches 8. The Plague

Clive Barker – The Damnation Game
Graham Masterton – Night Warriors
Lisa Tuttle – A Nest Of Nightmares

1987

Peter Tremayne – Nicor!
Peter Tremayne – Trollnight

Lisa Tuttle – Gabriel

1988

Alan Ryan (ed.) – Halloween Horrors

Guy N. Smith – Fiend

Stephen Laws – Spectre
Graham Masterton – Mirror
Eric Sauter – Predators
Robert McCammon – Swan Song

1989

Stephen Laws – Wyrm
Guy N. Smith – The Camp
Guy N. Smith – Mania

Graham Masterton – The Walkers
Graham Masterton – Ritual
Bernard King – Witch Beast

The listing above and many of the cover images are reproduced from the Sordid Spheres web blog. Bar the odd addition and amendment, the list first appeared in Paperback Fanatic 3 (August 2007). For more information about each title, its author and links to reviews, visit Sordid Spheres

Horrorpedia is a non-profit website. Please help us cover our web-hosting costs by buying from our affiliate links. Thank you.

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The Kiss of the Vampire also known as Kiss of the Vampire and Kiss of Evil, is a 1962 (released 1963) British vampire film made by Hammer Film Productions. The film was directed by Don Sharp and was written by producer Anthony Hinds using his writing pseudonym John Elder.

Originally intended to be the third movie in Hammer’s Dracula series (which began with Dracula and was followed by The Brides of Dracula); it was another attempt by Hammer to make a Dracula sequel without Christopher Lee. The final script, by Anthony Hinds makes no reference to Dracula, and expands further on the directions taken in Brides by portraying vampirism as a social disease afflicting those who choose a decadent lifestyle. The film went into production on 7 September 1962 at Bray Studios.

Plot:

Gerald (Edward de Souza) and Marianne Harcourt (Jennifer Daniel), are a honeymooning couple in early 20th-century Bavaria who become caught up in a vampire cult led by Dr. Ravna (Noel Willman) and his two children Carl (Barry Warren) and Sabena (Jacquie Wallis). The cult abducts Marianne, and contrive to make it appear that Harcourt was traveling alone and that his wife never existed. Harcourt gets help from hard-drinking savant Professor Zimmer (Clifford Evans), who lost his daughter to the cult and who finally destroys the vampires through an arcane ritual that releases a swarm of bats from Hell…

Reviews:

“Sharp’s ability to use his settings, including a beautifully photographed Bavarian wood, the sinister castle and a deserted inn, demonstrates his talent for mise-en-scène, the hallmark of his subsequent films, including Rasputin – The Mad Monk and The Face of Fu Manchu (both 1965).” The Aurum Film Encyclopedia: Horror 

“Kiss of the Vampire ends in the most lackluster way possible, a low for the studio. Our gruff vampire hunter conjures up a pack of bats to come flying to the rescue and it looks as cheap as special effects come. They bob through shattering stained glass windows and swoop down to feast on the flesh of the undead cult members, their white robes turning red with each new bite. The deaths are over dramatic and poorly timed as they shriek out through the rubber bats glued to their faces.” Anti-Film School

“My favorite aspect of the film, though, is how concisely it encapsulates the contradiction between Hammer’s status as the foremost envelope-pushers in the British movie industry and the intense social conservatism that shines through practically all of their output in the horror genre. Just watch the scene that plays out between Ravna and Gerald when the latter comes to spring Marianne from the vampires’ clutches. In no other movie that I can think of from this era is it so glaringly obvious that the real threat posed by the vampires lies in their capacity as sexual emancipators of women, and it’s hard to think of anything more obnoxiously retrograde than horror at the prospect of women having a say in the expression of their own sexual identities.” 1000 Misspent Hours and Counting

“Kiss of the Vampire has a relatively tight script, one of the many penned by son-of-Hammer honcho Anthony Hinds, a typically effective score by James Bernard, quality performances, and both bathes in tradition and extends it. Those are all good reasons to seek this film out, but the best is that restrained but prolonged tension and ghostly ambience that Hammer did so well. While there are films that achieve it as well as Kiss of the Vampire, few achieve it better.” Brandt Sponseller, Classic Horror

Offline reading:

Rigby, Jonathan (July 2000). English Gothic : A Century of Horror Cinema (in English). Reynolds & Hearn.

