Andy Milligan in London (Part II of II)

BLOODTHIRSTY BUTCHERS (1970)

THE MAN WITH 2 HEADS (1972)

THE RATS ARE COMING - THE WEREWOLVES ARE HERE (1972)

"Their prime cuts were curiously erotic ... but thoroughly brutal!" Apparently "sadism was just an appetiser" for Andy Milligan's BLOODTHIRSTY BUTCHERS. 

THE three Andy Milligan pictures under consideration here all typify the filmmaker's "horror and hate" ethos, showing disdain for family, heritage and both sexual and working relationships. His take on Sweeney Todd, BLOODTHIRSTY BUTCHERS, can be described as his most entertaining London-based release, and in true Tod Slaughter style, is filled with grisly details and unnecessary melodrama. Todd (John Miranda) brutally murders customers in his barbershop, with the corpses passed on to neighbour Maggie Lovett (Jane Hilary). With the help of "head" butcher Tobias (Milligan's English mainstay Berwick Kaler), Lovett fills her prize pies with body parts. Lovetts’ innocent employee Johanna (Annabella Wood) and her fiancé, sailor Jarvis (Michael Cox), are just two who get caught up in the convoluted shenanigans.

BLOODTHIRSTY BUTCHERS starts as it means to go on, where Todd slits the throat of an Irishman, then uses a meat cleaver to hack off a hand to take the victim’s ruby ring. Later, a couple discover a female breast (complete with nipple) in a pie, and Mr Busker (William Barrel) whispers to Mrs Lovett the items he and his sister would like to find inside their next purchase. The picture benefits from strong performances - particularly a haunting Kaler, and Wood excels with a Madeline Smith-like purity - but basically it is one unhinged argument after another.

Filmed as DR JEKYLL AND MR BLOOD, THE MAN WITH 2 HEADS was chosen as the title to ride the coattails of AIP hits such as THE INCREDIBLE TWO-HEADED TRANSPLANT and THE THING WITH TWO HEADS.

Milligan's strangely static version of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, THE MAN WITH 2 HEADS, credits the source novelist as Robert Louis Stephenson and opens with a totally unrelated scene of what one assumes to be a Jack the Ripper murder. Dr William Jekyll (Dennis DeMarne) believes that evil has a specific location within the brain and can therefore be isolated and removed. Working alone in the lab, Jekyll's assistant Smithers (Kaler) accidentally knocks over a glass of water, obliterating Jekyll’s antidote notes. Smithers attempts to write over the impressions, recreating the formula. Jekyll, frustrated by the non-delivery of lab rats and unaware his antidote is now ineffectual, tests the formula on himself, transforming into Danny Blood, a brutal sadist who torments and abuses prostitutes – taking particular interest in Soho resident April (Julia Stratton).

The movie sees Milligan particularly barbaric towards women. "There’s nothing a man likes more than to come home to a cigar, his beautiful wife, and dog," Blood tells April, "only you’re not so beautiful, and I don’t have a dog" (this precedes his command to April to bark, then puts out his cigar on the nape of her neck). As the madness begins to bleed into Jekyll’s day-to-day life, he cruelly and misogynistic-ally addresses a quiet female student, Victoria (Jennifer Summerfield), in front of her peers: "what makes you think you should be a doctor, standing up there as if you know what you’re talking about? All women should be in bed… to be used." 

A more apt title for Milligan's English swansong would be THE RATS ARE COMING TO PAD OUT THE PICTURE - THE WEREWOLVES ARE HERE EVENTUALLY. 

THE RATS ARE COMING - THE WEREWOLVES ARE HERE attempts to do for werewolves what THE BODY BENEATH did for vampires. But due to the success of the rodent-themed WILLARD, sequences were added to increase the running time (one of which has the real killing of a rat). Set in 1899, a lycanthropic clan is headed by Papa Mooney (Douglas Pfair), who lives in a country manor with children Phoebe (Joan Ogden), Mortimer (Noel Collins), sadistic Monica (Hope Stansbury) and subhuman son Malcolm (Kaler). When his "normal" daughter from a different mother returns home from medical school, Diana (Jackie Skarvellis) - together with new husband Gerald (the godawful Ian Innes) - the family starts to unravel for good, including the revelation that the curse was not due to an animal bite, rather Phoebe's incestuous union with Papa.

Festering in their estate, the Mooney's are your quintessential Milligan doomed family. Jimmy McDonough, in his Milligan biography The Ghastly One, describes the picture as "by far the weakest effort from Milligan’s English sojourn," and only Stansbury's bitchy psychopath is of note. Started under the title THE CURSE OF THE FULL MOON, the film is ineptly bland and talkative, and like all of the filmmaker's output characters seem genuinely beyond hope, a reflection of Milligan's wider wounded soul.

Andy Milligan in London (Part I of II)

NIGHTBIRDS (1970)

THE BODY BENEATH (1970)

Berwick Kaler and Julie Shaw play strained lovers in the avant-garde NIGHTBIRDS. Their entanglement illustrates Andy Milligan's perennial view of the sexes: how passive men are manipulated by women.

DESCRIBED by Tim Lucas in Video Watchdog as "horror's unwanted weirdo," Andy Milligan was more derogatorily pigeon-holed by Psychotronic's Michael Weldon, who said that if you were a Milligan fan, there was no hope for you (Stephen King also famously dismissed his 1968 opus THE GHASTLY ONES as "the work of morons with cameras.") Most of the Minnesota-native's movies were made for under $15,000, and he was virtually a one-man production company. Not only did Milligan write, direct, photograph, edit and design costumes, he was also a make-up effects supervisor using Grand Guignol techniques (this garish style put him on a similar plain to Tod Slaughter). Dying in 1991 from AIDS and buried in an unmarked grave, Milligan was not an open homosexual, rather an S&M addict relying on fantasy to exorcise his personal demons.

