KISS OF THE VAMPIRE: REVIEW AND GALLERY : HAMMER FILMS

PRODUCTION:

Director – Don Sharp, Screenplay – John Elder [Anthony Hinds], Producer – Anthony Hinds, Photography – Alan Hume, Music – James Bernard, Special Effects – Les Bowie, Makeup – Roy Ashton, Production Design – Bernard Robinson. Production Company – Hammer films. UK 1962

CAST:

Edward de Souza (Gerald Harcourt), Jennifer Daniel (Marianne Harcourt), Clifford Evans (Professor Zimmer), Noel Willman (Dr Ravna), Barry Warren (Carl Ravna), Jacqui Wallis (Sabena), Isobel Black (Tania), Peter Maddern (Bruno), Noel Howlett (Father Xavier)

SYNOPSIS:

The early part of the century. Gerald Harcourt and his newlywed wife Marianne are passing through Bavaria on their honeymoon when their car breaks down. They seek refuge in the local village where the locals seem very superstitious and fearful. They are befriended by the wealthy and charming Dr Ravna who invites them to a masque at the Chateau Ravna. Gerald passes out drunk and when he wakes in the morning he finds that Marianne is missing. Both Ravna and the entire village deny any trace of her existence. The only person who will help him is the embittered Professor Zimmer and so Gerald bands together with him to rescue Marianne from being claimed by Ravna’s vampire coven.

COMMENTARY:
Kiss of the Vampire is one of the more interesting vampire films to come out of Hammer Films during the 1960s. It was made in the period after Hammer had had their huge initial international success with Dracula/The Horror of Dracula (1958). For several years after that, Christopher Lee refused to return to the part of Dracula, determining to establish himself as a serious actor first. The period saw The Brides of Dracula (1960), which tried to be a Dracula film without having Christopher Lee or any Dracula present.

Kiss of the Vampire interestingly enough had begun life as another tentative Christopher Lee-less Dracula film. Hammer then decided to make it an original film that would not be dependent on such a notable absence at its center and such connections were written out.

Kiss of the Vampire is an interesting effort. It has been aptly called a vampire version of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Lady Vanishes (1938) – a film that Hammer later directly remade in 1979. Producer Anthony Hinds sets up a fair and reasonable script, better than most of the later Dracula sequels. The focus is not so much the hardly interesting married couple but the two opposing figures of good and evil fighting on either side of the film – Noel Willman who plays the vampire with glacial stolidity but alas lacks any real charismatic presence, and Clifford Evans who plays the vampire hunter with a brooding harshness. Kiss of the Vampire also comes filled with several other intriguing performances packed around the sides, most notably from Barry Warren as Ravna’s very weird son and Barbara Steele-lookalike Isobel Black as the innkeeper’s vampirised daughter who one wishes had been given more screen time.

Don Sharp’s handling sometimes falters but he is aided considerably by the sumptuous production values of all early Hammer films, which buoy the film up, most notably during the beautifully staged masque sequence. [The masque scenes were later wittily parodied in Roman Polanski’s The Fearless Vampire Killers/Dance of the Vampires (1967)]. There is an unusual climax featuring hordes of attacking vampire bats (a sequence that had originally been intended as the climax of The Brides of Dracula), which falters slightly through merely adequate effects.

Kiss of the Vampire was the genre debut of Australian-born Don Sharp who later became a regular director within the British horror industry making the likes of Witchcraft (1964), Curse of the Fly (1965), the first two of the Christopher Lee Fu Manchu series The Face of Fu Manchu (1965) and The Brides of Fu Manchu (1966), Hammer’s Rasputin The Mad Monk (1966), the period sf comedy Jules Verne’s Rocket to the Moon/Those Fantastic Flying Fools/Blast Off (1967), the psycho-thriller Dark Places (1972), the undead biker film Psychomania (1973) and the lost world film Secrets of the Phantom Caverns/What Waits Below (1984).

Kiss of the Vampire exists in two different versions, the original cinematic and video release. Kiss of Evil is a cut version for tv, which adds additional scenes taken from Hammer’s The Evil of Frankenstein (1964).