Wikipedia | IMDb

(Agnes) Elisabeth Lutyens (9 July 1906 – 14 April 1983) was an English composer of classical music but is best known for her contribution for scores to horror films throughout the 1960′s.

Born in London, one of five children of the architect Sir Edwin Lutyens and his wife Emily, Elisabeth studied composition at the École Normale de Musique de Paris, before accompanying her mother to India in 1923. On her return she studied with John Foulds and subsequently continued her musical education from 1926 to 1930 at the Royal College of Music in London as a pupil of Harold Darke. 

Lutyens is credited with bringing the Schoenbergian serial technique to the world of film scores, not always employing or limiting herself to 12-note series; some works use a self-created 14-note progression. Schoenberg’s exploration of tonal and atonal music was a huge influence on Hammer’s early sound, the gloomy expressionism first evident in Benjamin Frankel’s 1960 score for The Curse of the Werewolf (1960) though it was Luytens who is credited with fully exploiting these avenues. Her rejection of the traditional lush, romantic scores often used in film, lead to her being viewed as ‘difficult’ and sometimes even ‘un-British’.

Perhaps it goes without saying that Lutyen’s ability to break into territory inhabited almost solely by men is little less than remarkable, paving the way for future female composers such as Nora Orlandi and Wendy Carlos (born Walter, of course). Lutyens was no shrinking violet though – striding through upper class London society amongst such company as Constant Lambert, Francis Bacon and Dylan Thomas (for a time, her lodger) but posturing as a radical left-winger, even joining the Communist Party, all the while living in something approaching squalor – a real paradox. This, combined with her often outrageous anti-Semitic outbursts and homophobic ranting (I may have forgotten to mention her alcoholism) did not make her an ideal dinner guest.

Lutyens once said, “film and radio music must be written not only quickly but with the presumption that it will be only heard once. Its impact must be immediate. One does not grow gradually to love or understand a film score like a string quartet”. She was the first female British composer to score a feature film, her first foray into the genre being Penny and the Pownall Case (1948) but her work on horror films, undertaken for financial reasons, are where she made her mark. Her work in the genre began in 1960 with Cyril Frankel’s Never Take Sweets From a Stranger for Hammer, an alarming film even now. Her distinctly anti-romantic treatment is wistful but still angular, leading you down, disturbingly apt strange paths.

This was followed in 1963 by a score for Freddie Francis and Jimmy Sangster’s Paranoiac, a marvellous work of grating textures – it sounds like a gnashing beast having a conversation with itself under the film. Lutyen’s score is mixed with diegetic music during some of the murder scenes, seagulls and running water mashing with her grim tones.

The following year saw her working on The Earth Dies Screaming but perhaps her most famous work was to appear in 1965 in Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors, the well-regarded anthology for Amicus. The rather scattershot approach of instruments combating each other in random blasts is typical or her minimalist though very purposeful manner of phrasing. It’s almost rioutously unjoyous, about the most depressing, upsetting and jarring thing you could marry to images on a screen – of course, it works perfectly. It should be noted that the Roy Castle jazz section of ‘Voodoo’ is the work of the musician Tubby Hayes, not Lutyens.

Continuing her work for Amicus came her own particular favourite score, for 1965′s The Skull. Employing harsh, irregular percussion, it is one of the elements which differentiates Amicus from Hammer, despite the obvious similarities of theme and often cast. As if being one of the lone females composing for film, it says much about her deep-felt belief in the power of the structure of her works that she was confident enough to submit this for what essentially was a major work for the studio. Whereas Italian composers at a similar period were also willing to be challenging in their composition, this tended to veer far nearer to jazz than obtusely challenging avant garde classical music.

As time progressed her work became no less-challenging - The Psychopath and The Terrornauts were tonally slightly more fun but still deliberately exactly the opposite to any other British composer for film at the time. She concluded her forays into the world of horror in typically unexpected directions – 1967′s somewhat obscure Theatre of Death, the evocative of the era educational short, Never Go With Strangers and finally the as raunchy and absurd as it sounds Dutch effort, My Nights With Susan, Sandra, Olga and Julie.

Her mark on the world of composition for horror film cannot be overstated – her complex, though often sparse pieces are hugely atmospheric and challenging yet give every film they appear alongside that extra something that would be sorely missed in their absence.

Daz Lawrence, Horrorpedia

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‘A seductive nymph terrorizes in a film of traumatic demoniac pleasures’

Countess Dracula is a 1971 British Hammer horror film based on the legends surrounding the “Blood Countess” Elizabeth Báthory. It is in many ways atypical of Hammer’s canon, attempting to broaden Hammer’s output from Dracula and Frankenstein sequels. The film was produced by Alexander Paal and directed by Peter Sasdy, both Hungarian émigrés working in England. The original music score was composed by Harry Robertson.

In 17th Century Hungary, Countess Elisabeth Nádasdy (Ingrid Pitt) and her bed companion and steward, Captain Dobi (Nigel Green), are snubbed in a will at the expense of the young and the too old to benefit. The Countess takes it rather better than Dobi as she has recently discovered the secret to ever-lasting youth, a quick bath in the blood of murdered young girls. Alas, the fridge is empty of such commodities and the effect is disappointingly short-lasting, so she keeps her hold on Dobi whilst enlisting him to furnish her with the required local young ladies. Her rejuvenated young self takes advantage yet further of the situation and embarks on a sexual affair with simpering Lieutenant Toth (Sandor Elès), the son of a famous general who is eager to similarly make his mark.

To stay in her youthful state, it begins to require ever more victims and the trail or bloodless corpses is beginning to arouse suspicion. To throw locals off the scent, she assumes the identity of her daughter, Ilona (Lesley-Anne Down) who has been absent for some time, squirreled away by her mother in a hut in the forest, lest anyone find it odd that they are surprisingly similar age –  but not before the resident of the castle library, Fabio (Maurice Denham), begins to suspect something dodgy is afoot, not least when he nearly stumbles upon an unfortunate meeting between local busty prostitute, Ziza (Andrea Lawrence), Toth and the Countess, an encounter which Ziza doesn’t fare well in.

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• Audio commentary with Ingrid Pitt and horror experts Kim Newman and Stephen Jones.
• Original Theatrical Trailer
• Archive interview with Ingrid Pitt (Tonight, 1999, 6min)
• 50 Years of Hammer – news feature about the celebrations (Meridan TV, 1999, 2min)
• Thriller episode: Where The Action Is featuring Ingrid Pitt (60min). The whole series is also available through Network
• Conceptions of Murder episode: Peter And Maria: a 1970 play about mass murder with Nigel Green (25min)
• Extensive image galleries (New and in HD)
• Commemorative booklet

Upon finding that actually only virgins prolong the youthful appearance, yet more attacks take place but it’s all too much for Fabio who realises he must inform Toth – alas, too slow and he meets his end at the hands of Dobi who has been blackmailed into protecting the Countess any way he can. A slightly hurried marriage is arranged between Toth and Elisabeth but lo’! Ilona makes a surprise appearance. The congregation can only stand aghast as Elisabeth’s ageing/marrying/slaying dilemma begins to unravel before them.

A particularly strange entry into Hammer’s canon, at a time when their star was still shining brightly. Playing rather more like a historical yarn (more-so than the likes of Rasputin) than a horror film, let alone a vampire film, there is much to admire here but it’s ultimately a disappointing, unsatisfying experience. Sasdy proved himself to be a director of some style for Hammer’s own Hands of the Ripper from the same year but Countess Dracula suffers from being overly ponderous, seemingly unable to decide on historical accuracy, breasts or geysers of blood – eventually it panics but too late for a discernible resolution.

Those expecting fangs, fog and fluttering bats will certainly be disappointed – this concentrates on the Countess’ plight, as she sees it, giving all the characters a decent fist of stating their moral standpoint but it becomes unnecessarily wordy and redundant relatively early. It’s difficult to root for the Countess, killing and preening; Dobi shows real promise as a character but is reduced to a stooge; Toth is a sap of the highest order and needs a good telling off leaving only a librarian and a prostitute as characters of real interest.

Though an exotic vision and alluring mysterious both on-screen and in ‘real life’, only the truly brave of heart would call Ingrid Pitt a great actress, though she is served well by good ageing effects courtesy of Tom Smith, who worked on several Hammer films and onto the likes of The Shining and Return of the Jedi. Indeed, Pitt herself was a replacement for Diana Rigg who ultimately declined the role. Elès (Evil of Frankenstein) presumably makes the cut due to being Hungarian, whilst Green (The Masque of the Red Death) shows real promise but was sadly cut down at the age of only 47 the following year. Denham essentially channels Merlin and Lesley Anne-Down ultimately has very little to do – far more interesting is ravishing Andrea Lawrence, who hopped, skipped and jumped from On the Buses to I’m Not Feeling Myself Tonight to Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell.

The rather unconvincing mountains of Eastern Europe are, of course, Pinewood Studios, but the interiors are perhaps the film’s greatest achievement, a feast for the eyes of a believable castle and various castes of life that exist in and around – it’s a real shame that the fascinating world they live in is still somehow bland, despite gory murders and sumptuous sets. Though there is,naturally, a reasonable amount of nudity, the murders are relatively few on-screen though there are some juicy moments involving a hair-pin and a nicely judged scene of Elisabeth bathing which is more wistful than gratuitous.

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• Audio commentary with actress Ingrid Pitt, director Peter Sasdy, screenwriter Jeremy Paul and author Jonathan Sothcott
• Immortal Countess: The Cinematic Life of Ingrid Pitt – Featurette
• Archival Audio Interview with Ingrid Pitt
• Still Gallery
• Theatrical Trailer
• Reversible Cover Artwork

Harry Robertson’s (here as Harry Robinson) score plays well alongside the relative drama on-screen, a mix of studious  orchestral sweeps and the use of a Hungarian cymbalom (like a harpsichord) to add some flavours of the unknown environment. The dialogue is largely forgettable, aside from some ‘common slut from the whorehouse’ chat and Ziza uttering a barely credible ‘juicy pair’ line but there is something about the film which lingers in the memory and, though not especially a success, a mark of Hammer’s bravery that this appeared when it did.

Daz Lawrence, Horrorpedia

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Ghouls, Gimmicks, and Gold: Horror Films and the American Movie Business, 1953 – 1968 is an academic  book written by Kevin Hefferman and published by Duke University Press in 2004.

In the first economic history of the horror film, Hefferman analyses how the production, distribution and exhibition of horror movies changed as the studio era gave way to the conglomeration of New Hollywood. He argues that major cultural and economic shifts in the production and reception of horror films began at the time of the 3-D cycle of 1953-54 – looking closely at House of Wax and Creature from the Black Lagoon – and ended with the 1968 adoption of the Motion Picture Association of America’s rating system and the subsequent development of the adult horror movie – epitomised by Rosemary’s Baby.

Hefferman describes how this period presented a number of daunting challenges for movie exhibitors: the highcosts of technological upgrade, competition with television, declining movie attendance, and a diminishing number of annual releases from the major movie studios. He explains that the production and distribution branches of the movie industry responded to these trends by cultivating a youth audience, co-producing features with the film industries of Europe and Asia, selling films to television, and intensifying representations of sex.

The book includes analyses of Hammer Films and The Curse of Frankenstein; Hypnotic horror; William Castle’s movies; Vincent Price’s rise to horror stardom; AIP; Astor Pictures and Peeping Tom; TV syndication of horror movies (with listings of all the packages); Bava’s Black Sabbath; Continental distributing and the success of independents such as Night of the Living Dead.

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Reviews:

“While acknowledging the importance of the insights into the genre provided by such theorists as Robin Wood, Carol Clover, and Thomas Doherty, Heffernan identifies a neglected area in their analyses of the genre’s evolution: how the economic imperatives of an industry shape its final product. As a result, Ghouls becomes a multi-disciplinary text, one that cultural theorists, business historians and horror enthusiasts alike will find both useful and entertaining.” Louise Sheedy, Senses of Cinema

“Historians of the medium will appreciate Heffernan’s detailed scrutiny of the economic and cultural influences at work on the industry, which he intersperses with lively descriptions and critiques of both notable and obscure horror films of the era.” Andrew J. Douglas, Business History Review

“The use of color and gore, first seen in The Curse of Frankenstein (1957), was similarly designed to increase profits through exaggerated and stylized responses to conventions completely familiar to hard-boiled movie audiences. As Heffernan notes, audiences found their worlds becoming and tougher and tougher, and it was important for any film to be even tougher in order to elicit the desired reaction.” John F. Barber, Leonardo Online

Scars of Dracula – also known as The Scars of Dracula on promotional material – is a 1970 British horror film directed by Roy Ward Baker for Hammer Film Productions.

