Film Reviews by NP

French director Jean Rollin tries his hand at a David Cronenberg-type horror/thriller set, for the most part, inside a massive clinic, wherein the patients are all suffering from some sort of mental relapse where they remember nothing about themselves. The idea of an ordered society collapsing into chaos puts me in mind of JG Ballard’s ‘High Rise’ story.

Here is an environment where just about every awkward and uncomfortable bout of spontaneous sex results in graphic death, giving us the chance to witness more nudity than usual for a Rollin film, and moments of genuine shock/gore.

After a strong beginning, the film becomes a series of events featuring characters we don’t ever get to know, which causes the action to drag without the audience being allowed to care aboutwhat is happening. Elizabeth, who has escaped only to be recaptured, is pursued by Robert, who initially discovered her (and her friend Veronique) wandering along a country road in the beginning of the story. In turn, they are pursued by the clinic’s officials.

“I want them alive,” one of the guards shouts to his three men, as they fire several bullets at them. Like ‘Killing Car’, this is an environment where just about everyone has a gun.

It’s a story that offers little hope for the characters. Those who don’t end up dead have their minds wiped once again (the female vocal music that sweeps in at moments of intensity is illusory and highly effective). The Government are behind events, unsurprisingly, and hope to cover up the experiments to avoid a scandal.

The outside views of the tower blocks and various areas of Parisian industry, shot in characteristically cold colours suggesting dawn or twilight shoots, are often accompanied by (what I suspect to be) chill wind sound effects and prove that once again, Rollin is a master at creating unsettling atmospherics in familiar looking places. The finale, with Elizabeth and Robert slowly walking away, hand in hand, high above a landscape of tower-blocks and industria, is a typical example of understated Rollin beauty. A deceptively simple viewpoint it made haunting and plaintive. With the film’s preoccupation with indoor locations, impressive and austere though they are, we are robbed of much in the way of such poignant imagery, which is why ‘The Night of the Hunted’ is not my favourite Rollin film (although it possesses a nicely unsettling atmosphere throughout) . Pornographic actress Brigitte Lahie acquits herself very well with the demanding role of Elizabeth, but again, her pouting good looks rarely fail to remind me she is acting; she doesn’t quite possess the natural unearthly lure of Le Masque de la Méduse’s Marlène Delcambre, Little Orphan Vampire Isabelle Teboul or the Castel twins.

This is adapted from the story by HG Wells in 1896, which was famously filmed as ‘The Island of Lost Souls’ in 1932, concerning animal/human hybrids.

Initially, Douglas’s (David Thewlis) disrespectful comments about Moreau’s cross-bred children, whilst in their presence, grinds alongside their exemplary manners. Indeed, the agent is told there is not one note of malice in them. However, it soon becomes obvious that Moreau’s control over them is far from humane, and the good doctor is – not that there was ever much doubt – insane.

Marlon Brando wrestles with an upper-crust British accent and some outsized false teeth. The accent is perfect, the prosthetics less so, rendering occasional moments of dialogue incomprehensible. His performance though, is terrific. Dangerous and a lot of fun. From his first appearance, draped in white, outsized sunglasses and a full face smothered in white ‘sunblock’, he is delightfully bizarre.

The film loses something when Brando’s presence is removed, and events become a bit of a jumble. Val Kilmer’s Montgomery, who takes Moreau’s place, is good, but he’s no Marlon Brando.

Ultimately, ‘The Island of Doctor Moreau’ is a thoroughly enjoyable film. David Thewlis (who joined the film after shooting had started, replacing another actor) initially seems miscast as Douglas, but he soon proves himself as the talented actor he is. The same can be said for the various hybrids, most of who really take advantage of the excellent make-up jobs and imbue them with tangible emotion which would be lost if everything was achieved with CGI.

It is difficult to ignore the critical mauling the film received, due in part to a series of unfortunate occurrences behind the scenes. Viewed almost 20 years after its release – and I speak as someone yet to see the original Charles Laughton version, so therefore have no other film to compare this to – I found it hugely enjoyable.

