The Creeping Flesh (1973)

Great poster!

The movie opens with someone visiting Professor Emmanuel Hildern, Peter Cushing’s character, in what is clearly some sort of asylum type setting. He goes on about evil as a disease and how he accidentally unleashed it back on the planet three thousand years early! Then we see how that happened in a flashback. Emmanuel is just returning from a trip to New Guinea with the bones of what he thinks is early man. He is trying to determine our origins and went fossil hunting. He is greeted by his daughter Penelope. He also returns home to a letter from his brother James, played by Christopher Lee, informing him that his wife has died.

James is also a scientist and runs an asylum. Emmanuel’s wife was institutionalized there for decades. Unfortunately, Penelope was told that she died so when the truth comes out she is rather angry. Also, Emmanuel finds out that if you get the bones he brought back New Guinea wet they start to grow flesh! From that flesh and reading books about the superstitions of the region he determines that they are the source of evil and that it is a disease. He creates an inoculation that in his mind will prevent someone from doing evil. He is afraid that Penelope has inherited her mother’s madness so of course he gives her a shot. One that actually infects her and things go downhill from there.

James finds out about the bones and wants them for his own research. He also locks up Penelope when she goes on a violent rampage. When he steals the bones it starts to rain and of course evil is reborn! Emmanuel also postulates that because it would have taken a couple thousand years for them to be exposed had he not dug them out he is responsible for bringing evil back to the Earth on a massive scale. Might also want to mention this movie takes place in the late eighteen hundreds right before a couple World Wars! Is that a coincidence?

Evil gave him the finger!

I know from poking around after watching The Creeping Flesh that a lot of folks have issues with it. I understand that seeing Lee and Cushing in a movie directed by Freddie Francis immediately makes people think Hammer and honestly it isn't as good as those movies. But on it’s own the movie isn’t too shabby. The actors are perfectly cast and by this time Cushing and Lee had a lot of screen chemistry and played off each other very well. The pacing is solid though I’ll admit there are a couple slow spots, but they always lead to a decent payoff. The movie is best when one or the pair of our lead actors are on screen. These guys make the most predictable of dialogue fun to watch thru their own charisma and talent.

There are some decent kills, though many are offscreen. A maid gets strangled (off-screen), a coachman gets his throat torn out (off-screen), a throat gets slashed, a face gouged, and a lunatic falls to his death. Though the best gag is the one they use to “grow” the flesh on the bones. If I had to guess they had some sort of material that melted off the prop and then reversed the footage, so it looked like it was growing back. It is a simple trick but works well. The reveal of the evil monster after it has returned to life is a bit silly but for the time The Creeping Flesh was made it was a respectable creature. I honestly don’t have any complaints.

I highly recommend this entertaining and informative movie. How is it informative you might ask? Well, if you in fact find an evil skeleton and cut off it’s finger to grow flesh and then freak out and burn it… well it may come looking for a replacement digit! Heh… check this one out.

 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer

Island of the Burning Damned (aka. Night of the Big Heat) (1967)

It is winter in England… well except if you live on the small island of Fara. There the temperature has hit the high nineties with so stop in sight. To that end we meet the locals. Jeff is a writer who also runs the local pub with his wife Frankie. There is also the island’s M.D. Dr. Stone and a cranky mysterious man named Hanson. As we see folks complaining about the heat Jeff’s new secretary Angela shows up to start her job. She wears a bikini, which is quite the thing. What is odd is that no one seems terribly concerned that the island is cooking while it is freezing right across on the mainland. We also know that everyone is aware of it because of radio reports.

What is up? Turns out that Hanson is a scientist that has come to investigate Fara. He has tried to convince the authorities that aliens have followed a radio signal back to the observatory and are testing Earth out for colonization. They apparently need things to be hot so cue the heat wave. Despite the obvious strange weather no one is coming to help them, so they must try and stop the invasion themselves. Nothing works and pretty much everyone is dead before the last three minutes happen. In those three minutes we hear thunder, it rains, and all the aliens die… probably because they cooled off. The end.

The Drama... The Scandal!

Island of the Burning Damned had all the ingredients for a cool movie. Isolated island setting, alien invasion, mysterious deaths, and a great cast, more on that later. So, what the hell happened? First up the story is painfully slow. We get so much walking around and people talking about the heat that there is never any momentum. We spend more time watching Hanson setup a camera trap then we do with them discussing the aliens! This is even worse with the introduction of a major subplot involving Jeff and his new secretary Angela. They had an affair in London, and she has pursued him to the island to try and continue things while he wants to leave peacefully with his wife. Sweet… forget the aliens I want the drama of an affair. Not really. The movie feels like they didn’t really have much of a plot and threw a bunch of random plotlines in to pad things out. I still can’t get over the abrupt and silly ending. I mean advanced spacefaring aliens didn’t know it was going to rain! Really?

