Séance and Sensibility

A DARK SONG (2016)

One location, two faces: Catherine Walker brings palatable turmoil to speak to the dead - forever shrouded by council estate sorcerer Steve Oram - in this Abramelin-inspired journey.

GRIEVING from the death of her son at the hands of an undisclosed ritual, Sophia Howard (Catherine Walker) rents an isolated house in Wales. Abrasive, alcoholic occultist Joseph Solomon (Steve Oram) leads her on a months-long rite based on The Book of Abramelin, to summon her guardian angel whom Sophia can then ask to speak with her son. The relationship between Sophia and Joseph becomes frayed as the grueling ceremonies unfold, and Solomon is seriously wounded when he accidentally falls on a kitchen knife. With Howard increasingly susceptible to sounds and shadows, Solomon succumbs from his injury. After breaking a seal surrounding the house, demons drag Sophia to the basement and torture her; but the deities retreat when Howard sees a white light, and an armoured angel awaits her. As it silently speaks behind aniridia eyes, Sophia’s redemption is one of forgiveness rather than revenge.

This confident British/Irish independent - the debut feature by writer-director Liam Gavin - contains such a detailed and methodical approach to occult ritual that it can only be a slow-burner (which is pretty unique in cinema, summoning is usually successful within minutes). But it is much more than a building psychological horror, its as if Ben Wheatley and Mike Leigh wrote a script after watching REPULSION and THE EXORCIST (the other prime example of systematic terror). When Solomon completes his salt circle around the retreat, not only are the duo cutting themselves from society, but from conventional reality. There is also a stripped-down enchantment here, a supernatural veneer that gives us hope against technological progress and the scientific march into an abyss. 

"Science describes the least of things;" the third act sees payoff from the Abramelin ritual, as Sophia confronts her warrior guardian angel, as if lifted from a Renaissance painting. 

Walker is magnificent as the tortured soul, blending steely determination with inquisitive desperation. Oram's gruff pie and chips mystic is no Stephen Strange, and sits uncomfortably with the seriousness of the narrative, but he is also uncomfortable in his skin. Before the terror takes hold, the audience is never sure of Howard's legitimacy (in a brief tea room scene with her sister, there are hints of mental illness), or if Solomon is just a pervert with a robe and ginger beard.

Abramelin and its demand for intricate, long-term preparation is credited to 14th-century Egyptian magician Abra-Melin, and plays out like a binding contract. In 1897, The Book of the Sacred Magic of Abramelin the Mage was translated into English by British occultist Samuel L. MacGregor Mathers, and was highly influential in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Aleister Crowley - at the time a young member - started preparations for seeking the angel in Boleskine House, but abandoned this plan during the Hermetic Order division of 1901. The one thing that Mathers, Crowley and, indeed, most occultists, take from Abramelin is the existence of a benevolent demigod; consequently, a master or supreme magus can feed any number of charismatic and egotistical myth-makers.

Don't Look Back in Anger

Kenneth Anger's chaotic relationship with British rock gods

A follower of Aleister Crowley's Thelema religion, Kenneth Anger's filmic influence can be seen in the emergence of the music video, and the work of David Lynch and John Waters.

SANTA-MONICA born Kenneth Anger is equal parts Aleister Crowley disciple, avant-garde filmmaker, and gay Hollywood gossipmonger. Fixated with fading silver screen stars and homosexual male icons, his scandalous tome Hollywood Babylon lifts the lid on an endless array of tinsel town drug abuse and depravity, stories of deviance and death that would befit The Great Beast himself. Anger considered Rolling Stones guitarists Keith Richards and Brian Jones - and Anita Pallenberg, who had been a lover to both musicians - to be at the centre of his provocative path. Perhaps the Stones themselves saw Anger as a possible conduit for the rebellious tone of the late 1960's, yet looking at the cover of their 1967 album Their Satanic Majesties Request, it isn't absolutely clear how serious the group were taking the magus (the band wear sorcerer garb that would only suit a pantomime).

Anger's infamous film LUCIFER RISING is a mesmeric ritual charting the shift of Christianity (Aeon of Osiris) towards a demonic land (Aeon of Horus). Anger considers movies as spell-casters, "a transparent excuse for capturing people," but this subscribes to Crowley's religious cycles, looking at a post-anointed faith. Mick Jagger was intrigued by Anger, and how occultism had the potential to inspire counterculture. The filmmaker tried to convince The Stones talisman to take the role of Lucifer, but Jagger baulked and offered his brother Chris instead. The more famous Jagger composed a gratingly discordant moog score, which would be used in INVOCATION OF MY DEMON BROTHER, a short that salvages initial LUCIFER RISING footage and splices scenes from The Stones Hyde Park concert for what is essentially a film about a funeral for a cat. Donald Cammell was also cast as Osiris in LUCIFER RISING, together with Marianne Faithfull as Lilith and Jimmy Page in a cameo as "Man holding the Stella of Revelation." On set, Anger repeatedly argued with Chris Jagger, resulting in the latter being fired, and Faithful fell off a mountain, luckily sustaining only mild concussion.

Mick Jagger's score for INVOCATION OF MY DEMON BROTHER was created from a newly acquired Moog synth and it shows; it has the much the same effect as turning on the instrument and leaving it running.

The soundtrack to LUCIFER RISING is another contentious affair. Anger met Page at a London auction where they were both bidding for Crowley memorabilia. Anger convinced Page to compose the soundtrack for his film, with the rock star giving Anger permission to move into the basement of his London mansion to use his editing suite. In October 1976 Anger got into an argument with Page's then wife Charlotte, who threw him out for allegedly giving guided tours to strangers. The magus consequently labelled Page as a washed out musician unable to meet deadlines, and removed him from the project. In fact the Led Zeppelin guitarist had the soundtrack in place before he ever saw any footage; Page had extended an existing piece that he thought would fit the film, centred around a "majestic drone" on a bass tanpura acquired from India. He then used chants and assorted instrumentation to create a twenty-minute track that takes up one side of the 2012 release Lucifer Rising and Other Soundtracks.

Bowels of Hell

THE BORDERLANDS (2013)

An Englishman, Irishman and Scotsman go to a church... Graham Humphreys' poster art for THE BORDERLANDS ("Where faith goes to die.") For the film, unfriendly locals, a burning sheep and mysterious footage open up a bottomless pit of horror.

WHEN claims of a supernatural event are made at a remote church in the west of England, a Vatican-sanctioned team are sent to access the situation. Working under an organisation called The Congregation, Brother Deacon (Gordon Kennedy), Father Mark (Aidan McArdle) and technology expert Gray (Rob Hill) investigate the claims of Father Crellick (Luke Neal) that during a filmed baptism various religious artefacts are seen vibrating on an altar. Gray fits CCTV equipment to the church and the cottage where the trio are staying, with each of the members also wearing a headcam. As events take a darker turn with Crellick's suicide, the team start to question their own judgements when they - quite literally - start to travel into the labyrinthine bowels of hell. 

The found footage sub-genre can be conceptually and technically limiting, but with the right dynamics the format can be greatly enhanced. Such is the case with first time writer/director Elliot Goldner's THE BORDERLANDS, which excels both as a character study and an exploration of Olde England. Kennedy and Hill make for an unlikely dynamic duo - Deacon is a gruff hard-drinking Scotsman answering to the Vatican, Gray a talkative agnostic Englishman only in it for the money - but the actors gel on screen (McArdle is a stilted Irish head of operations, and this viewer yearned to see Reece Shearsmith in the role). The use of headcams make for a smoother and more sensible ride than the obligatory handhelds, which seem to remain relatively intact whatever the situation in similar pictures. The surveillance cameras maintain an eerie perspective within the church - capturing a vibe which melds THE STONE TAPE with EXORCIST: THE BEGINNING - but there is also a fertile depth into a Pagan time of more tangible beliefs, against the modern era where we need to believe.

Like all memorable horror, THE BORDERLANDS' locations, 
characters and themes form a successful whole.

What can be best termed British rural horror is defined by two main characteristics: quietly sinister country locals (when asking for directions and ignored, Gray snipes back "give my regards to Edward Woodward") and foreboding ancient terrors - often subterranean. Even though the countryside and the elements portray a deft mythology, counterculture has added another layer since The Beatles included Aleister Crowley on the cover of Sgt Pepper in 1967. As Vic Pratt states in his Sight & Sound article 'Long Arm of the Lore' (October 2013), "folk custom, witchcraft and the occult were no longer absurdities; they might almost be an option."

Making exemplary use of locations in Denbury, South Devon, THE BORDERLANDS climax is filmed extensively at Chislehurst Caves, Kent. The caves themselves are enveloped with a rich history of uses; originally a 22-mile stretch of man-made chalk and flint mines, this popular tourist attraction acted as an ammunition depot in the First World War and mushroom cultivation in the 1930s. Built by Druids, Romans and Saxons, this colourful past led it to be a music venue used by the likes of the Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd, and Led Zeppelin's Swan Song label had a launch party there in October 1974. Additionally, they have been used in the DOCTOR WHO adventure THE MUTANTS, and substituted for an underground space headquarters in INSEMINOID.

Their Satanic Majesties Request

THE HELLFIRE CLUB (1961)

TERROR (1978)

French A style poster for New World's THE HELLFIRE CLUB, more pulp adventure than demonic horror.

THE real-life Hellfire Club was famed for its debauchery and devil worship, the name given to several establishments in Britain and Ireland as meeting places for "persons of quality," who wished to take part in immoral acts. Founded in 1719 London, The Club motto Fais ce que tu voudras (Do what thou wilt) was a philosophy associated with François Rabelais' fictional abbey at Thélème, and later adopted by Aleister Crowley. Set in 18th century England, THE HELLFIRE CLUB tells of circus acrobat Jason (Keith Michell), in his attempt to reclaim the estate of his estranged father Lord Netherton (Andrew Faulds), leader of The Hellfire Club. Years earlier, Jason as a boy (Martin Stephens) is whipped by his father after walking in on an orgy, and together with his mother (Jean Lodge) flees with Timothy (David Lodge). Jason discovers that his cousin Thomas (Peter Arne) has stolen his inheritance, and together with lawyer Merryweather (Peter Cushing), plans to bring an end to the deceit and break the grip of The Club on King George II’s rule. 

Although billed as a guest star, Cushing's fussy but erudite character is pivotal to the fate of English society (the actor later adapted Merryweather's demeanor for his takes on Doctor Who and Abner Perry). Because of Cushing's presence and its lush staging, the film is often mistaken for a Hammer release; but there is no bite to the picture, limiting itself to a handful of orgies where most of the participants remain fully clothed. Directed by Robert S. Baker and Monty Berman from a script by Leon Griffiths and Jimmy Sangster, it is more swashbuckling melodrama, using The Club as a pinning to hang its elaborate fight scenes and love interests (redheads Adrienne Corri and Kai Fischer). Like most cinematic heroes brandishing a sword, Jason is not only morally perfect but also irresistible to women, and Michell gives a likable performance as he gathers his circus comrades to do battle with the hierarchy.

With a running time of only 80 minutes, TERROR is a whirlwind of gore, semi-nudity and in-jokes. Amazingly, the film topped the UK box office charts for a week in early 1979.

TERROR takes a more traditional approach to the devil. Reuniting director Norman J. Warren with scriptwriter David McGillivray after SATAN'S SLAVE, TERROR is not so much an unashamed rip-off of Dario Argento's operatic gore noir SUSPIRIA but a star-struck reaction to it. The movie starts with a witch hunt and a beheading, subsequently revealed to be a "film within a film" being watched in the same house where hundreds of years before the events being portrayed on screen took place. The witch exacts her revenge on the ancestors of her persecutors, one of whom is the production's director, James Garrick (John Nolan). After a makeshift hypnosis goes awry, the curse takes on a more direct approach, including death by lighting equipment, murderous film cans (in reality nine faulty prints of SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER specially supplied by Rank Laboratories) which leads to a very Argentoesque window-pane decapitation, and aspiring actress Carol (Glynis Barber) is impaled to a tree trunk.

The performances are generally competent, but James and Ann Garrick (Carolyn Courage) both have too little screen time to develop the family curse scenario. Instead, the focus is on Les Young's coloured filters to provide TERROR with a suitably garish tableau and enhance the hallucinatory disregard for logic. The opening "film within a film" acts both as a Hammer Gothic pastiche and a expostulation of it, but this is not the only nod to a cinematic heritage; the viewer is also treated to a fictitious softcore film called BATHTIME WITH BRENDA, scenes heavily indebted to experiences not necessarily enjoyed by Warren and McGillivray in their careers. Other points of interest are a nightclub act you won't forget in a hurry, and a red herring sequence culminating in a Peter Mayhew cameo.

Do You Dare Spend a Night in the ...

MADHOUSE (1974)

"In our day in Hollywood, the monsters didn't need makeup ... they just came as themselves." The MADHOUSE cover to Famous Monsters of Filmland #109 (August 1974).

MADHOUSE begins with friends gathered to celebrate the horror movie career of Paul Toombes (Vincent Price), whose signature role is Dr Death, a character co-created by writer/actor Herbert Flay (Peter Cushing). Toombes has decided to settle down with fiance Ellen (Julie Crosthwait), an actress who has been previously linked to producer Oliver Quayle (Robert Quarry). However, the night ends in tragedy as Toombes finds Ellen beheaded, a murder undertaken by someone wearing the cinematic garb of Dr Death. Though never convicted of the crime, Toombes is institutionalised. Twelve years later, Flay convinces Toombes to resurrect Dr Death for a new television series to be made in England; before long the body count begins, leaving Toombes to wonder if he is enacting the events of his character in real life. Eventually consumed with guilt, he locks himself into the studio, turns on the cameras, and sets fire to the set. In fact it has been frustrated actor Flay who has been committing the murders; a burnt Toombes returns to kill Flay and cavort with his spider-obsessed, basement-dwelling wife Faye (Adrienne Corri), who has had long-standing feelings for Toombes.

This joint Amicus/American International venture plays both as a requiem for Price's association with AIP and the nature of the 60s/70s B-movies that became suppressed by the release of THE EXORCIST. COUNT YORGA star Quarry - who had appeared with Price in DR PHIBES RISES AGAIN and was originally cast in the Herbert Flay role - was being groomed to replace the horror star, and this was one of many frictions: Price was also experiencing an impending divorce, the budget-cutting Twickenham Studios provided indifferent production values, and director Jim Clark wrote a despairing letter to Price complaining about Milton Subotsky's interference in the editing room. The feel of MADHOUSE also isn't helped by the extent of footage used from Roger Corman's Poe pictures to illustrate Toombes' career; in fact, so much so that Corman almost deserves a co-directing credit. As Denis Meikle observes in Vincent Price: The Art of Fear, "[Price] comes closer to playing himself in this film than in any previous one ... and with the footage having been supplied by Corman's Poes, Price must at times have felt like a dying man, watching his life pass before his eyes."