Milligan's filmography of open scars shows a venomous disdain for the church and dysfunctional families; in particular, the home is a cesspit, and relatives are endlessly judgmental. These onscreen complexities mirror his real-life upbringing, as his mother was an overweight alcoholic who allegedly was physically, mentally and sexually abusive to all her children and husband. Although close to his father, Andrew Milligan Sr was a US Army officer, which meant further pressures due to frequent relocation. On set Milligan had a reputation to be demanding and bad-tempered; colleagues also relate to emotional and sexual manipulation, raising speculation that he suffered similar (untreated) health problems to his mother. To typify his chaotic life, one of the filmmaker's few long-term partners was Vietnam veteran Dennis Malvasi, who was a convicted abortion clinic bomber.

THE BODY BENEATH promised "sexually rampant ghouls, depraved souls and blood-red roses filmed in the graveyards of England." In fact, Andy Milligan shot in Highgate Cemetery without permission.

Milligan's residence in London produced NIGHTBIRDS, THE BODY BENEATH, BLOODTHIRSTY BUTCHERS, THE MAN WITH 2 HEADS and THE RATS ARE COMING - THE WEREWOLVES ARE HERE. Although known as a horror director, NIGHTBIRDS - similar to his 1965 debut short VAPOURS - exists in a contemporary setting and aspires to be an arthouse stage play. NIGHTBIRDS tells of Dink (Berwick Kaler) and Dee (Julie Shaw), who have run away from their mothers and are struggling to survive in a not so swinging London. A slow-burning character study, the fragile, virginal and possibly gay Dink is in direct contrast to the resourceful, strong-willed but unbalanced Dee. Kaler and Shaw - both impressive first-timers - force along the paper thin plot, until the true nature of Dee is revealed in the final reel (in which syphilis and the abandonment of her dying child doesn't stop a calculating demeanour).

Behind the nonsensical title THE BODY BENEATH, this is Milligan's most accessible film and illustrates his loathing of clerical figures. Reverend Ford (Gavin Reed) and his silent wife Alicia (Susan Heard) are 400-year-old vampires residing at Carfax Abbey, aiming to restore their incestuous bloodline after years of outsider marriages. Aided by three ghoul brides and hunchback with a heart Spool (a returning Kaler), Ford captures relatives Susan (Jackie Skarvellis) and Candace (Emma Jones) for his carnal needs. The production is best remembered for its delirious Undead Gala climax, where the Vaseline-smeared, red-tinted lens captures the cannibalistic conference (we learn that even Julius Caesar and Elizabeth I are members of the bloodsucking clan).

Chiefly, THE BODY BENEATH takes place in the Neo-Tudor mansion Sarum Chase near Hampstead Heath (Milligan would return for THE RATES ARE COMING - THE WEREWOLVES ARE HERE). The nudie short MISS FRANKENSTEIN RIP was also shot there, as well as being photographed for the sleeve of The Rolling Stones’ Beggars Banquet.

It could generously be said that Milligan modernised vampires before Hammer's DRACULA, A.D. 1972, and played with lore akin to CAPTAIN KRONOS VAMPIRE HUNTER. For example, the ghoul women politely say hello before biting their victims, although they don't have fangs. In further quirks the undead use chloroform, as well as having blood pressure reduced by leeches and being able to move around in daylight thanks to an injection that counteracts the sun. Painfully ponderous and talkative, the washed-out look adds to the Gothic austerity, with Reed revealing in the madness (and certainly getting the best lines).

"Where Science and the Occult Clash!"

NOTHING BUT THE NIGHT (1973)

Here is a film starring Christopher Lee and featuring a Police investigation on a Scottish island that isn't THE WICKER MAN. The climax - where Lee is tied around the neck and arms and propelled into a bonfire by minors - mirrors Edward Woodward's demise in Robin Hardy's cult favourite, which was actually released nine months later.

AGAINST the backdrop of several Trustee murders who support an orphanage on a Scottish island, one young girl, Mary Valley (Gwyneth Strong), is taken to a London hospital after a coach crash and suffers psychological issues. Psychiatrist Dr Haynes (Keith Barron) and journalist Joan Foster (Georgia Brown) interview the girl's wayward biological mother Anna Harb (Diana Dors), a prostitute and convicted murderer. When Haynes is killed, the hospital's senior member Sir Mark Ashley (Peter Cushing) and friend Colonel Charles Bingham (Christopher Lee) take their enquiries to the orphanage, as Anna also travels to the location hoping to reunite with her child. Ashley and Bingham eventually uncover the sinister truth: personalities are being transplanted into the children.

Based on the novel by John Blackburn and directed by Peter Sasdy, NOTHING BUT THE NIGHT was the only film from independent Charlemagne, set up by Lee and former Hammer producer Anthony Nelson Keys. A commercial failure, the picture suffers from a laboured script by Brian Hayles - mostly known for his television work and creator of The Ice Warriors for DOCTOR WHO - and also wastes its outstanding cast, as no character is fully fleshed out. Cushing and Lee are almost playing themselves, and Dors is totally unhinged with her red wig. In fact the acting standout is thirteen year old Strong, and it was a shame no substantial big screen roles came her away, the actress becoming forever known as Cassandra from ONLY FOOLS AND HORSES.

Barely seen in America, NOTHING BUT THE NIGHT became THE RESURRECTION SYNDICATE, a title which unveils its premise. The picture was also released on video as THE DEVIL'S UNDEAD.

As a thematic exercise NOTHING BUT THE NIGHT is troublesome in its use of children, portraying orphans and castaways as scientific guinea pigs and exploitative commodities. Apart from Haynes, the leads are using the unfortunate youngsters for their own needs: Anna views Mary as property which has long been denied to her, Foster and Ashley see the minors as their particular professional interests, and Bingham engages in the mystery for his murdered friend but relishes the thrill of the chase. As an interesting side note, with Blackburn's novel published in 1968, a similar theme is explored in the 1971 United States offering THE BROTHERHOOD OF SATAN. Here, in an inversion of the thesis, a coven are kidnapping souls of children to transfer into their bodies.

Black As Sin

POSSUM (2018)

Designed by Sydney-based Odd Studios, the titular creature is based on writer/director Matthew Holness' fear of spiders. After an original head had a more goblin-like design, found to be too emotive, a sculpture of lead actor Sean Harris lead to a blankness - similar to the Michael Myers visage - where viewers could project their own fears.