REVIEW:Richard Scheib  Here

WIN DONALD FEARNEY'S 'THE LEGEND OF HAMMER VAMPIRES' DVD TODAY!

A heads up to our competition TODAY! Five copies of Donald Fearney's 'The Legend of Hammer Vampires' dvd documentary up for grabs. The competition will be posted at our UK Peter Cushing Appreciation Society Facebook Fan Page from 6.30 pm gmt (12.30 pacific time) TODAY. Competition closes tomorrow Sunday 19th  January 2014. - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.bGGCiIGA.dpuf

 

Here's a heads up to a competition that's staring up on The UK Peter Cushing Appreciation Society Facebook Fan Page TODAY! There's FIVE copies of Donald Fearney's superb and rare 'The Legend of Hammer Vampires' dvd documentary up for grabs.The competition goes up tonight and is only open until tomorrow evening 11.00pm gmt (5.00pm pacific time) So, get yourself along, enter the competition and maybe bag yourself a copy of the dvd that has to be the best documentary on Hammer films vampire movies for sure!

A heads up to our competition TODAY! Five copies of Donald Fearney's 'The Legend of Hammer Vampires' dvd documentary up for grabs. The competition will be posted at our UK Peter Cushing Appreciation Society Facebook Fan Page from 6.30 pm gmt (12.30 pacific time) TODAY. Competition closes tomorrow Sunday 19th  January 2014. - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.bGGCiIGA.dpuf

A heads up to our competition TODAY! Five copies of Donald Fearney's 'The Legend of Hammer Vampires' dvd documentary up for grabs. The competition will be posted at our UK Peter Cushing Appreciation Society Facebook Fan Page from 6.30 pm gmt (12.30 pacific time) TODAY. Competition closes tomorrow Sunday 19th  January 2014. - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.bGGCiIGA.dpuf

UK Peter Cushing Appreciation Society Facebook Fan Page from 6.30 pm gmt (12.30 pacific time) TODAY. - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.bGGCiIGA.dpufFive copies of Donald Fearney's 'The Legend of Hammer Vampires' dvd documentary up for grabs. How you can win them, find out tomorrow!

A heads up to our competition TODAY! Five copies of Donald Fearney's 'The Legend of Hammer Vampires' dvd documentary up for grabs. The competition will be posted at our UK Peter Cushing Appreciation Society Facebook Fan Page from 6.30 pm gmt (12.30 pacific time) TODAY. Competition closes tomorrow Sunday 19th  January 2014. - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.bGGCiIGA.dpuf

'MASTER BUILDER' THE HAMMER HOUSE HINDS THAT HINDS BUILT

Hammer Film fans across the globe were saddened yesterday by the news that Anthony Hinds had passed away at the grand age of 91.  Hinds is seldom discussed as much as Peter Cushing.  Or Christopher Lee.  Or Terence Fisher.  Or Jimmy Sangster.  Or Jack Asher.  Or Bernard Robinson. But the fact remains, it was Hinds who assembled these gifted men, thus creating “Hammer Horror.”

Hinds was born in Middlesex, England, on September 19^th, 1922.  After a stint in the Royal Air Force, he accepted an invitation from his father, Will Hammer, to come and join the ranks at Exclusive Films.  In 1948, he produced his first picture, a modest potboiler named Who Killed Van Loon?.  Hinds displayed an ability to bring his films in on time and on budget and also showed a genuine concern for quality, which was something of a rare quality for men in his position in the lower echelons of British film production.  In 1954, Hinds produced The Quatermass Xperiment – in essence the first of Hammer (as the studio had by then been rechristened) Films’ major commercial successes.  A tight, well-paced adaptation of a hit TV serial by Nigel Kneale, the film disappointed its original writer, but proved to be a hit with audiences.  The film’s success prompted Hinds to push his friends and coworkers at the studio to develop an idea for a follow-up in a similar style.  Production manager Jimmy Sangster won the friendly competition by suggesting a story of radioactive mud which has undesirable effects on those who come into contact with it, and Sangster was then catapulted into a new career as a writer; Sangster always remembered Hinds for having the faith in him to allow him to write his first screenplay.  The success of these early black and white sci-fi/horror hybrids eventually lead Hammer, and Anthony Hinds, into a new direction…

