Nothing but the Night (1972)

**POSSIBLE SPOILERS**

Adults use a lot of rather creepy threats to keep children in line.  “The boogeyman will get you.”  “You’ll shoot your eye out.”  “You’ll go blind if you keep that up.”  My grandmother used to say she’d put me outside for the gypsies if I didn’t behave.  True to her word, one night she did, in fact, lock me out of her house at night, and I was left to wait (for what felt like hours but was likely only a few minutes) in sheer terror for the gypsies to snatch me up.  I swore I could hear the clip-clop of their horses’ hooves (no doubt engulfed in the very flames of Hell) on the then-brick road leading to her place.  Needless to say, I was scared shitless but pretty well-behaved after that.  But what we also had in my area was the Kis-Lyn reform school for boys, and this was the place where the bad kids were left to fend for themselves from the other bad kids, according to popular gossip.  The mother of a friend of mine even packed his things in a suitcase and dropped him off at the doorstep of a different local boys’ home which he believed was Kis-Lyn to put the fear of God in him.  Even though the school had been closed for eight years by the time I was born, you would still hear the name bandied about as a form of punishment for some time.  It’s funny, most parents today wouldn’t dream of intimidating their children with some of the things with which we were coerced into good behavior.  But the impact was immediate and undeniable (at least in the short term).  The kids at the Inver House orphanage in Peter Sasdy’s Nothing but the Night (aka The Devil’s Undead aka Castle of the Living Dead aka Devil Night aka The Resurrection Syndicate) get the double whammy of being menaced not only with death but also with the far worse fate of becoming adults. 

On the Scottish island of Bala, various elderly people are murdered, all of whom are trustees of the Van Traylen Trust which funds the Inver House orphanage.  Colonel Bingham (Sir Christopher Lee) calls on acquaintance and pathologist Sir Mark Ashley (Peter Cushing) to help him investigate after a busload of children crashes with more trustees aboard.  One survivor, the young Mary Valley (Gwyneth Strong), holds the key to all the answers.

Nothing but the Night is a deceptively simple thriller with a rather dark underbelly.  The greatest and clearest piece of that seedy dark side is in how the children in the film are treated.  Kids in this film are little more than pawns.  For the trustees of the orphanage, they are vessels to be filled with their selfish venality.  For Mark and Bingham, they are clues to a deeper mystery.  Bingham even admits that the whole reason he wants the case is because a friend of his was involved; the deaths of the children on the bus are “incidental.”  Mark resents being pulled into the whole affair, only getting involved because he doesn’t like being put in his place by the hoi polloi.  For Dr. Haynes (Keith Barron), children are painful memories screaming to be dragged out into the light of day.  For reporter Joan Foster (Georgia Brown), they are a hot, tabloid-y story to be exploited and splashed across the front page.  For Anna Harb (Diana Dors, in full-on late stage Shelley Winters mode), her daughter Mary is a piece of property, her ownership of which is more important than the girl’s well-being, and this isn’t the only reason that Anna is a poor candidate for motherhood.  Never are the children really treated as individuals, Mary being the exception as she’s the sole clue to what’s going on.  Despite the protestations of the adults who claim to have the children’s best interests at heart, they are more intent on probing them to satisfy their own ends.  It’s a tragic statement on the callous abuse of children as things, and it’s all the more terrible in this instance, because the children are already considered castaways, unwanted by society, and therefore, prey.

In this vein, but to a lesser degree, are issues of identity and maturation.  The orphans are a collective.  We see them playing, and that’s about it.  Mary, as the focus of the narrative, is the exemplar for the film’s depiction of the aforementioned themes.  On the fateful bus ride, she is the cheerleader, conducting her fellow children in a variation of “Ninety-Nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall.”  She usually has the innocent exuberance we expect from a girl her age.  This is the genesis of the person she should grow to become; it should be a process.  Her “repressed memories,” then, are the loss of her childhood identity/individuality and the domination of a new identity, an adult one.  That these two actions are instantaneous and simultaneous is indicative of their nefariousness.  There is no development.  There is only the loss of childhood, and this absence is what produces monsters.  The juxtaposition of virtuous children with iniquitous adults and the unification of the two is where the film derives its horror.

The film’s tonal shift from giallo-esque thriller, a la What Have You Done to Solange? (sort of), to science fiction/horror film is rather jarring, even though the groundwork is laid out from the beginning.  Said groundwork, however, is cleverly disguised with a few guileful twists you probably won’t see coming because the filmmakers wisely don’t emphasize them.  Lee and Cushing get to play on the same side of the moral coin, much like in the superlative Horror Express, though Cushing infuses his character with just enough of his classic Baron Frankenstein portrayal to give yet another in a long, long list of fantastic, fully-realized performances.  The locales are all gloomy, casting a predetermined pall over the proceedings.  Sasdy (primarily a television director [most notably responsible for the 1972 production of Nigel Kneale’s The Stone Tape], though he directed a few films, such as Hammer Studio’s Taste the Blood of Dracula, one of the less traditional offerings in the series but no less worthy) brings a workmanlike sense of direction that grounds the film in a reality which is both straightforward and twisted.  Overall, the film is satisfying, and the aftermath is chilling, but I can’t help but think what could have been had Sasdy and company played the story straight.  I know I would like to have seen more entries in a franchise featuring Bingham and associates (this was the first and the last film produced by Lee’s Charlemagne Productions; it was adapted from a series of novels by John Blackburn, and the original plan was to produce more of them).  Especially if the dynamic lead duo from this one starred in them.  Alas…

MVT:  It’s Lee and Cushing all day long.  It usually is when they appear onscreen together, and this is no exception.

Make or Break:  The finale slaps all the pieces together, but I could see it not working for some people.  That, and that the reveal of a certain character’s fate made little sense to me, considering the timeline of the film.

Score:  6.5/10

Horror Express (1972)

Floccinaucinihilipilification is, to my knowledge, the longest word in the English language.  Now, I know the kids like to throw it around and drop it into every sentence the same as “like,” but some of us may be completely unaware of it (the mind boggles).  It is defined as “the action or habit of estimating something as worthless.”  It’s kind of interesting in two senses to me as of this writing.  Number one, the story of today’s film, Eugenio Martin’s Horror Express (aka Panico En El Transiberiano), deals with two anthropologists.  Their job is digging through dirt most people would find worthless and finding things they feel may or may not be of value from a scientific/historical perspective.  Imagine if you will an anthropologist who mistakes the greatest find in the history of mankind or even life on this planet for a Tanzanian pot holder or something.  It’s a value judgment (an educated one, but still…), and at least in some part, hubris plays a role in its estimation.  Number two, the act of being a film reviewer also has to involve floccinaucinihilipilification at some time or another.  Some reviewers make a practice of this, turning every critique into a hyperbolic screed, and that’s fine when they feel a film genuinely warrants such dismissal.  But I somehow get the notion that when almost every picture that’s brought up is treated with merciless derision, either the writer shouldn’t be writing about film, or they’re writing because they want to show everyone how clever they are.  Either way, it’s a reason to quit film review.  But misery loves company, I suppose.

In 1906, while on an expedition in Manchuria, Sir Alexander Saxton (Christopher Lee) discovers a “missing link” frozen solid in a cave.  Carting it back with him on the Trans-Siberian Express, Saxton runs across rival scientist Dr. Wells (Peter Cushing) and makes the acquaintance of the beautiful Russian Countess Petrovski (Silvia Tortosa).  As the train hurtles across the barren landscapes of Siberia, it’s soon discovered that Saxton’s specimen may have a bit more life in it than previously thought.  As well as having a few surprises up its hirsute sleeve.

This is yet another of those movies that I initially encountered in a nasty, grotty print late on a Saturday night on some local cable channel (I’m thinking WWOR out of Secaucus, New Jersey, but that’s really neither here nor there).  The experience of seeing something like Psychomania or Horror Express at an early age and of that quality of presentation was eye-opening to say the least (or maybe just eye-straining, hence why I’ve had spectacles since the fourth grade).  The marvel of these films isn’t the quality of their respective productions, though both have more than enough to be very effective (and Martin’s use of miniatures as well as the interior sets is impressive).  It’s also not in their originality, since neither one has an original bone in its body.  The latter film, in fact, borrows much from John W. Campbell’s novella Who Goes There? (most likely unknowingly), and it did it ten years before John Carpenter went back to the same source material for his remake of The Thing From Another World.  Obviously, Martin doesn’t wring quite the amount of tension and paranoia from the premise as Carpenter does, but I think the two make nice companion pieces.  

And yet I can honestly say that, at the time, there was nothing else like these movies coming across my path.  It’s not the elements; it’s the mixture of them and their treatment.  Horror Express runs the gamut from Cosmic Horror to Creature Feature to Siege film to Zombie film to Disaster film, but it gives you just enough of each genre/subgenre in just enough of a dose that you swallow it down whole, and the instant that your mind starts to question anything, gets bored, etcetera, it’s on to another facet and back again.  Playing partly into one idea from the film, the effect comes from a gestalt of the pieces, rather than focusing strictly on any one of them.  Furthermore, the fact that almost no one else I knew seemed to have seen this film and no books or magazines I read had any sort of information about it was mind-blowing to me.  Today, everyone and their brother expound the virtues of this film, and it’s easy to see why.  But back then?  If you mentioned this film’s title, you’d likely get little more than a momentary narrowing of the eyes and a slight shrug from most people.