THE feature directorial debut of Matthew Holness, POSSUM is an expansion of his short story from The New Uncanny: Tales of Unease. Comma Press had the writers read Freud's theory of the uncanny, then asked them to choose a fear and provide a story (Holness combined two, doppelgängers and dummies). The film sees puppeteer Philip (Sean Harris) returning to his childhood home where his uncle Maurice (Alun Armstrong) has been living for some time, who raised him after the death of his parents. The haunted Philip revisits places significant to his formative years, as he attempts to understand the past and rid himself of his unnerving puppet, a spider with a human head and a thousand yard stare.

POSSUM draws on silent expressionist horror and English Gothic, especially THE INNOCENTS. Jack Clayton's adaptation of The Turn of the Screw shares a lot of POSSUM's foundation, namely an inherent sadness through problematic sexual awakening. This examination of trauma is expertly brought to live by performance and fractured narrative, and even the surrounding forest - with its warped branches - symbolise spindly spider legs (when Maurice attacks at the climax, he puts his fingers into Philip's mouth, providing a further nod to arachnid digits). Another plus is the score by The Radiophonic Workshop, marking the studio's first soundtrack purposely constructed for a feature film. Actually more a sound design for mental anguish, pieces include unreleased material by Delia Derbyshire.

The muted hues of POSSUM mirror the houses and surroundings of the grimmist 1970s Public Information Films. Here, Philip's visit to a school manifests into the "Stranger Danger" aesthetic.

Philip has never recovered from a corrupted innocence, with his monosyllabic speech and movement reminiscent of childlike mannerisms and anxieties. Even the rhyme, "Mother, Father, what’s afoot? Only Possum, black as soot et al," lovingly illustrated in a sketchbook, bridges the simplicity of youth to his adult existence. Harris would remain in character throughout the shoot to the point where Holness felt that he was working with Philip rather than Harris. Both lead actors only interacted with each other while filming scenes together, further enhancing the feeling of separation and tension.

Force of Nature

IN THE EARTH (2021)

"It can get a bit funny in the woods sometimes;" from sacrificial sites to otherworldly portals, standing stones have a firm history in British film and television, hinting at the ancient and the macabre.

BEN Wheatley's IN THE EARTH is a slow-burning folk horror freak-out referred to as his "lockdown movie." Conceived and made during the Coronavirus pandemic, it is not just a companion piece to Wheatley's KILL LIST and A FIELD IN ENGLAND, it is a film which is umbilically linked to them. This mirrors the narrative, that in a virus-stricken world fertile soils are sought to increase crop production. A standing stone is discovered to be the epicentre of an underground network; attempting to communicate by sound and light, can humans actually talk to nature? And if so, what would the inherent features have to say to us? Scientist Martin Lowery (Joel Fry) and forest scout Alma (Ellora Torchia) venture into the woods with equipment for Dr Olivia Wendle (Hayley Squires), Martin's former colleague and ex-lover who is researching Mycorrhiza, the symbiotic association between fungus and plant roots. However, this two-day trek is interrupted by Zach (Reece Shearsmith), a man living in the terrain who inducts them into his own world of ritual.

Using a template of John Carpenter's HALLOWEEN for what can be achieved with a microbudget and a fifteen day shoot, IN THE EARTH makes the most of its natural production and 2:39:1 frame, very much an "outdoor" picture to reintroduce normality after the shock of Covid. Visually beautiful but awkwardly flat, there are too many threads to form a nuanced experience: we have the BLAIR WITCH psychology of Parnag Fegg; SAW extreme violence; trippy ALTERED STATES sequences; science against myth; and dull back stories (Zach is also Wendle's ex-husband). Of the performers Shearsmith is unsurprisingly the highlight, providing the stand-out scene of literal toe-curling horror. Torchia is a believable guide, but Fry is lamely introverted, and Squires too wide-eyed from the get-go to be believed or trusted.

"Everything seems to just keep us here;" Reece Shearsmith is Zach, a fusion of Robert Plant and Jack Torrance.

Yet Wheatley is not leading to any rational conclusions, rather a heavy dose of weirdness expertly described by critic Peter Bradshaw as like "the last crashing cord of The Beatles' A Day in the Life." IN THE EARTH not just mimics woodland horror, it illustrates the pastoral gothic of British creatives from Algernon Blackwood to Nigel Kneale and 1970s Hauntology. Although there are overtures to THE STONE TAPE and even CLOSE ENCOUNTERS, allusions to Blackwood are particularly apt. The writer and broadcaster wrote stories not to frighten but to create awe with alternative consciousnesses and creations, imaginative treatments of possibilities outside our normal human range. For example, in The Willows, part of his 1907 collection The Listener and Other Stories, the environment is personified with threatening and powerful characteristics; and The Wendigo, first published in 1910's The Lost Valley and Other Stories, details spiritual possession during a hunting trip.

Britain in the Raw

COOL IT CAROL (1970)
GOODBYE GEMINI (1970)

Released by AIP in the United States as DIRTIEST GIRL I EVER MET, COOL IT CAROL is a kitsch time capsule of swinging London that also started Britain's love affair with Robin Askwith's naked arse.

COOL IT CAROL and GOODBYE GEMINI were released within four months of each other in the latter half of 1970, both telling tales of young couples traveling to London. Inspired by a true story, COOL IT CAROL is part sex comedy part cautionary tale, and Pete Walker's finest slice of sexploitation before shifting to horror. Butcher boy Joe Sickles (Robin Askwith) and garage attendant Carol Thatcher (Janet Lynn in a role intended for Susan George) leave Shropshire to seek fame and fortune. With Joe unable to find work, he soon becomes Carol's manager, Thatcher guiding their wealth through modelling, cheap porn loops and prostitution ("it's only a fuck - I can't believe people pay good money for it.") As Carol becomes a high class call girl with Sheikh and cabinet minister clients, the pair become tired of fabricated existence and return home to resume their old jobs. 

