tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-44554836758893403332024-03-25T08:52:29.916-04:00HAMMER & THONGSAlex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comBlogger92125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-29857568419145472722024-03-22T21:25:00.001-04:002024-03-22T21:25:59.083-04:00RACE FOR LIFE (Terence Fisher, 1954)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhj1YzcUunKk_t6B4w-qa4AhbQceJMxN1oTzieZScTypHM74TmGm_J0TomaQeLEIc1zP1BjDLf6HIsP278JMILhE9LVzjEFrBvMk2pmfdvl7ZWhBlWg4aD27pnIiwJjj-OgehL4vtMBhuQhhNqeM0-uDCB7JlNBlA9qgLx-_5cRZpR1pr9Pesa0TyxxPvUq/s500/race%20for%20life.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="396" data-original-width="500" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhj1YzcUunKk_t6B4w-qa4AhbQceJMxN1oTzieZScTypHM74TmGm_J0TomaQeLEIc1zP1BjDLf6HIsP278JMILhE9LVzjEFrBvMk2pmfdvl7ZWhBlWg4aD27pnIiwJjj-OgehL4vtMBhuQhhNqeM0-uDCB7JlNBlA9qgLx-_5cRZpR1pr9Pesa0TyxxPvUq/w400-h316/race%20for%20life.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Speed racer Peter Wells crashes his marriage but not his car, his choice between chrome and steel and the soft, supple flesh of his lovely wife. The movie isn’t nearly as interesting as that sentence; it’s a humdrum melodrama without a single noir element. Terence Fisher’s direction is lax, the photography bland, and the editing and back projection lackluster. However, much of the film is stock footage of Formula 1 racing and it includes some awful, deadly crashes and some tense moments on the track. In one crash, the driver is actually catapulted from the car, and I expect it was a fatality! </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">How this film ended up being included in the Hammer Film Noir set Volume 2 is the real mystery. This is purely a tepid melodrama that has as much energy as a TV soap opera. Peter Wells (Richard Conte) is aging out of his profession but can’t give it up just yet, while his beautiful wife Patricia (Mari Aldon) can’t take the pressure of his life-threatening career any longer. That’s it. That’s the plot. No femme fatale. No Blackmail. No murder. No backstory. Just a lot of stock footage with an announcer telling us which driver is in the lead. This movie crashes and burns on the first lap. Skip it. </span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (D-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-16670899266345565472024-03-14T20:24:00.000-04:002024-03-14T20:24:03.560-04:00THE UNHOLY FOUR (Terence Fisher, 1954)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpXtym_TxbxOnndTTAtYnKAh6aE5HvuLnbReNi8W3E4z8QKaEq-Ed1SvFPFZh8-eKX-YPrMoxmj0fylx_0F4XTT0gZSvsIDDTQ0VXdXYM9jZNbEZmp2wA6vzInRf8ngMGbk9OvT7O0fRQ1UOQy2B_DxVHDFCqRr-6yNF_9-VLPyqelmefDTdcp2YS5NUgx/s1530/the%20unholy%20four.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1530" data-original-width="1000" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpXtym_TxbxOnndTTAtYnKAh6aE5HvuLnbReNi8W3E4z8QKaEq-Ed1SvFPFZh8-eKX-YPrMoxmj0fylx_0F4XTT0gZSvsIDDTQ0VXdXYM9jZNbEZmp2wA6vzInRf8ngMGbk9OvT7O0fRQ1UOQy2B_DxVHDFCqRr-6yNF_9-VLPyqelmefDTdcp2YS5NUgx/w261-h400/the%20unholy%20four.jpg" width="261" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">A dead man returns home after four years to confront those he believes responsible for his murder. This sentence is so much more interesting than the muddled mess of a story that follows, as our protagonist is so cold and detached (though warm and breathing) and the impious tetralogy so ill-defined that our interest in the bickering and arguing over who killed who is tiresome. This may win the Hammer Film Award for most phone calls in an 80-minute film! Terence Fisher’s direction is pedestrian but his DP Walter Harvey, working in widescreen (1:66:1) compositions with deep focus, somehow makes this dull story feel alive. Harvey often shoots characters in mirrors to reveal their duplicitous nature, and his medium shots still keep the background characters in focus so we can see expressions or body language. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Philip Vickers (William Sylvester), sporting a jagged scar on his forehead, returns home after a four-year absence and is surprised that his wife Angie (Paulette Goddard) may be moving on with her life. She is having a party and coincidentally the three business associates, one of whom Vickers believes is responsible for his murder attempt, are in attendance. When one of these men ends up with his brains bashed in that same night, Vickers becomes the prime suspect. Soon, the story’s convolutions become monotonous and characters act, not out of reason or suspicion, but as plot points to propel the story to its unsurprising conclusion. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">William Sylvester imbues his character Vickers, the story’s protagonist and one we should feel some compassion for, as a stone-cold asshole. Paulette Goddard seems to be following the inept script and not doing much else, as there is zero chemistry between her and her husband. And this is four fucking years later, yet it seems like a few days as people don’t’ seem very shocked or alarmed at his return, while Angie’s life must have remained in stasis for this entire time both physically and emotionally. The entire third act is laughable, as Vicker’s associate attempts to frame him for the murder of the secretary (who claims Vickers was responsible for her father’s suicide years before), but the resolution is so inane it makes one laugh out loud. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">If you’re going to title a film that evokes Tod Browning’s fantastic silent masterpiece, there better be a murderous Ape in the third act! Alas, no such luck. So, the title exclaims that there are four who are blasphemous, but it remains ambiguous as to who the final applicant truly is. The secretary? The wife? Or Vickers himself? I posit the later. </span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-18094392432931475602024-03-07T18:28:00.010-05:002024-03-07T18:28:51.420-05:00THE DEADLY GAME (Daniel Birt, 1954)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkEBaDRDP3ieYrCyQEBt8i_Om-JtMUpm0kXtHK9gHTSJyi8rY43QZDbVemTiTbv-IvSl8SX2JRCs6VAtQEvQFIvgQjyjA9I8JnCPXwuB62ZlBjh9j0XyugghCvmdZJ6DJsx_OQ9p8c9izdeoYeYrlZPTJYvxr6Kva0VQDpZYDFjnUVsQgZh9NB9bjcbywm/s1544/the%20deadly%20game.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1544" height="311" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkEBaDRDP3ieYrCyQEBt8i_Om-JtMUpm0kXtHK9gHTSJyi8rY43QZDbVemTiTbv-IvSl8SX2JRCs6VAtQEvQFIvgQjyjA9I8JnCPXwuB62ZlBjh9j0XyugghCvmdZJ6DJsx_OQ9p8c9izdeoYeYrlZPTJYvxr6Kva0VQDpZYDFjnUVsQgZh9NB9bjcbywm/w400-h311/the%20deadly%20game.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />A<span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"> high society photographer starts dealing in tiny portraits of the micro kind and embroils his buddy in a darkroom full of nitrate death. Daniel Birt’s utilitarian direction lacks suspense, drama, emotional complexity and thrills for 70 minutes of Lloyd Bridges acting like a goofy nice guy, who knowingly carries the deadly microfilm around in his coat pocket without any bad guy shooting him (or at least clobbering him)! The film eschews action for talky exposition especially in a tearoom where plot points are practically shouted so anyone can overhear the secret information. Bad script, apathetic direction, uninspired compositions (except one scene) define this flaccid noir. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Philip Graham (Lloyd Bridges) and his photographer buddy Tony (Pete Dyneley) are on vacation in Spain when Tony is suddenly called back to England on business. But he needs to get a mysterious envelope that he had stashed in the hotel’s safe; however, the owner’s wife has the only key, and she won’t be back until morning. Since Tony just has to leave now, Philip will snag the envelope in the morning and drive Tony’s car back to England where they’ll meet up. Of course this leads to Philip getting assaulted, confronting a femme fatale burning letters in Tony’s apartment while his cohort’s body goes all rigor mortise in the darkroom, discovering more mysterious envelopes, and getting involved in tepid blackmail subplot, then discovering that he’s carrying a secret formula on microfilm. It’s way less exciting than it sounds. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Lloyd Bridges reads his lines and hits his marks, investing his character with a good-natured persona, yet shows practically no emotion like fear or loss (I mean, his wartime buddy was murdered) and his romance is flat and ineffectual. In one neat scene when Philip eavesdrops in the aforementioned tearoom, he slips the microfilm into the pocket of the man who sold it to Tony. It’s a compassionate act towards this little man who loudly proclaims his regret. Of course, Philip takes it back the next day! Then there’s a scene where Philip is led by one of antagonists into an empty theatre while carrying the microfilm, and why this dude doesn’t kill him immediately remains a mystery. Especially since it soon turns into fisticuffs above a trap door revealing a room full of pointy polearms while the theatre burns down around them, and if someone didn’t get impaled, I would have turned the movie off! It’s the only scene that develops some visual interest and tension, as low angle shots through the trap door depict the flailing men, while the weapons are foregrounded. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The finale is as absurd as the previous 60 minutes as Philip meets with the kingpin (which is no surprise) and tries to secretly tape record the conversation. It should be notes that his reel to reel recorded is the size of luggage! It’s just shoved under the table. Once discovered, we are shown another microphone hidden in the dangling light and the Spanish police detectives eavesdropping. But the story builds no suspense as these key elements are never set up prior to the scene! It could have been a more exciting denouement as Philip and the police hide the microphones and maneuver the bad guys to the right table. Then as the conversation begins to reveal implicating details, maybe a loud sound or technical problem could briefly interrupt. Hell, I just plotted a better scene! I do like the final reveal as the bad guys try to escape in costume and the kingpin is exposed by man’s best friend. </span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C-) </span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-82999724254369580962024-03-03T12:28:00.004-05:002024-03-03T12:28:30.617-05:00TEN SECONDS TO HELL (Robert Aldrich, 1959)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbrgkVrfS9ekg5bQgOEHbwg4ATS4IK3_KfSJzRD4t_4M2uTo7ukiLeLdn6Q6YBtkZ5XGSYbrKSWNp9u0mVvxbdJNZFXAmfRxlwJu7upolWt3TgjciIkSSR_EoSC8DK1NuKLAGcZ_P6BNY0bkJCflSXzpm_QyTk37RyhIj7QEx_mkLrRsTCT8WIJpJFA8J-/s1795/ten%20seconds%20to%20hell.