Tag: Christopher Lee

Star Wars, Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (2005)

Posted on by Steve Biodrowski

Picking up from the disappointing ATTACK OF THE CLONES, this film finally showed audiences the only plot development that made the prequel trilogy (including THE PHANTOM MENACE) interesting: how Anakin Skywalker turned to the Dark Side of the Force and became Darth Vader. Despite some quibbling, the critical consensus emerged that this is the best of the three prequels, even if it fails to live up to the glory of the original STAR WARS trilogy (particularly the original and its first sequel THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK).
Interestingly, on top of the expected wave of media attention focused on box office receipts and fan adulation, the film even generated some fairly high-profile political controversy, due to the perception that George Lucas had inserted some not-so-subtle Bush-bashing, with the film interpreted as a thinly-veiled commentary on the war in Iraq. Lucas himself partially disavowed this connection, insisting that the real parallel is with the Vietnam War, which was much on his mind when he first conceived the saga back in the 1970s. Nevertheless, Lucas admitted that the “parallels between what we did in Vietnam and what we’re doing in Iraq now are unbelievable.”
Of course, being the best STAR WARS film since EMPIRE STRIKES BACK isn’t saying much, when you consider what came between: RETURN OF THE JEDI, THE PHANTOM MENACE, and ATTACK OF THE CLONES. EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH is better because it lacks, for the most part, the egregiously annoying elements that marred the intervening episodes: there are no Ewoks, no Jar-Jar dialogue, no tiny tot version of Anakin blasting the bad guys like something out of a bad Disney kiddie flick. Unfortunately, there is still romance — and it’s still terribly bad; fortunately, there’s not as much of it.


In short, the film is watchable, though often ponderous and dull. The outstanding feature of the original STAR WARS was that it was fresh and energetic. At the time, Lucas’ ambition fell well within his grasp: a child of the movie-going era that yielded cynical ’70s paranoid thrillers like THE PARALLAX VIEW and ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN, Lucas turned back the clock to a simpler time when movies were exuberant fun. His inspirations were clearly old-time serials like FLASH GORDON, which he dressed up in modern technology, using skilled craftsmanship to make the material seem new and invigorating, even though it was all very familiar.
After Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers, in their famous PBS interview, cited the original STAR WARS as an example of archetypal mythic story-telling, Lucas gradually fell prey to a grandiose ambition that did exceed his grasp, and to a large extent that reaches its climax in REVENGE, which plays out like a Wagnerian operatic tragedy — with a humorless, heavy hand guiding the proceedings.
As if this weren’t bad enough, Lucas cannot abandon his silly kiddie pandering. The early scenes in the film are filled with ridiculous comic relief, including Keystone Cops-style droids that speak in silly voices and say things like “Uh oh” before falling beneath the Jedi sword. R2-D2 doesn’t fly this time, but he does pop up into the air like a spring-loaded practical joke.
What partially redeems the film is that its position in the saga allows for some actual suspense, with a sense of inevitable doom as all the things we have been expecting finally come to pass: the Jedi are wiped out, and Anakin Skywalker finally turns into Darth Vader. In effect, this is the only film of the prequel trilogy that tells a story worth telling.
The special effects are terribly overdone, all flash and noise instead of clean and clear. Some of the battle scenes are nicely staged, and the confrontation between Obi-Wan and Anakin/Darth Vader actually carries some measure of dramatic weight — something sadly lacking in the series since EMPIRE.
As for the alleged political subtext, it is clearly there, and just as clearly it is not specific to Iraq and George W. Bush. In the film, the Republic gives up freedom for security — didn’t Benjamin Franklin have something to say about that centuries ago? Chancellor Palpatine uses the continuing war as a pretext to manipulate popular opinion so that he can maintain and strengthen his hold on power — not too dissimilar from what happens in Orwell’s 1984. Anakin says, “If you’re not with me, you’re my enemy” — echoing a statement that harkens all the way back to the New Testament.
The only moment that feels thrown in as a contemporary dig is when Obi-Wan responds to Anakin’s statement by saying, “Only the Sith deal in absolutes.” This is clearly inconsistent with the whole STAR WARS saga, which has always been a fairy tale world of Good and Evil painted in the most absolute terms. We can either chalk this up to bad writing on the part of Lucas, or we can see it as being intentionally thrown in as a comment on the current political situation, in which the absolutist views of the current administration have led to an unprovoked war that has cost thousands of lives.
Surprisingly, amidst all the talk of politics, it seems that most (if not all) commentators have missed the homo-erotic subtext permeating the film. The love story between Anakin and Padme never generates any sparks, but the seduction of Anakin to the Dark Side by Palpatine does. During a relatively early confrontation, the chancellor croons seductively, “I can feel the Force in you!” Later, when Anakin finally turns evil, a prostrate Palpatine lets out an almost orgasmic sigh of ecstasy. (One waits in vain for him to ask Anakin, “Is that a light saber in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me.”)
Bottom line: REVENGE OF THE SITH is no masterpiece, and it comes nowhere near recapturing the glory of STAR WARS and EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. But it is a decent, if unduly serious, summer popcorn movie, filled with enough good moments to make it worth viewing, in spite of the clunky dialogue (like the use of the word “younglings” for “children,” which occurs three times and sounds more absurd each time). It’s not a total embarrassment, and discerning audiences should be grateful for that.

ABSURDITIES

In spite of the entertaining action, REVENGE OF THE SITH is flawed in a variety of fairly fundamental ways. Most obviously, on a narrative level, it falls prey to a series of plot absurdities, many of them caused by contradictions in the previous films that were left untied until this final episode. For instance, we’re clearly told that C-3PO has his memory erased (to explain why he recognizes no familiar faces in the original trilogy), but it’s not clear that the same is done to R2-D2, leaving viewers to wonder whether he does indeed recognize Yoda, et al, when they show up in Episodes IV-V.
A couple other curious omissions and/or credibility gaps:

  • Anakin and Padme supposedly keep their marriage a secret. Two problems with this: 1) She is obviously pregnant, a fact everyone simply seems to ignore until near the end. 2) She shares an apartment with Anakin with a panoramic upper-floor window, easily viewed by hundreds of flying vehicles. (Apparently, there are no snooping paparazzi in a “galaxy far, far away.” Can’t you just imagine the tabloid headlines: “Princess Pregnant – Jedi Mind Tricks, or the Dark Side of the Force?”
  • Late in the film, Padme tells Anakin that Obi-Wan has come by to ask about Anakin’s well-being. Two obvious questions: 1) If Padme’s marriage to Anakin is secret, why did Obi-wan come to ask her about Anakin? 2) Why didn’t the increasingly suspicious Anakin ask Question #1?
  • At the conclusion, Yoda and Obi-Wan want to ensure the safety of Padme’s two newborn children. They wisely give the daughter up to adoptive parents who will raise her under their name (Organa), thus concealing her identity. But poor Luke retains his familiar “Skywalker” surname. Even worse, pondering where the boy will be safe, Yoda opts to leave him with his “family” (i.e., the step-family that Anakin met in CLONES, whom we will see in A NEW HOPE) . In effect, Yoda puts Luke on the one planet in the galaxy — Anakin’s original home! — where Darth might conceivably think of looking.

STAR WARS, EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH(2005). Written & Directed by George Lucas. Cast: Hayden Christensen, Natalie Portman, Ewan McGregor, Ian McDiramid, Jimmy Smitts, Samuel L. Jackson, Frank Oz, Christopher Lee.
Copyright 2005 Steve Biodrowski
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Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960) – Hammer Horror Review

Posted on by Steve Biodrowski

This imaginative and original take on the old Robert Louise Stevenson tale is one of the best and most underrated efforts from Hammer Films, the English company that had previously produced updated versions of Mary Shelly CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN in 1957) and Bram Stoker (HORROR OF DRACULA in 1958). Bold and colorful, THE TWO FACES OF DR. JEKYLL (like Hammer’s version of THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, one year later) comes from an era when the company, having scored major box office success with horror, was pushing the boundaries of the genre, emphasizing the drama, characterization, and even philosophic undertones, wrapped up in lavish, widescreen production values that suggest an opulent costume drama rather than a tawdry terror show. Unfortunately, the film (like PHANTOM) was not a success, and subsequent Hammer horrors would retreat to more conventional territory.
The screenplay by Wolf Mankowitz more or less turns Stevenson’s story “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” inside out. Dr. Jekyll (Paul Massie) here becomes a bearded, somewhat anti-social recluse, more at home in his lab than in his home, who (per Nietzsche) dreams of going beyond Good and Evil, not of separating the two. When he transforms it is not into a misshapen monster or a Darwinian throwback (as in the 1932 version with Frederick March) but into a dapper, handsome devil, eager to enjoy all the delights the seedier side of London has to offer. This is a decidedly amoral (as opposed to immoral) Hyde, only interested (at least initially) in the pursuit of pleasure; there is almost a touch of Oscar Wilde about him – which should not be a big surprise, since screenwriters have been using Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray to pad out the details of Stevenson’s slim story at least since the 1920 silent DR. JEKYL AND MR HYDE with John Barrymore.
After seducing a lady snake charmer, Hyde soon grows bored with conventional debauchery.After seducing a lady snake charmer, Hyde soon grows bored with conventional debauchery, but in the meantime he has learned that Jekyll’s best friend Paul (Christopher Lee) is having an affair with Jekyll’s flirtatious wife Kitty (Dawn Addams), so he sets his sights on her. When neither seduction nor bribery works, he resorts to rape and murder, then frames Jekyll for the crimes. However, after an inquest clears Hyde, Jekyll reasserts himself, transforming in front of the police, who arrest (and presumably go on to try and convict) him for the murders, insuring that Hyde will never be unleashed again.
Hammer horror owed much of its success to brilliant color photography (often by Jack Asher), lavish production design (usually by Bernard Robinson), and clever casting (often with Peter Cushing and/or Christopher Lee), but their best efforts featured solid scripting as well (often by Jimmy Sangster). This is nowhere more true than in TWO FACES OF DR. JEKYLL, which features probably the best screenplay of any Hammer film, written by Wolf Mankowitz (a successful playwright who also co-scripted Val Guests DAY THE WORLD CAUGHT FIRE). The film is filled with witty dialogue and clever characterization that breaks down the usual Good-Evil dichotomy seen in most Hammer movies, which often resembled fairy tales scripted for adults.


