Saturday 27 November 2010

ASK AND YE SHALL RECEIVE


Way back in June when I posted that Dynamite Entertainment would (finally) be releasing The Vampirella Archives, I was wishful that Moebius would add a Vampirella model kit to their re-issues of the classic and infamous Aurora Monster Scenes from the 1970's. Well, it's happening. Set to be released in January of 2011, the Vampirella Monster Scenes kit is struck from the original and is poised to bring a lot of nostalgic happiness to middle-aged Monster Kids like myself. Click here for unbridled joy!


Tuesday 23 November 2010

MY TEN FAVOURITE FLICKS

Coincidentally, Roger Ebert has posted a list of his Ten Greatest Films of All Time at the same time as I was compiling a list of My Ten Favourites. About his list, Ebert states, “My first vow is to make the list for myself, not for anybody else. I am sure than Eisenstein's "Battleship Potemkin" is a great film, but it's not going on my list simply so I can impress people. Nor will I avoid "Casablanca" simply because it's so popular: I love it all the same. If I have a criterion for choosing the greatest films, it's an emotional one.”

Here, alphabetically, is his list:

Casablanca
Citizen Kane
Floating Weeds
Gates of Heaven
La Dolce Vita
Notorious
Raging Bull
The Third Man
28 Up
2001: A Space Odyssey


For Ebert's comments and details about the films on his list, visit his site via this link: Ten Greatest Films of All Time

My criterion was the same as Ebert's. My list, however, could’ve been comprised entirely of Hitchcock films, and I wish I could’ve included something by Godard, Russ Meyer, John Waters, the Coen Brothers, Todd Solondz, Lars von Trier, and Alejandro Jodorowsky, some gialli, more Tarantino, some Corman, and Terry Zwigoff's Ghost World would definitely be there at number 11. I also had to struggle with not including the following: George A. Romero’s Martin, Brian De Palma’s Carrie, Woody Allen’s Annie Hall and Manhattan, Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove and Paths of Glory, Leo McCarey’s Duck Soup, Charles Reisner’s Steamboat Bill Jr., Kaneto Shindô’s Onibaba, Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show, Robert Aldrich’s Kiss Me Deadly, Mervyn LeRoy’s I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang, Howard Hawks’ The Big Sleep, Ken Russell’s The Devils, Lina Wertmüller’s Seven Beauties, Frank Capra's Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Henri-Georges Clouzot's Les Diaboliques and Wages of Fear, Vittorio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves and Umberto D., Kurosawa’s Rashomon and Ikiru, David Cronenberg’s The Brood, Robert Wise’s The Haunting, Jacques Tourneur’s The Cat People, and Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack’s King Kong, amongst a hundred others, but, um… that’s more than ten (Talk about having my cake and eating it too).

My list follows, also alphabetically. What's on yours?













Thursday 18 November 2010

MY HAMMER HORROR DILEMMA



I love Hammer movies. I grew up with them. I saw so many Hammer Horror double bills when I was a kid in the 70's that they're as much a part of my childhood as Pet Rocks and flared jeans.

Hammer made movies that literally thrilled me as a kid, goofy as that sounds. I would watch the screen crouched down in my seat, anticipating the next vampire's hiss or Frankenstein Monster's stumble. Today, I appreciate them, partly for their nostalgia value, but mostly because they are terrific movies.

The studio was so successful at being distinctive in what it did, at creating its own world, that it also created a dilemma for me. You see, it's almost impossible for me to differentiate one Hammer movie from the other. Not that they're all the same; far from it. Some are Black & White, some are colour; some are gothic, some are contemporary; some are graced by the presence of Lee and Cushing, some aren't; and some are just better than others. But all share that Hammer stamp, unlike almost anything else I can think of other than the Val Lewton-produced cycle of suggestive horror flicks from the 40's, and there were only nine of those. Different than a world that a single filmmaker creates through an entire filmography, say Alfred Hitchcock or Jean-Luc Godard, Hammer movies feature different directors, writers, cinematographers, composers, and casts, but each Hammer Horror makes up a part of the "world of Hammer" in my mind, and to me "The World of Hammer" is one utterly fantastic, continuous movie.


As a blogger, the opportunity to take part in numerous Favourite Film lists arises with some regularity. My Hammer dilemma means that I rarely include a selection from the Hammer studio... There's just too many to choose from and I want to include them all! It's as if one Hammer film comments on or relates to another in the Hammer cannon; like one is somehow connected to the others. This leads me to attempt to pick a representative movie, but that's just foolhardy and it's just not fair to the individual films. The fact is that Hammer produced a large number of not just good films, but several that can easily be considered classics.

So in recognition of all the times that I've left a Hammer film out of the creation of whatever list I may have been taking part in, and because I'm so fond of each of these films, here are my favourite Hammer Horrors, each one a unique part of "The World of Hammer":

The Curse of Frankenstein, Horror of Dracula, The Revenge of Frankenstein, The Brides of Dracula, Never Take Candy from a Stranger, The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll, Taste of Fear, The Curse of the Werewolf, These are the Damned, Paranoiac, The Plague of the Zombies, The Reptile, Frankenstein Created Woman, Quatermass and the Pit, Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, The Devil Rides Out, Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed, Taste the Blood of Dracula, Scars of Dracula, The Vampire Lovers, Countess Dracula, Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde, Hands of the Ripper, Twins of Evil, Straight on Till Morning, Vampire Circus, Captain Kronos - Vampire Hunter, Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell, and The Satanic Rites of Dracula.

There is, however, one Hammer Horror that I'm incredibly partial towards. And having said that, I feel like I'm being oddly dismissive of all the others. That film is Hands of the Ripper. I first saw it when I was 12 years old, on TV during a trip to England with my parents. There in the St. James Hotel, I watched fascinated and terrified as Jack the Ripper's daughter gorily (for its time) slashed her way through victims both deserving and shockingly undeserving. Later during this trip, we visited the Whispering Gallery at St. Paul's Cathedral. The fact that the climax of Hands of the Ripper occurs there added an extra frisson for me as we sent our whispered messages around its circumference. I've watched this film several times since this initial and impressionable viewing, and it's still one of my favourite films. The attack scenes still pack a jolt, the story is still involving and fresh, and Anna, the Ripper's daughter played by Angharad Rees, is one of the most tragic heroines in all of Hammer's films. I love it.


Hammer Studios closed in the late 70's after changing public taste resulted in declining box office. With the old studio recently reanimated anew and producing films like the remakes (sigh) of Let Me In and The Woman in Black, there's the potential that it may yet recapture some of its old glory. Whatever the future of the new Hammer, there are plenty of Golden Era Hammer films out there; go get you some!