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1795" data-original-width="1341" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbrgkVrfS9ekg5bQgOEHbwg4ATS4IK3_KfSJzRD4t_4M2uTo7ukiLeLdn6Q6YBtkZ5XGSYbrKSWNp9u0mVvxbdJNZFXAmfRxlwJu7upolWt3TgjciIkSSR_EoSC8DK1NuKLAGcZ_P6BNY0bkJCflSXzpm_QyTk37RyhIj7QEx_mkLrRsTCT8WIJpJFA8J-/w299-h400/ten%20seconds%20to%20hell.jpg" width="299" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Six Wehrmacht soldiers, relegated to defusing Allied bombs by their Nazi superiors, are now POWs returning to the rubble of occupied Berlin and must wage another war against rational egoism. Robert Aldrich’s superb direction allows the narrative to unwind and defuse like the dual detonator of a British thousand-pound bomb, while DP Ernest Laszlo’s wonderful compositions and deep focus photography, especially while shooting on location in post-WWII Berlin, add verisimilitude and tension to this taught melodrama. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The six-pack is led by demoted Architect and anti-Nazi Erik Koertner (Jack Palance), a man whose altruistic temperament reduced him to choose between bomb squad tech or concentration camp victim, who must battle against his SS cohort Karl Wirtz's (Jeff Chandler) inherent selfishness. They gamble their mortality in a tontine, a three-month annuity where they invest their wages (minus living expenses) and all goes to the survivor, winner take all. But the group of experts is confronted by a new, unknown British bomb with a dual detonator, and they soon become extinct, one by one. There is a minor love interest between Koertner and his landlady Margot Hofer (Martine Carol), a French woman who betrayed her country by falling in love with a German soldier who was killed in the Africa Corps during the war. Alone, she is repulsed by Wirtz’s mocking nihilism and drawn to Koertner’s kind humanism. But the film doesn’t explode this melodrama as it’s concerned with the battle between Nazi ideology and Western morality.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The bomb defusing scenes are full of the anxiety of flesh and sinew against rusting steel death, which is less than ten seconds away at any moment. The scenes are shot from low angle without music, so we only hear their sharp breath and the slow grinding of metal as the fuse spins ever so slowly. They wear no armor or padding, their only protection their skill and blind luck, which soon runs out. So, it comes to the final scene were Wirtz is stuck with an unexploded bomb with only a pencil stub keeping him from oblivion, while Koertner works to save both of them (damn the annuity, which he wants to pay to one of the squad’s widows anyway). But Wirtz has the opportunity to sabotage the effort and he does so, with only Koertner’s skill keep him balanced on the razor’s edge of existence. But Wirtz realizes this is his bomb to defuse and as Koertner walks away, Wirtz purposely blows himself to kingdom come. </span></p><p><b><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B+)</span> </span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-58324862344481363372024-02-23T22:17:00.001-05:002024-02-23T22:17:14.541-05:00THE BLACK GLOVE (Terence Fisher, 1954)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZj5wsoh_CDd9zdOoNh8vr1jy67uZ16aQ8Kx3r-ZWme1ItMuTUNDOJmXDfkPDw2IrPdtmtCiqSG8Fd2Q8F9ld9U9E_7bJD2vC8w-Sa3Bz-Hj23YqFa3FlYlWsp6jPiEvHXL9FoVyWc1fZYg4FyFpRB0n7KYPctJLmYU0uo-F-W5CZu_rxebdR5PwGSWF7_/s900/the%20black%20glove.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="679" data-original-width="900" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZj5wsoh_CDd9zdOoNh8vr1jy67uZ16aQ8Kx3r-ZWme1ItMuTUNDOJmXDfkPDw2IrPdtmtCiqSG8Fd2Q8F9ld9U9E_7bJD2vC8w-Sa3Bz-Hj23YqFa3FlYlWsp6jPiEvHXL9FoVyWc1fZYg4FyFpRB0n7KYPctJLmYU0uo-F-W5CZu_rxebdR5PwGSWF7_/w400-h301/the%20black%20glove.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">James Bradley is a world-famous trumpet player who really digs the London jazz scene but may just get buried by it! Terence Fisher and DP Walter Harvey just point the camera and go, allowing Alex Nicol as the musician James Bradley to blow his own horn once too often, investing his character with a smarmy resilience. Is this a one-man comedy act or a noir murder mystery? </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The film opens with Bradley (Brad, from here on out) and his orchestra bebopping to a packed house in London’s Palladium. He bails on the after-concert party (he doesn’t dig that scene), and by chance is lured by a siren’s song echoing down a crowded street. He hooks up with this bluesy siren Maxine (Ann Hanslip) and she promises to make a spaghetti dinner for the two of them...at 2 in the morning! When Brad exits a few hours later after a wholesome liaison, he’s surprised to wake up with police detectives hovering over his bed. Maxine was murdered and he’s the person of interest! The next 70 minutes or so involve Brad, a musician whose livelihood and creative outlet are in the use of his hands, get involved in multiple fistfights. Hell, he even dukes it out with a jazz pianist who doesn’t seem to care much about his own hands either. The convoluted story makes little sense as the story unwinds because Terence Fisher doesn’t know how to create tension or suspense; instead of giving the audience information hidden from Brad so we can root for him to uncover the killer or get some cheap thrills as he edges closer towards doom, Fisher gives Brad information not shared with the audience until the final minutes! Ha! So, the whole finale after the poisoned mouthpiece, which should have been a nice piece of suspense, is just Brad telling the police he discovered the killer’s identity so they round-up all of the suspects. The resulting mayhem is absurd. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">What really makes this film kick and feel alive is the jazz score full of diegetic music, as Alex Nicol as our protagonist mimics some killer trumpet solos played by legend Kenny Baker. The music is worth more than the price of admission to this tepid, unintentionally hilarious non-thriller. And it should be noted that there is no fucking black glove anywhere in this story. </span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-4966384981838325092024-02-14T19:21:00.003-05:002024-02-14T19:22:52.511-05:00X THE UNKNOWN (Leslie Norman, 1956)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8FH8JXaCCGAKlLGo_6J7FFTGzbqG4NLaXUzMTHBbk1TnBgGWC0qYK0bo1OoaHHNJjVQn-ivIgDr1N8KM0NxepdcJm_CxrcUGBJEAjVf2KOyhcDZFfrLmKj1ZAZw3d9aiio5_KBE9Vm5U8z-pvGrP1WfVuRFiONHC54_XqRM10uQMOgL28-xzCKe9GxMVQ/s570/x%20the%20unknown.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="570" data-original-width="400" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8FH8JXaCCGAKlLGo_6J7FFTGzbqG4NLaXUzMTHBbk1TnBgGWC0qYK0bo1OoaHHNJjVQn-ivIgDr1N8KM0NxepdcJm_CxrcUGBJEAjVf2KOyhcDZFfrLmKj1ZAZw3d9aiio5_KBE9Vm5U8z-pvGrP1WfVuRFiONHC54_XqRM10uQMOgL28-xzCKe9GxMVQ/w281-h400/x%20the%20unknown.jpg" width="281" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The Earth belches forth a parasite that feeds upon the fission of the Atomic Age, its amorphous symmetry laying radioactive waste to the surface world in its endless quest for sustenance. Hammer Films mimics the American zeitgeist of Cold War fiction, adventuring into this hybrid genre of science and horror that actually spawns its own grotesque cinematic bastard child: <b>THE BLOB</b>.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The film begins with restless soldiers during a training exercise, their Geiger counter clicking away in search of a harmlessly radioactive ingot. Suddenly, the ground erupts with fire and brimstone as a crack in the world opens into a grinning chasm, and a soldier’s flesh blisters with radiation burns. The bottomless hole vomit’s a sentient protoplasm that searches for nourishment, plentiful in the modern world of nuclear armament, this food of the gods. The roiling weapon of mass destruction consumes everything in its path, and one lone scientist has a theory that can render the charged creature neutral, as the army is impotent to stop its day of wrath.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Director Leslie Norman evokes a chilling suspense with bleak black and white photography, as landscapes of shadow and fog become the hunting grounds for this unknown evil. The story progresses logically and thrums with tension, as Dr. Royston’s erector set laboratory becomes the nexus of the investigation. Stunned into silence when a dead boy’s parents hold him morally culpable for the child’s gruesome demise, Dr. Royston must perfect his experiment quickly in order to save the world. American science fiction of the Cold War era is ripe with conflict between science and the military, but here the two work together to solve this violent equation.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The final act seems too rushed, as belief is suspended between two trucks that must have been built in a few hours (at most), utilizing Dr. Royston’s esoteric experiment. But they race to capture the malignant mass between two sonic disruptors and blast it to oblivion. As the film fades to black, we wonder if other denizens of this underground labyrinth will someday surface to feed again.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final grade: (B+)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-40883297191769256632024-02-04T10:28:00.002-05:002024-02-04T10:28:37.460-05:00PARANOIAC (Freddie Francis, 1963)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgouqdQXqQc-rMaFe4HR5QZ2j53_jMh8C1QN2EOGEYY6_CxQus1MjcG_PD5g3Q2oTmYEpjLRxq_2nIRAmI0d-DjEe64wJEJjpH01IPS8RXHsyjs6gBP97yQykb-XA6yJgv28aXrkFpvxa_hMJMIVf8i54RXw470RiGml1r79lXyTVN3y3grsiQsui14vje5/s574/paranoiac.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="574" data-original-width="424" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgouqdQXqQc-rMaFe4HR5QZ2j53_jMh8C1QN2EOGEYY6_CxQus1MjcG_PD5g3Q2oTmYEpjLRxq_2nIRAmI0d-DjEe64wJEJjpH01IPS8RXHsyjs6gBP97yQykb-XA6yJgv28aXrkFpvxa_hMJMIVf8i54RXw470RiGml1r79lXyTVN3y3grsiQsui14vje5/w295-h400/paranoiac.jpg" width="295" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">A dysfunctional family feud becomes a funeral procession as an ancient organ bleats a tormented tune. Freddie Francis imprints this delightfully paranoid celluloid with his signature touch, juxtaposing suspense and melodrama into a sordid mixture of horror where a family’s fortune is an inheritance of nihilism.