Due to unexpected popularity (which caused round-the-block queues) of the original ‘Dracula’ and ‘Frankenstein’ re-screenings, Universal at last lifted their curfew on horror pictures with this hugely budgeted, star-studded sequel to the mighty ‘Bride of Frankenstein.’

Alongside Basil Rathbone’s ambitious Baron Wolf Von Frankenstein, the viewer is literally transported from the real world into a vast, rain-lashed and unforgiving removed reality of horror via a train journey that really does traverse from one to the other very effectively. The town (now also called ‘Frankenstein’) is populated by those who want nothing to do with the new Baron, his wife, or his mop-headed, curiously Texan-sounding son Peter (played by future voice artist for Bambi, Donnie Dunagan). Understandably, they remember well the chaos brought about by Henry Frankenstein’s creation, or more accurately, their own townsfolk’s brutal treatment of him.

Rathbone is brilliant in this, transforming from impetuous family man to hysterical ‘mad doctor’ with great skill. Bela Lugosi plays Ygor in one of his greatest performances, a part that was strengthened in order to give Lugosi a greater share of the action. Lionel Atwill, enjoyable in any part, gets probably his best role – that of Inspector Krogh, the wooden armed Police Inspector determined to protect both Wolf’s family and the townsfolk.

The sets are huge and expressionist, casting great shadows and rising imperiously above the tremendous cast, and the music used here would crop up again and again in future, less well-funded Universal horrors and mysteries.

So why does this film seem slightly disappointing to me?

Even after all this time, I still cannot answer that. Could it be that Peter, such an integral part, is entrusted to a four year old? Dunagan is a terrific performer for his age, but perhaps if the role was given to someone slightly older, they could invest it with just a hint of gravitas. Could it be that a thicker, jowlier Boris Karloff is given a strange sheepskin vest (presumably by friend Ygor, who upstages him regularly) and given no scenes of sympathy as he was so effectively in earlier films? Could it be that the film is just slightly overlong, and suffered from an unfinished script at the time of filming, which as a result, means that it plods – rather like the monster – in places?

I don’t know why I’m less than satisfied by this. Maybe it is because it follows what I consider the greatest film of all time? There’s no doubt that so many elements are excellent here, and this clearly is one of the last Universal horrors to benefit from a generous budget (indeed it was their final ‘A’ production for a Frankenstein film).

‘Treehouse’ starts off in an intriguing manner with the very young looking Elizabeth (Dana Melanie) coming home to find her young brother ‘little Bob’ missing after, bizarrely, being left in the family house alone.

Two brothers, the bullied Killian (J. Michael Trautmann) and wholesome Crawford (Daniel Fredrick) discover Elizabeth trapped in a treehouse, before Crawford disappears (he appears to be one of several figures hung from the tree in probably the film’s most effective sequence) and the two youngsters then have to fend for themselves.

What happens next is a jumble of flashbacks and tantalising glimpses of what appears to be a creature in the distance. The creature turns out to be one of three hillbillies who seem intent on killing the two juveniles.

There were some sound problems (loud music and quiet dialogue), but ‘Treehouse’ has been shot and directed very well, much of the action appearing to take place in crisp early morning sunlight which helps give the woodland setting a stark, uncomfortable look. The acting too, is very good until the very end when the two surviving leads are required to be hardened and detached by events, ready to take on the world – which is asking too much and fails to convince.

This is an effective, mildly graphic shocker of the ‘Jeeper Creepers’ variety where a selection of teens get themselves involved in the eerie ritualistic machinations of animated scarecrows eager to recruit more innocents to become like them. There is no CGI, the scarecrows are physical, solid creatures, and as such, provide a tangible and frightening threat.

The location is beautifully shot and lit. The use of colour is especially worthy of note. The cornfield and decrepit farmhouse nearby provide a wonderfully creepy location for many of the events.