A major portion of the film is concerned with eyes and looking.  Everyone wants to see what’s in Saxton’s crate.  The monster’s eyes glow red when its powers are in effect.  The monster steals the memories and skills of its victims through their eyes, leaving them devoid of the capacity for sight (even if they were still alive to see; which they are not) and turning them into automatons, bereft of identity.  The monster’s own memories are stored in its eyes.  In these ways the film reveals its own truth, that knowledge and individuality come from observation or at least from the power to observe.  Yet, the eyes can be deceived, and this is the flip side of the notion.  Saxton thinks that Father Pujardov (Alberto de Mendoza) is a simple conjurer employing tricks, despite seeing that the same piece of chalk which writes on the stones of the train station won’t write on the anthropologist’s crate.  Even after a fellow scientist avers that there is nothing unique about the chalk, Saxton refuses to accept that anything other than a deception is at work.  Wells and Saxton are taken in by a passenger who turns out to be up to nefarious purposes.   The beast itself has the ability to move from person to person, always disguised as a means of survival.  In other words, even what can be plainly witnessed with the naked eye cannot be trusted absolutely.

The film also contains concepts about social classes, to some degree or another (summed up for me by the classic Cushing retort, “Monster?!  We’re British, you know!”).  Though Saxton and Wells are both anthropologists, Saxton is haughty and upper class in mien.  Wells, by contrast, is not above bribing a station agent to get a couple of compartments on the departing train or to sneak a peek at what’s in the crate.  He’s friendlier to the common man.  Naturally, Saxton dislikes Wells, and he only seems to put up with those he considers lower in class because they serve some purpose for him.  The Inspector aboard the train (Julio Peña) is strictly working class, but he holds power over others due to his authority.  He’s a cog.  The Countess and her husband (George Rigaud) are clearly in the most rarefied of air, and they therefore do not need to bother themselves fraternizing with the Plebes or burdening themselves with matters of the soul (to Pujardov, the Count says, “our immortal souls are your concern”).  The priest is little more than a mongrel in the eyes of all, and it is this humiliation which will color his decisions later in the film (though he’s the most dichotomous character here I would argue).  Captain Kazan (Telly Savalas) is the ultimate display of Tsarist power, second in stature only to the Count (whom he still treats with sarcastic obeisance), but he is intent of purpose (“the Devil must be afraid of one honest Cossack”).  He also has no compunction about using brute force in order to meet his ends.  He has his men hit Saxton and Wells with their rifles.  He whips Pujardov.  Yet his methods, though cruel, are nevertheless effective.  Clearly, Kazan would never Floccinaucinihilipilificate his own work techniques.

MVT:  I love the story of this film.  It moves along at a nice clip.  It hits just enough sweet spots and turns just enough of its well-worn clichés to make for satisfying viewing.

Make Or Break:  The Make is Savalas’s ranting, scenery-chewing display of histrionics after he boards the express.  It’s a delightful little cherry on top of a sundae loaded with awesomeness.  

Score:  8/10 

The Gorgon (1964)

**I’m afraid there will probably be SPOILERS of some sort in this review.  Sorry about that.**

In the accursed village of Vandorf, dandy artist Bruno (Jeremy Longhurst) sketches his topless paramour Sasha (Toni Gilpin) for a future painting.  After revealing she is pregnant with his child, Bruno, naturally, overreacts and heads off to confront her father who already had a low opinion of the painter in the first place.  Giving chase, Sasha runs into something in the woods which petrifies her.  Bruno is found hanged the next day.  Sasha’s stone body is brought to local Doctor Namaroff (Peter Cushing).  The Gorgon Margera has returned.