American writer/producer Milton Subotsky approached Hinds with the idea of remaking James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931), but Hinds wasn’t exactly wild about the idea.  After considering his options, however, Hinds decided that a brand new approach to the Mary Shelley novel might prove rewarding – and he proceeded to assemble an ace team of artisans and technicians to make the picture.  It was Hinds who also decided to push for filming in color – a costly addition, in a sense, but one which the producer wisely realized would pay off in dividends.  The end result, The Curse of Frankenstein, would prove to be a watershed “event” in the evolution of the horror genre.  With its deceptively rich production values and then-scandalous dashes of blood and gore, the film would go on to become a box office triumph, revitalizing the popularity of Gothic horror films at the box office and putting Hammer on the map as a major player in the UK film production scene.  Hinds decided to reassemble the same team – director Terence Fisher, screenwriter Jimmy Sangster, cinematographer Jack Asher, production designer Bernard Robinson, composer James Bernard, and stars Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee – for Dracula (1958), and the resulting film was met with critical consternation and tremendous box office numbers.  From this point on, Hammer was, as the saying goes, a force to be reckoned with.

Quite apart from being savvy enough to assemble the people who made these films so special, Hinds was also a rare producer who had genuine passion for film.  He took pride in his work, and expected others to do the same.  Hinds was by all accounts a humble, laid back individual – not exactly the kind of cigar chomping “mover and groover” one normally associates with producers.  His thoughtful disposition prompted him to push his collaborators to take their work seriously.  He knew the value of a pound, and saw to it that the films he produced were executed with a glossy veneer which hid their humble origins.  It was an attitude that he did his best to implement on every picture he ever produced.

In time, Hinds branched out yet again, this time becoming a screenwriter.  The story goes that Hammer’s planned historical epic, The Rape of Sabena, fell afoul of the British Board of Film Censors (BBFC), thus leaving Hinds in a bit of a predicament.  He had already authorized Bernard Robinson to build some imposing “Spanish” sets, and now that this particular property was dead in the water, he had to find a way to utilize these sets.  Hinds turned his attention to Guy Endore’s novel The Werewolf of Paris – realizing that Hammer had yet to make their own werewolf film, he decided to change the setting from Paris to Spain, thus enabling the studio to make use of these troublesome sets.  Looking to save a buck, Hinds elected to write the script himself – and he found that he preferred the process of creating scenarios to dealing with the bureaucratic nightmares associated with producing.  Hinds would continue to produce throughout the better part of the 1960s, but when he found himself working “under” American producer Joan Harrison on Hammer’s ill-fated venture into anthology television, Journey into the Unknown, he decided to call it a day.  Hinds would later recall working with Harrison (or as often was the case, being at loggerheads with her) on this problematic production to be a dispiriting affair which he was in no great hurry to relive.  And thus it came to be that producer/writer Anthony Hinds became “plain old” writer Anthony Hinds… or John Elder, as the self-effacing scribe decided that having his name plastered all over the credits might look a bit conceited.  As a writer, Hinds’ credits include Kiss of the Vampire (1962), Phantom of the Opera (1962), The Reptile (1966), Frankenstein Created Woman (1966), Taste the Blood of Dracula (1969), and Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1972).  He eventually left Hammer for a time, going to work for rival company Tyburn Productions.  For them, he scripted The Ghoul and Legend of the Werewolf in 1974.  His final credits would include an episode of Hammer House of Horror, titled Visitor from the Grave, and a “story by” credit on Tyburn’s made for TV Sherlock Holmes adventure, The Masks of Death (1984), starring Peter Cushing and John Mills.

Hinds went into retirement in the 80s, granting the occasional interview, but basically content to enjoy his “golden years” on his own terms.  A quiet, humble and unpretentious individual, he reacted with genuine surprise (and pride) when his many classic Hammer productions were dredged up and celebrated as classics of their kind.  True to form, Hinds never seemed to take himself too seriously – but his passion for the work itself was obvious.  With his passing on September 30^th (a mere 11 days after his birthday), the key architect of Hammer horror passed to the great beyond.  Indeed, of the key creative personnel who created this world that we fans know and revere so much, only one remains standing: Christopher Lee, himself a mere four months Hinds’ senior.  Hinds’ passing may not signal the end of an era, but it does put one in a reflective mood as we look back and celebrate the many wonderful achievements of one of the British film industry’s unsung treasures.