I was especially disappointed with this because it wasted direction from Terence Fisher, and performances from both Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee. That is some legendary British horror both in front of and behind the camera. All three are hamstrung with a script that goes nowhere and other characters that don’t deserve the screentime they get. I wanted more Lee and Cushing and less girl drama! Damn asshole script killed them off and left the girl alive… stupid movie.

Yinz gonna move... ever?

The aliens in this alien invasion movie are saved until the very end. For most of the movie they are a portrayed as a spotlight on the victim while a loud sound plays. When we do see them, they are at best a Horta (classic Trek reference… hope you get it) looking rubber blob that I don’t believe ever actually moves on camera. You know real scary stuff. Other than that we get nothing. Despite them telling us “something landed” we never see a ship or anything. Not even a crappy cardboard set! Very disappointing.

I can’t recommend spending your time on Island of the Burning Damned. It just isn’t a good movie. If you want to see a very similar and much better executed flick check out Island of Terror also starring Peter Cushing and directed by Terence Fisher. It is even from the same year!

 

© Copyright 2023 John Shatzer

The Beast Must Die (1974)

This is an old favorite of mine that I’m shocked I’ve not covered here for the site yet. The movie opens with a wealthy man named Newcliffe throwing a party at his country estate. We have already seen that the place is wired and locked down so that no one can move around or leave without him knowing. Why you may ask? Thru his research he has determined that one of his guests is likely a werewolf and he wishes to hunt it. See Newcliffe is a big hunter and is looking for a challenge. Sort of The Most Dangerous Game meets The Wolfman. 

After disabling the cars, he waits for the werewolf to reveal itself and it does. Employees and guests alike are killed by the beast. Thru some discussion it is established that lycanthropy is a disease and that as it progresses the person suffering from it has less and less control until it eventually kills them. There are also some familiar rules about Wolfsbane and silver, which gives them a chance to run tests to prove who is the monster. The rest of the movie is hunting and figuring out who it is. 

This isn’t a great movie, but I’ve always enjoyed it. The story is straightforward and gets to the action right away. The bodies start to drop on the first night which leads to some discussion and mystery as quickly everyone is convinced that there is a werewolf among them. There are also attempts during the day on Newcliffe’s life, which lets us know that the person who is the werewolf knows what they are. The Beast Must Die plays out much like a detective/murder mystery as well as a horror flick and that was a nice twist on the genre. 

This is the werewolf

Now I must warn you that this movie is also very cheesy. From them using a large black dog as the transformed creature to the infamous werewolf break where you get a minute to shout out your guesses as to which character is the creature this isn’t trying to be a serious horror movie. At least I don’t think so because if they were then they screwed up. But I have noticed when I show new people the movie, they do get into it and are yelling their guesses at the screen, so it works and is fun. If you want gore, great creature design, and a serious story this is probably not the one for you. 

The movie was made by Amicus, which was the “other” British horror studio with Hammer being the more well-known one. Though I’ve always had a passion for Amicus as they put out some great movies that in my opinion rival anything anyone else was doing in the sixties. Because this was an established studio, we get a lot of familiar faces including the great Peter Cushing, Anton Diffring, Michael Gambon, and Charles Gray … Dr. Scott! Though the star of the movie is Calvin Lockhart as Newcliffe. You may not recognize his name, but he was in a ton of stuff. Here he gets to be the star and is excellent. 

Like most of the Amicus movies this was hard to find for many years. But you can track down copies easily now and I’d suggest doing so. Again, this isn’t a great or gory werewolf flick, but it is a ton of fun. So go grab a copy, invite some friends over, and have yourself a werewolf break! Trust me it is a blast. I highly recommend The Beast Must Die. 

© Copyright 2021 John Shatzer

The Skull (1965)

The movie kicks off with some gravediggers in a spooky cemetery. Now that is how you start a movie! We see them dig up a grave and remove the head from the corpse inside the coffin. One of them then takes it home, kicks a naked lady out of his bathtub, and then proceeds to remove the flesh from the skull. Not long afterwards he lets out a scream and is dead.

Years later we are with our main cast. Christopher Maitland, played by Peter Cushing, is a scholar of superstition and is at an auction where he is outbid on some statues of demons by good friend Sir Matthew, played by Christopher Lee. Afterwards Maitland is visited by a sketchy fellow that always seems to have things to sell. They make a deal for a book about the infamous Marquis de Sade that is bound in human flesh! The man promises to return the following night with something even more valuable.