To some extent, Jekyll is an unsympathetic personality who (we can infer) drove his wife into an affair because of his inattention to her. Kitty may not be a faithful wife, but she genuinely loves Paul and wants to end the hypocrisy of her marriage; she also has the good sense to find Edward Hyde completely repulsive. Paul is somewhat of a rogue and a scoundrel, but he is also guilt-ridden and remorseful over his betrayal of his friend; he’s just too weak to terminate the love triangle by taking Kitty away from Jekyll. As for Hyde, as the film’s title implies, he really is Jekyll’s alter ego; much of what he does (such as the revenge against Paul and Kitty) makes sense only if we understand that he is simply acting out Jekyll’s repressed impulses – impulses that Jekyll knowingly and deliberately unleashed with his experiments. The result is a highly charged drama, punctuated with mere moments of horror, that plays out like a tragedy, leading to the inevitable moment when Jekyll publicly reveals himself as the man behind the monster.
Director Terence Fisher seizes upon the opportunities in the script, to brilliant effect. Fisher always seemed more interested in the emotional underpinnings of his Gothic films than in the mechanics of suspense: his horror scenes were seldom of the Hitchcockian variety, using multiple camera angles and editing to build tension; instead, he preferred long takes in which the movements of the actors, complimented by subtle movements of the camera, created the dynamic. Shot in widescreen, TWO FACES OF DR. JEKYLL offers a perfect showcase for this directorial approach, providing a large canvas on which Fisher can project all the gaudy elements at his disposal, which fill the frame like a colorful pageant.
Fisher mostly eschews traditional horror elements in favor of emphasizing the moral horror of a conscienceless hedonist completely indifferent to the suffering he inflicts on others. The formerly de rigueur transformation from Jekyll to Hyde is never explicitly shown, taking place mostly off-camera; the only horror comes from Jekyll’s increasing helplessness at stopping the process. Fisher also plays clever little games to underline Mankowitz’s point about hypocritical Victorian distinctions between respectable and non-respectable society. He conveys a certain lusty glory while indulging in depictions of the less respectable entertainments available in London. The film is filled with colorfully costumed extras, including numerous dancing girls in flowery skirts, all captured in an enticing fashion that makes them seem vibrant and exciting. Again, this seems to be a deliberate attempt to undermine Stevenson’s story, wherein Hyde’s Soho shenanigans (implied but not detailed) were clearly meant to symbolize nothing but sin and degradation.
Perhaps the highlight of this approach is the snake charmer’s dance. In an era when explicit depictions of sexuality were not allowed, Fisher managed to give this sequence, laden with innuendo, a galvanic charge as powerful as anything seen in later, more permissive eras. The erotic gyrations, accompanied by exotic music (composed by David Heneker and Monty Norman, the later the creator of the famous James Bond theme) are at once tawdry and refined, sophisticated and suggestive, culminating in a climax wherein the dancer actually takes the constrictor’s phallic head into her mouth (a trick Alice Cooper would adopt in his demented stage show over a decade later)!
David Kossoff is sincere and touching as Dr. Ernst Littauer, an old colleague who warns Jekyll against his experiments and later laments his downfallThe performances are first-rate. David Kossoff is sincere and touching as Dr. Ernst Littauer, an old colleague who warns Jekyll against his experiments and later laments his downfall. Dawn Addams is sharp and seductive as Kitty. Paul Massie does an excellent job in the dual role, capturing the stolid Jekyll with a low voice (aided by a beard and contact lenses to hide his good looks), then bursting forth with vibrancy and gusto as the unleashed Hyde. As the film goes on, his acting strategy becomes perhaps a bit transparent (Jekyll’s strained voice starts to sound artificial), but in the end Massie nonetheless emerges triumphant as the actor who has done perhaps the best job of blurring the lines between Jekyll and Hyde.
But the true scene-stealer here is Lee as Jekyll’s faithless friend, Paul, whose function in the film is to act as a sort of yardstick for Hyde’s debauchery. Paul initially seems like a hopeless reprobate, but his moral failings pale to insignificance when placed against Hyde’s – Lee perfectly captures the sudden sense of moral indignation when Hyde offers to pay off his gambling debts in exchange for an opportunity to sleep with Kitty. Lee was most often give roles (like Dracula) that emphasized his height and his screen presence, often using him more like a prop than an actor, but here he gets to convey a wide range of emotions (love, laughter, lust, and more), ultimately making Paul a sympathetic if fatally flawed human being. This is the one role, perhaps more than any other, that shows Lee capable of giving a genuine character performance, as opposed to being a horror star or a heavy.
When the movie flopped during its initial release, Hammer tried retitling it as “Jekyll’s Inferno” and “House of Fright,” but for some reason the movie never caught on. Perhaps it was too clever, and audiences could not accept the portrayal of a dashing young handsome Hyde (even though this approach was perfectly in line with Hammer’s other success stories, such as turning Lee’s Count Dracula into a seductive sexual predator). In any case, THE TWO FACES OF DR. JEKYLL faded from screens and memories, never attaining the cult-classic status of Hammer’s Dracula and Frankenstein films. This is unfortunate, as the film at least equals those previous efforts in production value – and exceeds them in its screenplay. This is a masterpiece in its own right – and not merely a genre masterpiece. As a horror film, TWO FACES OF DR. JEKYLL barely ranks on the scare-meter; those looking for shocks and suspense had best seek them elsewhere. But as an exploration of two-faced hypocrisy and the mystery of identity, this ranks as one of the genre’s finest achievements.

TRIVIA

A few lines of dialogue have been looped in post-production, apparently in an attempt to please the censors. For example, when Hyde is confronted by a night club bouncer, he says, “Go to the Devil.” The audio recording quality is clearly different from the rest of the dialogue, and the words do not match the lip movements. (Presumably, he originally said, “Go to hell.”)
The film features a very young Oliver Reed as the night club bouncer who tries to shake down Edward Hyde for a little cash.

Paul Massie as the film's handsome Hyde

THE TWO FACES OF DR. JEKYLL(1960). Directed by Terence Fisher. Screenplay by Wolf Mankowitz, based on “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” by Robert Louis Stevenson. Cast: Paul Massie, Dawn Addams, Christopher Lee, David Kossoff, Francis De Wolff, Norma Marla, Magda Miller, Oliver Reed.
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The Gorgon (1964) – Horror Film Review

Posted on by Steve Biodrowski

This is the last Hammer horror film to feature the studio’s essential triumvirate of director Terence Fisher and stars Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing. Made when the studio was looking for new ideas, but before it had begun its later decline, THE GORGON is an interesting addition to the company’s pantheon of classic monster movies – a sort of tragic love story told as a Gothic fairy tale. It features the company’s glossy production values, including colorful sets and beautiful photography, spiced with usual horrific chills (most memorably the petrified bodies of the Gorgon’s victims). Although never likely to rank alongside the seminal CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1957) and HORROR OF DRACULA (1958), the film is a fine example of the form that deserves a place with Hammer’s other classics, such as CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF (1961) and THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1962).
The story follows Paul (Richard Pasco), a young man who comes to an isolated village where the residents have been dying under mysterious circumstances, their bodies literally petrified. After a close encounter and a fleeting glimpse of a horrifying figure in the shadows, Paul is stricken, though not fatally. His university professor, Karl Meister (Christopher Lee) shows up to lend assistance and soon deduces that Dr. Namaroff (Peter Cushing) is concealing the identity of the Gorgon. Unfortunately for Paul, the monster turns out to be Namaroff’s assistant, Carla Hoffman (Barbara Shelley, previously seen in 1957’s  CAT GIRL), with whom Paul has fallen in love. Although normal during daylight hours, Carla is possessed by an ancient spirit that, werewolf-like, turns her into a monster during the full moon. The next time the moon rises, Paul, Professor Meister, and Dr. Namaroff converge on the abandoned castle, where the Gorgon is known to lurk, for a final, fatal confrontation…


Scripted by John Gilling (who would go on to write and/or direct THE REPTILE and PLAGUE OF THE ZOMBIES), THE GORGON is an imaginative attempt to take the famous creature from Greek mythology and turn it into a viable movie monster by lifting bits and pieces of lore from other creatures of the night, most notably the werewolf. Consequently, the film has an almost achingly fatalistic tone, with an innocent individual cursed to do evil against her will, whose only hope for salvation lies in her own death.
This sets THE GORGON apart from Hammer’s earlier Frankenstein and Dracula titles, which often evinced the aesthetic of robust action film: colorful, dynamic, exciting. THE GORGON is more stately and sad. The narrative is in no hurry to string shock scenes together, and the suspense is minimal, restricted to a few key points. Instead, the film’s goal is, clearly, to work on an emotional level by emphasizing the doomed romance. The result may not jerk quite as many tears as the ending of TITANIC, but it works on its own level quite well.
As one would expect from a Hammer production, the sets, costumes, and photography all combine to create a wonderfully atmospheric version of a haunted European landscape, which belongs more properly to the realm of imagination that reality. The period detail may or may not be correct, but it does not matter: the film takes place in that same self-contained universe that is home to all Hammer horrors.
Horror stars Lee and Cushing also do expert work. As was usually the case, their combined efforts create a wonderful sort of chemistry that is more than the sum of its parts, making them the greatest duo in the history of the horror genre. The script even contrives to play a little game with audience expectations, delaying the inevitable confrontation between the two stars until viewers have just about given up hope — and then springing it on them after it seemed that it would not be happening after all.

Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, seen in a composite image

Cushing delivers another variation on his Frankenstein persona, a doctor who runs an asylum and serves as a cornoer, but his villainy is more ambiguous. Clearly, he is covering up the truth, but he appears to be doing out of concern, even love, for Carla. For all his cold-heared precision, he ultimately succumbs to his emotions, risking his life to confront Carla in her Gorgon form – and failing because he cannot resist the urge to gaze upon her face.
Lee gets a rare opportunity to shine in a heroic role as the gruff, sarcastic Meister, taking the attributes he usually used to invoke fear (e.g., his imposing stature) and turning them to the side of the angels. The actor has a wonderful moment when Meister warns the local constable (Patrick Troughton) that the townsfolk had better not try to run him out of town (as they did his predecessor). Coming from anyone else, the line would sound like an empty threat (is Meister saying he will take on an entire mob, single-handed?), but Lee’s delivery imbues the words with conviction. (You’re almost sorry he never gets to make good on his threat.)
Barbara Shelly is excellent in the title role. Although not as glamorous as some of Hammer’s other leading ladies, she was perhaps the finest actress, and it is sad that she never became a bigger star in the genre despite her many good performances in a variety of roles ranging from RASPUTIN THE MAD MONK to QUATERMASS AND THE PIT (a.k.a. FIVE MILLION YEARS TO EARTH). Here, as in DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS and CAT GIRL, she deftly handles a schizoid role, half love interest and half monster.
Prudence Hyman as the title characterThe briefly glimpsed Gorgon makeup is quite good in terms of its frightening look, especially when Fisher keeps it in shadows. Unfortunately, the special effects component, which brings the serpents to life, is slightly disappointing: the movements of the snakes writhing in the Gorgon’s hair have a mechanical quality that undermines the effect. Although Barbara Shelley wanted to play the character beneath the makeup, the producers were afraid that audiences would recognize her early on, giving away the surprise that Carla is the Gorgon; consequently, actress Prudence Hyman played the title character.
As a pure horror film, THE GORGON may be a disappointment. The fear-factor is not up to the levels of Hammer’s highest efforts, and the scares tend to be low-key, lacking the action-packed punch of, for example, HORROR OF DRACULA. Instead of a bloodthirsty Count leaping over a table and hurling his vampire mistress to the floor, you get a snake-headed woman lurking the shadows and staring at her victims — a sort of static tableau that does not necessarily set adrenalin coursing through the veins.
But then, Terence Fisher was never a pure horror director. In the definitive career interview he gave to Cinefantastique magazine in the early 1970s, he expressed less interest in the mechanics of suspense, as exemplified by Alfred Hitchcock, than in the melodramatics of Frank Borzage. Fisher always wanted to make a love story, and here he gets his chance — albeit a doomed love story. The emotional underpinnings raise THE GORGON to the level of a genre gem, even if you are more likely to cry than scream.
THE GORGON (1964). Directed by Terence Fisher. Written by John Gilling, story by J. Llewellyn Devine. Cast: Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Richard Pasco, Barbara Shelley, Michael Goodliffe, Patrick Troughton, Jack Watson.
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Curse of Frankenstein (1957) – Horror Film Review

Posted on by Steve Biodrowski

Foreign language poster for the British horror filmThis is the mad scientist’s experiment that resurrected the Gothic tradition in cinema and created the second great wave of monsters movies. (In the 1930s and ’40s, Universal had given us black-and-white horrors like DRACULA and FRANKENSTEIN.) The first of many reinventions of classic movie monsters by Britain`s Hammer Films, CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN established new style for horror – bold, bloody, beautiful – that completely broke tradition with the cobwebby classics of the 1930s and 1940s. The film also gave us two new horror stars, Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, who – along with director Terence Fisher – would go on to redefine the genre for the next decade and a half. Some of their subsequent collaborations (notably 1958’s HORROR OF DRACULA) equaled or surpassed their achievement here, but this remains their original classic, the grimoire establishing the magic formula they would use again and again.
In the mid-1950s, aspiring producers Milton Subotsky and Max J. Rosenberg approached one of Hammer’s executives with a script Subotsky had adapted from Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, the archetypal tale of a man-made monster. Hammer purchased the script (which, according to Subotsky, remained faithful to the source material), discarded it, and had Jimmy Sangster write something totally new.
Apparently, the original idea had been to create a fairly traditional horror film, possibly casting the aging Boris Karloff as Baron Frankenstein. Fortunately, Hammer realized that, although Shelley’s novel was in public domain, the 1931 film version of FRANEKNSTEIN, starring Karloff as the monster, was still under copyright to Universal Studios; therefore, any similarity to that horror classic, particularly the famous flat-head makeup devised by Jack Pierce, could result in a lawsuit.
Consequently, Sangster’s screenplay discarded most of the familiar elements. About all the remained from the novel was the concept of creation, some character names, and a few bits and pieces, stitched together into something almost entirely new. Only two points were carried over from the Universal films: Frankenstein is still a Baron (he had no title in the novel), and his creation is mute (unlike Shelly’s articulate creature).
Frankenstein (embodied perfectly by Peter Cushing) is no longer the nervous inventor who creates a man in a fit of enthusiasm and immediately regrets his rash action. Cushing’s Baron is precise and cold as a scalpel, a handsome blue-eyed dandy who has a way with women (at least with the maid) and never blinks or hesitates in pursuit of his goal. In truth, he is the real source of the horror in the story; his completely amoral detachment from the consequences of his work is more disturbing than the actual gore (which, though shocking for its time, is actually mild). And this moral horror is accentuated by the fact that Cushing’s performance (his dapper air and smiling confidence) actively invites the audience to identify with him even as the film tells in no uncertain terms that what he is doing is evil.
In this context, Christopher Lee’s creature has no chance of attaining Karloff’s stature. He’s a bit more of a simple monster, with less emphasis on his suffering and misunderstanding. His real function is as a sort of silent rebuke to his creator: all of Frankenstein’s grand dreams of perfection have resulted in a pathetic patchwork that barely seems stitched together. As in most Frankenstein stories and films, the creation is, ultimately, a kind of dark doppelganger to his creator, even acting out Frankenstein’s murderous intentions. (The Baron locks the maid in a cell with the creature when she gets to nosey. The scene is all the more effective for its suggestiveness, dissolving away as the woman screams when the creature reaches out for her, leaving it unclear whether his intention is murder or rape. The juxtaposition with subsequent scene, with the Baron enjoy a convivial breakfast, is so incongruous that the result is an excellent piece of black humor: when the Baron asks his fiancé to “pass the marmalade,” as if nothing untoward had recently happened, the viewer is forced to laugh in wicked admiration of Frankenstein’s cheek.)
The film is also notable for the way it re-imagines one of the genre’s most overused clichés: the mad scientist’s assistant. In the 1930s films, such characters were named Fritz or Igor; they usually had hunched back, and their purpose was usually to wander around looking creepy—an added bit of visual unpleasantness during an era when physical deformity was much on the public mind (thanks to soldiers returning home after being maimed on the battlefields of World War One). In CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, the “assistant” is actually Frankenstein’s former teacher (the pupil becomes the master). Played by Robert Urquhart, Paul Krempe is the voice of decency, moderation, and restraint—the conscience that Frankenstein refuses to heed. He is also a sort of emotional barometer for the audience, his reactions to Frankenstein’s work expressing the moral outrage we are meant to feel.
If the film has any weaknesses, they lay in the somewhat slow pacing of the early scenes, which also feature a less than assured performance by Melvyn Hayes as the young Victor Frankenstein. Perhaps his fresh-faced innocence is supposed to supply a contrast with the steely-eyed determination of his adult self, but the effect backfires, providing too little foreshadowing of what is too come and leaving the early scenes feeling empty, without the galvanizing impact of Cushing’s presence. Fortunately, once Cushing arrives on screen, the film sparks with energy, and you have to watch in awe as he ruthlessly establishes a new standard for mad science on screen, one that is all the more horrible for looking so attractive, so assured, and so unperturbably cool.
The film was shot in Technicolor by Jack Asher, under the direction of Terence Fisher, working on a budget of 65,000 pounds (approximately $150,000). The script eliminated all of the novel’s globe-trotting, so Bernard Robinson’s production design could concentrate—quite brilliantly—on the Baron’s luxurious castle, creating an almost decadent sense of a polite aristocratic facade presiding over the “workshop of filthy creation” in the basement. James Bernard supplied the first of many effective musical accompaniments.
The result is a timeless classic that stands up as well as the best of Universal’s 1930s horror films. The film’s novel approach changed the face of horror, replacing black-and-white shadows with colorful grue. The huge (and unexpected) success launched Hammer into the horror genre for most of the next two decades, creating numerous new versions of classic movies monsters (THE MUMMY, THE TWO FACES OF DR. JEKYLL, THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF, etc), not to mention numerous Frankenstein sequels (REVENGE OF FRANKENSTEIN, FRANKENSTEIN CREATED WOMAN, FRANKENSTEIN MUST BE DESTROYED, etc), some of which were as good as (and possibly even better than) the original.
If anything, time has been kind to CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, which was chastised in its time for being tastelessly explicit and for failing to establish an effective atmosphere. (Critic R. D. Smith proclaimed, “For all lovers of the cinema, only two words describe this film – Depressing, Degrading!”) Decades later, the shock of Technicolor gore has long worn off – which is ultimately a good thing, because it proves that Smith and other contemporary critics, who derided the film for its graphic violence, were completely wrong. The true horror of in Sangster’s screenplay is moral in nature, and it continues to make the skin crawl today, thanks to the incisive performance of Cushing as the Baron – never flinching from his purpose, despite the accumulating atrocities he must commit. The appalling lack of conscience is underlined director Fisher’s careful use of reaction shots emphasizing the disgusted reactions of the mad scientist’s former mentor.
Subsequent viewings also benefit Lee’s performance as the creature. Often viewed as little more than a killing machine, lacking the soul of Karloff’s monster, Lee’s interpretation reveals a surprising sense of sympathy for the shambling being. And the color makeup by Phil Leaky may not match the iconic stature of Pierce’s work on Karloff, but it does suggest a more believable result of surgery—a creature that really does seem to have been stitched together piecemeal by Frankenstein.
Ultimately, the enduring appeal of CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN rests in Cushing interpretation of the Baron. The late actor, who professed to having “a tremendous amount of affection for Baron Frankenstein,” said that, besides Mary Shelley’s novel, he based his interpretation of Frankenstein upon Dr. Robert Knox, the anatomy teacher who suffered a scandal when it was learned that the cadavers he used to teach his students had been illegally obtained –and in some cases murdered – by Burke and Hare. Many believed that Knox must have known what was happening, and simply turned a blind eye in the name of science. “I try to base Frankenstein on a man who is, fundamentally, trying to do something for the good of mankind, as indeed Knox was, but against all odds….”
Indeed, the odds always thwart Frankenstein, not only in this film but also in the sequels, eternally depriving him of the success he so ardently desires. There is some dark fascination in this eternally fruitless quest, enough to keep the Frankenstein franchise fresh until its conclusion in 1972’s FRANKENSTEIN AND THE MONSTER FROM HELL. But CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN remains the classic film that started it all, like a burst of electricity that still gleams to this day, forever illuminating the mad scientist’s lab equipment—and the awful results—in our minds.