Troy Howarth

Hammer Film fans across the globe were saddened yesterday by the news that Anthony Hinds had passed away at the grand age of 91.  Hinds is seldom discussed as much as Peter Cushing.  Or Christopher Lee.  Or Terence Fisher.  Or Jimmy Sangster.  Or Jack Asher.  Or Bernard Robinson. But the fact remains, it was Hinds who assembled these gifted men, thus creating “Hammer Horror.” - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.ApafMCzc.dpuf

Hammer Film fans across the globe were saddened yesterday by the news that Anthony Hinds had passed away at the grand age of 91.  Hinds is seldom discussed as much as Peter Cushing.  Or Christopher Lee.  Or Terence Fisher.  Or Jimmy Sangster.  Or Jack Asher.  Or Bernard Robinson. But the fact remains, it was Hinds who assembled these gifted men, thus creating “Hammer Horror.” - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.ApafMCzc.dpuf

Hammer Film fans across the globe were saddened yesterday by the news that Anthony Hinds had passed away at the grand age of 91.  Hinds is seldom discussed as much as Peter Cushing.  Or Christopher Lee.  Or Terence Fisher.  Or Jimmy Sangster.  Or Jack Asher.  Or Bernard Robinson. But the fact remains, it was Hinds who assembled these gifted men, thus creating “Hammer Horror.” - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.ApafMCzc.dpuf

Hammer Film fans across the globe were saddened yesterday by the news that Anthony Hinds had passed away at the grand age of 91.  Hinds is seldom discussed as much as Peter Cushing.  Or Christopher Lee.  Or Terence Fisher.  Or Jimmy Sangster.  Or Jack Asher.  Or Bernard Robinson. But the fact remains, it was Hinds who assembled these gifted men, thus creating “Hammer Horror.” - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.ApafMCzc.dpuf

Hammer Film fans across the globe were saddened yesterday by the news that Anthony Hinds had passed away at the grand age of 91.  Hinds is seldom discussed as much as Peter Cushing.  Or Christopher Lee.  Or Terence Fisher.  Or Jimmy Sangster.  Or Jack Asher.  Or Bernard Robinson. But the fact remains, it was Hinds who assembled these gifted men, thus creating “Hammer Horror.” - See more at: http://petercushingblog.blogspot.co.uk/#sthash.ApafMCzc.dpuf

'WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?' : LOBBY CARD GALLERY AND REVIEW

CAST:

Bette Davis (Jane Hudson), Joan Crawford (Blanche Hudson), Victor Buono (Edwin Flagg), Maidie Norman (Elvira Stitt), Anna Lee (Mrs Bates), Marjorie Bennett (Della Flagg)

PRODUCTION:

Director/Producer – Robert Aldrich, Screenplay – Lukas Heller, Based on the Novel by Henry Farrell, Photography (b&w) – Ernest Haller, Music – Frank DeVol, Special Effects – Don Steward, Makeup – Monty Westmore, Art Direction – William Glasgow. Production Company – Associates and Aldrich/Seven Arts.  USA. 1962.  

SYNOPSIS:

It is 1917 and Jane Hudson is an enormously popular variety show child star. She is able to get anything she wants and throws tantrums when she does not get it. She is envied by her sister Blanche who vows to one day get even. Blanche’s opportunity comes in the 1930s when she becomes a Hollywood star and Jane is a has-been who has sunken into alcoholism. As the two sisters drive back from a party one night, one gets out to open the gate and the other slips the car into gear and drives forward at them. The accident leaves Blanche paralysed from the waist down. Thirty years later, Jane is left tending the wheelchair-ridden Blanche. However, Jane’s sanity has snapped and she cruelly tortures the helpless Blanche, keeping her imprisoned and feeding dead rats and her pet bird up to her.