There are several interesting things going on in Terence Fisher’s The Gorgon just from the concept on down.  First of all, the Gorgon in question isn’t the infamous Medusa.  It is one of her sisters, Margera.  To my knowledge, though, the three Gorgons were Medusa, Sthenno, and Euryale.  There never was a Margera according to any Greek myths I was able to get a hold of, but I could be wrong in this.  But, by not using Medusa, they keep that portion of Perseus’ myth intact, and they also sort of hint at the idea that the other two had to flee in order to escape destruction (the method of flight also tensing the two siblings’ immortality).  It’s as if they were expanding and extrapolating on the extant fable, and this sort of implied backstory rears up at several points in the film.  Further, it is not an eternal Margera living in Castle Borski, though of the three sisters, Medusa was the only mortal.  It is her spirit which haunts the village.  Further, Margera’s spirit has taken over the body of one of the village people (hopefully not the Cowboy – sorry), so this adds a possession aspect.  To make things even more gonzo, Margera’s spirit is most powerful during a full moon, thus making her a quasi-Were-Gorgon, truly a unique creature.  Why, it’s almost as if the folks at Hammer had a werewolf script with a Dracula plot, but through some insane quirk of fate they just didn’t want to do it, and someone raised their hand at a meeting and said, “How about a Were-Gorgon?”

Of course, this presents us with one of my very favorite themes in film, in case you hadn’t noticed (or haven’t been reading my reviews; for shame), and that is one of duality.  The Gorgon is two people, one evil, one innocent.  Naturally (for anyone who has seen Clash Of The Titans, or, I don’t know, ever read anything), the only safe way to gaze upon Margera is in her reflection, and there is a nice sequence where Paul (Richard Pasco) encounters her and looks at her in a pool of water, a window, and so on.  A brief tangent; Fisher is also careful to not show the monster clearly for the majority of the film, and this is an effective way to hide a rather disappointing makeup.  Fortunately for the filmmaker, though, it also masks her from the audience in such a way as to heighten her menace.  After all, we know what she can do.  It’s right there in the title.  And Fisher and company are protecting us by not showing her directly.  Back to the point; the reflective aspects of the film point out not only Margera’s weakness but also the idea that what is in the mirror is opposite in appearance and nature from what is in front of it.  It’s an interesting way to delineate this Jekyll/Hyde, Leon/Werewolf doublet.  

This also plays on the role of art in the film.  Bruno is a painter, and he is about to create a representation of his ladylove on canvas.  She becomes a literal statue, no longer represented in a medium, but the medium itself.  In the same way that some groups believe that photographs and so on can capture a person’s soul, here art takes your life.  People are transformed into another state of being.  Their corporeal bodies exist, but they are vacant now (presumably).  Thus are they robbed of their identity, a major theme in Horror films for as long as they have existed.  This act of transformation also changes its victims into something hideous, with welts breaking out on their brows, before finally becoming smooth and arguably beautiful, in a very definite final repose.  This mid-stage equates Margera’s victims with her own ugliness.  She gets to “live” with it, though.  

Furthermore, the transformations in the film represent a sort of sexual repression and punishment for defiance of sexual mores (as a great many Hammer films seem to discuss).  People are either lured to their doom by a kind of siren song or run into Margera as a consequence of following their hearts (and consequently their loins).  Even though women can be victims too, predominantly they are men, and that they turn to stone is an interesting metaphor for male turgidity.  The Gorgon in its human form has been in a form of remission (read: repression) for some time, and when the human side begins to fall in love, Margera gains power and begins killing more.  This plays into the horrible past/conspiracy of fear angle of much of the story.  The history of the Gorgon’s human side can be seen as a sexually liberated one (this is tacit, not overtly stated), and it was this promiscuity which brought about the curse of the Gorgon in the first place.  Repression is forced, and the human side’s personality is quashed in order to save lives.  

Fisher’s direction is as solid as it has ever been, and the production design is up to Hammer’s normal high standards.  Naturally, seeing Cushing and Christopher Lee (the DeNiro and Pacino of British cinema) onscreen together is an absolute delight, and Lee’s Meister is a wonderful curmudgeon in opposition to Namaroff’s icy dispassion.  However, the film focuses largely on the romantic Melodrama aspects of its story to the detriment of its Horror aspects.  This also causes the majority of the mid-section of the film to falter in pacing, essentially forming a cinematic spare tire around its gut.  This is despite some of its more outré facets, and this is startling since these outlandish elements are so left-of-field, one would almost think that they could carry a movie on their own.  Disappointingly, they can’t.  The film is still worth seeing, it’s just not top tier Hammer for me in the same way that their more oddball films like The Abominable Snowman or Quatermass and the Pit are.  Perhaps if Nigel Kneale had a hand in this one too, I might feel different.  

MVT:  Cushing takes the honors.  I mean, you really can’t elaborate more on that.  He’s Peter Cushing.  You’re not.

Make Or Break:  After a mildly interesting opening scene, the Make is when Sasha’s body shows up at the hospital.  When her gorgon-ized hand appears from under the white sheet, we know we’re off to the races.  It’s just more like Shetland ponies rather than Thoroughbreds.  

Score: 6.25/10