TRIVIA

Milton Subotsky and Max J. Rosenberg, the duo who had sold their unfilmed Frankenstein script to Hammer, later formed Amicus Films. The company became Hammer’s chief English competitor in the horror genre during the 1960s. Subotsky and Rosenberg produced numerous terror titles like HORROR HOTEL, DR. TERROR’S HOUSE OF HORRORS, and TORTURE GARDEN, usually starring Christopher Lee and/or Peter Cushing.
CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1957). Directed by Terence Fisher. Screenplay by Jimmy Sangster, based on the novel by Mary Shelley. Cast: Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Robert Uquhart, Hazel Court, Valerie Gaunt.
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Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968) – A Nostalgia Review

Posted on by Steve Biodrowski

Campy poster art for DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE

“Ah! The good old time – the good old time. Youth and the sea. Glamour and the sea. […T]ell me, wasn’t that the best time, that time when we were young at sea, young and had nothing, on the sea that gives nothing.”

– Joseph Conrad, “Youth: A Narrative.

Yes, the glories of a youth are a treasure trove of riches that shine on like dusky jewels buried in the pirate chest of one’s memory. For me, however, that “good old time” of Youth and Glamor had nothing to do with the sea. My dark ocean was the cinema screen; my luxury liner was the local theatre; my ticket was still a ticket, but my ports of call ranged from when dinosaurs ruled the Earth, to the Dawn of Man, to Beyond the Infinite. Unlike “the sea that gives nothing,” the vast timeless ocean that I explored – of past, present, and future – gave me everything: amazing adventure and enchanting excitement, fear and fantasy, and most of all – that grandeur of awe that first evokes a Sense of Wonder. I may have resided in a small, unexceptional suburb a half-hour east of Hollywood, but thanks to movies – particularly cinefantastique – my mind soared through the stars: I never felt earthbound, trapped, limited; infinite vistas always lay before me, for little more than a quarter.
Recollecting these hours upon hours spent gazing up at the flickering images on the silver screen, the verbal temptation is to joke about my “misspent” youth, but I cannot deem it so. So much of our identity – so much of our very selves – is derived from our memories. So much of who we are is expressed in our dreams. For me, memories and dreams merge in the movie houses of my youth, and in retrospect I cherish every moment – the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Perhaps strangely, I do not harbor a particular fascination for the films of the ’60s and ’70s, except in so far as I relate to them personally. I do not think the films of my youth represent the apex of cinema, nor do I wax nostalgic for the good old days. Many of my favorite movies come from earlier eras; just as many, perhaps more, arrived in the ’80s, ’90s, and on into the present day. Yet there is some kind of magic about the classics of yesteryear.
For me, “classics” always referred to films made before I was old enough to book passage: the Universal films of the ’30s, the Hammer horrors of the ’50s. However, as my luxury cinema liner continues to carry me to new and ever more modern and exotic ports – places of enchantment, mystery, and horror – I realize that many of my past journeys were to places that, although new at the time, have since become cherished by subsequent generations, who regard with reverential awe what I now take for granted.
This concept rammed me like an unexpected iceberg during a cybersurfing trip to Horror Movie a Day, where Brian Collins lamented in this post:

My biggest regret as a human being is that I wasn’t born in 1959 or so. I would have loved to have been a kid in the 70s, getting to experience pretty much all of my favorite horror films when they were first released, instead of 10-20 years later, after many of them had their impact blunted by ripoffs (and now remakes).

Perhaps it was just a cosmic coincidence, but I prefer to think of it as an omen that Brian named my year of birth. Hence, I am launching this semi-regular feature, a sort of travelogue of my past cinematic voyages, from the depths of darkness to the shores of space. Casting my mind back over the many far-off lands I visited from the comfort of my first-class passenger seat in the local movie house, I recall that my very first solo voyage (that is, sans parents) was to a double bill of Hammer horror, DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE and FRANKENSTEIN MUST BE DESTROYED (1968).

DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE is the third Hammer horror film to feature Christopher Lee as the Count, although I did not know that at the time. I had seen the last few minutes of REVENGE OF FRANKENSTEIN on television, so I had a glimpse of Hammer’s horror output even though I was ignorant of their history. Thanks to movies like FRANKENSTEIN’S DAUGHTER (1958), I knew that low-budget filmmakers would sometimes cash in on a famous character name, creating pseudo-sequels to the classic Universal monster movies of the 1930s (which I had seen on late-night television with my parents). I assumed that DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE and FRANKENSTEIN MUST BE DESTROYED were examples of this strategy; I had no idea they were genuine sequels to the earlier Hammer films, HORROR OF DRACULA (1958) and CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1957).
I cannot remember exactly when this double bill reached the El Monte Theatre, but it was at least a year or two after films were produced. The advertisement in the local papers listed the titles along with their ratings: G for DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE, GP for FRANKENSTEIN MUST BE DESTROYED. Since the GP rating replaced the old M-rating in January of 1970, it is safe I enjoyed this experience sometime before my eleventh birthday (which took place in December).
My siblings and I importuned our parents to take us to the film; they had taken us to other mature movies (including the M-rated BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID), but for some reason they decided not to attend these horror movies, leaving us off at the theatre for the very first time. The ratings system had only been around for a couple years, and there were then (as now) concerns about too much violence on screen. Uncertain about the new GP rating (which had replaced the M for Mature Audiences), my dad asked the girl behind the ticket window whether these movies were “okay for kids,” and she assured him they were.
Back then, tickets for kids cost fifty cents. We got some money to buy popcorn and sodas, too. Then we took our seats; the lights went down; the screen opened; and the film began. It is safe to say I have never been the same since…
I’m not sure what we were expecting. We had seen horror movies on television, but they were usually old black-and-white films that relied on atmosphere and suggestion. Even then, we knew that films on TV were often cut (we would hear our parents complaining about scenes missing from films they had seen in theatres), and we knew that the rating system had been invented to deal with the increasing amount of on-screen bloodshed. Ther very fact that we were sitting in a movie theatre, about to watch a horror film, meant we might be seeing something we had never seen before – maybe even (thanks to the confusion fo the ratings system) something that we were not meant to see…
DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE begins with big bold titles that give a sort of psychedelic impression of exploding corpuscles. I didn’t know anything about directors and screenwriters then, but I think I had read Bram Stoker’s novel and recognized his name on screen (the credit reads something along the lines of “based on the character created by…”). There followed a brief prologue, with a bell-ringer seeing blood dripping down the rope he is pulling. This leads him to investigate the church tower above – and the youthful audience in my local theatre screamed in fright as a woman’s body flopped upside down from its hiding place, stuffed inside the bell.
This was the first of many frights that day, but in general I did not find DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE to be particularly terrifying. I had always had a fondness for the Count and his vampire brethren, based on my fondness for bats. Although this version of Dracula (personified by Christopher Lee) did not turn into a flapping rubber vampire bat, the association in my mind was still strong, and the Count’s long black cloak was enough like bat-wings to suggest the similarity. I liked Dracula, and even though I knew he had to die, I didn’t particularly want to see him go. In a way, I was rooting for him, not frightened by him.
No, the enjoyment I got from this vampire film was more along the lines of excitement. Although I could not articulate it at the time, I must have sensed that this was a glossy well-made film, filled with atmosphere and action. I might have said it was “fun.” Today, the word I would use is “enthralling.” Certainly, my siblings and I – along with the rest of the young viewers – were as much under Dracula’s spell as any on-screen victim.
But to continue…
One year later, Msgr. Muller (Rupert Davies) finds the locals in Klausenberg still living in fear of the departed Dracula, so he and the local priest (Ewan Hooper) head up to the castle to read a rite of exorcism. The Count makes his first appearance after the local priest lags behind, falls and cuts his head, his blood seeping through the broken ice to revive the vampire. The sight of the bloody lips savoring the rejuvenating fluid elicited a loud communal “EWWWWWWW!” from my fellow theatre-goers.
Dracula turns the priest into a slave and sets out to avenge himself against the Msgr. Muller for putting the cross on his castle. Vampire and assistant head to Muller’s home town in a carraige; the slightly speeded-up footage of the Count furiously whpping the horses, his face twisted in demonic anger, drew gasps of excited approval from the crowd in the movie house. (We didn’t wonder where the horses had come from. Had they survived in Dracula’s stable for a year without anyone to look after them, or were they stolen – like the coffin the priest digs out of the ground so that Dracula will have a resting place in the far-off city?)
Muller’s niece Maria (Veronica Carlson) is in love with Paul (Barry Andrews), but Muller disapproves because Paul is an atheist. Dracula claims Zena (Barbara Ewing) as his first female victim but soon sets his sights on Maria. Muller tries to protect her, but the local priest wounds him fatally. Paul takes over, but being an atheist he refuses to pray after driving a stake through Dracula’s heart.

The vampire (Christopher Lee) is staked but manages to survive

This scene, with its over the top gore, was a highlight of that long-ago afternoon. Kids gagged in horror as the stake went in; they gagged louder when the blood started to spurt; and they really started to scream when the camera cut in for a closer look. Best of all was the big surprise: we had thought this was the end of the movie, but the vampire managed to pull the stake out of his chest and survive! If Dracula is to be portrayed as a fearsome foe, then he should not be easily killed off, and Paul’s horrible moment of realization – that he was now face to face with a vampire who was holding the stake in his hand like a spear, ready to hoist the would-be vampire slayer on his own petard – was worth the price of admission.
Dracula absconds with Maria and heads back to his castle, ordering her to toss the offending cross over the battlements. Paul pursues, and a struggle ensues. Dracula ends up falling over the battlements and impaled on the giant cross, while the local priest, the vampire’s spell broken, says the necessary prayer to ensure that the vampire will die. It is the major, enduring miracle of DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE that, after the aborted staking scene, the film actually manages to top itself with the even more spectacular “crucifiction” finale. With the cross wedged in from behind, there was no way that Dracula was going to reach around and pull it out, and the screams of horror in the theatre echoed louder than ever before, amplified by the sight of the vampire weeping blood. The echoes started to fade only when the credits rolled, superimposed over a wide-shot of the empty cross, with Castle Dracula in the background, the Count’s body apparently having disintegrated off-screen.
I cannot recall the exact conversation after the lights went up, but it is safe to say we were stunned – and not in a bad way. There was a sense that we had perhaps transgressed in some sense – seeing more than our parents might have wished us to see, despite the imprimatur of the MPAA’s G-rating. Yet we knew we had seen something good. It might or might not give us nightmares (I never had any), but this was the kind of film that you told people about, relating the juicy details to your jealous friends who had not been so fortunate as you to see the movie.
I have to admit that I was not totally pleased with DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE. I had dressed up as Dracula for Halloween, and to my young eyes, the pasty vampire makeup on Christopher Lee looked no better than the chalk-white that had been applied to my own face. (Looking back, I realize that the idea was to make Lee’s Dracula appear older in this film, to create a visual contrast with the young ingenues.) I was also disappointed that we never saw the inside of Castle Dracula – the exterior promised so much, but just when the Count was about to take his new bride home and set up house, Paul came along and ruined everything!
Having been raised in the Catholic Church, I totally got the religious subtext of the film, the Battle between Good and Evil. I knew Dracula was alligned with the Devil, and it was up to the Church to send him back to Hell. Of course, the script plays around with this a bit, but Barry Andrews (as Paul) is so clearly a decent person – a scholar who makes a point of giving an honest answer instead of an easy lie – that you know he is on the side of the angels even if he does not believe in them. (It was not until years later, when I became a fan of the Who, that someone pointed out Andrews’ resemblance to vocalist Roger Daltrey.)
Also magnificent was Count Dracula’s reluctant Renfield – a priest who becomes the vampire’s slave because of his own human weakness. This seemed to suggest that, whatever the ideals of the Church, it took a man with some courage to live up to it, and that courage was not always found within those who professed to believe those ideals. Not profound by adult standards perhaps, but it added something extra to the movie.
I’m sure I was too young to fully appreciate Barbara Ewing and Veronica Carlson, but I was not blind to the suggestive costumes that the former wore in her barmaid role, and I could not help noticing that the film contrived to open Carlson’s blouse for one or two scenes. Both women were obviously pretty, but Carlson in particular was gorgeous; she really is forever embedded in my mind as the ideal of the vampire’s victim – buxom, blond, and beautiful.

The innkeeper (Michae Ripper) and Paul (Barry Andrews) console Maria (Veronica Carlson) after a close encounter with Dracula.

The sexual undertones of DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE were also quite oblivious to me and (I imagine) the rest of the audience, who were all about my age. When Maria has to get a drunken Paul into bed, it only struck me as a little embarrassing for her when she had to bring herself to undress him. It never occurred to me that the cutaway, after Paul awakens and embraces her, indicated that they had had sex. Likewise, Dracula’s embrace of both women registered as bloodlust, not lust. It was food he was after, not sex, and I’m sure we all assumed that the heaving bosoms on display were simply an attempt to lure in older teenage viewers, in the same way the Raquel Welch’s presence in ONE MILLION YEARS, B.C. would sell tickets to people who didn’t like dinosaurs.
In retrospect, I realize that Dracula’s visit to Maria’s bedroom was probably the first sex scene I ever witnessed on screen. Sure, it was disguised as blood-drinking, but it was still about the exchange of bodily fluids between a man and a woman. Of course, this had always been latent in the vampire mythology, but DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE pushed the envelope quite a bit. It was not just that Veronica Carlson was gorgeous and profoundly sexually attractive; it was that she was the Good Girl, the innocent blond, yet she welcomed Dracula almost as enthusiastically as the barmaid. As a child, I assumed the Count put a hypnotic spell on his victims, the mise-en-scene suggests something else, a sort of willing seduction to which Maria succumbs without much if any struggle. The implications are bizarrre to say the least: Do women – even the pure and innocent – yearn for overpowering strangers to ravish them in their bedrooms? No doubt it is just as well that this element sailed right past me, because I doubt my ten-year-old mind could have processed it. It would take some heavy-duty psychoanalysis to determine whether that first viewing had a lasting effect on me, but I do know that the scene still stirs up some dark waters; beneath the rippling waves are distorted glimpses of domination-submission, sado-masochism, and even necrophilia. If only my parents had known, when they bought our tickets and left us off like passengers boarding a ship, to what strange destination this dark voyage would take their children!
Looking back, I am also amazed at the way DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE conveyed more than it showed. Although the impact is somewhat muted decades later, there is a nice moment when Dracula’s attitude shifts from seductive to lethal toward Zena. All we see is the change of Chirstopher Lee’s expression; his hands grip Barbara Ewing’s shoulder’s tightly; she screams, and a red filter descends over the image as the scene fades. We know the Count is going to drain her dry, without having to see it happen…
This is followed by perhaps the grizzliest sequence, in which the Count orders the priest to dispose of Zena before she can be reborn as a vampire. Again, we do not actually see what happens, just the image of the priest carrying her body toward the furnace. The dancing red firelight, reflecting off the actor’s sweating brow, conveys what is going to happen in a way that was perfectly revolting to my ten-year-old mind – probably the most genuinely frightening scene for me at the time.
I would go to many more horror movies at the local theatre, sometimes with my mom and/or dad, sometimes with my brother and sister, and later alone. This was a good time for horror films, at least in quantity if not quality, with new titles arriving on marquees on almost a weekly basis. Unfortunately, this was also a time when wretchedly awful movies (which today would be consigned to video oblivion) played on the big screen, and thanks to the relatively recent ratings system, censorship was deader than a crucified vampire, allowing exploitation filmmakers to push the limits of a GP (later PG) rating with blood-and-gore, revealing costumes, and even occasional flashes of nudity. I enjoyed many of these, but few had the same impact as DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE – which set the standard for all the followed.
The film provided the yardstick that has stayed with me the rest of my life. I have always known, despite howls of outrage from concerned moral guardians, that horror films can be violent and sexy without harming the minds of young viewers. Furthermore, based on this film, I always sensed in some intuitive way that even the most horrific subject matter could be entertaining and fun – a truly cathartic, satisfying experience. Other films with the same amount of gore – or even less – might merely disgust with their shoddy cinematic technique, but DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE proved that a little craftsmanship and – dare I say it? – artistry could transform disreputable material into a kind of art.
I did not know it then, but this was the beginning of a life-long love for Hammer horror. Eventually, I would discover the earlier, even better films (made before the company began recycling all their hits), but DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE continues to hold a special place in my heart. Thanks to broadcast television, cable, revival screenings, and DVD, I have seen DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE many, many times over the years, but I would not trade that first experience for anything.
Of course, I experienced a one-two punch on that day, Count Dracula sharing the screen with his fellow titan of terror, the Baron, who appeared in FRANKENSTEIN MUST BE DESTROYED. Unlike DRACULAS HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE, the Frankenstein film did terrify me, but I will leave that experience to form the next chapter in this travelogue…

ADULT PERSPECTIVE

So, that is what DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE meant to me as a child, and later as a teenager when I saw the film again on television (usually with the close-up of the stake through the chest deleted).  How do I view the film now, as an adult? Is it pure nostalgia value, or does this trip to Transylvania still have sights worth seeing through more mature eyes?
Having now seen all the Hammer Dracula’s many times over, I can fairly say that DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE is a slight step down from the HORROR OF DRACULA and the almost (but not quite) as good DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS. Some of the freshness has gone out of the franchise, and screenwriter Anthony Hinds (using his “John Elder” pseudonym) seems not to know what to do with the Count, so instead he concocts a love story about two other characters and uses Dracula as a plot complication. Fortunately, the production values and Gothic atmosphere remain as lush as ever, and former cinematographer Freddie Francis does a spectacular job in the director’s chair, milking every scene for maximum visual impact, emphasizing not only the Gothic horror but also the romance. He puts the camera in close during Dracula ravishment of Maria, creating a seductive intimacy that goes even a little bit beyond what director Terence Fisher had focused on in HORROR OF DRACULA and DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS.

The Count lavishes his attention on Maria (Veronica Carlson).

As often happened in the Hammer Dracula series, the Count seems motivated by petty revenge, which he executes mostly through his assistants (in this case the priest and Zena). The real focus of the story is on Paul and Maria, whose love is thwarted by Paul’s atheistic beliefs (and on his insistence on expressing them to Maria’s Catholic uncle!). The only connecting link between this pair and Dracula is Maria’s uncle. As a result, the story seems a bit arbitrary and stitched together, without the strong, usually action-packed narrative line displayed in the best of Hammer’s classic horrors.
Nevertheless, DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE contains several interesting ironies, with the weak-willed local priest falling under the vampire’s spell, while the non-believer Paul is Dracula’s chief adversary. Not unexpectedly, Paul becomes a believer by the end, after seeing the power of the cross destroy the Count. Clearly, writer Anthony Hinds was trying to exploit the religious subtext of the Dracula myth. Even the title rings a note reminiscent of the resurrection of Jesus in the New Testament, and surely it is no accident that Dracula is almost literally crucified at the end — in one of the most spectacular demises ever suffered by the vampire, who weeps tears of blood as he expires.

Unfortunately, the portrayal of Count Dracula as an Antichrist figure is mostly symbolic. Absent from the script is any action that shows him devoted to the grandeur of evil; he behaves like a run-of-the-mill, garden variety vampire, leaving it up to Christopher Lee to imply the character’s stature as the “Prince of Darkness” in his performance. This he accomplishes to a great degree with little more than body language and screen presence, although he is aided by a few masterfully lit and composed shots that emphasize the brooding stillness of the Count as he lurks in shadows, awaiting his next victim. In a matter of a few seconds, these images convey a tiny glimpse of what immortality must be like for the vampire.

In a masterfully composed and lit shot, Dracula waits and broods in his subterranean lair.

Also heavily emphasized in DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE are the sexual undertones inherent in vampire mythology. Count Dracula’s first female victim is a dark-haired woman of easy virtue who had tried to seduce Paul. Yet the blond and apparently innocent Maria turns out to be not that different from Zena: not only does she sleep with Paul (even though they are not married); she also overtly responds to Dracula’s advances when he sneaks into her bedroom. Francis puts his camera in close, heightening the tension and the eroticism, which is much more seductive than that seen in HORROR OF DRACULA (which more resembled a rape). Here, the vampire lover gently nuzzles Maria’s neck first, as if sensitizing her skin for the bite to come. And Christopher Lee eschews his trademark red contact lenses for the close-ups of his eyes, implying that it is not blood lust that is so much motivating the Count.

As in many good horror films, the simplicity of the story does stir up some interesting imagery that resonates on a deeper, mythic (sometimes even subconscious) level. The trek by Dracula and Maria back to the castle features the woman clinging to his coffin as if yearning for a lover. Later, she follows through the woods, the camera tilting down to her bare feet, emphasizing her indifference to her own pain as she follows her new vampire lord and master. Then, in a quick ironic shift, we dissolve to the Count carrying her up the rocky terrain toward his castle, looking for all the world like a bridegroom carrying his beloved to the threshold.
Although G-rated, DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE hardly seems tame. There is no actual nudity, but both Barbar Ewing and Veronica Carlson display their ample charms, either in corsets of low-cut dresses. And the gore is plenty effective, too, particularly during the failed staking of the vampire. Although some purists (including Lee himself) have objected to this scene, it works wonderfully and gives some hint as to how the Vampire King could have survived for centuries – destroying him with a wooden stake just is not as easy as it looks. The final “crucifiction” scene does not feature as much flowing blood, but it is just as grizzly, with the pont of the cross producting from Dracula’s chest. Francis serves up a variety of camera angles, giving ample screen time for Lee to register the Count’s helpless agony on an almost operatic level of melodrama.

The Count (probably Christopher Lee's stunt double Eddie Powell) is crucified - impaled on a crucifix.

The cast is strong. Christopher Lee, as always, makes Count Dracula a formidable figure, both frightening and alluring; even if the script does not serve him well, he makes the most of his scenes, indelibly impressing himself on the audience imagination with all the force of an archetype that needs no distinguishing details.
Rupert Davies does a good job as his chief religious opposition, and Ewan Cooper creates a wonderfully weak portrait of the priest who falls under the vampire’s spell. Stalwart character actor Michael Ripper lends amiable support, and Barbara Ewing makes a good first victim, perfectly registering sexual attraction to the Count and then jealousy when he turns his attention elsewhere. Barry Andrews has the right charm and charisma to pull of the young male lead role, and Carlson is absolutely gorgeous – the perfect embodiment of “Dracula’s most beautiful victim” (as she was called in some of the film’s promotional materials).
James Bernard provides another rousing score, reusing his famous three-note Dracula motif (the orchestra almost seems to be singing “DRA-cu-la!”). And Bernard Robinson’s sets are wonderful as always (although it is disappointing that we never see the interior of Castle Dracula). If only the script had been able to meld is religious and sexual motifs into a stronger narrative that did full justice to the Dracula character, then DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE could have taken its place alongside HORROR OF DRACULA as genre masterpiece. As it stands, this is an above-average sequel that lingers in the mind thanks to its memorable imagery and directorial flair.

TRIVIA

DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS (1965), the previous film in the series, had ended with the Count sinking beneath the icy waters around his castle. DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE was trying to pick up directly from where its predecessor left off by showing the vampire revived from beneath the ice. However, the script fudges continuity a bit: We are told that Dracula killed the woman found in the bell-tower in the prologue – an even that took place one year before the main action of the film. Since Dracula had been dead during the ten years of screen time that separate HORROR OF DRACULA (1958) from DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS, the bell-tower even must have taken place sometime during the later film; however, the Count certainly did not seem to have time for this diversion during the frantic back-and-forth action of PRINCE OF DARKNESS.
This is the first Hammer Dracula that presents “Count Dracula” as a household name familiar to all the characters: When Msgr. Muller announces that the vampire is alive, his sister-in-law gasps in horror, obviously knowing who – and what – he is talking about, without any further explanation. This has the unfortunate side-effect of reducing the tone to the level of an old-fashioned, melodramatic horror movie, abandoning the more modern approach of Hammer’s previous Dracula films, which had avoided such histrionics.
This is the first time that Christopher Lee speaks as Dracula since the opening scenes of HORROR OF DRACULA. The character remained mute throughout the later portions of that film and throughout the entirety of the sequel, DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS. Curiously, Lee abandons the fast-paced, authoritative voice he used in HORROR OF DRACULA, here opting for a slower-paced, sepulchral tone.
This is the first of Lee’s Hammer Dracula films in which we do not see the interior of Dracula’s castle. This will happen again in the next film TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA, as well as the later DRACULA A.D. 1972 and THE SATANIC RITES OF DRACULA. Only SCARS OF DRACULA will show us Lee at home in his castle once again.
Terence Fisher, who had helmed Hammer’s three previous “Dracula” films (including BRIDES OF DRACULA, in which the Count does not appear), was scheduled to direct DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE, but he injured in a car accident while crossing the street and had to drop out of the project. Although his replacement, Freddie Francis, brought a refreshing visual style to the film, loaded with nifty camera angles and atmospheric staging, it seems likely the Fisher would have hammered out the screenplay’s narrative kinks if he had had the chance.

DVD DETAILS

DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE is available in a bare-bones DVD presentation from Warner Brothers. The disc offers English and French audio tracks with optional English, French, and Spanish subtitles. The only bonus features is a theatrical trailer. The transfer mattes the full-frame image to the 1.85 aspect ratio of theatrical screenings, and the picture has been enhanced for widescreen televisions. The transfer displays all the artful color of the photography (including Freddie Francis trademark use of a custom-made filter that shades off lighting toward the edge of the frame, creating a “spotlight” effect toward the center). In fact, the use of color recalls some of the best work scene in the Gothic films that Italian Mario Bava (another cinematographer-turned-director) was making during the same decade.

Beautiful, atmospheric colors in the DVD transfer recall the best work of Mario Bava.

There is a nice piece of cover art on the front. The back features a close-up of Lee in his Dracula makeup. The inside cover lists the 23 chapter stops, which are printed over a gruesome color shot of Lee with blood streaming out his chest from the stake in his heart. Artwork on the disc features an image of Lee’s face lowering toward Carlson, who rests her head on a pillow – a composition later echoed during the infamous “head” scene in REANIMATOR (1985).

DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE (1968). Directed by Freddie Francis. Screenplay by John Elder (Anthony Hinds), based on the character created by Bram Stoker. Cast: Christopher Lee, Rupert Davies, Veronica Carlson, Barbara Ewing, Barry Andrews, Ewan Hooper, Michael Ripper.

Supernal Dreams: Should Roger Corman and Christopher Lee recieve Honorary Oscars?

Posted on by Lawrence French

At next Sundays Academy Awards show, art director Robert Boyle will be awarded with an honorary Oscar. While he certainly deserves such an honor, it’s rather amazing to consider how many living genre artists have been overlooked in this area. Today, in an article in The Washington Post, Ann Hornaday argues that Roger Corman is long overdue for such an honorary Oscar. It’s a sentiment I hardily agree with, and maybe it actually could happen at next years awards show.

Roger Corman (center) directs Jane Asher and Vincent Price.

Besides Mr. Corman, I’d also say Christopher Lee should be added to the list. In fact, given the role both Roger Corman and Christopher Lee have played in the film industry over the past 40 years, that these two living masters have never even been nominated for an Oscar has to be considered nothing less than, to quote Mr. Lee, “a disgrace!” Of course, genre legends like Boris Karloff were never nominated, either. But, in reality, none of this is very surprising, especially if you look at the long list of directors who have never won Oscars. Just a glance, and you’ll see it’s actually much more of an honor to be on the list of non-winners!  Here are just a few of the great directors who have never won an Oscar as best director – a list which includes some of the greatest name in the history of the cinema:  Orson WELLES, Alfred HITCHCOCK, Howard HAWKS, Stanley KUBRICK, Jean RENOIR, Fritz LANG, Otto PREMINGER, Nicholas RAY, Arthur PENN, Ingmar BERGMAN, Douglas SIRK, Robert ALTMAN, George LUCAS, Sidney LUMET, John BOORMAN, Alain RESNAIS, Jules DASSIN, Jean Luc-GODARD, Joseph LOSEY, Michelangelo ANTONIONI, Anthony MANN, Federico FELLINI, Roger CORMAN, Roberto ROSSELLINI, Sergio LEONE, Francois TRUFFAUT and many, many others.
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No Knighthood for the Count

Posted on by Steve Biodrowski

Over at NewsLetter.co.uk, an incensed writer laments the snubbing of actor Christopher Lee, who was again passed over for a knighthood this year.

But if there is one denizen of the acting realm for whom a knighthood is achingly overdue then that man is Christopher Frank Carandini Lee. The basso-toned legend -most famous, of course, for his near definitive portrayal of Count Dracula in seven bloody, brilliant Hammer films – was awarded the CBE in 2001, but advancement to KBE has thus far eluded him, despite a highly acclaimed entertainment career spanning seven decades.

The article goes on to give an impassioned summar of Lee’s career. Although he came to fame fifty years ago in the Hammer horror films, Lee is still active in the film industry, having played Saruman in THE LORD OF THE RINGS and Count Dooku (seen below) in ATTACK OF THE CLONES and REVENGE OF THE SITH.

lee-as-dooku-copy.JPG

Supernal Dreams: CHRISTOPHER LEE – Now you see him… Now you don't

Posted on by Lawrence French

You can barely see Christopher Lee in THE GOLDEN COMPASS

Christopher Lee has been delighting aficionados of the genre since his appearance in Hammer’s Curse of Frankenstein fifty years ago. Since that time, Lee has gone on to enjoy the kind of late career success that eluded most of the other big genre movie stars.  Unfortunately, the flip side to all the renewed interest in casting Christopher Lee in big-budget fantasy movies,  seems to be the rather alarming trend of having his scenes end up on the cutting room floor!   

You can barely see Christopher
Lee in THE GOLDEN COMPASS.
The most drastic example of this occurred a few years ago when Peter Jackson cut Lee’s incredibly important final scene as Saruman from The Return of the King.  Now, for all intents and purposes, Lee has been cut from New Line’s The Golden Compass, as well.  Presumably Lee never had a very large part as the First High Councilor of the Magisterium to begin with, but now, what remains of his part is little more than a joke!  A single line, in a throwaway scene lasting no more than 30 seconds.  To add insult to injury, director Chris Weitz totally botches what could have been quite a dramatic entrance for Lee’s character.  
Thankfully, Christopher Lee is not even mentioned in the billing for The Golden Compass.  Presumably Lee asked that his name not appear.  Here’s what Mr. Lee told me about a similar case, when he almost appeared in William Wyler’s 1965 thriller, The Collector: 
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Sleepy Hollow (1999) – Film & DVD Review

Posted on by Steve Biodrowski

[EDITOR’S NOTE: Since Tim Burton fans are showing up today in response to our preview of SWEENEY TODD, we thought we would offer up this review of Sweeney’s closest antecedent in Tim Burton’s ouevre.]

The Headless Horseman rides hell bent for leather in Tim Burton’s elaborate 1999 horror film, derived loosely from Washington Irving’s “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” There may be some problems in the storytelling and exposition departments, but no one would deny the effective visual scheme that creates a fairy tale world in which the existence of a malevolent Headless Horseman – who returns from the grave to decapitate his victims – is completely believable. Burton’s work is a triumph of style over substance – a visual tour-de-force in which the director’s fairy tale horror aesthetic (so charming in THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS) is rendered in live-action to stupendous effect, overwhelming the weaknesses in the storyline.

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Horror Hotel/City of the Dead: Film & DVD Review

Posted on by Steve Biodrowski

The film was retitled HORROR HOTEL for US releaseTonight, as part of their 7th Annual Festival of Fantasy, Horror and Science-Fiction, the American Cinematheque will screen HORROR HOTEL at the Egyptian theatre in Hollywood. This film was known under the somewhat more atmospheric title of CITY OF THE DEAD in its native England (it really should have been called THE THIRTEENTH HOUR, but no one asked me); unfortunately, the Cinematheque seems to be screening the U.S. version, which not only changed the title but also deleted two minutes of footage. Still, any excuse to discuss this excelelnt exercise in atmosphere is good enough for me. It freaked me out when I first saw it as a kid on TV, and subsequent opportunities to enjoy it n the big screen (thanks to previous Cinematheque screenings) have proven that it holds up to adult scrutiny. It may not be a complete masterpiece, but as a cult item it certainly is a gem worth discovering for yourself.

The orginal title was CITY OF THE DEADThe film — about a New England town ruled by a coven of witches — falls just short of greatness thanks to an excessive reliance on horror movie cliches (e.g., sinister residents of said town staring ominously at the hapless protagonists). Although the lack of subtlety and refinement relegate the film to the ranks of entertaining spook shows (rather than genre classics), the four-star level of weirdness earns HORROR HOTE/CITY OF THE DEAD a place alongside the most memorable horror movies. On top of that, it sports what may be the best, most terrifying (happy) ending ever seen in a genre fear fest – a genuine tour-de-force so powerful in its imagery that it almost single-handedly erases any reservations one has about the rest of the movie.
Borrowing a page from Mario Bava’s BLACK SUNDAY, the story begins with the execution of a witch, Elizabeth Selwyn (Patricia Jessel), around the time of the Salem Witch trials. Centuries later, Nan Barlow (Venetia Stevenson) is a college student taking a course in witchcraft by Professor Alan Driscoll (Christopher Lee). In order to do some research for a term paper, she takes the professor’s advice and visits a Whitewood, the town where Selwyn was executed, and checks into the Raven’s Inn, which is operated by Mrs. Newless (also Jessel). Shortly thereafter, poor Nan finds herself abducted into the catacombs below the hotel, where she is the victim of a ritual sacrifice; among the hooded faces looming over her are Mrs. Newless and Professor Driscoll. Nan’s brother Richard (Dennis Lotis) and her boyfriend Bill (Tom Naylor) grow worried when she fails to return from Whitewood, so they investigate; Bill gets in an auto accident on the way and remains mostly on the sidelines, while Richard talks with Patricia (Betta St. John), the daughter of the aging local Reverend (Norman Macowan), who claims that Whitewood is under a curse: the executed witch Elizabeth Selwyn now presides over a coven that maintains immortality by performing sacrifices when the clock strikes thirteen. The only way to stop them is with the shadow of the cross. Richard is skeptical until Patricia is abducted to be the next sacrifice; he tries to save her, but the cult members restrain him. Bill revives from his stupor as the clock begins to strike midnight. The cult cannot flee without completing the ritual, and Mrs. Newless cannot strike the lethal blow (with a knife) until the thirteenth tolling. Following shouted orders from Richard, Bill uproots a cross from the graveyard and stumbles weakly toward the scene of the intended sacrifice; as the shadow of the cross falls upon the cult members, they burst into flames. Finally, Bill collapses, dead. Patricia and Richard go searching for Mrs. Newless, who got away. They find her in the hotel, her corpse withered and aged as if she had been dead hundreds of years.
As a piece of storytelling, HORROR HOTEL lifts several obvious motifs from Alfred Hitchcock’s PSYCHO. Most notably, there is the hotel set in an isolated area that is now almost forgotten. The ostensible lead is a young blond woman who is murdered with a knife midway through. And the final revelation of Mrs. Newless in her decomposed state recalls the withered corpse of Norman’s mother in the cellar of the Bates mansion.
Despite the obviously derivative elements, HORROR HOTEL works on its own terms as a sinister piece of supernatural horror. The New England setting, the witchcraft rituals, and the twist with Professor Driscoll being part of the coven — all of these tie in nicely, creating a solid storyline the pulls the viewer along into the movie’s strange world.
And it is strange. HORROR HOTEL is one of those lucky films (“accidental art,” as I like to call it) whose missteps and limitations somehow magically fall into place, creating a weird alternative universe — a sort of Twilight Zone in which the incredible seems completely natural. To begin with, there are no actual exterior location shots anywhere in the movie, which was filmed entirely on studio sets, creating a claustrophobic sense of being cut off from the world at large. The “normal” world of college and homes is depicted only in interiors, mostly brightly lit and cheerful. Whitewood, on the other hand, has numerous “exterior” scenes that were actually filmed inside a sound stage. Filled with fog, this obviously artificial town comes across like something out of a demented dream, the unreality adding to, rather than undermining, the unease in the audience.
The film’s second major lucky break lies in the fact that it is an English production set in New England. The British cast strives with varying degrees of success (Lee best among them) to affect mid-Atlantic accents, and the result is a stilted artificiality that almost makes the film sound dubbed. However, as with the unreal (or surreal) exteriors, the strange vocal inflections only increase the off-balance sense of being set apart from the real world, adding another layer to the perception that we are trapped in a dreamy, imaginary landscape.
Where the film falls short is in knowing when to back off the spook show theatrics. The townsfolk of Whitewood are given to hushed whispers and threatening glances, underlined with lingering tight shots and music meant to instill fear. Not only is this effect so overdone that you are tempted to laugh, there is also a mysterious “Elder” (Fred Johnson), who shows up to hitch a ride with each intended victim, and then inexplicably disappears from the car upon arriving in Whitewood – a piece of hokum that is more amusing that frightening. It’s not bad exactly, but it does seem to scream, “Ooo, scary!” in a manner that recalls SCTV’s Count Floyd.
Whatever the missteps, the film hits its stride during the climax, which is one of the greatest horror sequences ever filmed. The black-and-white photography lends the shadowy images an Expressionist power that goes far beyond anything conjured up by the narrative. Nan’s dying boyfriend Bill, ostensibly the hero, resembles a shuffling zombie, seen only in silhouette as he wields the cross like a child using a magnifying lens to focus the rays of the sun into a flash-point that ignites the target in a burst of flame. There is something uncanny in the character’s movements, as if he were a puppet animated by an external supernatural force (rather like the revived sailors in Coleridge’s “Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner”), and cloaking his face adds to the perception that Bill may already be dead, his body nothing more than a vessel for some kind of divine retribution meted out against Elizabeth Selwyn’s cult. Never has the power of a righteous God been portrayed with such unnerving force; even the plagues visited upon Egypt in THE TEN COMMANDEMENTS seem tame by comparison.

Divine vengeance is meted out by the half-dead hero.

The entire film may not work at this exalted level, but it is more than suspenseful enough to hold your attention until the climax. Although his is truly a supporting role, horror star Lee turns in a solid performance, nicely bridging the gap between stern professor and demented cultist without undue histrionics. Despite the awkward accents, the rest of the cast mostly handle their roles well, even if the villains overdo their spooky routine a bit. The slightly hammy approach to horror during the early sequences guarantees that HORROR HOTEL will never achieve the same high critical reputation as, for example, DIABOLIQUES, but like that much-praised French thriller, HORROR HOTEL saves the best for last, serving up a devastating denouement that induces a level of fear few films ever achieve. 

TRIVIA

Although the names “Selwyn” and “Newless” are not anagrams, they are the phonetic equivalent of palindromes (that is, “Selwyn” pronounced backwards sounds like “Newless”), indicating that that the Mrs. Newless who presides over the hotel is indeed the same person as the witch Elizabeth Selwyn, who was executed centuries ago.
This is the first horror film from the producer team of Milton Subotsky and Max J. Rosenberg (although the latter is uncredited). Later, the duo would form Amicus, a film company responsible for numerous horror titles in the 1960s and 1970s, including DR. TERROR’S HOUSE OF HORRORS, TORTURE GARDEN, and THE HOUSE THAT DRIPPED BLOOD.
Director John Llewellyn Moxey later directed 1973’s THE NIGHT STALKER (about a vampire in Las Vegas), which became the most-watched made-for-television movie up to that time.
In one scene, Professor Alan Driscoll (Christopher Lee) is seen sacrificing a small bird in his office; he is almost interrupted by the doorbell, forcing the visibly annoyed professor to put on a happy face and receive an unwanted visitor. The scene seems to have inspired a similar one in Ken Russell’s adaptation of LAIR OF THE WHITE WORM. In the latter film, Amanda Donahoe’s pagan priestess is on the verge of sacrificing a young virgin she has lured to her mansion, when she is interrupted by the doorbell and snarls, “Oh, shit!”

 DVD DETAILS

HORROR HOTEL has been released several times on DVD, but the only version currently available is under the title CITY OF THE DEAD. This “Widescreen Undead Collector’s Edition” from VCI offers the original English cut of the film, plus numerous bonus features:

  • Audio commentary and interview with star Christopher Lee
  • Audio commentary and interview with director John Moxey
  • Interview with actress Venetia Stevenson
  • Theatrical trailer, photos, and talent bios

The widescreen presentation is clean, clear, and beautiful, especially if you are watching on a 16×9 television. Unfortunately, VCI’s initial pressing of the disc presented problems for regular televisions; it was difficult if not impossible to set the aspect ratio for pan-and-scan or letterbox, so you ended up watching the film squeezed. (Hopefully, the current pressing, which has redesigned cover art [shown below] has fixed this.)
The interview with Christopher Lee is informative, though occasionally marred by the actor’s tendancy to lapse into pompous pronouncements about the state of the British film industry. Lee also trots out his standard complaint about being typecast by the press (who still see him as Dracula over thirty years since he last played th role), but when he gets down to business he actually has a lot to say – about the film and his career in genre pictures. (Most interesting for fans of Lee’s Hammer horror films is his statement that director Terence Fisher ” knew what he want – when he saw it,” meaning that Fisher made the cast rehearse the scene until they showed him something he liked.)
Unfortunately, Lee’s audio commentary suggests that he said everything he had to say during the video interview. Most of his comments consist of describing the action on screen while remarking that he is not quite sure what is happening because he cannot hear the sound. The few bright points occur when he extolls the virtues of the film’s atmospheric black-and-white cinematography and when he briefly mocks his own performance for laying on the sinister angle too thick early on. As if aware of the shortcomings, toward the end he asks, “Do you think people are really going to watch this film, listen to the dialogue, and listen to me? […] I imagine you’ll cut a great deal of what I’m saying.”

Patricia Jessell and Christopher Lee preside over the sacrifice of Betta St. John

Director John Moxey’s interview is also worth checking out. Although not a genre specialist (his only other major genre credit is the tele-film THE NIGHT STALKER), he speaks knowledgeably about the techniques necessary to generate mood and suspense. He seems particularly fond of one technique he used to convey a sense of the uncanny: early in the film, a character walks down the street of the haunted city and sees numerous, ominous townspeople; when another character follows the same path later in the film, we see the same townspeople in pretty much the same order, creating a dream-like feeling of repetition.
Actress Venetia Stevenson’s interview is breezy and fun but less informative; because she was on the film for such a short time, she has less to say about it, focusing instead on the rest of her career (which included a switch to working behind the camera). Trivia buffs, however, will delight in learning that Stevenson’s mother, Anna Lee, co-starred with Boris Karloff in the classic 1945 horror film BEDLAM, before going on to play the role of Lyla Quatermain (named after the hero of KING SOLOMON’S MINES) in a long-running afternoon soap opera.
The so-called “Original American Trailer” looks vintage in terms of the footage, but it has video-generated titles that display the film’s English title CITY OF THE DEAD; there is also a 2001 copyright date, suggesting that this version of the trailer was created for the DVD release. It’s one of those trailers that gives away too much (including the final image), and the melodramatic narration lays things on a bit too thick.
The photo gallery is actually a slideshow containing nearly three dozen images: publicity shots, behind-the-scenes photographs, posters, lobby cards, and home video cover art. Unfortunately, the images are not accompanied by a music cue from the film’s soundtrack.
The talent bios, ccntrary to standard DVD form, are not static; the text scrolls up the frame like the opening crawl in STARS WARS; fortunately, you can use you pause button if you want to peruse the filmographies included at the end of each. The information is thin. In the case of Moxey, Lee, and Stevenson, this hardly matters, since we learn details in their video interviews elsewhere on the disc; however, it would have been nice to include something more substantial about Patricia Jessell, Dennis Lotis, and Betta St. John; otherwise, why bother including them at all? The worst example is for Lotis, who played Richard Barlow, the brother of the missing Nan. His bio reads simply:

In THE CITY OF THE DEAD, Dennis Lotis plays Richard Barlow, the concerned brother of the adventurous Nan Barlow, who has gone ‘missing.’

As if you couldn’t have figured that out from watching the movie!
CITY OF THE DEAD (a.k.a. HORROR HOTEL, 1960). Directed by John Moxey. Written by George Baxt, story by Milton Subotsky. Cast: Christopher Lee, Patricia Jessel, Dennis Lotis, Tom Maylor, Betta St. John, Venetia Stevenson, Valentine Dyall, Ann Beach.
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