COMMENTARY:

With the exception of Psycho (1960) and to a lesser extent Les Diaboliques (1955), What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? is the film that had the greatest influence on the prolific psycho-thriller genre of the 1960s. It gave an entirely new impetus to the flagging careers of Joan Crawford and Bette Davis, both former Hollywood stars beyond their glory years who subsequently found new careers in horror movies. Indeed, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, with its sight of former Hollywood stars over the hill and going round the bend, created a lurid pseudo-tabloid sub-genre of Grand Guignol Hollywood self-devouring (one that had its antecedent in Gloria Swanson’s swan song, Sunset Boulevard (1950), which was almost a horror film). What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? was followed by a cycle of Grand Guignol psycho films featuring over-the-hill female stars – Olivia De Havilland appeared in Lady in a Cage (1964), Tallulah Bankhead in The Fanatic/Die, Die My Darling (1965), Eleanor Parker in Eye of the Cat (1969), Shelley Winters in What’s the Matter with Helen? (1971) and Who Slew Auntie Roo? (1971), Ruth Roman in The Baby (1972), Lana Turner in Persecution (1974), while both Bette Davis and Joan Crawford appeared in several lookalike films – Davis in Hammer’s The Nanny (1965) and The Anniversary (1968), and Crawford in Strait-Jacket (1964), I Saw What You Did (1965) and Berserk (1968). Indeed, Joan Crawford’s own life story was even turned into a Batty Old Dames film of sorts with Mommie Dearest (1981).

When What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? came out, a large part of its success was the shock of seeing the two former stars reduced to monsters. The horror in the film fails to translate so well to today’s teen and twentysomething audiences who often find the film dated and ludicrous because they are not conversant with the film’s context – that it represented a shock trashing of two of the icons of Hollywood glamour in the 1940s. Bette Davis in particular shocked everybody with her completely over-the-top performance. It is a real theatre-rattling barnstormer of a delivery that she gives – and one that garnered her a Best Actress Academy Award nomination. She goes totally bonkers and the results are fascinatingly grotesque to watch. The scene where she in cracked, gargoyle makeup sings a song I’ve Written a Letter to Daddy in a cracked, girl-like voice is a masterpiece of the memorably bizarre and twisted.

Joan Crawford’s fine performance was not unexpectedly overshadowed by Bette Davis but is one that elicits a good deal of pained sympathy. Although such is something that the film seems to misunderstand. The final twist in the ending mutes the horror – seeming to imply that we should forgive Jane for what she has done as Blanche deserved it. A good deal of the venom between the characters was apparently something that existed between the two actresses in real-life with both delighting in spitefully nasty games of one-upmanship on the other on set – there was even a book written about such Bette and Joan: The Divine Feud (1989) by Shaun Considine. The irony that only came out in later years is that the roles were uncommonly close to the truth upon the parts of both actresses – Joan Crawford and Bette Davis were both utterly vain, particularly when it came to their own celebrity, both abused their own family members and both had daughters who wrote books about the cruelty of their parents.

Director Robert Aldrich has the power to shock at his disposal – the dead rat scene always has gross-out impact. There are the odd moments of suspense – the move down the stairs and the balled-up note – although there are also times when the film seems talky, almost too stagy, and needs more drive and tension. Indeed, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? is a film whose effect lies with the barnstorming theatrics of its two stars rather than as a straight psycho-thriller. (It would make a very interesting revival as a stage play). There is fine black-and-white photography, which only serves to bring out the deliberately unglamorous making-up of its two stars. The other Academy Award nominee among the cast was Victor Buono as Supporting Actor – there is a sly amusement to the scenes with his mother and a piquant charm to his clumsy English mannerdness in the scenes with an outrageously flirting Bette Davis. In recent years, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? has gained the status of a gay cult classic because of its campy over-acting.

The film was later blandly remade as a tv movie What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1991), which was executive produced by Robert Aldrich’s son William. In a piece of freakish stunt casting, the Joan Crawford and Bette Davis roles were played respectively by real-life sisters Vanessa and Lynn Redgrave.