Pulp potboiler Devilday acted as the source material for MADHOUSE. The film dropped the satanic overtones of the book, and makes its lead character more sympathetic.

With Price and Quarry being snide on and off screen, the supporting cast supply a number of welcome diversions. Natasha Pyne is enthusiastic as Toombes' PA Julia Wilson, and Linda Hayden leaves an all-too-brief impression as stalking actress Elizabeth Peters, who is despatched by pitchfork. In a further eerie pursuit, Peters' parents Alfred (Ellis Dale) and Louise (Catherine Willmer) follow the actor across twilight lawns before both being skewered on the same sabre. But the real meat lies in the final ten minutes, where Flay sees Toombes step down from the screen of his own snuff movie and subsequently murder and become Flay, utilising some startlingly effective make-up as Cushing's distinctive cheekbones are melded with Price's heavier facade. 

MADHOUSE was loosely based on the novel Devilday by Angus Hall, a smutfest of late 60s/early 70s Satania. In the book Toombs is a sadistic heroin addict, a latter-day Aleister Crowley whose film career is in meltdown after being suspected of inserting an icicle up a vagina (paralleling Fatty Arbuckle's notorious scandal of 1921). Opening with a quote from Poe's Marginalia, of men who "soared above the plane of their race," during the course of the novel the faded star - as "the dark and dreaded" Dr Dis - enjoys relations with jailbait groupies, and appears at a Black Mass so that the congregation can (literally) kiss his ass. At the climax, he is killed by a falling rock, and a swarm of fans scavenge his corpse for souvenirs; but years later the book's narrator glimpses Toombs in a Rolls-Royce, leading him to suspect that the notorious actor's LaVeyan mayhem will resume. 

Worlds of the Dead

THE ZOMBIE DIARIES 2: WORLD OF THE DEAD (2011)
OUTPOST II: BLACK SUN (2012)
COCKNEYS VS ZOMBIES (2012)

ZOMBIE DIARIES 2's decontamination suites recall images from George A. Romero's original CRAZIES. The cut-away scenes of the white figures rounding up civilians like cattle to shoot then burn them is detrimental to the "race against time" narrative.

RETURNING to the world created in their 2007 hit THE ZOMBIE DIARIES, Michael Bartlett and Kevin Gates use the same lead character Leeann (Alix Wilton Regan, replacing Victoria Nalder) and predatory villains Goke (Russell Jones) and Manny (Hiram Bleetman) for the pro-military sequel THE ZOMBIE DIARIES 2: WORLD OF THE DEAD. Found by a squad of T.A. reservists - with their own documenting cameraman - traumatised Leeann journeys with them across zombie-infested Hertfordshire towards Hope’s Point, where rescue ships are due in two days. As the group head towards this destination, civilians are as much a threat as the ghouls. Starting effectively with an intimate family birthday gone to hell, ZOMBIE DIARIES 2 is more polished than the original, but doesn't bring anything new to the table. Its relentlessly grim facade rejoices in three rape scenes, the most self-defeating filmed in gloating close-up; and it is ironic that the most memorable aspect was produced by a fortuitous cold-snap during production, with snow adding to the struggle and providing an edge to the midnight dash through a graveyard.

Released four years after their claustrophobic and testosterone-fuelled OUTPOST, director Steve Barker and writer Rae Brunton widen the scope - and shift the tone - for OUTPOST II: BLACK SUN. In the present day, a NATO force is sent to Eastern Europe, where a sinister enemy appears to be killing everything in its path. Following in the footsteps of her late father, Lena (Catherine Steadman) - an investigator on the trail of the notorious German scientist Klausener (David Grant) - learns that the war crimes of the man she is looking for goes far beyond the blasphemy of extermination camps. Together with former colleague Wallace (Richard Coyle) - a physicist who has been chasing Nazi secrets for years - they team up with the NATO force to prevent the rise of a zombie 4th Reich.

The depiction of the Nazi undead is the highlight of OUTPOST II: BLACK SUN; relentlessly brutal, the zombies either club their prey or stab them repeatedly, with the visuals presented in an effectively dirty brown-and-grey colour palette.

Despite a promising opening salvo with an aged SS officer, Steadman becomes yet another ineffectual female lead and largely unable to look after herself, despite being a seasoned Nazi hunter. As usual, it is up to the military grunts to protect her, who are portrayed as the usual stereotypes: the ruthless one, the compassionate one, the belligerent one, and the wise-cracking one. In fact, the history of the Black Sun and its adaptations into popular culture are more interesting than anything in Barker's film. This motif may have originated from the Theosophy of Helena Blavatsky's Central Sun, an invisible or burnt out star which symbolises an opposing force or pole, and it was former SS member Wilhelm Landig who coined the idea of a mystical source capable of regenerating the Aryan race. Pop culture references include Grant Morrison's comic strip Zenith, which makes its Black Sun cult a combination of Nazi and Lovecraftian ideas; in the novel Satan's Seed by Mark Ellis, the Brotherhood of the Black Sun and Aleister Crowley use geomancy to travel through time; and in the computer game Wolfenstein, the Black Sun was actually another dimension altogether.

The feature directing debut of German Matthias Hoene - who rebooted Hammer for the 2008 online serial BEYOND THE RAVE - and co-written by James Moran, who penned SEVERANCE - the zombie-gangster-comedy COCKNEYS VS ZOMBIES does everything it says on the tin, but isn't as wily as it thinks it is. A proposed building development threatens the Bow Bells Care Home with closure, and to secure the wellbeing of their war-hero grandfather Ray (Alan Ford), chancer brothers Terry (Rasmus Hardiker) and Andy (Harry Treadaway) ineptly rob a bank with the aid of spunky cousin Katy (Michelle Ryan), friend Davey (Jack Doolan) and psychopathic weapons-specialist "Mental" Mickey (Ashley Thomas). But the East End of London has more pressing matters; workers at the development site have excavated into a plague pit sealed by Charles II in 1666, unleashing a mutated infection that transforms humans into shambling zombies.

"The Undead are Brown Bread." Former EASTENDER Michelle Ryan is effortlessly strong and sexy in the otherwise irksome COCKNEYS VS ZOMBIES.

Overtly formulaic and a SHAUN OF THE DEAD facsimile, COCKNEYS VS ZOMBIES suffers from muted action scenes, no real tension, and cockney rhyming slang jokes that wear thin pretty fast. Consequently, it's not funny enough to be a memorable comedy, and not scary enough for hardcore zombie enthusiasts. The film works best when it depicts the potential abandonment of the elderly. In the stand-out sequence, deaf Hamish (Richard Briers) hobbles along on his zimmer at the same pace as a ghoul eager for his flesh, and it is this old guard of performers - Ford, Briers, Honor Blackman, Dudley Sutton, Tony Selby, Georgina Hale - that provide the production with ballast.

Hammer Rides Out

THE DEVIL RIDES OUT (1968)
TO THE DEVIL A DAUGHTER (1976)

"The Goat of Mendes! The Devil Himself!" Eddie Powell dons the monster suit for Hammer's  THE DEVIL RIDES OUT.

TERENCE Fisher's THE DEVIL RIDES OUT is based on Dennis Wheatley's pot-boiling 1934 novel, and benefits from a Richard Matheson script which surgically cuts the fat from the author's most famous - but sprawling - work. It is also the most sumptuous-looking Hammer film produced by the studio after their move from Bray to Elstree. Set in 1920s London, Nicholas, the Duc de Richleau (Christopher Lee) and Rex Van Ryn (Leon Greene, dubbed by Patrick Allen) decide to pay a visit to Simon (Patrick Mower), the son of a late comrade. The duo find him hosting a gathering of The Left Hand Path, and under the influence of satanic priest Mocata (Charles Gray), Simon escapes. Consequently, our heroes must seek out the mysterious Tanith (Nike Arrighi) - the daughter of a French countess - who is destined to join their friend at a satanic ritual. When de Richleau and Van Ryn rescue the seemingly doomed pair, Mocata sends his supernatural forces to obtain those promised to him.

Aleister Crowley served as technical adviser to Wheatley's book, and THE DEVIL RIDES OUT illustrates a series of genuine arcana. Ceremonial details, allegiances to nineteenth century magician Eliphas Levi and dialogue (the Susamma ritual is not Matheson but the actual incantation) are all Crowleyesque in tone. A penny-dreadful villain in the novel, Gray's Mocata is the living incarnation of what Fisher often described as "the charm of evil." His central battle of wills with Lee are perfectly played, and the casting of Arrighi is also noteworthy, as her quirky beauty is suited to a role for a woman seeking spiritual awakening. But even with these strengths, the film was not the box office success Hammer had hoped, and packs less dread today when viewed outside of the cycle of satanic movies that would sweep through cinema until the mid-1970s. Particularly detrimental are the special effects, and the orgy that presages The Goat of Mendes is too tame to seem even remotely diabolical.

Christopher Lee and Nastassja Kinski in TO THE DEVIL A DAUGHTER. A tour de force for Lee, even Astaroth's effigy - a crucified bat in the source novel but a spread-legged hermaphrodite mounted on an inverted black cross in the film - befits Dracula.

Crowley's mandate to bring the Devil's offspring to Earth was channelled into his 1929 work Moonchild. This inspired a 1953 Wheatley novel that acts as the springboard for TO THE DEVIL A DAUGHTER, the last Classic Era Hammer Horror. The film tells of excommunicated Father Michael Rainer (Lee), who is head of a cult which rears innocent minors in a closed Catholic convent to serve Astaroth. One of his charges - Catherine Beddows (Nastassja Kinski) - has been chosen as the Devil's representative when she comes of age. Catherine's haunted father Henry (Denholm Elliott) enlists occult author John Verney (Richard Widmark) - an obvious Wheatley alter ego - as the girl's temporary guardian, and with the aid of his agent Anna (Honor Blackman) and her gallery-owner boyfriend David (Anthony Valentine), aim to halt Rainer's plans.

Directed by Peter Sykes, TO THE DEVIL A DAUGHTER was afforded the largest budget for any Classic Era Hammer film, but it was a troubled production. Widmark allegedly punched an electrician on set and considered the subject matter distasteful and beneath him; Christopher Wicking's typically anarchic script was constantly being rewritten by THE DUELLISTS scribe Gerald Vaughn-Hughes; and stuntman Eddie Powell suffered burns when set on fire for David's church-bound demise. There was also controversy surrounding Kinski, the scandalous teenage lover of Roman Polanski at the time; her naked cavorting in the final scenes - as the actress was born in 1961 - made them highly illegal. Even the money shot - when Catherine presses the bloodied demon child into her womb - exists only to adhere to EXORCIST-style shock tactics. Equally disappointing is the notoriously flat ending: in the original rough cut, an alternate conclusion saw Catherine return to the Bavarian convent to perpetuate the evil of Father Michael, but all we get is Verney halting the wave of evil by throwing a rock at Rainer's head.

Don't Go In The House

THE LEGEND OF HELL HOUSE (1973)

THE INNOCENTS child star Pamela Franklin plays spiritualist Florence Tanner. The Yokohama-born actress was busy with the supernatural in the early 1970s - appearing in NECROMANCY and the made-for-TV SATAN'S SCHOOL FOR GIRLS - before retiring from acting in 1981.

PHYSICIST Dr Barrett (Clive Revill) is offered £100,000 by elderly Mr Deutsch (Roland Culver) to establish "the facts" about survival after death. The only suitable location for such an undertaking is the foreboding Belasco House, the "Mount Everest of haunted houses." Barrett is given a week to deliver his conclusions, organising the delivery of his newly perfected (and extremely bulky) electromagnetic radiation machine, and works alongside mental medium Florence Tanner (Pamela Franklin) and Ben Fischer (Roddy McDowall), a physical medium and only survivor of a previous investigation. The property owner was "Roaring Giant" Emeric Belasco, a six-foot-five perverted millionaire who disappeared soon after a massacre at the house. Florence claims to receive visits from Belasco's abused son Daniel, and when Barrett expresses scepticism he is attacked by - in quick succession - a glass, a flying meat rack and a falling chandelier, then a fire starts. Meanwhile, Barrett's wife Ann (Gayle Hunnicutt) - accompanying her husband during his stay - is turning into a nymphomaniac, and Florence is being molested by the disturbed spirit of Daniel and later, mauled by a black cat.

THE LEGEND OF HELL HOUSE beat THE EXORCIST into theatres by six months, and both deal with demonic possession in tandem with sexual language. However, the British entry plays like a children's horror movie, with one of the most laughable endings in genre history: basically, Emeric was no giant. Scripted by Richard Matheson from his novel Hell House, the writer was apparently "sick with disappointment" after seeing the film, a notion shared by the majority of its audience over the years. At least half of its performers bring something to the table: Franklin takes the acting honours despite the ludicrous situations her character is thrust into, and McDowall entertainingly sleep-walks through his role as the distant Fischer. In comparison, Revill makes for a staid and stuffy scientist - one can only dream of Peter Cushing in the role - and Hunnicutt is miscast as the faithful yet sexually-frustrated wife, who at least can experience some kind of carnal pleasures while in the grip of the Belasco environment.

The cover to Saint Martin's reprinting of Hell House. More graphic and sexually violent than the screen adaptation, the novel also depicts the Belasco property as a luxurious art deco-style palace - complete with swimming-pool and ballroom - rather than the cobwebbed Gothic mansion of the film.

Crowleyesque Emeric apparently shut himself and his acolytes within the mansion ("look at the windows ... he had them bricked up so no one could see in ... or out"), the house a haven for murder and debauchery ("drug addiction, alcoholism, sadism, bestiality, mutilation, murder, vampirism, necrophilia, cannibalism ... not to mention a gamut of sexual goodies.") In one unintentionally hilarious scene, sexually-souped Ann approaches Fischer with a sweaty verbal onslaught after rubbing the breasts of a statue ("together, naked, drunk, clutching, sweating, biting ...") Perhaps it was Matheson's intention to subscribe to Crowley's beliefs, and portray a set of individuals with differing viewpoints to illustrate that the only unifying human condition is sensual and sado-erotic pleasure, and to test what is physically and spiritually possible.

The film has a misplaced feeling through its not always convincing time-frame captions, and the week of the investigations takes place in the lead up to Christmas, without any mention of the holiday season. This otherworldly quality is enhanced by BBC Radiophonic Workshop veterans Delia Derbyshire and Brian Hodgson’s electronic soundtrack, which exists more as a series of drum-driven oscillations than a formed score, and its distinctive visual style was recently plundered by Edgar Wright for his fake trailer DON'T! in GRINDHOUSE. The special effects though are hardly special, resulting in an ectoplasm scene that has to hide behind some scientific hyperbole ("premature retraction of ectoplasm causes systemic shock”) and one gets the impression that Matheson and director John Hough think they are making some important statements, though it's hard to see behind shock tactics and silly sex. This serious stance is underpinned by the opening written assurance from Tom Corbett - a "clairvoyant and psychic consultant to European Royalty" who also acted as technical advisor - that the story, though fictitious, is "not only very much within the bounds of possibility, but could well be true."

"It's in the trees ... it's coming!"

NIGHT OF THE DEMON (1957)

Despite being book-ended by appearances of a crudely
animated monster, NIGHT OF THE DEMON
is an effective exercise in atmosphere.

IN 1957, British horror cinema exploded into life with the garish, Eastmancolour THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN. Terence Fisher's box office sensation was the starting point of Hammer's domination, but Jacques Tourneur's NIGHT OF THE DEMON - which started filming on the same day as Fisher's classic - was shot in black and white, and unlike Hammer's emphasis on physical violence, owes more to the power of suggestion. Tourneur's stylish project - an adaptation of M.R. James' Casting the Runes - predicted an anti-Hammer stance in the early 1960s that produced a triumvirate of successful monochrome horrors based on works of supernatural fiction: THE INNOCENTS (from Henry James' Turn of the Screw), NIGHT OF THE EAGLE (from Fritz Leiber's Conjure Wife) and THE HAUNTING (from Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House).

Scenes such as the storm invoked by black magician Julian Karswell (Niall MacGinnis), dressed in clown's makeup for a children's Halloween gathering, are genuinely unsettling, and this garden party suddenly interrupted by demonic intervention anticipates THE OMEN. As in that film, the leading protagonist is an American - here, Dr John Holden (Dana Andrews) - coming to terms with what he initially sees as bunkum. This theme of the modern, rationalist American adrift in a world of superstition can be traced through several films, including AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON, and even back to Universal's cycle of the 1930s and 1940s, were settings were often in generic old Europe.

Columbia's 2002 R1 DVD of NIGHT OF THE DEMON was sold as a "double feature" with CURSE OF THE DEMON, the film's Americanised, truncated version which cut fourteen minutes from the running time.

Screenwriter Charles Bennett crafts a meditation on the conflict between science and superstition, embodied by the personality clashes between Andrews' psychiatrist and MacGinnis's occultist. One of James's most important achievements was to redefine the ghost story by dispensing with many of the Gothic trappings of his predecessors, and replacing them with more realistic, contemporary settings. By using this trait cinematically, NIGHT OF THE DEMON sometimes seems somewhat dry, but this is a small price to pay for a movie that takes its subject matter with an utter conviction rarely seen.

Tourneur was a master of implied terror, his visual style the perfect film equivalent of James' prose; Holden's eerie encounters alone in forests, empty hallways and desolate farmhouses evoke a paranoid atmosphere. Ken Adam's production design is an effective blend of British antiquity and modernism, rendering library corridors and railway carriages as endless passages which need to be conquered. It has become a cliche to point out that Tourneur cut his directorial teeth on three of producer Val Lewton’s brooding 1940s horrors (THE CAT PEOPLE, I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE, THE LEOPARD MAN), but NIGHT OF THE DEMON seems to be Tourneur's attempt to recreate the Lewton formula: the emphasis on solid scripting, the use of shadows, and belief versus skepticism. But none of the Lewton-produced films ever endorsed the supernatural; in fact, such beliefs were often equated with mental illness. Holden is not portrayed as a man sinking into madness; in fact, acting on his new-found knowledge saves him from death, and it is interesting that Andrews' wooden performance loses up as he gets closer to supernatural enlightenment.

Video Watchdog #93 (March 2003) featured a "duelling critics" piece where Kim Newman and Bill Cooke assess Columbia's DVD release, as well as detailed analysis by Cooke of the cuts made to produce CURSE OF THE DEMON.

A 1960s Mad magazine article pointed out that movie heroes and villains often act against type: villains are courteous, charming and open-minded, while heroes are bad-tempered, bigoted and thuggish. NIGHT OF THE DEMON illustrates this theory expertly. James' Karswell is a melodramatic character akin to George Zucco, but MacGinnis plays the Devil-bearded disciple with a touch of Celtic whimsy, treating his enemies with exaggerated politeness. The odd relationship between Karswell and his mother (Athene Seyler) is one of the many off-beat aspects of the film, suggesting that the magician is an insecure mother's boy who shows none of the insidious interest in the opposite sex so commonly demonstrated by screen devil worshippers. This hint of homosexuality doesn't progress further, leaving Karswell as a paunchy, balding character whose resemblance to Aleister Crowley is closer than any other actor.

Tourneur crafted NIGHT OF THE DEMON to exist in a shadow world which would evoke feelings of dread through expressive lighting and sound rather than any sensationalised effects such as a man in a monster suit. Bowing to pressure from executive producer Hal E. Chester, the director agreed to reveal the demon for a few frames in the finale. Much to Tourneur and Bennett's horror, Chester re cut the film so that Karswell's fire demon (a combination of a puppet, suit and a mechanical bust influenced from medieval woodcuts) was shown extensively at the beginning and end of the feature, and was on all publicity materials. For decades, the debate has raged whether Chester's use of the demon cheapens or enhances the overall product. Dubbed as a "monumental blunder" and "atrocious," the monster is over-used at the climax, but overall beneficial to the narrative though not perhaps the overall facade.

Stairway to Sex Magick

The Strange Case of Aleister Crowley and Jimmy Page

English Occultist Aleister Crowley, aka "The Great Beast 666," "The Wickedest Man In The World," and a number of other equally outlandish monikers.

BORN in the Victorian age into a family of Plymouth Brethren - who regarded sex as horribly sinful - Aleister Crowley spent his life violently reacting against this view. Legendary for an unabashed use of hashish, opium, cocaine and heroin, Crowley achieved further notoriety with sex magick, or sexual intercourse continued indefinitely - without orgasm - to produce long, drawn-out states of ecstasy and intoxication. Traditional magicians had built a system of ritual and drama; but Crowley felt that real magick was hidden in a man's will, and could be summoned by an unconscious process. Conventional morality was worthless; Crowley's credo became "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law." Suffering from bronchial infection and addicted to heroin, he passed away quietly in an unassuming Hastings boarding house during 1947, and was almost forgotten until the rock musicians - who alone had the money and inclination to live as Crowley did - started reading about him years after his death. With his libertarian agenda, insatiable appetite for sex and drugs, and a wardrobe of spectacular costumes, it’s as if Crowley had already predicted the heady counterculture of the 1960s and transformed into an icon of rebellion - a metamorphosis crowned by his appearance on the cover of The Beatles’ ‘Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ (1967).

Boleskine House - a sprawling U-shaped farmhouse on the shores of Loch Ness - is the most physical ramification in the link between Crowley and Led Zeppelin’s virtuoso guitarist Jimmy Page. Bought by Crowley acolyte Page in 1970, it was purchased in 1900 by The Great Beast for almost twice its value, because it met certain requirements of Abra-Melin the Mage. These included windows and a door that opened to the north toward a secluded structure that was to serve as an oratory (those who practice Thelma - the religious philosophy Crowley founded - are still instructed to "face north to Boleskine" when conducting ceremonies). Crowley subsequently styled himself The Laird of Boleskine, adopted the kilt, and began trying to summon Thoth and Horus. Stories of unexplained – and unconfirmed - occurrences in the area during his residency are numerous; one tells of a local butcher accidentally cutting off his own hand with a cleaver after reading a note left by Crowley.

Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page. Zeppelin’s phallic guitar worship and uninhibited sexuality made them the rock phenomenon of their era. Asked of any connection to the Black Arts, the groups publicist B. P. Fallon once said, “Jimmy certainly wasn’t sacrificing virgins at midnight. He couldn’t find any.”

Page was quoted in Roadrunner magazine discussing further mayhem, including the story that Boleskine was once the site of a church that burned to the ground with its congregation. This historical background gives insight into the lyrics of Zeppelin’s landmark track Stairway to Heaven. When we consider its nature - a woman searching for the path to a Celtic higher plane - it is a yearning for spiritual transformation; it also appears to be partially a song of hope for all those who once suffered at Boleskine. Controversy for the tune began in 1982, when a prominent Baptist used his radio pulpit to preach that Stairway to Heaven carried subliminal messages. Then the California State Assembly played a backward tape in a public session, with members of the committee claiming they heard the words, "I live for Satan." Zeppelin were duly denounced as agents of The Devil, who were luring millions of teenagers into damnation as unwitting disciples of the Antichrist.

Rumours of devilry dogged Zeppelin throughout their career, fuelled by Page’s interest in Crowley and their deliberately mysterious album sleeves and personal tragedies - singer Robert Plant’s son Karac died of a respiratory infection in 1977, and drummer John Bonham succumbed after a drinking binge in 1980. Shortly after Bonham’s demise, rumours resurfaced about Zeppelin’s so-called 'Black Album', a record of death chants that a German writer claimed he had translated from Old Swabian. Plant himself dismissed any pacts with the Devil, remembering that the only deal the band made was with some of the girls’ High Schools in San Fernando Valley. But Page’s interest in Crowley is profound; the magus took Lucifer as an agent of intellect and freedom, the liberation of the individual. Without any restrictions, there would be no frustration to lead to violence, crime or mental breakdown. Feeling Crowley a misunderstood genius, the musician believed this doctrine of common sense.