As promised, he shows up the night with a skull, the one we saw earlier. It belonged to the Marquis de Sade and is said to have supernatural powers. Maitland is a skeptic not only in the skulls supposed powers but that it even belonged to de Sade. He mentions it to Sir Matthew who admits the skull was stolen from him and that he doesn’t want it back. This intrigues Maitland who starts to pursue it and ends up entangled in all sorts of satanic shenanigans. In the end he comes to believe that the skull is in fact very evil and that it might have been a mistake to acquire the damned thing.

This is a wonderful old school horror flick. The story is paced well and gets right to the action with the graverobbing. Never fear despite the quick start it doesn’t dump the entire plot out for us as we get bits later with flashbacks to fill in the story. I enjoy the fact that we have something spooky and mysterious happening from start to finish. This is the kind of movie where you need to turn the lights down and watch in the dark. Heck we even get Maitland being menaced by some weird Satanists!

Not only does The Skull have a great story it also boasts genre favorites Cushing and Lee. There is also get blink and you will miss them appearances from Michael Gough as the auctioneer and Patrick Wymark as the sketchy dealer of stolen goods. Additionally we get direction from Freddie Francis who did some wonderful horror flicks in the sixties for Amicus, of which this is one. There is a lot of horror cred in front of and behind the camera with The Skull and it shows.

Peter Cushing does a fantastic job in his role. Much of the horror from The Skull comes from its influence on the characters as it tries to twist them into doing terrible things. The last fifteen minutes of the movie is basically Cushing doing battle with it as he fights to not stab his wife to death. He does this with no dialogue using instead his body language and facial expressions to portray the struggle within. Not many actors could convincingly pull this off without it seeming silly or overly dramatic. Cushing nails it. To a lesser extent Lee, who has a very small role here, adds some gravitas to the proceedings as he sets the stage for what the skull can do. Him not wanting anything to do with it is key to telling the part of the story that sets up what is to happen later.

Skull Vision!

The movie is also shot beautifully. The way that they use lighting both an odd and disturbing green light when the skull is active, to the strobing lights used when it is annoyed the movie finds creative ways to let the audience in on when something bad is happening. You also get some neat perspective shots like the hallway full of gas as well a neat use of mirrors to distort what we are seeing. I’m also a fan of the slightly cheesy “skull view” where the camera is placed inside the skull so we can see what it does. This is a visually interesting movie that makes the sort of absurd premise of everyone being afraid of the skull work.

I could go on but don’t feel the need to. This is a wonderful movie that I highly recommend everyone check out. I’m as big of a Hammer fan as the next guy but I’ve always thought of the Amicus flicks as overlooked gems that were on the same level as the more famous studio. Check it out you won’t be disappointed.

 

© Copyright 2021 John Shatzer

 

 

House of the Long Shadows (1983)

I’m a huge fan of director Pete Walker’s movies, especially his output from the seventies. He had retired by the end of that decade only to return for this one last time. With House of the Long Shadows he was hired by Cannon films to make an old school horror flick and boy did he succeed at that.

Desi Arnaz Jr. plays Kenneth, an American author touring England promoting his latest novel. When his publisher makes a comment about how they don’t write them like they used to Kenneth bets him that he could knock out an old school story in twenty-four hours. The bet is accepted, and an isolated country house is chosen as a nice quiet location to work. Only the place turns out to not be so peaceful. The weekend that he arrives to write also happens to be the same time that the former inhabitants decide to revisit their ancestral home. If that weren’t enough the publisher also sent his lovely assistant Mary along to spook Kenneth and distract him! I suppose all is fair when bets are involved.

Now if this alone were the story it wouldn’t be terribly interesting, would it? The family has a skeleton in their proverbial closet, as well as one upstairs in a locked room! Before anyone realizes it they are all being stalked and killed off one at a time by an insane brother bent on revenge. It doesn’t matter if you are family or not, being present is enough to make you fair game. The rest of the movie plays out as a mystery/stalk and kill. Along the way we get a couple old school twists and turns to make things entertaining.

I love this movie for a couple of reasons. The first of which is the casting. When Walker was hired to direct an old school horror movie, he basically cast everyone still living from the old days. The patriarch of the family is played by John Carradine with his sons being portrayed by Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, and Vincent Price. Let that marinate in your brain for a few seconds. Here we have four of the greatest horror actors ever, and certainly the best still living at the time. The only bummer was that they had intended to cast Elsa Lanchester as the only daughter, but she was too ill to travel to the set. Not only is it amazing to see these guys working off of one another, but individually they are each able to bring something unique to the screen. Cushing plays the mousy, cowardly brother with zeal. Price is larger than life delivering over the top soliloquies and chewing up scenery, and well Lee is awesomely creepy. This alone makes House of the Long Shadows worth a watch. But that isn’t all we get.

Look at this cast... seriously drink it in. Amazing...