COOL IT CAROL benefits from a solid Murray Smith script and strong performances (we are naturally enthused by Joe and Carol to the extent that the pimping sequence is quite harrowing). Unsurprisingly the papers couldn't see past the smut, describing it as "liable (if not calculated) to corrupt" (Evening News) and "a patch of untreated effluent" (Sunday Times). Similar to Walker's exploitation breakthrough HOUSE OF WHIPCORD, COOL IT CAROL portrays corruption as being far more dictated (and practiced) by those with higher moral standing, where sexual possession is seen as commodity (even in the filmmaker's 1969 travesty SCHOOL FOR SEX, a Judge takes over promiscuous reigns). After all, this is a London for the domain of young players, greasy businessmen and seedy politicians, in Soho clubs with indoor swimming pools.

Judy Geeson, Martin Potter and Alexis Kanner enjoy a London on the threshold of hippie disintegration in GOODBYE GEMINI.

Judy Geeson and Martin Potter star as fraternal birth partners Jacki and Julian Dewar in Alan Gibson's GOODBYE GEMINI. A companion piece to MUMSY, NANNY, SONNY AND GIRLY in its portrayal of childlike family interaction, Jacki and Julian, on a University break, are sent by their father to an old Chelsea Embankment house and immediately hospitalise their elderly governess. They frequent London's underground party scene - complete with Jacki's teddy bear Agamemnon - and are soon ensnared by hustler Clive Landseer (Alexis Kanner with elaborate sideburns). Clive is using the Dewars to shroud him from gangster Road Barstowe (Mike Pratt), who he owes a large gambling debt; Clive blackmails Julian by plying him with whiskey and marijuana then taking him to a hotel room with two transvestite prostitutes. When Landseer is stabbed to death by the twins in a ritual - dressed in bed sheets as makeshift ceremonial robes - Agamemnon is cut in half, and Jacki goes on the run.

Adapted from Jenni Hall's experimental and fragmented 1964 novel Ask Agamemnon, the film abandons the book's Greek tragedy and fantasy sequences for a more linear experience, focusing more on Julian's incestuous yearning. Although it is hard to categorise - psychological sexploitation is perhaps nearest the mark - GOODBYE GEMINI is a surprisingly dull affair. Geeson (at the height of her career following TO SIR WITH LOVE) and Potter (fresh from Fellini's SATYRICON) are overshadowed by Kanner's stellar performance; neither does their journey gel with the older performers ("two old tombstones" Michael Redgrave as "member of parliament with a heart" and partygoer Freddie Jones). It is all too hedonistic to be enjoyable; self-indulgence is one thing, but no production can cope with such a quirky mix of naivety and ruthlessness. At least the fashions and party scenes are garish enough to hold interest, priming Gibson for helming Hammer's DRACULA A.D. 1972.

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.

Ghost Breakers

CATACOMBS (1965)

DARK PLACES (1973)

Released in the United States as THE WOMAN WHO WOULDN'T DIE, the Hitchcockian CATACOMBS subscribes to that age old task of murdering one's wife.

CATACOMBS is a largely forgotten gem of British horror, the story of wealthy businesswoman Ellen Garth (Georgina Cookson), her downtrodden husband Raymond (Gary Merrill), and their Art student niece Alice Taylor (Jane Merrow). Ellen needs control over everything in her life, even her sudden physical pains in which she induces a trance to escape from. A murder plot between Raymond and her seedy secretary Corbett (Neil McCallum) is played out with Alice starting an affair with Raymond. The planned scheme involving actress Rachel Thomas (Christine Glynn) is prematurely halted by the overbearing Ellen finally breaking her husband's patience at their cottage retreat: Raymond drowns her in the bathroom sink and buries her in the potting shed. But this doesn't seem to end Ellen's yearning to act revenge on her husband and niece.

It was during his time as story editor on ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS that director Gordon Hessler discovered the film's source novel by Jay Bennett. An adaptation was rejected for the show, but became his theatrical directorial debut. Yet CATACOMBS cannot shake off its feel of an extended anthology episode; Merrill - himself a veteran of Hitchcock's TV programme - is perfectly cast as the aging gigolo, and Cookson is frightening and glacially fragile (when Raymond carries his wife in his arms, Ellen seems to eerily transform into a mannikin). The tension is simple but effective (the sound of Ellen's walking cane, the moving of locked door knobs), and although the double twist ending will not surprise all, it nevertheless is a satisfying climax to a well made and entertaining thriller.

Shot at an old psychiatric hospital near Uxbridge, DARK PLACES was the only release from Glenbeigh/Sedgled, but it had a great poster. 

Helmed by Don Sharp, DARK PLACES is a pedestrian haunted house/psychological thriller that is also rarely discussed at length. Following the death of an aging asylum inmate, Edward Foster (Robert Hardy) inherits an old mansion with a grim reputation: a woman, the housekeeper and two children have disappeared without trace. However Edward is more interested in the £210,000 hidden somewhere behind the walls. Unfortunately there are others who also want the money: Dr Ian Mandeville (Christopher Lee) and his sister Sarah (Joan Collins), together with solicitor Mr Prescott (Herbert Lom). With Sarah helping Edward at the mansion, and the siblings faking paranormal occurrences, the building and its backstory start to affect Foster's fragile psyche. Possessed by the spirits of the deceased, he begins his own murder spree.

Similar to the feel of CATACOMBS, DARK PLACES plays more like a TV movie, hampered by uncharismatic direction and photography. Hardy has a lot of character aspects to grapple with and manages to just about carry the film, while the all-star cast are wasted (although Collins inevitably shines as the sexually conniving sleuth). Even the flashback sequences have quality performers in small roles, with Jean Marsh and Jane Birkin. The notion of the Mandeville fake haunting is never developed; in fact, the realisation that strange things are actually happening is only met with brief puzzlement. It's a shame, as this interesting trope dates back to earlier stories such as THE CAT AND THE CANARY and THE GHOST BREAKERS, particularly in the context of money and induced madness.

The Cat Creeps

THE CAT AND THE CANARY (1978)

Carol Lynley and The Cat in the only colour film of the celebrated but dated play. The production was not released theatrically until 1982 due to litigation with the original distributor, and consequently sat uncomfortably with the glut of slashers of the period. 