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Oliver Reed as Simon the drunken antagonist steals nearly every scene, chewing up the scenery with devilish delight, his sharp eyes and Cheshire grin reflecting a playful yet pugnacious nature, like a bully with a grim sense of humor. Simon says and the deranged Aunt follows, her masquerade a chilling falsetto echoing through an empty cathedral, abandoned by both god and sanity. As Simon plans to drive his sister to her grave, his journey ends in his own final resting place of brimstone and hellfire.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The beautiful black and white Scope cinematography is often utilized for triptych compositions, as deep focus allows mise-en-scene to impart information through background events. Francis’ skewed angles are scored with eerie etude, and the pacing induces just the right amount of suspense without overzealous exposition. The opening scene is wonderful, as Francis introduces the family members one at a time (even the grave of the dead ones) with an unbroken crane shot, focusing upon each character and alluding to their unique personality traits. It is the perfect setup for the mystery to come.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The convoluted plot points an accusing finger at each character except Eleanor, who remains the femme whose fate seems written in blood, her sanity cursed and stripped away without last rights. Traumatized by the death of her parents and the suicide, years before, of her little brother Tony, she is now haunted by the grown-up image of her sibling who proves more flesh than bloodline. Invested by an incestuous affair, Eleanor nearly completes Simon’s murderous recipe for inheritance. But the truth sets her free and condemns Simon, self-medicating his malignant guilt with an excess of alcohol, to a burning embrace with his desiccated brother, evermore.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B+)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-37707041645905506182024-01-29T21:33:00.002-05:002024-01-29T21:33:47.668-05:00STOP ME BEFORE I KILL (Val Guest, 1960)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFr0Z2GJEqlIYDh-BUNVU9jt5STnN34Dk0tcNO2BRO-5fdEeoTw1_ouII_Z9UNqDYiqj1J0Mwgffsg4cfiKrU10rveg-ayvkLNzXSTLi-XC545EEtkaa3nLbKaf68NmMPykOwhVqjpuTeT7QxLmhi5P9Ch4LJiCUep0cuxoLt9WApe3jiOnizBI5HuwFlD/s600/stop%20me%20before%20i%20kill.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="600" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFr0Z2GJEqlIYDh-BUNVU9jt5STnN34Dk0tcNO2BRO-5fdEeoTw1_ouII_Z9UNqDYiqj1J0Mwgffsg4cfiKrU10rveg-ayvkLNzXSTLi-XC545EEtkaa3nLbKaf68NmMPykOwhVqjpuTeT7QxLmhi5P9Ch4LJiCUep0cuxoLt9WApe3jiOnizBI5HuwFlD/w400-h316/stop%20me%20before%20i%20kill.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">A race car driver finds his life stuck in neutral after a terrible crash on his wedding night, his emotions twisted metal and impotent rage. Val Guest directs this thriller with the accelerator pushed firmly to the floor, a narrative that races through red flags towards a surprising climax.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Alan Colby is a world-famous race car driver who can no longer run at full speed, suffering post-traumatic stress that relegates him as a passenger to his docile wife. He must conquer the consuming fear of loss of motor control as his hands become weapons, murderous entities that seemingly act of their own accord. Unable to be physically aroused by his beautiful bride, he lashes out with unbridled violence, nearly strangling her with intimacy. Denise sticks by his side and seeks the help of a psychiatrist, but first Alan must swallow his pride and purge his guilty conscious.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Val Guest imbues the film with a riptide of dialogue as the characters trade barbs and malicious tirades, or collapse into crippled silence worn out from the maelstrom. Overlapping conversations heighten the sense of dynamic tension as Alan spins out of control while his wife stands by her man. Dr. Prade utilizes psychiatric gimmicks that would make professionals cringe (oxygen deprivation, drug therapy, hypnotic regression) that works well as a plot device, and finally gets to the root cause of the association between the crash and his urge to strangle his wife. It’s a clever link in the chain of events, as Alan is a man who controls his life with his hands, thundering horsepower his heartbeat…and it’s his hands that betray him. The suspense mounts between the trio: will Alan be cured, are Dr. Prade’s intentions therapeutic, and is Denise faithful?</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Though the story relies on pop psychology (but so does Hitchcock’s <b>SPELLBOUND</b>) the final suspension of disbelief becomes refreshing and enlightening. The film begins with a car crash and fortunately doesn’t end as one.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-59043249080493719562024-01-24T22:20:00.008-05:002024-01-24T22:20:37.817-05:00PAID TO KILL (Montgomery Tully, 1954)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlbZsSEKx5jDb81ZOMtu510KxZvt7ng424lfgIrkrSd_sUyoXJAqrsVn9eiJXXSub-ir8Fb_Vja33ZaBB9KARa1DNAiFVtnfLKMkuNtc71XLHDT645wRr0DWNnkcsZd3mxKgtuhD3kdw-bTuTCpuf8OgZM68LpA0LmCrBWaVJHu4Mrsr3eo0T6dcZwMCDO/s304/Paid%20To%20Kill1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="239" data-original-width="304" height="314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlbZsSEKx5jDb81ZOMtu510KxZvt7ng424lfgIrkrSd_sUyoXJAqrsVn9eiJXXSub-ir8Fb_Vja33ZaBB9KARa1DNAiFVtnfLKMkuNtc71XLHDT645wRr0DWNnkcsZd3mxKgtuhD3kdw-bTuTCpuf8OgZM68LpA0LmCrBWaVJHu4Mrsr3eo0T6dcZwMCDO/w400-h314/Paid%20To%20Kill1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Bankrupt businessman James Nevill decides he is worth more dead than alive, so he pays an ex-friend to kill him. An interesting setup with a nice twist in the third act! Montgomery Tully’s direction is rather bland and unexceptional, but he tells the story in a linear and straightforward fashion. Here, DP Walter J. Harvey frames the story in a utilitarian style that is neither visually inspired or tonally anesthetizing; the photography is rather neutral and doesn’t get in the way of the story. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Nevill (Dane Clark) shouts a lot and pushes people around, but he’s the President of Amalgamated, a corporation that does something or other, and he must answer to the Board of Directors. His rather shady dealings bring the company to bankruptcy so he decides to hire his one-time buddy Paul Kirby (Paul Carpenter) to murder him so his wife Andrea (Thea Gregory) can benefit from the insurance policy. But the deal actually pays off so Nevill must track down his buddy before the contract can be carried out! As the brief story progresses, we witness Andrea’s estrangement, Nevill’s secretary getting rather chummy with her boss, a triad of life-threatening encounters, and some bar brawls. So, who is trying to kill Nevill? The story has a neat but not unexpected twist in its final minutes which is full of talking and exposition, explaining all of their motivations leading up to the denouement. It seems all kind of silly, but the film doesn’t overstay it welcome. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><b><span style="color: red;">Final Grade: (C)</span></b> </span></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-58025517110725000962024-01-18T18:40:00.004-05:002024-01-18T18:40:16.209-05:00THE GLASS TOMB (Montgomery Tully, 1955)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0iDrUqpOw976K9e8rNbwq7UH-ay87GoOrHDe6lsvlqVaJPdCcigTHPfLVNvnDfYguIGU60ixsL4DFxLROLK5OSFHV3ZufG0SVdzTj2nncKoTRxuNCq9nw8zQbO9l6Yo2jiAe_oVnYHI868tOlFnS7fiVBBjtxjvtCmIEuHpcMc4tb7pDsv-uWv_kDUpi_/s600/the%20glass%20tomb01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="381" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0iDrUqpOw976K9e8rNbwq7UH-ay87GoOrHDe6lsvlqVaJPdCcigTHPfLVNvnDfYguIGU60ixsL4DFxLROLK5OSFHV3ZufG0SVdzTj2nncKoTRxuNCq9nw8zQbO9l6Yo2jiAe_oVnYHI868tOlFnS7fiVBBjtxjvtCmIEuHpcMc4tb7pDsv-uWv_kDUpi_/w254-h400/the%20glass%20tomb01.jpg" width="254" /></a></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">A showman goes straight with a Starvation Act, displaying a man who will go 70 days without eating locked inside a glass cage, but unfortunately the incarcerated carny cheats by ingesting a mouthful of strychnine! Montgomery Tully deftly directs this Tod Browning-like tale of absurdity on the Midway, a strange concoction of film noir and freak-show integrants.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Pel Pelham (John Ireland) supports his nuclear family by promoting sideshows, a carny who left the racket behind and now goes it straight and narrow. He gets a call from his shady past in the form of Tony Lewis (Sid James) and is asked to look into a little feminine blackmail situation Tony is suffering from. Nothing rough, mind you, but just talk to her. Tony gifts Pel a nice fat check to help him with the startup cost of his new venture. Coincidentally, this femme isn’t so fatale after all and is the daughter of Pel’s mentor, and she’s living a floor above Sapolio, the man who starves himself for food money. So, Pel can kill two birds with one stone, metaphorically. Pel visits Rena Maroni (Tonia Bern) but she’s not keen on blackmail and just wanted to tell Tony so long, and thanks for all of the fish. She’s not a bad kid. When Pel and Sapolio throw a huge party for the carny gang, Rena ends up in a big sleep and Scotland Yard is hot on the case. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The film isn’t a whodunit as that's revealed in the first act; it’s concerned with catching the real killer and builds a modicum of suspense. Journeyman DP Walter J. Harvey shows some inspiration, utilizing low angle compositions and low-key lighting, allowing flashing lights through dirty windows to illuminate a murder scene. Tully also utilizes some location filming in bombed out portions of London and it’s historically interesting! The acting is fine, and John Ireland is not too shabby as a barker (seems he had some real-life experience). The story is sprinkled with humor, from the snot nosed kid at the Midway to Pel’s own child devouring the contents of the refrigerator, a picnic spread on the kitchen floor. The story may not make much sense in the final act as the killer, afraid he’ll be caught for Rena’s murder, commits an even more obvious one...in public! And the story leaves one loose end dangling as another killer is never brought to Justice. However, Pel decides to honor Sapolio in the most freakish way possible: he displays his dead body as a paying attraction! Fucking brilliant. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B)</span></b></div>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-85078054277252942102024-01-14T14:22:00.008-05:002024-01-14T14:32:52.960-05:00WINGS OF DANGER (Terence Fisher, 1952)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIZEWlePrFwwrZguhfP1qO0AyVeSD6yaKtgPusB542FSnY6-_i6QV7FtBycHINkHk-h-DoHO3MKJx5j7uAduPp28zYx3s4oqJ-6DMceG8e-MoGzidwoWqBOe13u-XVl4260VI_edEaxHt3svYyDyQ0ozHUkjhiDGz6K6XiHXSMK4GfDcb2whG2owZbazHW/s785/wings%20of%20danger.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="785" data-original-width="423" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIZEWlePrFwwrZguhfP1qO0AyVeSD6yaKtgPusB542FSnY6-_i6QV7FtBycHINkHk-h-DoHO3MKJx5j7uAduPp28zYx3s4oqJ-6DMceG8e-MoGzidwoWqBOe13u-XVl4260VI_edEaxHt3svYyDyQ0ozHUkjhiDGz6K6XiHXSMK4GfDcb2whG2owZbazHW/w215-h400/wings%20of%20danger.jpg" width="215" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Pilot Richard Van Ness gets entangled in a web of smugglers and counterfeiters, but his greatest fight is against his own wartime brain injury. Terence Fisher’s direction is flat and uninspired, allowing the actors to speak their lines but not “act” them, and visually the film is as forgettable as a dream upon waking. The one interesting detail is that future Hammer Director John Gilling wrote the screenplay. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Richard Van Ness (Zachary Scott) is a Commercial Pilot whose roguish best friend Nick Talbot (Robert Beatty) blackmails him into allowing Nick to fly during a storm; with friends like that, who needs enemies? Seems Van suffers from random blackouts, and he’d lose his pilot's license, which seems like a good idea. They get in an argument and Van says he only transports cargo, so if he crashes only property will be lost. Doesn’t he fucking think for a moment that he could crash over a city or village, that innocent people on the ground may die? His blackouts are a dirty secret that he even keeps from his paramour Avril Talbot (Naomi Chance) who is Nick’s sister, which is the underlying reason he won’t marry her. So, Van couldn’t settle for another career in the airline industry or Avril’s hotel business as he’d rather risk catastrophe than give up his license. And this is the guy we’re supposed to have sympathy for! </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Now, the blackout idea sounds like a setup for an exciting, thrilling chase scene later in the film as Van would chase the bad guys in a death-defying flight towards the denouement...but nope. We don’t get his first blackout episode until late in the second act when he’s driving a car and chasing a motorcycle. But by this point there’s a police inspector who thinks Van may be involved in smuggling, Nick is presumed dead in airplane crash (hence the first act, his flying in a storm), and a tepid femme fatale Alexia LaRoche (Kay Kendall) who has a notebook full of incriminating evidence (and is being blackmailed herself), and a toolkit made of solid gold. Then there’s something about a Nazi printing press and counterfeit money. Of course, Nick’s alive and involved in this black-market morass yet he saves Van before dying (for real, this time). The ambiguous bad guys escape in a plane without warming up their engines and now we expect a high stakes action sequence. Van will race to his plane, his headaches will increase, we’ll get some nice POV fuzzy compositions as his eyesight blurs, the bad guys will get almost get away before they crash and burn, and Van is the hero. Nope. Our protagonists are busy calling every airport where the plane may possibly land before they hear the engines buzz and see a bright flash: the plane has crashed. See, the engines weren’t warmed up first, right? In the next scene Van is on the runway talking to another pilot but there is no debris or body parts strewn about, no smoking wreckage, not even one single emergency vehicle or mention of the crash that just happened. It’s unintentionally hilarious. I suppose it all ends well for Van but not so well for the Talbot family. I’ve written more words about this film than it deserves. </span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (D)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-18105039863093625232024-01-10T21:34:00.004-05:002024-01-10T21:39:50.904-05:00THE MAN WHO COULD CHEAT DEATH (Terence Fisher, 1959)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8OaE3MsIRfh3nB53mMkguo98zZfSbAFU6Q_z068W12xtg47Ko539YvdlB7Q2xdbpW30I_kPJN7M1MPA0c7mE1qxc5dGIrn6kft8sdOwQLOU9xc4w-oeD20Sa68OvTIjPeq_lFh4HtspVNFNXqRHhMiuyMrxIZZXPSQXsLjyfa3Wb56NPfphA1n4iNZxRY/s1024/the%20man%20who%20could%20cheat%20death.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="703" data-original-width="1024" height="275" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8OaE3MsIRfh3nB53mMkguo98zZfSbAFU6Q_z068W12xtg47Ko539YvdlB7Q2xdbpW30I_kPJN7M1MPA0c7mE1qxc5dGIrn6kft8sdOwQLOU9xc4w-oeD20Sa68OvTIjPeq_lFh4HtspVNFNXqRHhMiuyMrxIZZXPSQXsLjyfa3Wb56NPfphA1n4iNZxRY/w400-h275/the%20man%20who%20could%20cheat%20death.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Portrait of an artist as an old man hidden behind an illusion of flesh and bone, one gland away from the tomb. Director Terence Fisher directs this talky and rather mawkish tale of jealousy, betrayal, and temporary immortality.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Georges Bonnet is a renowned artist and doctor who has lived for over a hundred years. Every ten years, he must undergo an operation (that only his now elderly colleague can perform) to replace some mysterious gland in his abdomen. As the time grows ever closer for the surgery, he becomes devoured by madness and must drink a bubbling potion before he rots away.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The film begins in 19th century Paris as Bonnet greets his guests to reveal his new creation, a bust of the lovely Margo. But the sudden appearance of Janine (the beautiful and classy Hazel Court!) a past model and lover sparks his burning desire to stay alive...and give her his fleshy gland! The film has only a few sets and becomes too talky as characters regurgitate exposition, revealing the past and present tense through terse dialogue, thus suffocating suspense and interest. Anton Diffring portrays the antagonist Bonnet and is hilariously prone to starring off-camera in key scenes, while Christopher Lee is unceremoniously relegated to a secondary role (though he is magnificent, as usual). The narrative calculations just don’t add up as it attempts to multiply suspense by adding a Detective, hot on the trail of a missing women. The film is visually interesting with Hammer's slavish attention to period detail in the costumes and set designs.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Finally, Bonnet is consumed in a squelchy and searing climax of gooey makeup and kerosene. The film builds to just this moment but fails to deliver a gory denouement and becomes a bit of a meltdown...err...letdown.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-83356282434646854192024-01-08T21:07:00.000-05:002024-01-08T21:07:55.665-05:00TWINS OF EVIL (John Hough, 1971)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA0Qm9cxCGRPpGkP5mqmFrHD0PauHzMXbPh-FLHjYUnFo0HFOczGgkkePjgcUg2VZFPMdmQZqxr7Kw1iPApnrodRNqp-75OPFAh3nLQN8UE-xkd9Y8hpmivtOjnwTiB34KmAzKzUsjC24yAGNr9Pwxrw2rkJi2e3AFEzGxHJgtwxIXgnqfJ5RAwmegK8J4/s760/twins%20of%20evil.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="760" data-original-width="570" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA0Qm9cxCGRPpGkP5mqmFrHD0PauHzMXbPh-FLHjYUnFo0HFOczGgkkePjgcUg2VZFPMdmQZqxr7Kw1iPApnrodRNqp-75OPFAh3nLQN8UE-xkd9Y8hpmivtOjnwTiB34KmAzKzUsjC24yAGNr9Pwxrw2rkJi2e3AFEzGxHJgtwxIXgnqfJ5RAwmegK8J4/w300-h400/twins%20of%20evil.jpg" width="300" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">A tale of two men who worship different sides of the same ignoble entity, realizing their potential with the blood of innocents. John Hough's divisive drama splits one beautifully naive sister from her libidinous twin as a metaphor depicting the cruelty of good intentions refracted through a glass darkly, a vampiric reflection of vile deeds.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The premise concerns waifish twin sisters who are forced to live with their uncle, the detestable Gustav Weil (pronounced vile), whose bible thumping leads to witch burning. Weil isn't concerned with trials or evidence; he and his brotherhood are judge, jury, and executioner, murdering any woman of questionable lifestyle. Karnstein is a local Count who is immune to local law and custom, a man who revels in the basest of desires. Though Weil and Karnstein are dead set against one another, they are twins of evil deeds. The Count soon tires of the bloodletting and becomes a vampiric minion of Satan. The classic vampire tale is not much concerned with the undead; it is a cautionary Victorian tale of the women who enjoy their sexuality...and the dire consequences.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Hough’s direction is unremarkable and the editing confusing as characters move from scene to scene outside of narrative time. He shoots the night sequences in bright daylight, using blue filters to give the illusion of darkness, but the long shadows and blue sky dispel disbelief. Peter Cushing as Weil is wonderfully brutal and immoderate, a departure from the elegant heroes he so often portrays. The nudity is abbreviated while the cleavage is maximized to great effect, but the blood flows more freely than either.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-18170332032327877462024-01-06T13:10:00.000-05:002024-01-06T13:10:47.215-05:00TERROR STREET (Montgomery Tully, 1953)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVp-As_o-aJ4BTWH-wY_4ndxJNTl6MpxznJntMpivbixVLZF27CPeqGLaUQtdiTBCuQXNR2S7ard7kRRtbtwe7J4CF28skLWDkUpPKuqWF5WSmnBHSCEMwbQ3YJMMTp224Ilalw7AKZsVzNd6aDt35uhxgBCP_eb9aQVY6YoyOrtuTszI1wp55KpbGVnS7/s2547/terror%20street.