Robert Aldrich later returned with Bette Davis (and it was originally intended Joan Crawford who quit/was fired in mid-production because of the rivalry with Davis) in a follow-up of sorts Hush ... Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964), which is a much better film, if not as famous. Also of interest is Robert Aldrich’s The Killing of Sister George (1968), which returns to the same Hollywood Grand Guignol as What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? although is not a horror film, and his The Legend of Lylah Clare (1969), where a producer attempts to turn Kim Novak into a replica of his dead wife, which hovers for a time on the edge of being a ghost story. In the Hollywood Guignol stakes, Aldrich also produced a further Batty Old Dames psycho film What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice? (1969) and Bert I. Gordon’s Picture Mommy Dead (1966) where the spirit of Zsa Zsa Gabor haunts her daughter from out of a painting. Robert Aldrich had a celebrated career that stretched between the 1950s and 1980s, making films such as The Dirty Dozen (1967), The Longest Yard (1974) and The Choirboys (1977). He made several other films of genre interest, including the quasi-sf Mickey Spillane adaptation Kiss Me Deadly (1955), which is perhaps one of the finest of all Hollywood film noirs, and the nuclear missile silo hijacking thriller Twilight’s Last Gleaming (1977).

Novelist Henry Farrell, whose 1960 novel the film was based on, also developed a film career as a result of What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?. Farrell furnished the script for Robert Aldrich’s Hush ... Hush, Sweet Charlotte, the novel for the Curtis Harrington-directed Baby Jane copy How Awful About Allan (1970) and the script for Harrington’s What’s the Matter with Helen? (1971), as well as scripts for two tv movies, the haunted house drama The House That Would Not Die (1970) and the clairvoyance thriller The Eyes of Charles Sand (1972). 

       

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326 MAGIC TRICKS LIGHT THE SCREEN: CAPTAIN SINBAD (1963) GALLERY AND REVIEW

CAST:

Guy Williams (Sindbad), Heidi Bruhl (Princess Jana), Pedro Armendariz (El Kerim), Abraham Sofaer (Galgo)

PRODUCTION:

Director – Byron Haskin, Screenplay – Harry Relis & Samuel B. West, Producers – Frank & Herman King, Photography – Gunter Sentfleben, Music – Michel Michelet, Music Conductor – Kurt Graunke, Photographic Effects – Tom Howard, Special Effects – Augie Lohman & Lee Zavitz, Art Direction – Isabelle & Werner Schlichting. Production Company – King Brothers.

SYNOPSIS:

The sorcerer El Kerim usurps the city of Baristan from its weak king. The princess Jana tries to warn her beloved, Sindbad. Her intentions are discovered by El Kerim who turns men into rocs to bomb Sindbad’s ship with boulders. Sindbad survives and comes to Baristan disguised as a thief to stop El Kerim. However, El Kerim has removed his heart and cannot be killed. And so Sindbad must undertake a perilous journey to the tower where El Kerim’s heart is guarded by a hydra.

COMMENTARY:

Captain Sindbad was one of several productions inspired by the success of Ray Harryhausen’s The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958). Captain Sindbad was a West German production, although the producers imported for the occasion American director Byron Haskin, who had made a number of genre entries such as The War of the Worlds (1953), The Naked Jungle (1954), Conquest of Space (1955) and From the Earth to the Moon (1958), as well as Guy Williams, star of tv’s Zorro (1957-9) and later Lost in Space (1965-8) and several of the supporting cast.

Captain Sindbad is an innocuous juvenile fantasy. It quickly follows the cliches of the Arabian Nights cycle as set down by 7th Voyage and the various cinematic versions of The Thief of Bagdad – the honest sailor who raises rebellion while disguised as a thief, the blackguard vizier usurper who has designs on the princess (who also happens to be the hero’s beloved). It is colourful in a pedestrian, undemanding way that proves mildly entertaining. The scenes with Abraham Sofaer’s magician tend toward the buffoonish

When it comes to the fantasy on display, the conception of the effects work – flying rocs, miniature storms, the hydra, a hand that extends several metres and a pre-Exorcist (1973) head-spinning effect – tends to belie the delivery, although the film tries hard. The film’s great moment of creative corner cutting in the special effects department is having Guy Williams face an invisible dragon. The climactic confrontation with the hydra is a little shabby.

