surman-2

I saw this film in the theater when It came out when I was 11 years old. I'm surprised how much I remember of It after viewing It over 40 years later. The basic premise is if a Norman Bates type character(Roddy Mcdowall) had a Golem to do his bidding. It scared me in 1966 and its great fun to see again. The Golem reminds me of the tree creature in "From Hell It Came", great Saturday matinée movie fun. Roddy McDowall is always fun to watch and would have made a passable Norman Bates. His character in It, Arthur Pimm , Is sometimes crazed, sometimes remorseful, sometimes sad and definitely quite madly insane. The writer/director was also responsible for penning the "Fiend Without A Face", which still holds up as one of the most frightening movies of the 50's.

I just recently read Basil Rathbones' autobiography, and he talked about this version of a Christmas Carol. He didn't think very much about TV in general basically saying it can take great works like Dickens and turn them into mediocrity which pretty much sums up this TV movie. AT less than half an hour you get condensed version of this classic tale, minimal sets and less than than stellar performances. I never expected to ever see this movie but a friend found it in the dollar bin of DVD's in a grocery store. If your a fan of Basil Rathbone or A Chistmas Carol or both like me it is worth a dollar, and a half hour of your time.

Tod Slaughter plays(or over plays) another delightfully evil scoundrel in this British melodrama. The hard drinking and womanizing character Slaughter plays commits one evil act after another while delivering lines like "I`ll feed you`re entrails to the pigs" and "I`ll squeeze the life out of you`re greasy body". He actually gives his mustache a twirl ala Snidely Whiplash who could have been based on him. This is hardly even a B-Picture but its lots of fun.