Valerie Gaunt July 9 1932 - Nov. 27 2016

 

     When Valerie Gaunt made her appearance in Hammer's 1958 DRACULA it made for a startling revelation and in an eye opening way let we the viewers (especially if we were younger) know that we were heading into uncharted waters as far as vampire films were concerned. Unnamed (refereed to as "Vampire Woman" in the closing credits) she presages Christopher Lee's title role entrance in the film and thus became the first vampire to appear in a Hammer movie along with being the recipient of the first staking in blood red color and in addition was the first vampire to be shown with fangs in a major western film.
     Approaching Jonathan Harker with her low cut Grecian white gown and jet black hair she turns instantly from alluring almost coy like flirting innocence into a feral and sexually charged hungry animal. The look in her eyes as she turns toward his throat indelibly stuck in my young mind upon my first viewing and when in the next moment Lee's Dracula makes his unforgettable appearance and throws her violently to the floor where she lays hissing like a cornered snake it all made for one of the true cornerstones of screen horror.
    Valerie laid the groundwork for Hammer's next decade and a half of alluring female vampires but in spite of her abbreviated appearance in DRACULA she exuded a sexual evilness into the role that for me at least was never bested in the ongoing film series (although Barbara Shelley in DRACULA PRINCE OF DARKNESS came the closest).
    She also appeared in Hammer's inaugural Gothic horror 1957's CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN where she plays the conniving housekeeper Justine to Peter Cushing's Baron Frankenstein and who receives a nasty comeuppance. Her back-lit walk down a hallway in a sheer nightie is one of the first instances of the studio's ongoing motif of "Hammer Glamour".
    Born July 9 1932 in Stratford-on-Avon she retired from acting after DRACULA with only two other earlier acting credits for BBC TV on her resume besides CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN. She lived quietly raising her family and later in life eschewed the horror film convention circuit leaving her fans with a small but very well remembered film presence that left an indelible impression on many. She passed away on Nov.27th.

THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT 1955

AKA THE CREEPING UNKNOWN

The Keep Watching The Skies Blogathon !!

Hosted By The Cinematic Frontier

    By the mid 1950s, Hammer was best known for its small budget thrillers and crime pictures. In 1955 however, this changed when the British studio dipped its toe into the highly lucrative horror/sc-fi genre films (in particular the U.S. drive-in market) with this B&W outer space invasion opus that although well known for kick-starting Hammer's famous horror output can stand on its own as an excellent & creepy little film. In addition, it also features an amazing performance by Richard Wadsworth in the "title" role, Brian Donlevy playing take-no-prisoners style scientist, a host of British character actors and a horror-tinged alien invasion plot that looks ahead to Hammer's coming decade and a half (or so) of horrors.
    The film's success lead to a couple of sequels (QUATERMASS II aka ENEMY FROM SPACE in 1957 and later 1967's QUATERMASS AND THE PIT ) and as mentioned led to Hammer's color-soaked Gothic horrors in the coming years. Directed in a nice economic style by early Hammer veteran Val Guest (whose work has been somewhat sadly eclipsed by Terence Fisher's classic work in the studios later Gothic horrors), it was the first Hammer movie with a major distributor in the U.S. (United Artists - who re-tilted it THE CREEPING UNKNOWN) and was based upon a BBC teleplay from 1953 written by Nigel Kneale.

    Immediately kicking its plot into gear QUATERMASS XPERIMENT (the X in the title is a neat bit of publicity by Hammer referring to Britain's "X" certificate for adults only horror) as a rocket plunges to earth and buries itself nose-first into the English countryside. This necessitates the arrival of take-charge and bullying scientist/ rocket designer Prof. Bernard Quatermass who is played to scenery-chewing perfection by Irish/American character actor Brian Donlevy. Although born in Ireland Donlevy came to America at a very young age (later he served in the army with Pershing's Mexican expedition and flew with the Lafayette Escadrille) and appears about as far from an Englishman as you can get (Donlevy was most likely added for American box office padding).
   The crashed rocket presents itself with a nifty locked door mystery as two crewmen are missing (with only their empty spacesuits remaining) with the third alive but in a catatonic state with his bone structure oddly altered. Taking charge of the situation Quatermass hustles Victor Carroon (Richard Wadsworth) the remaining crew member off to his laboratory along with Carroon's dotting wife Judith (American born actress Margia Dean) where he begins to study the silent and non-blinking survivor.
    Brushing aside the wife's concerns ("Don't worry..He's fine !) and strong arming the local police (who for some odd reason feel the need to investigate the rocket's missing crewman) Donlevy's Quatermass stomps through the proceedings acting like every other other character is a clueless idiot all the while berating and yelling at anyone who attempts to question his motives.

     Quatermass begrudgingly allows Carroon to be transferred to a hospital and this allows his increasingly fraught wife to attempt to smuggle him out. Also about this same time Quatermass discovers that Carroon's body is slowly being taken over by an invisible microbe that entered the spaceship and is able to absorb other living organisms. This brought horrifically into the plot by having Carroon viciously smash a potted cactus in his hospital room before killing a private detective who was helping his wife.
     Guest's direction is superb here as he doesn't show us immediately what the after effect of Carroon's attacks in regards to his evolving physical state is as we just get quick glimpses of smashed half eaten way faces of his victims. During an attack on a chemist we see Carroon's arm has become a hideous mutated appendage with cactus thorns protruding from it (the film features some excellent make-up effects by Phil Leakey).
    There's also an unsettling scene where Carroon encounters a small girl in a dingy riverbank setting that brings to mind Karloff's tragic encounter in the original FRANKENSTEIN from 1931. Eventually all that's shown is slimy trail discovered in various places in London which makes us wonder what he's become which leads to the films climax in Westminster Abbey with the Lovecraftian -like monster perched amongst scaffolding in the hollowed Gothic surroundings.

      Richard Wadsworth is truly wonderful here as the pitiful recipient of the space virus and in an almost totally silent role (his only words are a whispered "Help me.." as he's carried from the rocket) as he uses only his eyes and body movements. He would appear memorably as the ill fated beggar in CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF (1961) and had a small but interesting role in 1958's THE REVENGE OF FRANKENSTEIN. Not to fault Christopher Lee in anyway and as great as he is in Hammer's Gothic debut CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN it would have been interesting to see Wadsworth as the monster. British character actor Jack Warner shows up as a harried police inspector (a type of role he would play over and over) and helps ground the film and serves as its everyman moral compass.
      As noted above THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT proudly displays its British Board of Censors "X" rating (no one under 16 admitted) and this was boasted about on it's advertising material. The film does contain some startling images including corpses with malformed faces and gaping blank eye sockets alonh with a disturbing view of a deserted zoo with dead animals strewn about as the result of the creature's rampage (an image that stuck with me as a child).
     A big thanks to The Cinematic Frontier for hosting this blogathon. I'm really looking forward to reading all the posts !

  

All Above Screen Caps Are from The Kino Blu-Ray

THE HAUNTED STRANGLER 1957

The Criterion Blogathon hosted by Criterion Blues, Speakeasy and Silver Screenings

(a very big thanks to the above hosts for organizing this !)

"Their wild beauty marked them for death by ..... The Haunted Strangler" 

     During the later half of the 1950's Boris Karloff's movie career was seeming winding down. Entering his early 70's he worked mostly in television and in theatre with only his only forays into motion pictures being projects such as the odd VOODOO ISLAND from 1957 and 1958's goofy but entertaining FRANKENSTEIN 1970.

    In 1957 producer Richard Gordon and approached Karloff about doing a pair of horror films in England, with the result being THE HAUNTED STRANGLER and 1958's CORRIDORS OF BLOOD. Harking back to the Gothic horrors of Karloff's earlier genre work they also bear a nodding resemblance to the Boris's Val Lewton films (in particular CORRIDORS in relation to Lewton's THE BODY SNATCHER), with STRANGLER also mixing in a bit of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and a dash of Tod Slaughter. Being filmed in England on sets at the MGM British studios and beautifully shot in B&W by Geoffery Faithfull (VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED) both films have handsome look to their productions that belay their small budgets.
     In both films Karloff plays sympathetic characters who are drawn in to dark circumstances beyond their control (whether by their own fault or not) which leads to their downfall. In THE HAUNTED STRANGLER (which went out in Britain as GRIP OF THE STRANGLER) Karloff plays James Rankin, who would be best described as "social reformer" in 1880's London. He begins investigating a case involving a serial killer known as "The Haymarket Strangler" and a one armed man (as it's explained the victims were "half strangled, then slashed to death !") named Edward Styles who was executed 20 years earlier after being convicted of the crimes.

     Believing that the judicial system is rigged against people of lower economic standing and convinced that Styles was innocent, Rankin along with his assistant Dr. Kenneth McColl (Tim Turner) begin investigating the crime. Also lurking on the sidelines is Rankin's doting wife (Elizabeth Allan MARK OF THE VAMPIRE) and step-daughter Lily (Diane Aubrey VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED). Lily also serves as the love interest for Dr. McColl - when he's not ogling dance hall girls.
     Rankin begins butting heads with Supt. Burke (an unusual "good guy" authority role for Anthony Dawson from DR. NO and CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF) and his investigation soon leads to a Dr. Tennant (who preformed the autopsy on Styles after his execution) and to a cabaret with the wonderful name of The Judas Hole where several of the victims had worked. Rankin then discovers Dr. Tennant's medical bag which has the scalpel missing and makes the rather quick and unconnected deduction that the scalpel is located in Styles casket (a sequence which was shown in the film's prologue).
     Finding no one to believe his theory that Tennant himself was the murderer Rankin bribes a guard and sneaks into the creepy prison graveyard and upon finding the scalpel in Styles coffin he immediately twists his arm to his side and contorts his face into a lopsided grimace. Karloff does the entire transformation without the benefit of make-up and while his exaggerated gestures and leering expression might elicit a few chuckles today (it made quite an impression on me as a child) it's still quite a performance and it is wonderful to see Karloff at this stage of his career scuttling amongst graveyards and diving with gusto into a true Gothic horror.

     The script by producer John Croydon (DEAD OF NIGHT and THE PROJECTED MAN - here under a "John C. Cooper" pseudonym) along with Jan Read (JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS) has a couple of nice twists while attempting some pseudo psychology for the cast to mull over and gives forth some wonderful dialogue for Karloff's inmedible vocal delivery. Released the same year as Hammer's CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, STRANGLER seems almost quaint with it's moody B&W photography and lack of blood (CORRIDORS OF BLOOD as befitting its title is far more bloody - albeit still in B&W) as in the next couple of years British producers would continue to ramp up the blood and sex (with sometimes extra "spice" added for the Continental market). The next year Karloff would appear in the daffy FRANKENSTEIN 1970 for Allied Artist before returning to primarily TV work until the 1960's brought about another round of film work mainly for A.I.P. (including the masterful BLACK SABBATH for Mario Bava) along with the odd Euro/British or Mexican project.
    Labeled here as "King of the Monsters !", Karloff although 70 years old at the time and somewhat hobbled with the arthritis and back problems that continue to plague him (and escalate) throughout the remainder of his life gives gives a wonderful & sympathetic performance here, seemingly buoyed by working in his home country and back on familiar ground in period B&W horror. Really getting into the physicality of the transformation (as mentioned a bit over the top) he seems to relish the role of "the monster" with some as expected body double for the more strenuous stunts including Rankin doing his best John Wilkes Booth as he leaps to the stage after a murder.  

    Moving from fog shrouded graveyards to shadowy prisons and Victorian drawing rooms THE HAUNTED STRANGLER is a beautiful looking film and with Karloff front and center most of the other roles seem to fade into the background with the exception of the great Anthony Dawson (you keep waiting for him to switch gears and do something evil or unsavory) and although the film does partly take place in a dance hall there is quite a bit more energetic can can dancing then required for the plot.

    Much of the same crew (and Boris) were also on hand for Richard Gordon's companion piece CORRIDORS OF BLOOD which is more of a historical drama dealing with Karloff as a pioneering surgeon (and an appearance by Christopher Lee) experimenting with anesthetic who unfortunately becomes addicted to drugs and gets involved with grave robbers. These two films along with THE ATOMIC SUBMARINE and FIRST MAN INTO SPACE are in the nifty Monsters and Madmen from Criterion.
     THE HAUNTED STRANGLER originally went out on a double bill with Gordon's crawling brain opus FIEND WITHOUT A FACE (also available from Criterion as a standalone release).