Review: Richard Scheib
Images Marcus Brooks

HAMMER FILM NOIR: HELL IS A CITY: STANLEY BAKER : BILLIE WHITELAW STILLS GALLERY AND REVIEW

Director: Val Guest. Writers: Val Guest (screenplay), Maurice Procter (novel)
Stars: Stanley Baker, John Crawford and Donald Pleasence

Based upon the 1954 novel by crime novelist Maurice Procter, a former policeman who served for 19 years with the Halifax police force, Hell Is A City is a highly effective and punchy 1960 British Film Noir/police procedural drama, mostly set on the mean streets of Manchester. 

Made by the famous Hammer film studio and directed and written by one of its star directors, Val Guest (The Quatermass Xperiment, Expresso Bongo, The Day The Earth Caught Fire), Hell Is A City is most notable for a driving, Elmer Bernstein style Crime Jazz score by Stanley Black, Arthur Grant’s (The Curse Of The Werewolf, The Devil Rides Out) lush black and white cinematography depicting a forbidding and mostly vanished post war Manchester and by a fine cast, lead by the irreplaceable Stanley Baker.

The opening titles of the movie set the tone: shot from the back seat of speeding police car, the silhouettes of the driver and his partner face the icky blackness of the night, illuminated by their car headlights, ominous speckles of neon and the street lights of central Manchester, while Stanley Black’s (in the early 1950s he habitually topped the Melody Maker chart of the most-heard musicians on radio) blaring big band soundtrack blasts a suitably portentous accompaniment. Guest transforms Manchester into a twilight vision of urban inferno Manhattan, as it was envisioned by fellow Brit Alexander Mackendrick’s 1957 classic Sweet Smell Of Success. 

Harry Martineau (Stanley Baker: The Cruel Sea, Zulu, Accident) is a tough, dedicated police inspector on the trail of Don Starling (John Crawford: The Enforcer), who escaped from prison after serving 5 years of his 14-year prison sentence for a jewelry robbery, and killed a warden in the process. Inspector Martineau was the arresting officer and knew the troubled Starling from his youth. He suspects Starling will be traveling to Manchester to recover the stolen jewels he hid away before being convicted.

 As Martineau deduces, Starling returns undetected to Manchester and goes to see Laurie Lovett (Charles Morgan: Sergeant Cork), who was in on the jewelry heist. Grateful Starling never turned him in Lovett finds him a place to hide at night. He reveals his plans to get a phony passport and flee the country, but not until he gets all the money he needs to implement his escape. He plans the next day to rob the bookmaker Gus Hawkins (Donald Pleasence: Halloween) of his gambling take with the help of Lovett’s gang.

The robbery expectedly does not go as planned and the gang is forced to disappear in different directions. Starling contacts Gus’ wife Chloe (Billie Whitelaw: The Omen, Frenzy) with whom he previously had an affair. She hides him in the attic located in the bedroom but when Gus takes a peek thinking he heard a noise, he is hit on the head and hospitalized with a concussion as the police take note that Starling has been spotted for the first time in Manchester and thereby connect him to the robbery. As inspector Martineau tracks Starling down, the gang fall one by one, until only the murderer is left.

Upon its release in 1960 Hell Is A City was acclaimed for its realism, bold depiction of violence and gritty Manchester locations, while nominated for two British Academy Awards for Best Screenplay and Most Promising Newcomer for Billie Whitelaw. More than half a century later, the films faults are glaringly obvious ”“ the portrayal of the troubled domestic life of Martineau and his wife is unconvincing (all would be well if she would just submit to his desire to bear him children), American actor John Crawford’s complete inability to muster a halfway convincing English, let alone Mancunian, accent, a somewhat cliched illustration of working class life and the sanitized depiction of the Manchester police force, which is without any single taint of corruption lurking in the shadows.

Yet the fantastic Stanley Baker’s intensely committed performance, which highlights the fact that the obsessed Martineau has really no life outside police work and that he will freely use any degree of emotional blackmail upon those he questions, regardless of the consequences, in order to catch Starling, endures. Coupled with Grant’s striking location photography (very well served by this digitally re-mastered DVD) of vintage Greater Manchester locations (including Piccadilly Gardens, Moss Side, Oldham, Levenshulme and Strangeways prison) and Black’s propulsive score, Hell Is A City remains an exciting proposition.

Images: Marcus Brooks

Review: HERE