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1951" data-original-width="2547" height="306" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVp-As_o-aJ4BTWH-wY_4ndxJNTl6MpxznJntMpivbixVLZF27CPeqGLaUQtdiTBCuQXNR2S7ard7kRRtbtwe7J4CF28skLWDkUpPKuqWF5WSmnBHSCEMwbQ3YJMMTp224Ilalw7AKZsVzNd6aDt35uhxgBCP_eb9aQVY6YoyOrtuTszI1wp55KpbGVnS7/w400-h306/terror%20street.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Major Rogers has 36 hours to clear his name, find his wife’s killer, and track down her secret stash. Unfortunately, there is no Terror Street in this Mr. Roger’s neighborhood. Montgomery Tully’s direction and pacing is listless, allowing Dan Duryea to shout his dialogue and spend copious amounts of time looking through empty apartments, starring at dusty shelves, massaging fur coats, handling lost knickknacks, and disposing of lost shoes. How exciting. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Major Bill Rogers (Dan Duryea) is an American pilot stationed in England after WWII where he meets and marries his sweetheart Katie (Elsie Albiin). He is suddenly assigned back to the US to train newfangled jet pilots, but Katie is not allowed to come with him. When he goes AWOL and hitches a flight back to England after 12 months, he’s surprised she has started a new life elsewhere. He tracks her down and is suddenly involved in her murder. Interesting setup but the entire first act is him rummaging through her belongings and a tepid flashback, which establishes nothing but boredom for the audience. There is no onscreen chemistry between Duryea and Albiin and their marriage seems nothing more than narrative convenience. As he escapes the murder scene and attempts to discover her murderer, not only to clear himself but for vengeance, he’s involved in rather amateurish looking fisticuffs and a plot that doesn’t make much sense. From a Customs Agent to Katie’s young lover, and a Nun who commits fraud because she trusts our protagonist, and a safety deposit box holding some secret, we hope this all ends on Terror Street. But alas, there is no such street and little terror, just a gaggle on incompetent criminals who allow themselves to be disarmed at every opportunity. Hell, there isn’t even a street: all of the action takes place indoors! </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><b>TERROR STREET</b> builds little suspense as Dan Duryea, usually rather solid in film noir, looking sluggish and bored. His performance is just good enough to hold momentary interest but evaporates like cotton candy. Like this film will a few moments after viewing.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-43596488022345277772023-12-30T14:18:00.003-05:002023-12-30T14:18:20.311-05:00HEAT WAVE (Ken Hughes, 1954)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3R-2YoySohSiZX1Tgqc0rEmZ60RuJ8r5AEl0jmQJ-0L8r7_8k_2rTfzofk5hyphenhyphenPeZCAr7tqL2_12gMC79hfsT3uTEzjTkJQ4fJucOwUJyyc-wAdUJ5KuIEWmA6N9vcTd0J-XblzGC615KL-S8jeTq8KizIeT8GDYNO0Efzktii8phflVODDFyUQdwC4MI4/s440/heat%20wave.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="333" data-original-width="440" height="303" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3R-2YoySohSiZX1Tgqc0rEmZ60RuJ8r5AEl0jmQJ-0L8r7_8k_2rTfzofk5hyphenhyphenPeZCAr7tqL2_12gMC79hfsT3uTEzjTkJQ4fJucOwUJyyc-wAdUJ5KuIEWmA6N9vcTd0J-XblzGC615KL-S8jeTq8KizIeT8GDYNO0Efzktii8phflVODDFyUQdwC4MI4/w400-h303/heat%20wave.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Writer Mark Kendrick scripts his own pulp fiction mythology, a man who chooses to be lured to his doom by the siren song of a lake goddess. Director Ken Hughes adapts his own novel, but one hopes the prose is more exciting than this droll and boorish derivative. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The story is told in flashback by our protagonist Mark Kendrick (Alex Nicol) as he narrates his story to an unknown man. He then tells the tale of his downfall as one night, after receiving a phone call to help ferry a few guests across the lake, he is introduced to the muse of his wealthy neighbor’s husband. It seems Beverly Forrest (Sid James) is married to Carol (Hilary Brooke), a sexually charged woman who collects men with artistic dispositions and masochistic impulses, such as pianists. Or pulp writers. Adultery ensues, to no one’s surprise including her husbands! </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The problem with the story is that there is no chemistry between Mark and Carol, no spark or fire (or heat wave, for that matter) that explains his decision to allow himself to be seduced. Beverly is a good guy, a man with a heart condition that will probably kill him with a year, and his relationship with Mark seems genuine even though he realizes his new companion will be her next mark (so to speak). Beverly is not a controlling or abusive man, and Carol doesn’t pretend otherwise. The film barely hints at a possible lover’s triangle between Mark, Carol and the stepdaughter Andrea (Susan Stephen) but fails to capitalize on this plot point. When Beverly is accidentally knocked unconscious on a foggy boat excursion, Carol and Mark are the only witnesses. She decides to chuck Beverly overboard and Mark is left to clean up the blood. But Mark’s typewriter is no replacement for a piano keyboard, and he soon realizes he’s just been henpecked like a minor chord. I suppose Mark just can’t see the Forrest for the trees...or prison bars. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The denouement is pointless and without suspense or tension. Of course, the man he’s telling his story to in the first act is the detective who suspected foul play, and the story ends with Mark being ferried across the lake towards his own well-deserved fate. </span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-27908442247376609152023-12-24T11:02:00.004-05:002023-12-24T11:02:22.797-05:00BLACKOUT (Terence Fisher, 1954)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-78osalz6TJ_JuARglsaekHab33-YJlt667Ph98_R8JyG3cksiKilUK-9_dYN5VMWlKu-hXOV2Vfwor7iJuRLpiUBMtITINxZd2TdMCCsxY5XtCv5tVhb06GPA6Euh-9pLqV97cR4nHalSa9CcqXJJ7Aza7Sh5_C4nbKib85LRhruBX9Qo2s2duDa5YTr/s430/blackout01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="430" data-original-width="320" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-78osalz6TJ_JuARglsaekHab33-YJlt667Ph98_R8JyG3cksiKilUK-9_dYN5VMWlKu-hXOV2Vfwor7iJuRLpiUBMtITINxZd2TdMCCsxY5XtCv5tVhb06GPA6Euh-9pLqV97cR4nHalSa9CcqXJJ7Aza7Sh5_C4nbKib85LRhruBX9Qo2s2duDa5YTr/w298-h400/blackout01.jpg" width="298" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Drunk and disorderly, Casey Morrow may never see another morrow as he ties the knot...and may hang from one too! Terence Fisher directs with a sublime economy that propels the story forward like a shot of cheap bourbon, a complicated tale of seduction and murder that goes down raw and settles in your gut that way. You may need a double shot just to understand the plot! </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Casey Morrow (Dane Clark) is broke and falling down drunk in a smoky jazz club when he is approached by a beautiful blonde, a stranger who offers him $500 pounds to do a job for her. Turns out, the job is of the matrimonial kind and bombshell Phyllis Brunner (Belinda Lee) is soon mysteriously betrothed to our clueless protagonist. Or is she? When Casey wakes up from his blackout drunken excess of the night before, he discovers her father has been murdered and he has blood on his clothes! He was dumped off on the doorstep of another stranger where Maggie Doone (Eleanor Summerfield) nurses him back to sobriety. When he swims to the surface of consciousness through his alcoholic fugue, he’s starring at a huge portrait of Phyllis and assumes he just dreamed the chance encounter. But when he leaves Ms. Doone’s apartment and sees the murderous headline, he knows he was set up to be a fall guy! Confusion ensues. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">DP Walter J. Harvey once again does a workmanlike job of camera movement and composition without being flashy. Very few scenes utilize low key lighting or elongated shadows, though he does move the camera into the streets of London and into real pubs and bars, eschewing studio set designs. This heightens the verisimilitude of his condition as Casey races to discover the truth about his one-night stand, or more precisely, his one-night fall. And Terence Fisher fills the story with false leads and possibilities, as Phyllis remains mysterious one moment and infatuated with her new paramour the next. Is she a femme of the fatale kind? Does she know the truth or is she as much victim as Casey? The over-complicated story makes little sense as you’re watching it, but it makes the viewer experience the confusion of our protagonist who struggles to clear himself and discover Phyllis’ involvement. But one thing is for certain, when marrying into an extended family one may have to tolerate a Mater Fatale. </span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B-) </span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-66184864358986045192023-12-21T22:56:00.007-05:002023-12-21T22:56:38.027-05:00THE REVENGE OF FRANKENSTEIN (Terence Fisher, 1958)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOBUEh9F7MZJa-1r-AquqmirpgFm1TIiolWfJQIbvJET-sd9yV0hTFZXyrZbHBEh0YOi3y6oSUxC_S8B9zjLWwfgDXmXZR2EVqiik4dew_SlesOuQLKWA9b_77CxzMWVQIQaqqo_0TUG2ihqJAAZA0Kj6guJkum6indGUd6i2ODbE1mw_GX49pNQD7S8jM/s692/the%20revenge%20of%20frankenstein.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="692" data-original-width="500" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOBUEh9F7MZJa-1r-AquqmirpgFm1TIiolWfJQIbvJET-sd9yV0hTFZXyrZbHBEh0YOi3y6oSUxC_S8B9zjLWwfgDXmXZR2EVqiik4dew_SlesOuQLKWA9b_77CxzMWVQIQaqqo_0TUG2ihqJAAZA0Kj6guJkum6indGUd6i2ODbE1mw_GX49pNQD7S8jM/w289-h400/the%20revenge%20of%20frankenstein.jpg" width="289" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Viktor Frankenstein in one step ahead of the guillotine and trades a priest’s death for another chance at forging life. Terence Fisher’s blackly humorous sequel doesn’t suffer from a irony deficiency, as the Baron must transplant himself into a new village under an assumed name, then suffer another kind of transplant with a little help from his friend.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The first scene picks up from the epilogue of <b>THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN</b> as the Baron is being led to his execution. A subtle gesture to a deformed assistant and the hooded executioner while a priest babbles biblical nonsense, cuts suddenly to the rusty blade descending: a quick jump-cut juxtaposes a man’s scream over the drunken laughter in some nearby tavern, as two bumbling alcoholics bicker and argue about completing a mysterious job for a few dollars. Of course, they dig up the unmarked grave and discover a cheap wooden coffin with Frankenstein’s name carved upon it: inside is the beheaded corpse of the priest.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Dr. Stein now has a successful practice in a faraway town and is blackmailed by another physician, who knows his secret identity. With the help of their deformed assistant, the two scientists place his brain into a healthier body, but Dr. Stein seems nonplussed with the cannibalistic side-effects of his last operation. Interestingly enough, the new creation becomes infatuated with a buxom nurse and destroys his old body, starting life anew by burning away the past. But he is victimized, and his brain damaged, devolving into animal instinct, craving human flesh. With part of his mind intact, he understands the beast he has become and curses Frankenstein before a large crowd, revealing the Doctor’s secret.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">In a neat twist of fate, Frankenstein is murdered by the very patients he was helping to heal (though he never wasted parts) and his cohort cuts out the brain and transplants it into a Peter Cushing look-alike. He is now Dr. Franck in London ready to see his first patient. But is he competent…or cannibal?</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-39279555874822990052023-12-18T17:58:00.000-05:002023-12-18T17:58:02.639-05:00THE GORGON (Terence Fisher, 1964)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix7TWd_8w1cI22_9bytxx8SwAcR-onSwRFeFsWr3n5He6tbpXAtzY-lkKML5DRpvafLNYRHRl7UyJpneF0A8tdn-nrzoRYVKYFZVs1Nldl1JaxwZNq381TJy-8xvWIz21y-WYUK_4ChIjmeCDy3toLRjWlS99zenr6Y_1hslwZWBEVwUG4xB5csyGeugDk/s965/the%20gorgon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="965" data-original-width="450" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix7TWd_8w1cI22_9bytxx8SwAcR-onSwRFeFsWr3n5He6tbpXAtzY-lkKML5DRpvafLNYRHRl7UyJpneF0A8tdn-nrzoRYVKYFZVs1Nldl1JaxwZNq381TJy-8xvWIz21y-WYUK_4ChIjmeCDy3toLRjWlS99zenr6Y_1hslwZWBEVwUG4xB5csyGeugDk/w298-h640/the%20gorgon.jpg" width="298" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Beauty is possessed by the beast whose writhing gaze turns flesh into stone and hardens the heart of her ardent lover. Director Terence Fisher is inspired by Greek mythology but forsakes details (Megaera is one of The Kindly Ones, spoiled of jealousy and ripe with fury, not one of the titular Gorgons!), to create an eerie metaphor of small-town ignorance that sparks violence and one man’s destructive domestic dominance.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">A village suffers the fate of the full moon as its inhabitants die systematically by being “Gorgonized” (yes, that term is used in the film): that is, they are turned to stone. The local Dr. Namaroff covers up this particular fact and buries the bodies quickly while forging autopsy reports. His lovely assistant Carla can turn a man’s specific organ to stone with her fiery hair and matronly passion but suffers from blackouts…on the nights of the full moon. When a local girl is murdered and her lover seemingly commits suicide, the Coroner’s Inquest shouts its final judgment against the wishes of the dead boy’s father Professor Heitz: it was a murder/suicide. The Professor is a stranger in this strange town, threatened by the police and torch-wielding villagers who attempt to chase him away to allay their guilty conscious, to conceal their dreadful ignorance. He is lured to the deserted Castle Borski which looms like some skeletal sentinel above the town, by a sing-song temptress and he too gets rocked. Professor Heitz’s son Paul then journeys to this rural charnel house to investigate and uncovers a bedrock conspiracy that must be shattered to fracture the two-thousand-year-old curse…and save his true love.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Fisher suffuses the film with the right amount of energy and exposition, charging headlong through plot points gaining frantic momentum, while allowing the characters room to exist beyond the need for narrative fodder. Peter Cushing as the possessive Dr. Namaroff and Christopher Lee as Dr. Meister both fulfill their rolls with scene stealing aplomb, while Barbara Shelly as the cursed victim and Richard Pasco as her infatuation are also exemplary. Fisher’s use of saturated daytime colors and thick nighttime shadows is a juxtaposition of chilling intent, and the use of reflections in mirrors and pools of turgid water or the soft surah of a Siren’s call are palpably delicious. The final scene is the great reveal, and when the Gorgon appears it’s a rather mundane head-severing climax. The ending is a bleak morass of nihilistic proportions, as Dr. Meister remains the sole (or soul) survivor; everyone else just got stoned.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-3084835202497340312023-12-16T22:49:00.003-05:002023-12-16T22:49:50.538-05:00THE SATANIC RITES OF DRACULA (Alan Gibson, 1974)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhheyHax4d8rkz35aht7HxT2uVZSzL1-fWoRHo9h8vlbiWSNjBofVZYFcmID7iwYnD2YkEpBPqxFEsQUU4WJE0Gg83xBR7IuDSzizb4TKbgwIFi4MQdB4Lm6ru_XlA_HqCYNQ9N3rlqKE3Xghf3vzAGIqbg3oFzGCOmkYYvwvcgSDkln-MxhL7rf3jIvQ4I/s1357/satanic%20rites.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1357" data-original-width="960" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhheyHax4d8rkz35aht7HxT2uVZSzL1-fWoRHo9h8vlbiWSNjBofVZYFcmID7iwYnD2YkEpBPqxFEsQUU4WJE0Gg83xBR7IuDSzizb4TKbgwIFi4MQdB4Lm6ru_XlA_HqCYNQ9N3rlqKE3Xghf3vzAGIqbg3oFzGCOmkYYvwvcgSDkln-MxhL7rf3jIvQ4I/w283-h400/satanic%20rites.jpg" width="283" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The Prince of Darkness rises once again into the modern world: this time, to spread a far deadlier contagion than mere vampirism! Director Alan Gibson confuses horror convention for spy drama, giving birth to this stillborn tripe that is <b>MOD SQUAD</b> meets <b>DRACULA</b>; an idea worth its weight in camp but played without humor...only thick gothic humours.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Christopher Lee’s final appearance as Dracula at least allows him more dialogue instead of relegating him to a caped corpse hovering over frightened girls. Unfortunately, Lee doesn’t appear until half-way through the picture and the obtuse plot fails to demonstrate the need for Dracula, thus there is no suspense or tension as we await his ethereal presence. Lee is delightfully wicked but it’s Peter Cushing as Van Helsing who gets the majority or screen time (and dialogue). Cushing’s elegance and professionalism makes this a better film than it should be, and he devises an original way to destroy, once and for all, his immortal nemesis: by a crown of thorns!</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The bland story revolves around powerful men participating in a secret satanic cult but is a mishmash of spy games and gothic horror. Shaggy-vested assassins on motorcycles, security systems, and micro-cameras become the arsenal for an impotent branch of the government's own secret service. The film spends too much time blathering exposition instead of showing us, and Gibson’s innumerable close-ups become visually tiresome and dull, much like a bad television episode.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The finale involves Dracula being led into a hawthorn bush, as if guided by more than chance (and Van Helsing). Dracula suffers his own undead torment before the hero stakes him and watches him dwindle away to ashes and dust. Forever. Thankfully.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-71385811397325964532023-12-15T18:03:00.003-05:002023-12-15T18:03:17.951-05:00THE SNORKEL (Guy Green, 1958)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilg71UH2Li5ybYE5MpBH8hQyXyrhzqKwo07bvCRF8rXSEuDtLsxR58xVoRfLQw2FiuVn0jgxEUKsMnTonmXQ-XjToB71d1F8SmntA1pT0AIyn8lLhf97TmaYbrpgXCDYrnkh1aC2Kgns6U4KuZnkxRwTxowLPSXunHZS76Tit6Rkg11JmsIhvKOWRAwgJh/s512/the%20snorkel.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="512" data-original-width="374" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilg71UH2Li5ybYE5MpBH8hQyXyrhzqKwo07bvCRF8rXSEuDtLsxR58xVoRfLQw2FiuVn0jgxEUKsMnTonmXQ-XjToB71d1F8SmntA1pT0AIyn8lLhf97TmaYbrpgXCDYrnkh1aC2Kgns6U4KuZnkxRwTxowLPSXunHZS76Tit6Rkg11JmsIhvKOWRAwgJh/w293-h400/the%20snorkel.jpg" width="293" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">A killer lurks beneath the surface of suspicion, breathing air in a noxious environment of murderous intentions. Director Guy Green balances a thrilling story with beautiful compositions, tightening the improbable machinations of murder and teenage angst into a suspension of disbelief.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Green was the cinematographer for David Lean's first two films <b>GREAT EXPECTATIONS</b> and <b>OLIVER TWIST</b>, imbuing each with a grim yet austere look of classic literature imprinted upon celluloid, framing scenes with slightly skewed angles or focusing upon the skeletal and bleak environment to create a sense of 19th century dis-ease. As director, his eye for capturing a scene with simple detail and the monotonous dread of routine elevates his film above the typical Hammer tropes. The film begins with a murder in progress with no build up or explanation, using mis en scene to convey murderous details. The two glasses of milk (one half-drunk) explain the sleeping woman without trite exposition, and as he tapes the windows and doors from inside, we begin to wonder what the hell he's up to. When Green suddenly cuts to the man in a scuba mask it's like the shocking revelation of some alien horror. By explaining the murder in the first act Green heightens the tension as the precocious teenage daughter Candy and her dog Toto begin to figure out the crime, and the nanny Jean whispers implications of act and intent.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Candy begins to drown in frustration as the child who cried wolf, once again accusing her stepfather of seemingly impossible crime. As she suffers, we empathize with her plight, admiring her headstrong attitude but also realizing that she is still a gullible child, easily lured into a trap by a cold-hearted killer. And her stepfather Paul is a sociopath wearing the mask of innocence, a monster who subsumes the role of victim. He is reminiscent of Joseph Cotton as Uncle Charlie in Hitchcock's penultimate film <b>SHADOW OF A DOUBT</b>, casting a hypnotic aura of charm and virile grace. The ending balances on the edge of brilliance, evoking the existential and ironic O'Henry twist perfected by those purveyors of nightmares at E.C Comics (pre-code, mind you).