TODAY’S FAR OUT FEATURE: TROG

SEE TROG MENACE JOAN CRAWFORD AND MICHAEL GOUGH HERE >>

KONGA

1961/Director: John Lemont/Writers: Herman Cohen, Aben Kandel

Cast: Michael Gough, Margo Johns, Jess Conrad, Claire Gordon, Austin Trevor, Jack Watson, George Pastell

Detroit born producer/writer Herman Cohen is a name that will be popping up here at the Café on a regular basis. Eventually there will be posts on his great dive-in classics The Bride of the Gorilla, Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla, I Was a Teenage Werewolf,  I Was a Teenage Frankenstein, How to Make a Monster, and Horrors of the Black Museum. In fact this posts feature, Konga, is not our first introduction to the works of this dedicated film-maker. I reviewed Trog starring Joan Crawford and Michael Gough, a few posts back and it, like Konga, was one of the color films Cohen made while in England during the 60’s and 70’s. He would also make the thriller Berserk (I do not even know if I have that film here or not. I need a hunchbacked, mute assistant to sort out all the stuff I have on DVDs or on my hard-drive) with Crawford while in England and I understand most people like it more than Trog, but I thought Trog was pretty darned entertaining. Appearing in five of his British productions was actor Michael Gough who seems to have been given free reign with his roles and he had the time of his life hamming them up to the extreme. While some consider his ultimate over-the-top achievement to be the insane curator and scientist Edmond Bancroft in Horrors of the Black Museum I think he is utterly hysterical as Dr. Charles Decker in the sadly underrated Konga.

MORE OF MICHAEL GOUGH IN KONGA >>

THE SORCERERS

1967/Director: Michael Reeves/ Writers: Michael Reeves, Tom Baker

Cast: Boris Karloff, Cahterine Lacey, Elizabeth Ercy, Ian Ogilvy, Victor Henry, Sally Sheridan, Susan George

Michael Reeves was an aspiring and ambitious young British director who only directed three films before his untimely death at the age of twenty-five by barbiturate overdose. It has never been assumed his death was a suicide and that he simply took a little too much of the strong medications (often over prescribed in the 60’s) to alleviate his depression and anxiety. His first film is nothing too fancy and often people assume that The Sorcerers was his first project. He actually filmed the low budget Italian horror film Revenge of the Blood Beast (La Sorella di Satana) in 1965 which featured the British actress Barbara Steele who was working in Italy at the time. His last film is considered not only his best but one of the best British horror films of the period, The Witchfinder General. AIP insisted that the film feature Vincent Price and legend has it that Reeves was none too impressed with Price’s trademark overacting and the two were often in heated debate as to the proper interpretation of Price’s Matthew Hopkins character. At one point Price became so infuriated with Reeves’ criticisms that he pronounced “Young man I have made 84 films. What have you done?” to which Reeves replied “I have made two good ones”. In the end Price was to come around to Reeves’ point of view and was more than pleased with the finished product and the two became and the two would work together on The Oblong Box though Reeves’ directorial involvement was cut short due to his premature death.

MORE OF THE SORCERERS WITH BORIS KARLOFF, INCLUDING TRAILER, HERE >>

TODAY’S SHOCKING FEATURE:

BLOODY PIT OF HORROR

SEE BLOODY PIT OF HORROR, WITH MICKEY HARGITAY, HERE >>

TROG

1970 /Director: Freddie Francis/Writers: Peter Bryan, John Gilling

Cast: Joan Crawford,  Michael Gough, Bernard Kay, Kim Braden, David Griffin

Now here is a film that is really beaten nearly to death in reviews over the net and while it deserves some degree of flagellation it is not the total waste of time most people make it out to be. There is some degree, albeit often half hearted, of talent involved with the project and while the movie suffers from an over serious attitude too often found in British low budget films it is nonetheless worth a watch. At least if you are the type who can watch and enjoy other films that producer Herman Cohen produced while he still lived and worked the US such as I was a Teenage Werewolf and I was a Teenage Frankenstein. In fact 1970’s Trog was originally slated to be called I was a Teenage Caveman. Appearing in the film is a regular of Cohen’s other British horror films (Horrors of the Black Museum, Konga, Berserk and The Black Zoo) the manically over the top and hammy Michael Gough. Leading the cast in her swan song film role is Oscar winner Joan Crawford who had all but slipped into 60’s style B movie oblivion after 1962’s Whatever Happened to Baby Jane. While a lot of her films during this time are derided I thought a couple, like Straight Jacket and Cohen’s Berserk, were pretty good “psychotronic” fare. On the set the mercurial Joan was not only downing copious amounts of vodka but more than her fare share of Pepsi as well. In fact, everyone on the set was drinking Pepsi since Joan had become a member of Pepsi’s board of directors and I managed to find a couple amusing shots of Joan sharing a cold bottle of the soft drink with Trog himself. The last piece of talent involved is none other than seasoned Hammer cinematographer and director Freddie Francis (Dracula Has Risen From the Grave, The Evil of Frankentstein, Paranoiac). While Trog will surely not be remembered as the nadir of any of these people’s careers  I found it to be a fair watch. I may be slightly biased here as Trog holds some sentimental value for me. I saw the film a couple times back when it was first released in San Antonio Texas (Joan Crawford’s city of birth) at the Lackland Air Force base Chaparral matinee for all of .35 cents. Some young friends and I had a good time reinacting some of the scenes later.

MORE OF TROG >>

FRANKENSTEIN AND THE MONSTER FROM HELL

1974/Director: Terence Fisher/Writer: Anthony Hinds

Cast: Peter Cushing, Shane Briant, Madeline Smith, David Prowse, John Stratton, Michael Ward, Elsie Wagstaff, Norman Mitchell

This was the last of the Hammer Frankenstein series and it actually takes up where Frankenstein Must be Destroyed left off as the prior film, The Horror of Frankenstein, broke the continuity of the films by going back to when Frankenstein was younger. Horror also suffered a bit by the absences of Terrence Fisher as director and Peter Cushing as Victor Frankenstein, but more on that film another post. Cushing and Fisher are both back for this 1974 film, as are Anthony Hinds (writing as James Elder) and Hammer composer James Bernard. In a couple more years Hammer would see itself all but out of business as the British film company that revived Gothic horror and with Monster from Hell they ended on a pretty good note. The only flaws for me are the title that does not really suit the film’s atmosphere and the rather shoddy monster played by David Prowse (Darth Vader) who also played the creature in Horror of Frankenstein as well. There were understandable budget constraints with the film since Hammer itself was going under. The idea of some sort of Neolithic monster is not in and of itself that bad and certainly the monster here is one of the most unique in the annals of Frankenstein films. I think it could have worked better really with less rubber makeup and poorly applied fake body hair. But it is easily over looked after a while really. Some people have criticized Madeline Smith’s as the mute assistant Angel but I liked it. The close ups of her face are beautiful and the innocent character’s charm may have been soiled by exploiting her ample endowments with a title corset as is known to be the attire of most Hammer queens.

MORE FRANKENSTEIN AND THE MONSTER FROM HELL HERE >>

THE ABOMINABLE SNOWMAN

1957/Director: Val Guest/Writer: Nigel Kneale

Cast: Forrest Tucker, Peter Cushing, Maureen Connell, Richard Wattis, Robert Brown, Michael Brill, Wolfe Morris, Arnold Marlé

The Abominable Snowman was one of Hammer’s ealry films that came out right before Curse of Frankenstein and Dracula. It was written by Nigel Kneale and directed by Val Guest, the pair who earlier had created the two Quartermass films. It stars a young and intense Peter Cushing before he became legendary as the morally ambivalent Victor Frankenstein and the morally unshakable Abraham Van Helsing. I had earlier reviewed X-The Unknown and like that film I will say the same thing about The Abominable Snowman and that is that it is too bad Hammer did not do more films like this after they took off in the early sixties. This is a fine film, well written, directed and acted and I wonder what else this great studio could have produced along these lines had they set their minds to it. Of course Hammer did do other films during the sixties than just their classic retakes of old Universal horror films like Frankenstein, Dracula, The Wolfman and The Mummy. Other than The Hound of the Baskervilles, with Cushing playing Sherlock Holmes, I have not had a chance to get too many of those suspense and crime style films from Hammer but hopefully I will be shortly. But this film, released the same year as but prior to Curse of Frankenstein, was from their very early days when they were just beginning to emerge as a so to be major horror studio and there is a certain quality the film has that their later non-Universal style films, the few I have seen, did not usually have though The Hound of the Baskervilles is a very good film.

MORE ABOMINABLE SHOWMAN HERE >>