The source material for the movie is based on an old play, Seven Keys to Baldpate, which itself had already been made into a movie seven times as well as a television adaptation in the fifties. While this story only loosely references the material in spirit it is very close. Basically, this is a more modern, for the early eighties, take on the old dark house movies that were immensely popular in the thirties. We get hidden doors, cobwebs, candles, and a big storm outside effectively trapping our characters in a giant spooky house. Of course, there is murder and a family secret that no one wants to revel as well as an unknown and unseen killer lurking about. The filmmakers effectively took these classic actors and put them in an equally classic story completely succeeding in making a fun throwback film.

I could and want to go on talking about House of the Long Shadows, but I’m afraid I’d spoil things and I really don’t want to do that. The decade of the eighties was dominated by Slasher movies and other gorefests. While I love those movies there is something special about seeing these old favorites getting a chance for one last hurrah together. Plus, this is the only movie where the big three of Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, and Vincent Price appear onscreen together. How can you pass that up? In case it isn’t obvious I’m going to recommend that you don’t pass on it. For many years you could only find this movie on bootlegs of varying quality, but now there is a very nice and affordable Blu-Ray from the fine folks at Kino Lorber. I suggest this as the best way to check out the movie.

© Copyright 2020 John Shatzer

Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors (1965)

You can’t have an Anthology marathon without tossing in some Amicus goodness. Not all the great British horror from the sixties came from Hammer. Amicus made their mark with some great Anthologies, including this one.

Five men step onto a train and end up in the same coach. Finding their seats, they are soon joined by an old man, Dr. Schreck (portrayed by Peter Cushing), who produces a set of Tarot cards and offers to predict their future. This serves as the wrap around story for the five tales of terror to follow. For this review I thought I’d take them one at a time.

In the first we meet an architect that is summoned back to his ancestral home to make some modifications to the structure in a tale called Werewolf. He gets caught up in a mystery and an old legend about a werewolf and his family’s connection to it. This one follows a predictable and fun pattern with some murders and a twist ending that I’m sure we all saw coming. The setting of the old house is solid, and I thought the cast did okay. Not terribly memorable, but a decent way to kick things off.

The next story is called Creeping Vine. Another of the men returns home from holiday only to find a strange plant clinging to the outside wall of the house. He tries to remove it and the thing fights back. He calls in some help from a couple of scientists and they speculate that it must be some new higher form of plant life. The vine traps them in the house until quite by accident they discover it is afraid of fire. Up until then they hadn’t thought of setting the thing on fire! Things end with one of them going for help. Of the five this is the weakest. The story is silly and doesn’t feel like a good horror tale. It’s a damn plant that can slowly creep along and is afraid of fire. How scary can that be?

Starting with the third, titled Voodoo, things get really good. We follow a musician who returns home from the West Indies with a catchy new tune for his band to play. The only problem is that he stole it from a Voodoo ritual that he was spying on. In spite of being warned by multiple people he still decides to play it at the club. This leads to a visit from the angry and jealous god that was summoned by performing it. I really liked this one as it feels like an old EC comic. Roy Castle is great in the lead and we get just enough of the spooky stuff with doors blowing in and strange sounds to make this one work.

The Honeymoon is over!

Story four is by far my favorite and stars the legendary Christopher Lee. Disembodied Hand tells the tale of Lee’s character, a critic who takes great pleasure in tearing down the work of an artist he hates. That artist is played by another familiar face, Michael Gough, who finally gets his revenge by embarrassing the arrogant critic. This leads to Lee’s character angrily running down the artist on the street resulting in a hand being lost. That hand eventually gets revenge on Lee’s character in a very appropriate way. Much like Voodoo this one feels like one of those creepy EC “getting what is coming to you” stories. Plus, there is a hand crawling around, which is always fun.

The fifth and final segment is a good old vampire story with a twist. Vampire stars a very young Donald Sutherland portraying a doctor who has come home with a new bride. Not long after patients start showing up with strange marks on their necks and low on blood. With the help of his mentor he figures that there must be a vampire in town and it is his new wife! There is nothing else that can be done except waiting for her to return one night after feeding and staking her in the heart! He does this, but not everything goes as planned. The twist is fun and while out of left field fits the tone of Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors.

our cast of characters

There is one final twist to be had. Spoiler warning. The men are all told that the final card off of the deck will reveal to them how they can avoid their fate. They all draw the death card! Arriving at their destination and stepping off of the train they realize they have nothing to worry about… because they all died in a train crash!

All of the Anthologies from Amicus are worth checking out and likely you will see more appear here on at Crappy Movie Reviews in the future. This one does a great job capturing the spooky vibe of the horror comics of the fifties in a way that put a smile on my face. I recommend tracking down a copy of Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors.

© Copyright 2019 John Shatzer