</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-67025182436371860992023-12-13T17:08:00.000-05:002023-12-13T17:08:10.318-05:00BAD BLONDE (Reginald Le Borg, 1953)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCtjtn8yoZ-9ZDUZY5l5eBVbsYYK0CrzqZAGiNI8cv1fsVs_NWphMGE0E_wzeEaSaXV6ejTt8iMN_YUt_h0MBHkM6T9cC-M7sh0R3OzvJhxtQJnTkGCo1yA8YQ-2T4b-6Frox2rD8m9CJtV068X2x44plgc06-FbaYMP-GsdQsEDmvKpWWmsI2xd9Zioyl/s726/bad%20blonde.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="547" data-original-width="726" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCtjtn8yoZ-9ZDUZY5l5eBVbsYYK0CrzqZAGiNI8cv1fsVs_NWphMGE0E_wzeEaSaXV6ejTt8iMN_YUt_h0MBHkM6T9cC-M7sh0R3OzvJhxtQJnTkGCo1yA8YQ-2T4b-6Frox2rD8m9CJtV068X2x44plgc06-FbaYMP-GsdQsEDmvKpWWmsI2xd9Zioyl/w400-h301/bad%20blonde.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Johnny Flanagan is a pugilistic seaman who trades his skill for semen (so to speak), until he runs out of time, his fate reduced to a bowl of soup and a cheap wristwatch. Director Reginald Le Borg and his DP Walter J. Harvey are not out to win any awards in style, but their workmanlike pacing and compositions perfectly capture this lurid and sultry tale of adultery and emotional corruption. Barbara Payton puts the fatale in femme and a shirtless Tony Wright as her hapless seduction Johnny Flanagan is a wonderful balance of violent sexual energy and existential crisis. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The plot is straightforward and predictable but it’s how it goes about showing the story that makes it interesting. Johnny is a Merchant Seaman with some skill in the squared circle and once he goes pro, falls for his promoter’s self-indulgent knockout of a wife. Our femme fatale Lorna (Barbara Payton) is introduced to her soon to be paramour (and the audience!) in a deep focus composition as she pulls her stocking up her long slim leg. Her leg dominates the frame in foreground, and we see Johnny diminished, reduced in size by perspective! Johnny fights and struggles against his base impulses throughout the film, and as he rises in fame he sinks into despair and sexual addiction. The story doesn’t portray Lorna’s husband Giuseppe (Frederick Valk) as a bad person who deserves his fate: he is a gregarious boxing promoter who came out of retirement to help his friend Sharkey (Sid James) and his pugilistic protege. He’s kind and generous towards everyone around him including his bored blonde spouse, so it’s more shocking when Johnny finally murders him not out of envy or a perceived injustice but for the mere sake of usurping his position. Lorna’s skill with emotional sparring transcends Johnny’s skill in the ring, and once she declares her pregnancy and plan to commit suicide by poison, Johnny plans on a watery demise for Giuseppe. It’s all a lie, of course, as it’s eventually revealed she isn’t pregnant! Too late, Johnny’s life is aborted and Sharkey, who isn’t blind to the whole sordid affair, makes sure Lorna goes down for the count. The story faithfully follows Chekhov’s Rule: when you show the poison bottle in the second act it has to be a part of the denouement! </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">This is a boxing film (though it’s not about boxing) and DP Walter Harvey films most of the bouts in medium long shot with few closeups, allowing the fight scenes to appear more realistic and violent. He doesn’t utilize low angle shots or long shadows like many film noirs, but instead the consuming penumbra is realized by the squalid morality of Lorna.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-72430777440459320312023-12-12T18:07:00.001-05:002023-12-12T18:07:28.022-05:00THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF (Terence Fisher, 1961)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivcbDmYnR5MAfyT0r1nxIHHYRiuW7s0HcCXIb2cMhjiYrtIm9gfJSrUuDLUbFbHXQ3sVLxQsoEnGeKnSL8Vfqt6UYaW_1YR77S2f0TQMMWJpLmrUi3PV1SWJmwmalx6nO-bQLxEy5iZ9ajfvLFfkrt-pEHx-MKoRIHOAksNN7HJhOwC_yzhgVugjOjkpJS/s1280/curse%20of%20the%20werewolf.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1280" data-original-width="910" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivcbDmYnR5MAfyT0r1nxIHHYRiuW7s0HcCXIb2cMhjiYrtIm9gfJSrUuDLUbFbHXQ3sVLxQsoEnGeKnSL8Vfqt6UYaW_1YR77S2f0TQMMWJpLmrUi3PV1SWJmwmalx6nO-bQLxEy5iZ9ajfvLFfkrt-pEHx-MKoRIHOAksNN7HJhOwC_yzhgVugjOjkpJS/w285-h400/curse%20of%20the%20werewolf.jpg" width="285" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Leon is born with tainted blood and position, cursed with both lycanthropy and dehumanizing poverty. Terence Fisher’s horror show becomes a metaphor of social hierarchy, of the diminished class struggling against the power of entitlement.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The first act is narrated by an omniscient presence, explaining the brutality of a local Baron and his cruelty towards the villagers, excising taxation without representation, bleeding the poor folk of their livelihood. A beggar stumbles into this morass and is caged, where he is reduced to pure animal instincts, imprisoned for many years in the tomblike dungeon. He eventually rapes a young servant, and her child is born, not of man and woman, but of base vicious desire and trauma. Leon is eventually raised by a loving family, strangers who discover his pregnant mother drowning in a swamp, thus explaining the narrator’s identity. But Leon is a bastard who doesn’t stand a chance, as the tidal forces of destruction pull his soul apart.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Fisher focuses his story upon Leon and his knowledge of the beast that lurks within, his discovery that only love can tame the savage wraith. But his love is endowed to a wealthy landowner, and the pull of social gravity is as irrepressible as the moon’s ubiquitous presence. Leon is an innocent born into this mystical poverty, sharing the same birthday as the Christian savior and suffering the same sacrifice: he begs for death to save their souls. Like Jesus, Leon was birthed in a world of shit and treated as such by Pharisees.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Oliver Reed’s physicality is wonderful to behold, a grueling and growling ballet of blood, an extroverted performance that transcends subtly, like the clotted wounds splashed in bleeding Technicolor. The basic cinematography propels the narrative but doesn’t rise above the mundane, though a few interesting compositions exist. For example, when the baby Leon is purged, we hear a howling before a baby’s cry, and the swaddled child is lifted up to the camera while a portrait of the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus dominate the background, setting up the parable.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (B-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-70496689208354047482023-12-11T16:10:00.004-05:002023-12-11T16:10:26.732-05:00NEVER TAKE SWEETS FROM A STRANGER (Cyril Frankel, 1960)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge4Q2-V9h02kpGcCW8nF2yOaFtKeiNCAUouvOE_5Srb14J_JVCq85-FFciwLhYl7OBR5UGHGQby51NE7_hTsgktqe1WFXvNV2Ass1NLBDmlaDkuudd3xCE4IrhtS1ZOvyquvLgytgRTZi6CUsn_H40n5JUdPdJOvlK4ECy9VbRrnjoKsgoyZSfhIzpKaDU/s593/never%20take%20sweets.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="414" data-original-width="593" height="279" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge4Q2-V9h02kpGcCW8nF2yOaFtKeiNCAUouvOE_5Srb14J_JVCq85-FFciwLhYl7OBR5UGHGQby51NE7_hTsgktqe1WFXvNV2Ass1NLBDmlaDkuudd3xCE4IrhtS1ZOvyquvLgytgRTZi6CUsn_H40n5JUdPdJOvlK4ECy9VbRrnjoKsgoyZSfhIzpKaDU/w400-h279/never%20take%20sweets.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Children become a sweet confection for a sick and twisted man who hides behind his reputation, a festering sore in a diseased community whose only reaction is denial. Cyril Frankel directs this honest and compelling drama concerning the dirty secret and shame of child sexual abuse as it pertains to the social macrocosm and familial microcosm. This is one of the most realistic films concerning this taboo subject that I have ever seen, and in my experience, it portrays the emotional trauma of the victims (both parents and children) as it often manifests eschewing dramatic license.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The premise of the film concerns an elderly giant in the community, the founding father Clarence Olderberry, who is accused of offering candy to two little girls in exchange for their undressing and dancing naked for his satisfaction. When the parents of one girl discover this crime, the film follows their trials and tribulations in court and in the community. Considered outsiders, they are shunned and despised not for telling lies…but for having the nerve to file a criminal complaint and upset the status quo of their tiny community. Mr. Olderberry it seems is a dirty secret that is ignored and considered harmless because, well, he has never actually ‘touched” a child. Wow. I wish I could say this attitude is relegated to the past, but it taints the minds of current attitudes and mores, a shame that lingers like a creeping malignance in a cancerous society.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The film is raw not with social conscience but human consciousness, with the girl’s parents fighting for justice and living through the brutality of the criminal justice system that allows a nine-year-old girl to be exposed once again before strangers. The court room scene is dramatically anxious and realistic, as the defense attorney gleefully attacks the child victim once again by twisting words and details creating a smothering tsunami of emotions. The defense attorney would not be allowed to ask questions that are speculative, so that line of attack would have been denied by the judge. And make no mistake; this little girl is attacked by counsel even though her story is consistent and true. The absolute power of the narrative is that the girl’s parents believe her and accept her honesty (I wish that were always true). Their reaction is believable as they accept the veracity of her story but weigh the pros and cons of ‘going public”. But their decision to seek justice (not retribution) soon portrays the old pervert (in the mind of the ignorant) as the victim!