JOHN Willard's black comedy stage play The Cat and the Canary originally opened on Broadway in early 1922, and has become a cornerstone of the "old dark house" subgenre and "creepy clutching hand" motif. The story concerns the death and inheritance of a rich eccentric who felt that his relatives "have watched my wealth as if they were cats, and I - a canary." To date the tale has been adapted into four motion pictures: the 1927 Universal silent directed by German expressionist Paul Leni, the 1930 pre-code sound remake released as THE CAT CREEPS, the 1939 Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard take, and this British-made offering helmed by American cult filmmaker Radley Metzger.

In 1934, on the twentieth anniversary of his death, the remaining relatives of Cyrus Canby West (Wilfred Hyde-White) are called to his Surrey mansion to view the filmed reading of his will. Cyrus lets it be known how much he despised and loathed his kin - calling them "bastards" and "leeches" - by setting up a psychological struggle for his fortune. With a history of insanity in the family, West reveals that Annabelle (Carol Lynley) is to be the sole beneficiary, but to claim the inheritance she must spend the night in the house and be deemed sane the next morning. The situation is further complicated when a "chief psychologist at the Fairview Sanitarium, an asylum for the criminally insane; we're just up the road..." - Hendricks (Edward Fox) - informs the guests that a homicidal maniac known as The Cat has escaped and is hiding in the area. But this is revealed as a ploy by the unhinged second heir to drive Annabelle insane.

Wendy Hiller robustly plays family lawyer Mrs Crosby, and is removed half way through the film by becoming the first victim.

Metzger was a pioneer famous for his lavishly designed, adult-orientated films such as THE LICKERISH QUARTET, SCORE and THE OPENING OF MISTY BEETHOVEN (he also edited THE FLESH EATERS, regarded as the first ever splatter movie). His career-long fascination with self-destructive beautiful people morphs here into a group of desperate misfits, a de-sexualised mansion mystery of secret rooms and building resentment. Even the cinematography is against type, casting a well-lit glow as opposed to the usual cobwebs and shadows, and Alex Thomson's wide-lenses providing a sense of anti-claustrophobia. The stand-out touch, however, illustrates Metzger's pendant for the juxtaposition of actors and the projected image, when the family's faithful retainer Mrs Pleasant (Beatrix Lehmann) moves behind West's home movie only to reappear on screen - monochrome and twenty years younger - with Cyrus during the reading.

The all-star cast give performances that could generously be described as unconventional, portrayals of people who are all killers one way or another: disgraced doctor Henry (Daniel Massey, whose father Raymond had spent a night at James Whale's THE OLD DARK HOUSE), big game hunter Susan (Honor Blackman) and her lesbian lover Cicily (Olivia Hussey), who shot an employer attempting to rape her, war hero Charlie (Peter McEnery) and songwriter Paul (Michael Callan), obliquely "the biggest killer of all" according to West. It's a hodgepodge of goofiness undermined by strange lapses: why is Cyrus' formalities in sound, for example, and the two climatic shootings are completely bloodless. 

We Are for the Dark

NIGHT VOICES - THE HOSPICE (1987)

GHOSTS - THREE MILES UP (1995)

The weird tales of Robert Aickman (1914 - 81) have a psychological and expressive richness which have gained comparison with M.R. James. Still relatively unknown, four of his stories were adapted for NIGHT VOICES: The Hospice, The Inner Room, Hand in Glove and The Trains.

THE obscure HTV anthology NIGHT VOICES was produced by Patrick Dromgoole, a coordinator of fondly remembered ITV programmes such as SKY and CHILDREN OF THE STONES. THE HOSPICE was directed by Dominique Othenin-Girard, who would go on to very little notoriety by helming franchise entries HALLOWEEN 5 and OMEN IV: THE AWAKENING. THE HOSPICE is based on a story by the master of strangeness, Robert Aickman, and beautifully adapted by XTRO scribe Robert Smith. A bizarre purgatory tale, Maybury (Jack Shepherd) finds himself in the eponymous building, a lavish country house filled with ambiguous and eccentric characters such as the maître d’ (Alan Dobie) and an alluring young woman (Marthe Keller). Maybury begrudgingly accepts the offer to stay the night and is put in a room with Bannard (Jonathan Cecil), but a surreally restless night continues to an evenly more unsettling dawn, as he at last escapes the confines by being given a lift in the back of a hearse.

Like all great artists and writers, their essence is difficult to pin down; on the written page The Hospice begins "It was somewhere at the back of beyond," a good place to start in the unravelling of Aickmanesque. The six episodes of NIGHT VOICES were made in 1987 and 1988 but not broadcast until 1993, creating a fitting state of flux richly illustrated in the author's netherworlds. Aickman’s characters often find themselves trapped in a series of poetic events unconnected by logic, and few stories end clearly. A driven conservationist, Aickman had a disdain for modern living, and his draw to the supernatural can in some part be explained by giving him a platform to unmake an ordinary world. Yet for a person who preferred the past, this did not seem to include conventional gender roles; Aickman’s best stories feature women as liberated protagonists, while men suffer from varying strains of anxiety and repression.

Blackpool-born Jacqueline Leonard commands the GHOSTS episode THREE MILES UP. Leonard has been one of our leading television actresses, which has included runs in PEAK PRACTICE, EASTENDERS and CORONATION STREET. 

GHOSTS was another six episode series, this time on BBC1 primetime in January and February 1995. THREE MILES UP is an adaptation of a story written by Elizabeth Jane Howard, which first appeared in the 1951 collection We Are for the Dark, co-authored by her then lover Aickman. Directed by Lesley Manning - best known for GHOSTWATCH - Billy (Douglas Henshall) and John (Dan Mulland) are estranged brothers who aim to repair their relationship after the death of their mother. They decide to go on a houseboat holiday, and after Billy blows an old whistle that the mother said to use if they were in trouble, they soon discover Sara (Jacqueline Leonard) sleeping under a fallen tree. As the trip becomes increasingly dreamlike - together with a recurring vision of the brothers as boys watching the mother drown in a freak cellar flood - Billy and John both fall under Sara's measured spell. When she recommends taking a route unmarked on the map, the brothers also succumb to a watery demise.

