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The Creative Death sub-sub-genre took flight in the ‘70s with The Omen (1976), as that little imp Damien (and his dad) dispatched the cast in different macabre and entertaining ways. (Variety is the spice, and all that.) The ’78 sequel continued the burgeoning tradition, leading us up to The Legacy (1978) - a film that takes its own stab at variety by marrying The Old Dark House to The Dark Underlord and delivering a fun, wicked (albeit goofy) little offspring.

Released in September in the U.K. (and the following September stateside) by Columbia-emi-Warner (and Universal in the U.S.), The Legacy brought in $11 million against its $2.5 million budget, making it a commercial if not critical success. That this British/American co-production manages to combine their unique aesthetics into something coherent is and of itself some kind of horror miracle.

Maggie (Katharine Ross – The Stepford Wives) and her boyfriend Pete (Sam Elliott – Ghost Rider...

You may not directly recall the name of director Richard Marquand, though in many ways he’s a notable director from the 1980s thanks to items like the pulpy Glenn Close courtroom drama Jagged Edge (1985), and a Ken Follett adaptation Eye of the Needle (1981). Oh, and he happened to helm Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi in 1983. The British director died of a stroke at the age of forty nine, which explains the abrupt end of a flourishing filmography. He made the jump from documentary and television series to feature with the forgotten 1978 British horror film The Legacy, which starred notable American stars (and real life couple) Katharine Ross and Sam Elliott. Based on a story by Jimmy Sangster, a writer of many Hammer Studio films, the screenplay was also co-written by Patrick Tilley (his last credit) and Paul Wheeler (who would exclusively work in television afterwards). The...