The teens are a formulaic bunch. Johnny, the one who goes missing; Brian, the square jawed hero; Chris, the untrustworthy one; Scott, the one in glasses (he seems empathetic and witnesses an insight into the ‘scarecrows’ past), while talented Australian actress Tammin Sursok has the thankless role of Natalie,‘the girlfriend’. And that is where I find this film lacking. Directly below this review is a film called ‘Beckoning the Butcher’; in it, we get to know the leads well, they are rounded characters. They laugh, joke and argue with each other. There are no jokes in this film – just posturing performers with whom we only sympathise when they begin dying. That isn’t to specifically knock ‘Husk’, which is an extremely well made and well-paced film – but just how more involving (and scary) would it have been for audience if they were actually invited to be invested in the main characters?

It is very effective, throughout much of the film, that the ongoing pattern of the spirit’s plan continues relentless, no matter what our heroes try to do. One by one they are strung up and killed, become infected by the ‘curse’ and, zombie-like, lurch towards the upstairs farmhouse room to fashion themselves a new scarecrow mask. It is through the mask that their possession is complete. When that is removed, their spirit then animates another in the ever increasing army.

The ending is as open-ended as any can be, and provides a real punch-the-air moment. It seems Chris is on the verge of rescue by two passers-by, even though another scarecrow is lurking in the foliage nearby. Fade to black.

‘In my big glass palace, the sun shines freely

And at night the pale moon shines its soft light

Princess, my beloved princess, a kind gentleman said to me,

Your face is a cameo, with your beautiful dewy eyes.’

This is French film director Jean Rollin’s first feature film. It was released at a time of local political unrest, and was one of only a few films available. As such, it drew large audiences who were often angry and scathing at the unconventional nature of the story-telling.

A lot of the back-story is initially conveyed by narration. The four sisters who are convinced they are vampires are suitably seductive and other-worldly, and the three who travel from Paris to ‘cure’ them of their perceived illness are, by contrast, very ordinary. No professional actors were used for budgetary reasons.

Typical Rollin flourishes are here from the outset: it takes less than three minutes for a young topless girl to be seduced, for example. In a scene where the character of Brigitte is stumbling across an open field, there are glimpses of the real world – society, industry – in the distance, but always out of reach, always on the periphery. The events are firmly rooted in a heightened reality, cocooned almost by the unreality of the world of the vampires. This is a theme prevalent in many Rollin pictures.

Denying a Rollin film colour is stripping it of one of his most defining hallmarks, but monochrome nevertheless gives his usual flair for imagery starker, more desolate tones far removed from the comparative ‘comfort’ of his love for rich palettes. The dilapidated buildings look colder, the skeleton trees in the woodland look starker.

It isn’t until act two (the film was originally intended to be a short, before but another chapter was added so that it could be released as a full-length film) that we see the first glimpses of ‘Rollin beach’ (Pourville-lès-Dieppe) which would feature in many future productions. It is this location in particular that Rollin favoured as it left a haunting impression on him as a child, and that eagerness to lend a child’s view impression on his projects is what makes them so appealing to fans of ‘personal’ films. The filming here always takes place in the cold months, under grey, heavy skies – in black and white, it looks very barren indeed. A perfect location for the arrival of the vampire queen (Jacqueline Sieger). Sieger’s acting is very theatrical, but there is no denying she brings an extreme and exotic nature to her character that sets her apart from the others.

The chaotic jazzy/violin soundtrack is used to both work for and against the unsettling mood: ‘against’ because it seems so inappropriate, and ‘for’ because that very jarring quality makes even straightforward scenes unnerving.

The vampire fangs are achieved more successfully here than in probably any other Rollin film. More subtle than usual, they are located on the teeth outside the incisors.

The titles of the two chapters are ‘The Rape of the Vampire’ and ‘The Vampire Woman/Queen of the Vampires’.

To me, an out-of-season sea-front is an ideal place for horror stories. Ever since MR James’ ‘Oh, Whistle, And I'll Come To You, My Lad’ perceived such a location as an isolated, ghostly, shunned arena for supernatural phenomena, it has amazed me the location hasn’t been utilised a lot more within this genre.

‘Sleeping Room’ makes excellent use of Brighton sea-front for such a premise, for both interiors and exteriors. The retro tackiness of some of the décor in various rooms conveys a nice suggestion of timelessness into which this somewhat standard story is set.