With Billy's history of mental illness and John resenting all the years he had looked after him, this premise is already alienating and underlyingly hostile. The passing landscape of a waterways journey adds to the detachment, and apart from one effective jolt scare THREE MILES UP is a slow-burning descent into impending doom. Henshall and Mulland are functional at best, and it is Leonard who carries the story, eerily glacial as her particular Mother Earth overpowers thoughts and processes. It is a fitting entry for both Aickman and Howard; Aickman co-founded the Inland Waterways Foundation, where Howard was a part-time secretary.

Skeletons in the Closet

NIGHT OF THE EAGLE (1962)
GHOST STORIES (2017)

"Don't see this picture unless you can withstand the emotional shock of a lifetime!;" fresh from THE INNOCENTS, Peter Wyngarde experiences the NIGHT OF THE EAGLE (or in America, BURN, WITCH, BURN!).

THESE two films focus on academics who have to question their sceptic beliefs towards the paranormal. Adapted from Fritz Leiber's 1943 novel Conjure Wife, Sidney Hayer's NIGHT OF THE EAGLE has sociology Professor Norman Taylor (Peter Wyngarde) discovering that his perfect wife Tansy (big-band singer Janet Blair) is actually a Witch, and has been practising her craft since their honeymoon. Tansy has manipulated Taylor's rising career at Hempnell Medical College, and discovering this, the Professor destroys all of her inventory of magical paraphernalia. Thereafter Taylor suffers a number of sinister situations, one of which is an accusation of "violating" one of his students. It transpires that his path is now being orchestrated by the hostile intent of another faculty wife, Flora Carr (Margaret Johnston), driven by both educational and sexual jealousy.

Fittingly shot in moody monochrome by Reginald Wyer, the movie is underplayed in the tradition of Val Lewton, and possesses a tangible chill. NIGHT OF THE EAGLE is comparable to NIGHT OF THE DEMON in its more adult approach to the uncanny, and Hayers cut large portions of occult and voodoo material from the original script - by Richard Matheson, Charles Beaumont and George Baxt - to concentrate on the plight of the Taylors. The Eagle itself - a stone embodiment that rests at the entrance of the school - comes to life with risible results, but it can't take away the fact that Hayer's film is a beautifully played classic of British horror; Wyngarde and Blair convince at every level of their descent, but Johnston steals the show with her permanently off-kilter performance.

"Everything is exactly as it seems;" for GHOST STORIES, horror fans Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman liberally draw from the genre - especially Hideo Nataka's DARK WATER - and even had the set blessed by a Rabbi.

Based on their own Olivier Award-nominated stage show, Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman's GHOST STORIES arrived on a wave of glowing reviews and hype that no film could fully justify. This three-part anthology mashes together Amicus and the BBC GHOST STORY FOR CHRISTMAS strand for old school scares and J-Horror that builds to a hokey finale that undermines its own building premise. Professor Goodman (Nyman) is given a trio of unsolved mysteries by his assumed-deceased idol Charles Cameron: Tony Matthews (Paul Whitehouse) is a night watchman of a disused female correctional facility, haunted by the spirit of a young girl; jittery teenager Simon Rifkind (Alex Lawther) encounters a Satyr in the woods; and country-based stockbroker Mike Preddle (Martin Freeman) is plagued by a poltergeist while awaiting his IVF-induced child.

The performances embrace its emotional tropes of family resentment, belief systems and childhood traumas. Simon's story is the most effective - underpinned by some wonderful black humour (Sooty and Sweep anyone?) - but these powerfully-played themes grate somewhat with its peripheral ghosts and jump scares, and the atmospherically barren landscapes of concrete halls, a daytime pub and an out-of-season caravan park. It's worth a second watch to pick up the easter eggs, but they are not so much Ghost stories as Ghost settings. In conclusion, it contains too odd a mix even for a horror movie, and reeks heavily of Nyman's misdirection and overblown showmanship evident in his association with Derren Brown.

Margaret Johnston in NIGHT OF THE EAGLE. Australia-born to English parentage, the stage and screen actress - also memorable in Amicus' THE PSYCHOPATH - latterly managed an agency with American director husband Albert Parker, whose clients included James Mason, Helen Mirren and Frank Finlay.

The most grounded argument from supernatural skeptics is not so much if ghosts exist, but why the human psyche actually needs them; ultimately it is a longing for comfort, away from the harsh and bleak reality of death. More specifically, the biggest difference in NIGHT OF THE EAGLE and GHOST STORIES handling of their respective Professor's is that Taylor's professional life is manipulated by the constant indignation of females, whether in the name of love - Tandy is even willing to die for him as he has much more to offer the world - or bitterness. Conversely, everything in Goodman's journey is devoid of women; partnerless and childless, he exists in a closed, work-dominated world. Though when Flora Carr sets fire to a pyramid of Tarot cards - the otherworldly equivalent of the character's beloved Bridge evenings - and spits "burn, Witch, burn," Goodman has certainly opted for a less suffocating existence. 

"Tops in Total Horror!"

THE CORPSE (1971)

The daughter of UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS actress Rachel Gurney, Sharon Gurney's brief screen career began on television, before graduating to memorable roles in WOMEN IN LOVE and DEATH LINE.

RELEASED in the United States under the nonsensical banner CRUCIBLE OF HORROR, this ambiguous, dreamlike melodrama takes its cue from Henri-Georges Clouzot's celebrated psychological thriller LES DIABOLIQUES. Walter Eastwood (Michael Gough) runs his upper middle class family with suffocating repression: wife Edith (Yvonne Mitchell) has retreated into painting from years of neglect, son Rupert (Simon Gough) is a facsimile of the patriarch working for the same insurance firm, and it is only rebellious daughter Jane (Sharon Gurney) who strives for a life beyond these watertight walls. When Walter discovers sixteen-year-old Jane has been sleeping with a friend from his golf club - and that she has also stolen money from the premises - he horse-whips her to sleep, while in an adjacent room Rupert turns up the volume in his headphones. Listening to her daughter's cries of pain, Edith is awakened from her trance-like state, and the following morning openly whispers to Jane "lets kill him."

