The Hellfire Club (1961)

Hammer-esque British film based around Sir Francis Dashwood's semi-secret 18th century club. The Hellfire Club has been linked to various Satanic and pagan rites, but appears to have been simply an excuse for drunken debautury and mocking blasphemy by a group of well connected 18th century Brit's. The plot concerns "Jason" (Keith Michell) the presumed dead heir to an English lordship who returns from exile in Europe after his fathers death. Jason's cousin Thomas (Peter Arne) has assumed the lordship and doesn't like the idea of being stripped of it, so upon discovering Jason's identity he hunts Jason down kills his cousins longtime guardian Timothy (David Lodge) and has Jason sent to prison. Timothy had run a travailing circus and upon his death and Jason's capture love interest #1 Yvonne (Kai Fischer) and the other cicus folks mount a rescue for Jason. After his escape Thomas and his men kidnap love interest #1, so Jason returns to the family estate to rescue Yvonne, but his cousins mistress love interest #2 Isobel (Adrienne Corri) betrays him to The Hell Fire club whose meetings he had infiltrated posing as a French aristocrat.Yeah its kind of ridiculous, but its fun and not nearly as graphic as I expected. Jason had been an acrobat at the circus so he gets to do a lot of gymnastics in addition to the rather enjoyable sword play we see throughout the film. This movies cast is padded with small roles from the always good  Peter Cushing and Miles Malleson. A really enjoyable romp. ***

You can watch it online for free here.

Threads (1984)

Threads is the British answer to the American anti-nuclear war tele-film The Day After, only its considerable harsher, more depressing, and effective. Done in a quasi-documentary style, the film focuses on two families, as well as one government official in Sheffield England, and how they cope with an impending nuclear war, the attack its self, and the aftermath. A tremendous job is done in building the tension. A mounting foreign policy crises centering on Iran begins as little more then passing news items in the background of the everyday lives of our characters. Gradually things become more and more heightened and uncertain, panic sets in, the government steps up, fear grips the nation and the world. This goes on for roughly the first hour, then we have the attack, and its of course a catastrophic one. It is followed by the long, decaying descent of the aftermath. The world of before has been destroyed, it is never to be again, the government tries but it is no where near up to the task. One of the things that distinguishes this film from its Yankee precursor The Day After, beyond simply its increased harshness and graphicness, is that it doesn't wind down in the immediate aftermath of the nuclear conflict, no it goes much beyond that, almost 15 years, and we get to the see the long term effects this has on civilization. Not only is most of the infrastructurean d production capacity wiped out, and not only do countless millions, the vast majority of the pre-war population die, but those born after the blast suffer from learning disabilities and deformities, they simple are not going to be capable of returning civilization to anything close to what it was before the war. This is a dark and depressing film, and an extremely effective one. It can be hard going at times, and it will stay with you long after you've finished it, but I think sitting through Threads (the title by the why is a reference to the threads that hold society together gradually unwinding) is well worth the time and effort. You can even watch it free online. Mighty impressive. ****

In God We Teach (2011)

Modest but intriguing documentary about a New Jersey high school student who secretly records his history teacher engaged in arguable Christian evangelism in class. The kid released the tape and it caused a local scandal that even managed to get some national television exposure. The kid in question, Matthew LaClair, came for an atheist family, and many in the community thought him to be a trouble maker who set the teacher up. The teacher, David Paszkiewicz, was a popular long time instructor at the school who was also a part time youth minister. The documentary is a no thrills affair, it allows both protagonists to give there take on events, as well as a number of talking heads, and clips from the media. Towards the end of the documentary they add an interesting counterpoint, in effect putting the shoes on other feets by briefly exploring the case of a California high school teacher recorded by one of his students making arguably anti religious statements in class. I thought this last part was very effective, it forces the audience out of there comfort zone by making them face an equivalent situation, and see where there loyalty's actually lie. A nicely compact piece. **1/2.

You can watch it for free here.

Poseidon (2006)

Weak re-make of the great 1972 film The Poseidon Adventure. This film is hardly worth talking about, an unnecessary and unimaginative, occasionally ridicules re-rending of its iconic predecessor. The characters are not that same as in the original film, but they are stock, and worst of all I didn't care about them. The special effects are largely CG, and not top of the line CG at that. I'm sorry but the film can't work with fake water and a fake ship, its the physicality of the original that lent it such verisimilitude. Anyway don't wast your time. *1/2

I Walked With A Zombie (1943)

Another Val Lewton horror film, and one of the more iconic ones. Lewton's second film for RKO is a kind of voodoo version of Jane Eyre. Canadian nurse Betsy Connell (Francis Dee) is hired to care for the sick wife of Paul Holland (Tom Conway, actor George Sanders lesser known brother) at his sugar plantation on the Caribbean island of Saint Sebastian. The British Holland has an American half brother named Wesley Rand (James Ellison) the product of a his mothers (Edith Barretts) second marriage. Mrs. Jessica Holland (Christine Gordon) had been left a kind of high functioning comatose, as in she can walk and respond to basic commands, but can not speak or doing anything proactively. The circumstances under which she arrived at this state are shrouded in mystery, the Holland/Rand family not wanting to talk about it. It becomes pretty clear however that the fate of Mrs. Holland was tied up with a love triangle between her, Paul and Wesley.

Betsy quickly falls for the brooding Mr. Holland and paradoxically desires to cure Mrs. Holland to make him happy (she is not yet aware of the love triangle). Betsy learns of a native voodoo priest who can reportedly work miracles and takes Jessica there one night, the locals in attendance react badly as their rituals indicate that Mrs. Holland is a zombie and must be put down, though they keep another, rather creepy looking zombie around for some reason. Anyway Gothic, melodramatic, voodoo-centric plot ensues. The movie does a great job of creating mood, and even though most of it is obviously filmed on a studio sound stage, it felts like its a hot damp climate there. No standout performances, though Calypso legend Sir Lancelot has a small part as, surprise, a Calypso singer. **1/2

Spine Tingler!: The William Castle Story (2007)

Bio-doc that examines the life and work of producer/director William Castle, who has often been called the poor man's Hitchcock. Castle was born William Schloss to a poor family of German Jewish decent in 1914 New York City. Orphaned by the age of eleven Schloss, who would later anglicanized his last name to Castle, was drawn to the theater and worked on Broadway in everything from acting to set construction. A natural born charmer by 23 Castle was directing films in Hollywood, though he was pigeon holed into b-pictures, often entries in popular thriller series such as The Crime Doctor or The Whistler. Castle was a capable director who brought in film on time and budget, but he wanted more.

Using his own funds, evening mortgaging his house, Castle produced his first low budget independent production Macabre in 1958. Every bit the showman that Hitchcock was the auteur, Castle afraid people wouldn't go to see his movie hit on a gimmick, a $1000 life insurance policy from Lloyd's of London insuring each audience in case they died of fright. The movie, apparently so-so, but the gimmick a hit. Castle would follow Macabre up with more horror films with more gimmicks, An inflatable glow in the dark skeleton,  "Percepto", and "Illusion-O". In Homicidal (probably the artistic standout of these picture) Castle included a 45 second "Fright Break" to allow audience member too frightened to view the films climax to leave the theater.

Castle did well by these films, but he wanted more, he wanted respect in the industry. He finally got it when be bought the book rights and produced Rosemary's Baby for Paramount in 1968. Unfortunately Castle was unable to follow up on this cue with any further great successes, and would die of a heart attack in 1977 at the age of 63. From this documentary Castle seemed an endearing  man, but one thing that kept coming up from the talking heads who knew him is that he often seemed scared, he investing o much, in both a literal and psychic sense in his pictures and was just terrified that viewers wouldn't like them, hence his reliance on gimmicks. Castle however was also just a big kid at heart, he truly seemed to love mixing with his often young audiences. Those of my generation, who post date William Castle and his movies, might still be indirectly familiar with him from the 1993 movie Matinee (which I recently re-watched and think still holds up), in which John Goodman plays a lovable, cigar chomping homage to Castle. An interesting guy and an interesting documentary. ***

Bedlam (1946)

The final of producer Val Lewton's trilogy with Karloff, as well as the formers last horror film period. Inspired by the last panel in 18th century artist William Hogarth's 'A Rake's Progress', Bedlam concerns Bedlam, also known as the Bethlem Royal Hospital, a London facility founded in 1247 and the worlds oldest mental hospital. Throughout much of its history Bedlam was known for the poor conditions under which its charges were kept, something aptly illustrated in the Hogarth panel. The story here is an original composition from the time the movie was made, but it plays like its source material was native to the time in which it was set, namely 1761. The dialogue feels fantastically period, and the story one you can imagine coming from a historical novel.

The central figure of the story is Nell Bowen (Anna Lee), an actress who has become the kept women (but because of the production code a chaste one) of the wealthy and rotund Lord Mortimer (Billy House). When an acquaintance of Mortimer's dies trying to escape from Bedlam, which in this movie goes by the fictionalized name of  St. Mary's of Bethlehem Asylum, the apothecary general Master George Sims (played by Karloff, and a fictionalized version of real Bedlam head physician John Monro) decides to make it up to him by having some of the inmates put on a play for Mortimer and his guests (in real life as in the film, the wealthy could pay money to go inside and "gawk at the loonies"). During the 'play' one of the patients/performers dies as a result of having his whole body covered in sparkling gold makeup. This is too much for Nell, who with the help of a sympathetic Quaker (Richard Fraser) and the real period Whig politician John Wilkes (Leyland Hodgson) trys to reform the asylum. Sims is threatened by this an cooks up a story which allows him to commit Nell to the asylum. Nell is at first horrified, but in time comes to serve her fellow inmates in Florance Nightingale type capacity. Fearing what Nell will do when she is eventually released Sims plots on inflicting a server "treatment" on her, but will the other inmates stand for it.

This is a really good, unusual story, well made and interesting. These characters feel more literary then cinematic, the historical setting is very well pulled off, and the subject matter reasonably enlightening. A strong note for the horror films of Val Lewton to go out on. Also Anna Lee's got a very strong, commanding, but still feminine face that serves her quite well in this role. ***1/2

The Body Snatcher (1945)

Lewton's second movie with Karloff is a much more substantial effort then Isle of the Dead. The Body Snatcher has a heft that the previous film lacked, this is no doubt do to its having a far more substantive source, a short story of the same title by Robert Louis Stevenson. Stevenson's story in turn was inspired by real events, Edinburgh's famed 'West Port Murders' of 1828, to which this story serves as a sort of fictional sequel. In brief the 'West Port Murders' were staged by two Irish immigrants named William Burke and William Hare who murdered a total of 17 people and sold there bodies for medical dissection. At the time there was a law which stated that only the bodies of executed murderers could be used for medical dissection, and a subsequent tightening of the requirements to actually execute a person lead to a substantial shortage of legal cadavers at UK medical schools. That unmet demand was filled in part by 'Body Snatchers' who either  robbed graves or otherwise absconded with the bodies of the recently deceased. Eventually the pair was caught, Burke was executed, but Hare was spared as part of plea agreement and vanished into such obscurity that there is no record of his death.

In the movie Dr. Wolfe "Toddy" MacFarlane (Henry Daniell) is the fictional former assistant of the real Dr. Robert Knox, the man who bought the bodies from Burke and Hare. MacFarlane is now a respected anatomy teacher in Edinburgh, and when one of his more promising pupils Donald Fettes (Russell Wade) threatens to drop out due to lack of funds MacFarlane takes him on as his personal assistant. While MacFarlane is an often cold man Fettes has a natural bed side manner, which results in his befriending a young widow (Rita Corday) and her crippled daughter (Sharyn Moffett). The widow wants Dr. MacFarlane to perform a potentially risky surgery that could prevent her daughters death and restore her ability to walk, only Dr. MacFarlane won't do it, there are too many unknown variables and he doesn't want his reputation besotted by having a patient die on him. However MacFarlane is pressured into conducting the eventually successfully surgery by Cabman John Gray (Boris Karloff), who had been the one to orignally take the widow and girl to Dr. MacFarlane's. In the story Gray had worked with Burke and Hare for Dr. Knox and had kept MacFarlanes name out of the controversy, largely for the amount of control that would give him over one society deemed to be his better. Gray continued to provide dissectable bodies for the doctor although he never killed any of them, that is until in the course of the movie he murders a young beggar women so that MacFarlane can experiment on her spine prior to performing the surgery on Sharyn Moffett.

In the course of the story MacFarlane and Gray come increasingly at odds, Gray murders MacFarlane's servant Joseph (Bela Lugosi) who tried to blackmail him, and then MacFarlane kills Gray in a struggle. Fettes is likable, but oblivious, a very passive character who occasionally tries to marshal his scruples against MacFarlane, but in the end he always caves, even agreeing to help the doctor to resume grave robbing after Gray's death. So there is not much to the very nominal lead, Daniell is interesting though playing MacFarlane kind of like Alan Rickman's Snape. Karloff is the funnest to watch, he seems to be enjoying himself as he gets to play menacing in a manner very different from his Universal Monster persona. This movie isn't really scary, but its exciting watching the characters try and fail to navigate moral gray areas. I even think the ending works, I'm kind of glad it leaves Fettes fate so open. ***1/2

 

Isle of the Dead (1945)

Taking advantage of a lull in the fighting during the First Balkan War, Greek Gen. Nikolas Pherides (Boris Karloff) and American reporter Oliver Davis (Marc Cramer ) take a nighttime journey to visit the grave of the formers long dead wife on a small island. When the two arrive they find that the tomb has been desecrated and the late Mrs. Pherdies removed. They go to the house of the islands only full time residents, an ex-patriot Swiss art collector named Albretch (Jason Robards Sr) and his native housekeeper  Madame Kyra (Helen Thimig). They find Albretch hosting a number of refuges displaced by the fighting, the British diplomat St. Aubyn (Alan Napier), his sickly wife Mary (Katherine Emery), her native Greek servant Thea (Ellen Drew) and (for some reason) a cockney tin merchant (Skelton Knaggs). Albretch explains that the graves were desecrated 15 years earlier by locals in a rush to sell artifacts, something he regrets having inspired and an a reason why he has stayed on the island to make sure there are no further desecrations. The promise of a warm bed and bath inspires Davis to get convince Gen. Phreides to let them stay the night. The next morning when they are about to depart they find the Knaggs has expired during the night from what they suspect is Plague, there having been recent outbreaks nearby). Somehow a doctor is sent for (Ernest Deutsch) who confirms that Kaggs death was from Plague, and insists that they must all remain in quarantine on the island for the time being.

Later Mr. St. Aubyn and the doctor both die, and Madam Kyra becomes convinced that the deaths are the work of Thea, who she suspects of being a Vrykolaks, a vampire-like undead creature of Greek folklore. Davis, who is falling for Thea, and Albretch think this is ridicules, but Gen Pherides is becoming increasing convinced himself as he starts to succumb to the effects of the Plague. Then Mrs. St. Aubyn dies, and this is were I will end with the plot description.

Isle of the Dead is the first movie made (second released) of a trilogy of films that Boris Karloff made at RKO for famed horror producer Val Lewton. While the pairing of Karloff and horror is an obvious one, these films are significantly diffrent from he kind of movies that Karloff made his name doing over at Universal. You see while the classic Universal horror movies were all about showing you something, Lawton's subtler efforts were mostly about what you were not shown. This started as a kind of necessity owing to the small budgets Lewton was given for his films, but it grew into the producers signature stock and trade. That being said Isle of the Dead is one of Lawton's weaker films, there is not much of a story (the movie was in fact inspired by an Arnold Bo:cklin painting of the same name, which is used in a mat shot of the island). The film has a good little ensemble cast, and certainly Karloff gets to do more then he usually does, though it would be in his next two film's for Lewton that he would really get to shine. Isle of the Dead is a good enough programmer, chiefly notable for being the start of Lewtons successful paring with Karloff. **1/2

The Gorgon (1964)

In Greek mythology a Gorgon was a terrible female creature with snakes for hair and a visage so horrible that to gaze upon it would cause a man (or women) to turn to stone. Medusa of course is the most famous Gorgon, but she had a sister named Megara who according to legend, or at least according to legend in this movie, may have made it as far north as Germany. That it so happens is where this movie is set, rural Germany circa 1910. Over the past five years the village of Vandorf has been the site of a series of bizarre deaths, all occurring during a full moon, in which the deceased is discovered having turned to stone. When his son Bruno is found to have hung himself after his reputed murder of a young women, Professor Jules Heitz (Michael Goodliffe) travels to Vandorf (from Berlin?) in an attempt to clear his child's name. Prof. Heitz finds the populace there highly uncooperative, terrified to even speak the truth about the bizarre goings on.

Against the wishes of the locals, especially the head of the local hospital Dr. Nameroff (Peter Cushing), Prof. Heitz stays on after the inquest to investigate. One night Prof. Heitz encounters the Gorgan, fortunately its petrifying effects are not instant, so he is able to dash off an explanatory letter to his other son Paul (Richard Pasco) before turning to stone. Paul travels to Vandorf, attempts to learn the truth about the deaths of his father and brother, and catches the eye of Dr. Hameroff's fetching young assistant Carla (Barbara Shelley). Paul and Carla fall in love, she begs him to take her and flee the village at once, but he insists on staying on until he has solved the mystery, he even induces his colleague Prof. Meister (Christopher Lee) to come and help with the investigation. And if you don't pick up early on that the attractive red-headed Carla is inextricably linked to the the Gorgon then you've not a very astute movie watcher. The explanation of course is silly, Carla is possessed by the spirit of Megara and on the full moon is transformed into her, only she of course can't remember any of this, and love struck Dr. Nameroff is at the head of a hospital wide conspiracy to keep this truth from her.

This movie has been billed as the first re-teaming of Cushing and Lee since there previous Hammer movie The Mummy, but they are both really secondary characters to Paul, Carla, and Professor Heitz. In fact aside from one brief cameo appearance about half way through the film Lee isn't really part of this movie until the last third, though in the end he is the hero, kinda, as none of our primarily leads remain alive. Not nearly as good as there earlier Hammer efforts, kudus for trying something different though. **