Of the cast, Joseph Beattie as Bill really impresses, transforming from being shy and slightly awkward, into a ‘The Shining’-style lunatic with great skill. Sadly, there is an occasionally lacklustre performance from scratchy voiced Leila Mimmack as Blue, who nevertheless comes to life in moments of tension. Julie Graham, David Sibley and Chris Waller provide excellent support.

The secret room in Bill’s new apartment carries ghostly remembrances of ‘Frisky’ Fiskin, a terrifying perverted murderer. It’s a fairly routine story given extra flourish by the director. It rushes through the events somewhat, leaving little time to dwell on the threat – especially during the climactic events.

This is almost an excellent film, but you have to work to understand what is going on.

A family is devastated by the apparent suicide of the son, with the mother Helen (Carolyn Hauck) in particular, making it a personal mission to get to the truth. The acting in this low-budget project is mostly top notch – in Hauck’s case, possibly too good; her obsession pushes her into very obvious insanity that wouldn’t go unnoticed by those she comes into contact with. It goes beyond ‘tell her she’s mad, dad’ and would surely lead to steps being taken to secure proper care for her – but she’s right, of course, to an extent, although the director fills the narrative with so many sped-up shots, blurred images, flashbacks and other effects that occasionally events become incomprehensible. Whilst this is a good way of conveying how Helen (who to me, has a smattering of Sigourney Weaver about her) now sees the world, it can leave the viewer confused. As a result, often the ‘quieter’ moments are most effective.

Suthi Picotte as daughter Kate is also very good in a cast who actually appear to be more concerned with acting than posturing, which can be one of the pitfalls of many modern horror/dramas.

There are many films I’ve thoroughly enjoyed, but it is doubtful I’ll visit them again. This deserves more than one airing however, to enjoy again events packed into the fast moving runtime, and also to see many things undoubtedly missed out on.

For a big lad, Big Foot is very adept at killing people whilst keeping himself out of sight. We don’t get to see him for a while, and when we do, we are given tantalising shots of silhouettes and various limbs speeding past.

At first, the tone of Savage seems to be somewhat tongue-in-cheek, with knowing performances from some of the cast. As time goes on, either the tone gets a little darker or I became used to some of the flippant moments. Either way, as the death toll mounts, we are effortlessly invited into darker waters (speaking of which, a solitary eye floating in the river is a moment that provides a perfect mixture of shock and mirth).

For a horror film, this isn’t going satisfy everyone, although there are some moments of gore and some tension, even if it is difficult to sustain an atmosphere of terror in blazing sunlight. For a low budget project, setting the action amidst forest fires is ambitious (the resultant fires don’t look like they need much controlling), but having those fires disturb the habitat of Bigfoot is an interesting plot device.

The Dark Hour is a Spanish film which explores an unknown dystopian society.

It’s a risk featuring a child actor in a dominant role in a film; the child’s acting maybe be adequate but not convince, or worse, he can produce a precocious, obnoxious performance which can lose the character sympathy. Luckily, Omar Muñoz is both convincing and appealing, which is refreshing, especially as his character Jesus is written as a mischievous scamp.

Jesus could be seen as the eyes of the viewer. He lives with a group of what appear to be survivors of a holocaust which may or may not have wiped out the rest of mankind. Their world is a sealed bunker of sorts. It seems to be infiltrated by ghost-like mutants, necessitating regular curfew. The relationships between the others is nicely outlined by Jesus, who seems intent to record a video-diary – however, this is not a found footage film, for reasons that become clear at the story’s end.

The bleak setting is beautifully conveyed, however the lack of apparent answers until the very end leads to the story dragging a little occasionally. The carefully built-up atmosphere is stiflingly grim, and there is a genuine sense of hope when the remaining characters manage to escape the bunker … or do they?

I won’t give away the final twist, which is tremendous and haunting. There are elements of zombie films here, although I would cautiously suggest this is better than most. It branches out into sci-fi territory, but is assuredly a claustrophobic horror film.