It stars Christopher Lee as Count Dracula, along with Dennis Waterman, Jenny Hanley, Christopher Matthews, Patrick Troughton, and Michael Gwynn. Although disparaged by some critics, the film does restore a few elements of Bram Stoker’s original character: the Count is introduced as an “icily charming host;” he has command over nature; and he is seen scaling the walls of his castle. It also gives Lee more to do and say than any other Hammer Dracula film except its first, 1958’s Dracula.

The film opens with a resurrection scene set shortly after the climax of Taste the Blood of Dracula, but is set in Dracula’s Transylvanian homeland rather than England, as that film was. British film group EMI took over distribution of the film in the UK and after Warner Brothers refused to distribute it in the US it was handled by a small company American Continental. It was also the first of several Hammer films to get an ‘R’ rating.

Deep in the Count’s lair, a vampire bat drizzles blood from its fakely-fanged mouth onto the ashes of the deceased vampire, giving Christopher another opportunity to do not-so-very-much but retain top billing. Skip forward an unspecified period of time and local villagers are frantic that yet another of their number has died in horrible circumstances at the hand (and mouth) of the resurrected Dracula. The timid and constantly at the rear priest gives his blessing to an assembly of the men-folk who set off armed with burning torches to his castle, leaving their wives in the sanctuary of the church. After a spot of ‘knock-knock’ with castle serf, Klove (Patrick Troughton, a former Doctor Who and also in The Omen), entry is gained and the building is left to burn. However, on returning to the church they find their loved ones have been messily savaged and killed by vampire bats.

Having enjoyed the pleasures of the burgomasters’ daughter, libertine Paul Carlson (Christopher Matthews, Scream and Scream Again, See No Evil aka Blind Terror)  flees her father (an ‘enthused’ Bob Todd of Benny Hill fame) and the Kleinenberg authorities by jumping into a nearby coach which, though driver-less, heads off at great speed. He is deposited near Count Dracula’s mountaintop castle. Initially he is welcomed by the Count and a beautiful woman named Tania (Anouska Hempel) who later reveals herself to be a prisoner of Dracula as his mistress.

Paul later has a liaison with Tania who concludes their lovemaking by trying to bite his neck. Dracula enters and, casually throwing off Paul’s efforts to stop him, savagely stabs Tania to death with a dagger for betraying him – Dracula partakes of several weapons in the film, unusually. Klove, Dracula’s mortal but obedient servant, dismembers her body and dissolves the pieces in a bath of either holy water or acid. Trapped in a room high in the castle, Paul uses a sheet to climb down to a lower window but the line is withdrawn by Klove and he is trapped in a dark room with only door locked and a coffin at the centre of the room. Unfortunate.

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In the sensible corner are Paul’s brother, Simon (Dennis Waterman, Fright and many a British TV programme) and his other half, Sarah (Jenny Hanley, also in The Flesh and Blood Show and who it’s impossible not to picture on her regular slot on kid’s TV show, Magpie) and they both set off to find the absent Paul. Repeatedly having the door shut in their face, they eventually find he’s loitering in the castle after landlord’s daughter can’t resist letting slip against her dad’s better advice, the always tremendous, Michael Ripper. This was Ripper’s 27th and final appearance in a Hammer film.

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At the castle, Dracula dispenses more of his hospitality wine and starts making a vampiric move on Sarah but hasn’t bargained on the oafish Klove taking a shine to her too. Refusing the relieve her of the crucifix around her neck to allow the Count to feast, he is brutally branded by a red-hot sword, an addition to the whip-marks he already sports.

With the priest we met earlier in tow (Michael Gwynn, Village of the Damned, What a Carve Up), Simon returns but the holy man soon meets his end, another to suffer at the teeth of the rampant bats. His is next betrayed by Klove and ends up in the same room his brother, we now find, met a particularly grisly end. Unable to finish the count as he slumbers in his coffin due to some dithering and some hypnotism, we move on to the final act, Simon realising the Count is somewhat quite inhuman and the surviving foursome reconvening on the Castle’s battlements. Klove is thrown to his death and just as Dracula takes aim with a handy metal spike, a storm is brewing…

Scars is the sixth of Hammer’s Dracula films (the fifth for Lee) and is derided in some quarters for the flimsy effects and notable lack of budget. What the film does have is lashings of gothic silliness – how forgiving you are of the capers, not least Bob Todd (also in Burke & Hare) essentially jumping up and down on a whoopee cushion for five minutes, is entirely down to you. The film has little in the way of traditional blood-sucking action but if you’re after bat brutality, you’ve come to the right place – the aftermath of the church attack is one of Hammer’s biggest ensemble slayings. The bats themselves are another matter entirely – if horror films up to this juncture had taught us anything, it was that the manufacture of believable fake bats was akin to turning blood into wine. Scars is perhaps not an all-time low… but it’s close.

The perception of the film’s ‘cheapness’ (the budget of around £200,000 was not that trifling and was the same as Taste the Blood of Dracula) can partly be attributed to the castle’s set, which, in fairness, is necessarily sparse due to the first scene’s fire attack. What is less helpful is the cinematography, which clearly shows the flimsy walls and rarely allows the viewer to suspend belief and accept it to be a genuine location. If anything, the film lacks the traditional fog which normally permeates Hammer fare, covering a multitude of sins.

It seems pointless to appraise Lee’s performance, the supporting cast should certainly stand up and be counted though. It seems incredible in retrospect that homely Jenny Hanley should star in one of Hammer’s first real forays into blood and boobs but she performs adequately and not a little alluring.

Far worse is Dennis Waterman, absolutely hopeless as a brave, romantic hero and is awfully Scrappy Doo at best – his appearance in Fright is a step up, thankfully. Roy Ward Baker has said in interviews he thought Waterman was badly miscast, his appearance being entirely down to the studio.

Equally, insipid Christopher Matthews could hardly be more annoying and it is left to the old hands – Ripper and Troughton to carry off the plaudits, pitching their performances as louche and barking as they need to be.

The film’s conclusion is one of the more inventive of Hammer’s – it’s the one with the lightning. Ward was already an old-hand and had come straight off the back of The Vampire Lovers and was ready to launch straight into Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde. James Bernard returns as the composer of the score, shifting the well-known ‘Drac-u-laaaa!’ motif to a new but still distinctive fanfare for the Count’s appearances. The film was released in some markets on a double feature with The Horror of Frankenstein, partly in a (failed) attempt to reinvent the Frankenstein strand as a hip and sexy venture.

Daz Lawrence, Horrorpedia

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Cast:

• Christopher Lee as Count Dracula
• Dennis Waterman as Simon Carlson
• Jenny Hanley as Sarah Framsen
• Christopher Matthews as Paul Carlson
• Michael Gwynn as The Priest
• Michael Ripper as Landlord
• Patrick Troughton as Klove
• Anouska Hempel as Tania
• Wendy Hamilton as Julie
• Bob Todd as Burgomaster

Wikipedia | IMDb | Cinema photos courtesy of Ray Gazzard on Cinema Treasures

English Gothic: a century of horror cinema is a film reference book book written by Jonathan Rigby first published in 2000 and expanded to include more recent films and TV productions and reprinted in 2006.

The British horror film is almost as old as cinema itself. English Gothic traces the rise and fall of the genre from its 19th-century beginnings to the present day. Jonathan Rigby examines 100 crucial movies, taking in the lost films of the silent era, the Karloff and Lugosi chillers of the 1930s, the lurid classics from Hammer’s house of horror, and the explicit shockers of the 1970s. The story concludes with more recent films, such as Hellraiser and Shaun of the Dead. Filled with film posters, stills, and behind-the-scenes shots, this entertaining study sheds new light on British cinema’s most successful, and misunderstood, export.

Chapters

Foreward by filmmaker Richard Gordon

Part One – British Horror in Embryo

Part Two – First Flood (1954-1959)

Part Three – Treading Water (1960 – 1964)

Part Four – New Wave (1965 – 1969)

Part Five  – Market Saturation (1970 – 1975)

Part Six – British Horror in Retreat

Afterword by David McGillivray (House of Whipcord; House of Mortal Sin; Satan’s Slave)

“English Gothic succeeds in providing an informed and in-depth overview of horror on British screens over the last hundred years, reflecting the important, yet often overlooked part the genre has played in the country’s cinematic output.” Irish Journal of Gothic and Horror Studies

Jonathan Rigby

Reviews:

“Even before I had paged myself to its conclusion, English Gothic impressed me as an instant classic, a true textbook, one to stand on equal terms alongside the seminal likes of Ivan Butler’s Horror in the Cinema, Carlos Clarens’ An Illustrated History of the Horror Film, Denis Gifford’s A Pictorial History of Horror Movies, and David Pirie’s A Heritage of Horror: The English Gothic Cinema 1946-1972″ Movie Morlocks

“The lack of a name index is a disadvantage and the onus is on the reference reader to access the book by film title, however this is not a major obstacle and the volume is, without doubt one of the most indispensable guides to this genre of British movie-making.” Stride Magazine

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WH

‘Terrifying suspense… it will shock you out of your seat!’

Hysteria is a 1964 British psychological thriller directed by Freddie Francis (Nightmare; The Skull; The Creeping Flesh) from a screenplay by producer Jimmy Sangster, for Hammer Films and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in the US in April 1965. It was released in the UK 27 June 1965.

The film stars Robert Webber, Jennifer Jayne (The Trollenberg Terror; Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors; The Doctor and the Devils), Maurice Denham (Paranoiac; The Night Caller; Countess Dracula), Lelia Goldoni (Theatre of Death; Invasion of the Body Snatchers; The Devil Inside) and Anthony Newlands (Circus of Fear; Scream and Scream Again). The bombastic jazzy score was provided by Don Banks (Monster of Terror; The Reptile; Torture Garden).

Plot teaser:

An American wakes up in an English hospital unable to remember anything of his life before a recent car accident. With only a photograph torn from a newspaper to guide him, and an unknown benefactor, he attempts to unravel what looks increasingly like a bizarre murder…

Reviews:

“By all accounts this was not a very happy production with Francis subsequently saying that his heart just wasn’t really in it, though it is all shot with his customary ingenuity and elegance. Indeed, despite some lacklustre sets by Edward Carrick (Hammer regular Bernard Robinson was on another assignment), Francis and his faithful cinematographer John Wilcox once again make good use of the filters the director used on The Innocents (1961) as well as his previous Sangster thrillers Paranoiac and Nightmare.” Tipping My Fedora

“Hammer fans generally regard Hysteria (1965) as the weakest of Sangster’s thrillers: “the last – and least – of Hammer’s series of Psycho clones,” wrote Tom Johnson and Deborah Del Vecchio in their recommended Hammer Films: An Exhaustive Filmography. But Maniac (1963) and Crescendo (1970) are much worse overall, and Val Guest’s The Full Treatment (released in the U.S. as Stop Me Before I Kill!, 1961), which Hysteria all but remakes, is downright terrible by comparison. No, Hysteria is perfectly respectable with many fine ideas. It’s interesting and genuinely suspenseful and unsettling at times, and though it doesn’t hold up to much scrutiny, is highly satisfying.” Stuart Galbraith IV, DVD Talk

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“If Chris Smith’s journey took him on a journey through London’s seamy underbelly, we might have a late-noir classic here, but Sangster does, eventually, move back to the more familiar, comfortable territory of red herrings and absurdly elaborate conspiracies that were his trademark contributions to Hammer’s suspense thrillers. Still, sharp dialogue is maintained to the very end, with appealing performances from the supporting cast, particularly Denham’s private detective, who proves to be tougher than he looks. Don Banks provides a jazzy score, and Freddie Francis directs, with his gift for drawing out every ounce of the eerie with eye-popping black-and-white photography.” Jeff Kuykendall, Midnight Only

Choice dialogue:

“How long can a man live in a void without going nuts?”

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Cast:

• Robert Webber as Chris Smith
• Anthony Newlands as Doctor Keller
• Jennifer Jayne as Gina McConnell
• Maurice Denham as Hemmings, a private investigator
• Lelia Goldoni as Denise James
• Peter Woodthorpe as Marcus Allan
• Sandra Boize as English Girl
• Sue Lloyd as French Girl
• John Arnatt as Mr. James
• Marianne Stone as Marcus Allan’s Secretary – Miss Grogan
• Irene Richmond as Mrs. Keller
• Kiwi Kingston as French Girl’s Husband

Wikipedia | IMDb | Image credits: Tipping My Fedora