</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Freddie Francis lenses the film with wide angle compositions that create a palpable tension with temporal use of empty spaces and medium shots crowded with accusations. The opening shot is fantastic as the children jump from a tree swing and run towards the mansion where the creepy dude haunts the attic rooms. The triptych composition keeps the tree in focus on one side and the swing framing the other, while the children recede in importance as they run towards the house: this is all shot in deep focus so the children can be seen to disappear, the tree swing representing a solid but vanishing childhood, soon overtaken by the trauma of victimization. Frankel’s solid direction carries the film towards its brutal climax, where Francis once again shines with a chase through the woods that ends in an abandoned house, like a mind dirty with the cobwebs of an ugly past. And surprisingly enough, the film is honest and forthright and doesn’t give the audience the happy ending, upsetting expectations with the death of a child. Or more precisely, the sexual assault and murder of a child by a child rapist. This is an important Hammer film that should be recognized as a classic.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (A)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-50796936730866137992023-12-09T18:25:00.003-05:002023-12-09T18:25:22.736-05:00DRACULA (Terence Fisher, 1958)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTas5CM5z1hEJHs4Dr_9-wyDPYgaOiHh5cXtqC-SUCYmpO_nt8xXddGAGhnLxlXhENrDglniuLOApweCyonNrLx2IDKJ1rtu5qYL0Vw0FHWckkVhm8EqUtcDW06C9clH401WtPZE2ZQSjNRnTMtou-yPvF1wBYYNrONtCFn4BEl_72g39xD_gYkcRNhbw-/s572/dracula01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="572" data-original-width="408" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTas5CM5z1hEJHs4Dr_9-wyDPYgaOiHh5cXtqC-SUCYmpO_nt8xXddGAGhnLxlXhENrDglniuLOApweCyonNrLx2IDKJ1rtu5qYL0Vw0FHWckkVhm8EqUtcDW06C9clH401WtPZE2ZQSjNRnTMtou-yPvF1wBYYNrONtCFn4BEl_72g39xD_gYkcRNhbw-/w285-h400/dracula01.jpg" width="285" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Two men embark upon the destruction of the King of Undeath, the venomous creature spreading its infection throughout Europe: the cost is paid in blood, their eternal souls at stake. Terence Fisher directs this Hammer masterpiece of climactic fury, resurrecting Dracula with a narrative economy that cuts directly to the chase.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Jonathan Harker travels to the foreboding castle to end the unlife of the vile Count, thinly disguised as the new librarian. He encounters a desperate woman whose indelible bite tattoos his intent upon his throat. After discovering the rather easily identifiable antechamber, he first stakes the lascivious vampire through the heart, revealing a shriveled corpse in the wake of bloodletting. Dracula awakens and slakes his thirst turning Harker into a minion, whose sleep of restless death is eventually ended by a hammer blow of violent compassion. Jonathan, here’s a hint: always kill the Big Baddy first and worry about the servants later, especially if they become powerless after losing their bloodthirsty benefactor!</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Fisher transmutes the story into an action film, allowing just he right amount of suspense, melodrama, and violence to span our attention. Van Helsing’s journey to the castle and discovery of his cohorts demise is shown through a few establishing shots tainted with a ghostly atmosphere: a nice shot of Van Helsing with a shattered picture frame, a torn corner of a photograph we know to be Lucy’s stuck in the corner. This mise-en-scene conveys much information: Dracula ripped the photo from the frame, knows who and where Lucy is, and will turn this beautiful portrait into an icon of horror. The film then races against time as Van Helsing must convince Lucy’s brother Arthur that she can be protected, Arthur’s wife can be cured, and they must find the new hiding place of the nocturnal nightmare.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Dracula becomes a surreal spectacle of sexual addiction, as Lucy awakens each night excitedly expecting to share her viscous elixir, and Mina seems rosy and nearly orgasmic with life after being pierced by the Count. Arthur’s decision nearly costs him the eternal soul of his wife, but the sun’s rays of hope and crossed candlesticks save Mina from her near-undeath experience.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><b>Final Grade: (A)</b></span></div><p></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4455483675889340333.post-80128036068912644952023-12-09T12:49:00.001-05:002023-12-09T12:49:55.233-05:00THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (Terence Fisher, 1962)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkRf9o8PALwjPhb-XVV3cbQX-S0h_Q5vvC1luh29g7K5wTx71qQRWs_7bL3kD-AI_hS1x9Jc8KEyN4M5uKOlsDVVZMWYKWDWnSYRHZNKSbKgx_2DPFou2hyphenhyphenSvx7QKLkB4jpRkDGbRuMDb9YsEIwqXLRBISgrkHeVHNMb1Ke3DWP6SMT-yrkSEMK8YduWWj/s859/the%20phantom%20of%20opera01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="859" data-original-width="580" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkRf9o8PALwjPhb-XVV3cbQX-S0h_Q5vvC1luh29g7K5wTx71qQRWs_7bL3kD-AI_hS1x9Jc8KEyN4M5uKOlsDVVZMWYKWDWnSYRHZNKSbKgx_2DPFou2hyphenhyphenSvx7QKLkB4jpRkDGbRuMDb9YsEIwqXLRBISgrkHeVHNMb1Ke3DWP6SMT-yrkSEMK8YduWWj/w270-h400/the%20phantom%20of%20opera01.jpg" width="270" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Hammer’s rather dull and boorish remake of the classic Universal 1943 version invokes more violence and bloodletting but excises romance and sentimentality to bring the whole affair to a yawning conclusion.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Director Terence Fisher films in splendid, saturated colors to bring this turn-of-the-century Victorian horror tale to half-life. Fisher utilizes some of the largest set-pieces ever seen in a Hammer film by filling the Opera House with hundreds of extras and hiring a full orchestra for the opera scenes. The opera within the film is <b>SAINT JOAN</b> (never mind that Joan of Arc wasn’t canonized in 1900) and is solidly staged and acted with grand designs and bombastic score: it is often more interesting the story we’re watching! The film does look wonderful and seems that Fisher realized the story’s innate weaknesses, so he dressed each scene with rich period details as eye-candy. There are some nice transitions such as the actress (who would be replaced by our heroine) turning to see a dark figure in her room which briskly cuts to clashing symbols. Herbert Lom as the wicked and betrayed Phantom is perfectly cast; he can show maddening violence checked by his sympathy, an artist whose very heart pumps musical notation, his very lifeblood sucked dry by the despicable Ambrose D’Arcy. Unfortunately, Michael Gough’s performance as D'Arcy is so evil and spoiled that it unbalances the film because the romantic interest, Edward de Souza (Harry Hunter) is rather bland and uninteresting. Even Christine Charles in the lead role of Heather Sears is nothing more than a meek and reactive child, a one-dimensional cipher for the film’s virtually static drama. She isn’t terrible, she’s just….there. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The story itself is rather weak and leaves one with some unanswered questions. The narrative unfolds as the lead actress in <b>SAINT JOAN</b> quits the opera after a murder/suicide during a performance. It is never explained why this poor soul was murdered: was he somehow in league with D’Arcy? We never discover if he deserved this cruel fate. We are then introduced to Christine as she auditions. After accepting the role, she begins to hear a taunting voice. As she and Edward investigate and begin to uncover the mystery, a ratcatcher is also murdered in the Opera House with a gruesome pick in the eye! There is no explanation forthcoming for this act, and we are later left to forgive the Phantom and his animalistic sidekick.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Soon, Edward discovers that a writer named Petrie actually wrote the opera <b>SAINT JOAN</b> and D’Arcy stole it from him. This resulted in a fire at a local printers and Petrie being scarred by acid and disappearing, presumed dead by the police. But he floated into a storm drain and into the underground lair beneath the Opera House. We are then left to suspend our disbelief that Petrie/Phantom moved a giant working organ and his many peripherals to this bunker and has not been discovered in ten years! When he captures Christine, he cruelly forces her to accept his tutelage as if he can train her in a few days. Though D’Arcy gets his comeuppance it’s not severe enough: he just runs screaming when he sees the Phantom’s scarred face. It’s also never explained who gets credit for the opera: is it Petrie, de Souza or still the knave D’Arcy? It’s difficult to find sympathy for Petri as we never know why he sold his lifetime’s work for such a small sum of 50pds. We also have to forget the innocents murdered (such as the hanged worker at the beginning and the ratcatcher) during his reign of terror even if his companion did the dirty work.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">The denouement seems tacked-on or made up at the last moment. The Phantom is given a heroic ending that fails moral judgment. Perhaps if he were to revenge upon D’Arcy and they both perished it would have felt more justified. Finally, it happens that during the final scene of the opera, the hunchback companion is discovered watching from the rafters above. As he is chased by stagehands, he accidently causes the huge chandelier to crash upon the stage. The Phantom jumps to save Christine and pushes her out of the way and is killed instead. Fade to black.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;"><b>PHANTOM OF THE OPERA</b> isn’t a very good film as its slow pace and thin characterizations make for an often boring 84 minutes. The flashback in the final act brings any suspense to a complete standstill as it then finishes with a dull thud. However, the film does look beautiful, and one can admire the grand set designs and brilliant colors. Herbert Lom is also wonderful though we don’t see enough of him. I recommend this film for Hammer completists only.</span></p><p><b><span style="color: red; font-family: georgia; font-size: medium;">Final Grade: (C-)</span></b></p>Alex DeLargehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16109849240459139170noreply@blogger.com