Creepy and compelling, Michael Gough is perfect as the overbearing head, illustrating his unwholesome air early on when Jane returns home on her bicycle, only for him to instantly clasp the still-warm seat. One reading is that Edith imagines everything after the beating of her daughter, yet spliced frames of jagged close-ups, a possible rape and a bag full of masks adds to the disorientation. When Edith corners Walter at his grouse shooting weekend - explaining that "I recently bought a copy of the Marquis de Sade, it's full of the most unutterable filth, but it opened up a few windows for me, I thought it might help to understand you" - it begins a middle third which sets up much but delivers little. Walter may well have been poisoned by the females of the clan, but his body won't stay still, moving from its bed to a crate marked "Mrs E Eastwood, Velvet House, Richmond" and creating a floating mental state for the mother who fades altogether as Water retains his place at the breakfast table.

Similar to the filmography of Peter Cushing, Michael Gough never disappoints, even in a wooden crate. His underappreciated performances as a parade of slimy villains should rank higher with the icons of the genre.

Described by producer Gabrielle Beaumont as a political work, THE CORPSE was actually filmed in the Spring of 1969, a period when the feminist movement were questioning the persistence of gender stereotypes; here, the emotionally and physically-abusing male is always in control, with his understated British venom. Consequently, the project can be viewed as an allegory for the ineffectiveness of rebellion within the traditional family unit, to the point where the mother even longs for a fresh outlook she knows will never come ("I'd like to go back to school, start again") and that the father will always return even if he is dead. To add to the frisson, Gough stars with his real-life son and daughter-in-law.

Unnatural Born Killers

CORRUPTION (1968)
PREVENGE (2016)

For CORRUPTION, Peter Cushing's trademark commitment and professionalism is tested in this notoriously nasty offering.

SHORTLY before making the lowest point of his filmography - THE BLOOD BEAST TERROR - Peter Cushing made his most controversial. This Titan production, directed by Robert Hartford-Davis, sees "The Gentleman of Horror" cast as respected surgeon Sir John Rowan. When his aging model fiancée Lynn (Sue Lloyd) starts an impromptu photo session with Mike (Tony Booth) at a swinging Sixties party, the photographer and impeccably suited surgeon's clash of personality boils over into a fight, where an arc light falls onto Lynn's face in front of horrified onlookers. Developing "an entirely new way of controlling the endocrine system to promote tissue growth," the doctor's yearning for pituitary glands to restore Lynn's looks leads him to murder, under the increasing demands of his wife-to-be. While at a Seaford holiday retreat a group of beatniks invade, and Rowan's colleague Steve (Noel Trevarthan) and Lynn's sister Val (Kate O'Mara) piece together the string of outrages. 

Dubbed "gratuitously violent, fearfully sick, but it was a good script" by Cushing, the posters to CORRUPTION stated that "no woman will be admitted alone to see this super-shock film." Rowan's murder sequences are still jaw-dropping today, amplified by the use of hand-held close-ups. With hair flapping around his sweaty crazed glare, the actor's slaying of a topless prostitute - stabbing her repeatedly on the floor before smearing his bloodied hands on her breasts then removing her head - is not only British horror's most shocking sequence, it also points towards the Seventies sleaze to come. The delirium is added another two layers with the arrival of Georgie and his gang in Seaford - an out of left field final act which sees a massacre by an out-of-control surgical laser - and amid production bickering, the "is it a dream?" ending.

After GARTH MARENGHI'S DARKPLACE and SIGHTSEERS,

Alice Lowe continues her outlandish comedic career with PREVENGE.

Written, directed and starring Alice Lowe, PREVENGE defies description - in a good way. Too easily labelled a sardonic, jet black comedy, it is also a meditation on loss and the mental process of pregnancy. Shot in two weeks to accommodate Lowe's real-life condition, and enveloped by an outstanding Goblinesque score by Toydrum, textures increase with subsequent viewings to reveal - almost - an art film. Ruth (Lowe) is a pregnant woman who goes on a killing spree, seeking revenge on the people she claims accountable for her partner's death on a climbing trip; struggling with her conscience and prepartum psychosis, the unborn child speaks to Ruth from the womb, coaching her to kill ("If you don't do as I say blood will be shed, one way or another.")

Lowe's performance flicks between deadpan, psychotic, angst and turmoil (possibly in equal measures). The casting is strong with numerous fan-favourites: DAVID BRENT LIFE ON THE ROAD's Jo Hartley as the Midwife, GAME OF THRONES' Gemma Whelan as Len, and THE WITCH's Kate Dickie as a businesswoman who succumbs to a throat-slitting straight out of Argento. One sequence is spontaneously filmed in Cardiff on Halloween night, and it is this ethic which makes PREVENGE seem consistently fresh in style if not always in content. The murders are effective, but the visuals seem to unfold in some other brooding universe, and Lowe has mischievously likened the feel to BLADE RUNNER. Yet you can see her thinking; in Ridley Scott's milestone, Vangelis' jazz-influenced score underpinned the yearning of remembrance, driving the narrative similarly to Toydrum's often thunderous electronica.

Demons of the 1970's (Part II of II)

SYMPTOMS (1974)
FULL CIRCLE (1977)

"Changes in the weather always upset me ... I don't know why;" Angela Pleasence battles with her twisted psyche in SYMPTOMS.

UNLIKE his exploitative VAMPYRES, José Larraz’s SYMPTOMS is a slow-burning triumph, a film that was unexpectedly chosen as an official British entry at Cannes. Neurotic waif Helen Ramsey (a mesmerising Angela Pleasence) has invited girlfriend Anne (Lorna Heilbron) to stay at her English woodland estate. Anne is welcoming the retreat to write and evaluate the end of a romance, but Helen's behaviour becomes increasingly erratic as questions are asked of the portrait of Cora - Ramsey's disappeared friend and possible lover - and the brooding presence of handyman Brady (Peter Vaughan). Helen's manifestations of Cora mirror Anne's unease in the house, under the shadow of Cora's body festering in the lake after a passionate embrace with the burly handyman.