Don’t be put off by the ‘cheeky’ packaging. It features a hooded figure that could be Michael Myers (and who doesn’t appear in the film) and the ‘Halloween’ part of the title is highlighted in a familiar font. But this is nothing to do with any ‘Halloween’ series – it was originally called ‘Hayride’ and then ‘Pitchfork Murders’ before settling on its current derivative title.

Colours are quite garish, unusually for a horror – making the grass look grassier, the (CGI) rain look rainier and the blood look bloodier! Then the cutesy young couple show up making fun of creepy local superstitions. They are not obnoxious in the way teens are often portrayed as being, but as their bland, squeaky exposition continues, I look forward to the prospect of the stocky escaped ‘bat shit crazy’ killer coming for them – although as events roll on, their inoffensive simplicity is probably the most consistent thing about this story.

The Halloween Hayride takes place at the same time as the legendry killer appears to be on a killing spree. So while the young people are having a great time scaring each other, nearby a couple of policemen stumble upon a number of the killer’s victims. Do they warn the youngsters about what is happening? Not at all. This is a curious lack of logic that makes it difficult to retain interest in the goings-on.

The twist is that the person we think is the killer actually isn’t, and the heroine decides that the moment of their assailant’s death is the time to announce she is pregnant. Cue a post credits scene that reveals the killer isn’t dead after all.

Low budget films can be incredibly good. They belie a lack of resources by being unconstrained by the limitations imposed by big studios and money-men. But when the main purpose appears to be the intention of making a horror-by-numbers that has been done many times before in the last 25 years, it’s confounding.

I suppose it’s a bid to assure the teen audience that horror is ‘cool’, but there seems to be an unwritten rule that films of this genre often have to feature a soundtrack made up of ‘college rock’ music. This faux-aggressive accompaniment is one of the first things we hear in ‘The Pack’, but thankfully it is just to let us know the sole heroine Charlotte (Emilie Dequenne) is dark and dangerous. The young man she gets to know Max (Benjamin Biolay) bears an uncanny resemblance to Gollum actor Andy Serkis.

Before too long, Charlotte has been customarily tortured, fed and bled and offered up as a sacrifice to some horrifying, sightless, hairless creatures in boiler-suits, that dwell underground. “I think she’ll hold out,” muses Le Spack (Yolande Moreau), the mother of the Texas Chainsaw-style family responsible for events.

And that’s what the films turns out to be, ultimately. A kind of French mash-up of ‘Chainsaw Massacre’/’Wrong Turn’ (there’s even some hillbilly banjo music towards the end). The nature of the sightless creatures is enigmatic (miners who ‘dug too far’ underground), and the group of comedy bikers who attempt to save the day are simply … odd.

Ultimately, ‘The Pack’ is a little disappointing after an intriguing start. It has an illogical ending and features characters with very inconsistent motives. It is, nevertheless, stunning to look at; the locations are very atmospherically shot and drive home a constant sense of grim, cold isolation.

A skimpily dressed blond hitching a lift alone, a group of gangsters headed by hard-man Vinnie Jones and the insane survivor of an electric chair execution. What could possibly go wrong?

This pleasingly intriguing set-up keeps us guessing. At first we fear for the safety of young Natalie (Shayla Beesley) as she climbs into cars with strangers; then we feel sorry for those behind the wheel as she turns out to be something of a highway robber; then we realise she is robbing these people to get money for an operation for her deathly ill mother.

Coincidences run strongly here. Two of those she has robbed happen to be in league, not only with each other but also with Jones’ hard-as-nails gangster Rob. Of all the characters, possibly the most likeable is Danny Trejo’s Jack. When a drug-dealer is comparatively sympathetic, it shows how refreshingly flawed the rest of the ensemble is.

Sadly, the second half of the film suffers from disappointingly executed (no pun intended) deaths and a plot tied up too hastily. Also, The Reaper just isn’t very frightening. The ever-present sparks that announce his presence merely serve to obscure him and his evil-doings. He appears to have assumed the role of an avenging angel, and the sole proprietor of the hotel (who is too much of a seedy caricature to take seriously) where it all happens, is in league with him.

Hammer films were grinding to a halt by the time this film was released. Even James Carreras admitted ‘we can’t go on remaking Dracula every year.’ And yet it seemed Dracula was still Hammer’s most well-regarded monster/villain. As ‘Brides of Dracula’ had proven over ten years earlier, Christopher Lee wasn’t essential to the success of such a venture, and so John Forbes-Robertson played The Count (briefly) in what was tagged as ‘The First Kung Fu Horror Spectacular’.

Whilst not exactly living upto the hype, the film (also known as ‘The Seven Brothers Meet Dracula’ and ‘The Seven Brothers and Their One Sister Meet Dracula’) isn’t as bad as its reputation sometimes suggests.

Despite the familiar Hammer music by James Bernard, and the inclusion of Peter Cushing as Van Helsing, the atmosphere is markedly different from the opening shot, as the lone Shaman Kah makes his way to Castle Dracula. Once inside, he meets Forbes-Robertson’s Count(dubbed by David de Keyser – which makes one question why cast Robertson if he is to be so heavily bewigged, made-up and dubbed). The effective scene is powerful, and ends with Dracula assuming Kah’s physical appearance, allowing him to escape the castle, which appears to have become his prison.

From then on, any attempt at character is quickly glossed over, at best. We’re familiar with Van Helsing, of course – his son Leyland (Robin Stewart), Hsi Ching (David Chang) and wealthy widow Vanessa Buren (Julie Ege) are given the most cursory of introductions, but still fair better than Ching’s brothers and one sister. However, this is perhaps the point – the characters are merely ciphers, relentless participants in the many kung-fu exchanges with the vampires. These vampires look very effective en masse. Roy Ward Baker directs some supremely creepy scenes of them rising from graves, hands and skull-like faces emerging from the dried soil, and there is a true nightmare ambience as they make their way through the night – on horseback, marching, or in some cases hopping in the style of the Chinese jiangshi reanimated corpses. In close-up, however, their somewhat tatty design becomes apparent.

The picture ends with Cushing facing Kah alone and chiding him to reveal his true face. In the resulting slo-mo transformation, there is a moment where Forbes-Robertson looks exactly like Christopher Lee – which answers my earlier question of his casting. Before a hoped-for exchange has really begun, Dracula appears to leap onto Van Helsing’s upturned spear, destroying him once and for all via some unusually rubbery decomposition effects.

Milton Subotsky, who first pitched the idea of remaking Frankenstein and Dracula to Hammer films, was the man behind Amicus productions, who became Hammer’s main rivals during the 60’s and 70’s – occasionally eclipsing the success of the larger company.

Amicus made many anthology films whereby three or four short stories would be cradled by a framing device. For ‘Beyond the Grave’ (one of the better portmanteau productions), Peter Cushing plays a curious accented seedy antique shop proprietor. Each item he sells or is stolen has a story of its own …

The magnificent David Warner buys a mirror with demonic properties. The way his life is taken over by this magical object is very well conveyed, an inexorable slide into seediness and blood - plenty of blood.

The next story features an incredible cast. Donald and daughter Angela Pleasance, Ian Bannen and Diana Dors conspire to create a weird, unworldly atmosphere about repression, hatred, failure and ultimately revenge.

Story three is comedic and has Ian Carmichael as the victim of an ‘Elemental’ which he hopes will be banished by dotty witch Margaret Leighton.

Finally, Ian Ogilvy buys a door that leads into another, horrific dimension. It bears too many similarities to the David Warner tale to provide a satisfying finale in its own right.

Apart from story three, I would say that all tales are let down by their respective endings. Often, the carefully constructed build-up of atmosphere and dread is completely undone by the obligatory ‘twist’ which renders events ridiculous. The story featuring Donald Pleasance and his daughter as a truly sinister duo is trounced, for example, by the revelation, that they are professional problem solvers.

The framing narrative comes to end with a prospective thief (Ben Howard) wishing he had picked another shop to rob when Cushing’s unnamed proprietor causes his demise. Clearly, the shop owner is more than human.