Larraz has long favoured mansions in his pictures, and the warring of the sexes; here they are quite literally foundations for exploring the horror motif of characters yearning for lost loves. Taking several inspirations from REPULSION, the director uses a mirror and the ticking of a clock to replicate Roman Polanski's idea of lulling the viewer into a false sense of security, before delivering bludgeoning shock tactics. Vanity Celis points out in her essay which accompanies the BFI Blu-ray that Larraz' contribution to the sexual anxieties of the Gothic tradition is "a safety net found in the auxiliary subtext of lesbian love," and the production - similar to Jorge Grau's THE LIVING DEAD AT MANCHESTER MORGUE, Juan Carlos Fresnadillo’s 28 WEEKS LATER and Alfronso Cuaron’s CHILDREN OF MEN - captures the English landscape more effectively than native filmmakers, creating an agitation that resonates more deeply in the outsider's eye.

Mia Farrow brings a tragic vulnerability to her role in FULL CIRCLE, part of a Seventies Anglo-Canadian co-production deal which yielded lesser pictures THE UNCANNY and DEATH SHIP.

An eerie atmosphere of love and loss is also central to Richard Loncraine's FULL CIRCLE, based on Peter Straub's 1975 novel Julia. A decade on from her subjection to Polanski's ROSEMARY'S BABY, Mia Farrow is again entangled with an unearthly child, playing a mother grieving the loss of daughter Katie (Sophie Ward) who chokes to death at breakfast. During her self-imposed isolation at an old house in Kensington, Julia is stalked by another girl ghost, who led a gang in the brutal murder of a German boy in 1938. As a "feeling of hate" infiltrates the dwelling, the murderous infant is identified as Olivia Rudge, and Julia traces Olivia's mother (Cathleen Nesbitt) to a Swansea mental institution, who admits to killing her offspring and accuses her visitor of doing the same.

In a moving final scene Julia welcomes the ghostly Olivia into her arms, the camera then pans around an armchair to reveal that Julia has a fatal neck wound. This not only brings us full circle from Katie's demise, but leaves the viewer wondering if Olivia has claimed another victim from her otherworldly plane, or the tortured mother has committed suicide. The willowy Farrow carries the whole burden of grief superbly, and quite rightly male players are kept to the margins (husband Magnus (Keir Dullea) is purely abandoned, and friend Mark (Tom Conti) suffers an unnecessarily sensationalised death)). The film also benefits from beautiful cinematography and a piano/synthesiser score which manages to underpin and elaborate on the unease.

Demons of the 1970's (Part I of II)

DEMONS OF THE MIND (1972)

One of Britain's last costumed Gothics, DEMONS OF THE MIND was filmed as BLOOD WILL HAVE BLOOD, exploring "dreams of sexual fear supressed through guilt."

AMID the dying embers of the 1970's British film industry, attempts to move into more psychological thrillers resulted in a number of underappreciated efforts. Dumped onto the wrong end of a double bill with TOWER OF EVIL, DEMONS OF THE MIND - directed by Peter Sykes and written by Christopher Wicking - is a Hammer production which focuses on Baron Friedrich Zorn (Robert Hardy), who fears he has passed on the "family madness" to son Emil (Shane Briant) and daughter Elizabeth (Gillian Hills). Held captive to curb their incestuous desires, Emil is at least released at night to murder women, while Elizabeth is "bled" to make her weak (making use of a vintage Scarificator from the British Museum). When discredited psychologist Falkenberg (Patrick Magee) arrives with his associate scholar Carl (Manfred Man singer Paul Jones), an experiment to rid Emil of his lust involving Inge (Virginia Wetherell) ends in another strangulation. The villagers, influenced by a deranged, self-styled Holy Man (Michael Hordern), decide that Zorn is the true demon, and stake him with a burning cross.

A mix of Hammer's Mittel Europe and fledgling psychiatry was one way the company attempted to make its product fresh, another was by infusing proceedings with new young directors and screenwriters. But DEMONS OF THE MIND is more cynical than satisfying, conveying a relentless dourness (quoting Psalm 38 "For my loins are filled with a loathsome disease, and there is no soundness in my flesh") where conventions are either twists or throwbacks: Magnee's unhinged Mesmerist and Van Helsing substitute helps no one ("Better men than I have been booted out of Vienna!"), an alleged Priest is a dangerous zealot, and the villagers revel in their own sadism.

In a role originally intended for Marianne Faithfull, Gillian Hills plays somnambulant Elizabeth Zorn. Faithfull was pulled late on due to insurance issues on her drug use.

A Poe-like story of an incestuous, murderous dynasty crumbling to dust, Zorn is driven by subconscious compulsions of his peasant bride's "virgin blood" and bare flesh (Zorn is a character undermined by Hardy's pantomime performance; to think we might have had Eric Porter, Paul Scofield, Dirk Bogarde or James Mason). Hordern is also overtly loopy, barely able to carry his over-sized wooden cross, and despite the emotional slant, DEMONS OF THE MIND actually serves up a copious amount of exploitative, early 70's gore: although optically fogged, Zorn's wife is seen to slash her wrists and throat in front of her children, but further scenes of Emil killing maiden aunt Helda (Yvonne Mitchell) with a bunch of keys and Zorn's climactic impalement are in no way shrouded.

The original pitch to Hammer by Frank Godwin - the composer-cum-independent producer who penned Strange Love for LUST FOR A VAMPIRE - was actually a werewolf picture. The studio was intrigued by Godwin's knowledge of the legend of Blutlust, and together with Wicking, formulated a treatment based on the Bavarian story of a man-wolf which was actually a psychopathic condition not understood by the medicine of the time. However, the tale was a complete fabrication, and Hammer did not warm to the werewolf elements anyway, leaving only a vague lycanthropic reference in the finished film where Zorn imagines himself stalking as an animal (to further the pseudo-werewolf angle, the muted cinematography is lensed by Arthur Grant, making his last Hammer picture in an association which started with THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF).