Chadzilla ROARS!!! (The Official Blog of Chadwick H. Saxelid, Writer)

Twins of Evil - by Shaun Hutson (Based on the screenplay by Tudor Gates)

Mircalla Karnstein is back.  Sort of...

The vampiress with lesbian leanings only makes the briefest of cameos in this more or less concluding chapter to Hammer Studio's popular Karnstein trilogy.  She appears before Count Karnstein, a male descendant, after he sacrifices a woman atop Mircalla's tomb, and turns the man into a vampire as a kind of thank you for the gift.  Then she disappears from the Count's story.

But the Count's story itself is not the real focus of Twins of Evil.

No, the central story concerns orphaned identical twins Maria and Freida (portrayed in the film by real life twins, and Playboy Playmates, Mary and Madeleine Collinson) who have come to live with their Aunt and Uncle, Katy and Gustav Weil.  Gustav (portrayed in the film by a stern and haunted looking Peter Cushing) is a devout Puritan, one obsessed with cleansing evil from the blighted township of Karnstein.  He does so by accusing attractive young women of practicing witchcraft, and then burning them to death.

Good twin Maria tries her best to make peace with her Uncle, but bad twin Freida rebels by seeking out the company of the wicked Count Karnstein.  Freida's rebellion leads to her becoming a vampire, which then leads to an "unfortunate" case of "mistaken" identity with Maria.  Can heroic schoolteacher Anton Hoffer (David Warbeck in the film) save innocent Maria from her Uncle's misguided attempt at purifying the wrong twin of evil?

What do you think?

This after the fact novelization of the Hammer Studio's 1971 cult classic is the third novel by Shaun Hutson that I have read.  Although the man is said to have written well over 50 books, the only other books by him that I had read prior to Twins of Evil were Slugs, which, I believe, was Hutson's first published book, and its sequel, Breeding Ground.  Where among Hutson's 50 books Breeding Ground falls numerically, I do not know.  But his novelization of Twins Of Evil is both a better written and a slightly duller book than either of his somewhat notorious killer slug opuses.

On the better written front, Hutson's prose is clean, his pace tight, and he even manages to give the story some interesting nuances, at times.  On the slightly duller front, those interesting nuances become fewer and farther between as the story progresses towards its action packed finale.  Granted that is a routine issue with most, but not all, film novelizations.  As the book dragged on, and Hutson's creative license with certain characters became more and more infrequent, it became more unsatisfying reading.  I found myself wanting to put the book down and just drop my DVD of Twins of Evil into the player and watch the movie, rather than try and finish the book.

I used to be a novelization junkie.  Back in the days when video tape recorders and video rental shops weren't on every street corner.  Back when you couldn't collect movies like bottle caps, comic books, or paperbacks.  Back when owning the novelization was the closest I could ever come to owning (or perhaps just seeing) the actual movie.  Back then I had an entire shelf of horror, science-fiction, and fantasy movie novelizations.

But those days, and most of those books, are long gone.  Reading Twins of Evil was just a bittersweet reminder of why the need to have and read those novelizations has become a thing of the past for me. 

The Woman in Black (2012)

"Don't go chasing shadows..."

Widower Arthur Kipps (Daniel Radcliffe) is given one last assignment to prove his worth as an employee at a London based law firm.  He is sent to an isolated English village to sort through the documents of the recently deceased Mrs. Drablow, a hermit.

Kipps arrival is greeted with hostility by everyone in town, save for the kindly Mr. Daily (Ciaran Hinds) and Mrs. Fisher (Mary Stockley), the Innkeeper's wife.  But that hostility does not deter Kipps from performing his duty.  He goes out onto the marsh and enters the empty and decayed Drablow house.

It is there that Arthur Kipps learns the terrifying reason for the villagers hostility...

I walked into the very first screening, on opening day, of The Woman in Black with a mixture of joy and apprehension.  

The joy was that, after growing up watching countless Hammer Studios productions on television (VHF and UHF broadcasts, as well as cable), and on VHS, laser disc, and DVD, The Woman in Black would mark the very first time that I would actually see a Hammer Studios production on the Big Screen.  (Since I thought that Let The Right One In was perfect in its original version, I passed on seeing Hammer's English language remake of the film, Let Me In, and the studio's psychological thriller The Resident did not play theatrically near me.)  For an almost life long "Hammerhead", this moment was a big deal.

My apprehension, of course, was a fear that the film would not be good.

That apprehension was dashed by the film's opening scene.  A trio of girls are having a tea party with their dolls.  The party comes to a nightmarish end when the girl's sense a presence in the room and, en masse, they get up off the floor, walk over to the windows, and jump to their deaths.  "My babies!" a woman screams in anguish.  The camera pulls back and, in the corner of the frame, the veiled figure of the woman in black is revealed. 

The sequence is both powerful and frightening, but not in an over the top way.  There is no thundering music as the girl's jump to their deaths, nor is a cattle prod stinger sound effect (to "goose the scare") used when the camera pulls back to reveal that it was the woman in black the girls had seen/sensed.  Director James Watkins trusts that the event itself is harrowing enough, that there is no need for heavy handed theatrics.

Watkins was (and is) not only correct in that particular judgment call, but it is one he continued to make it throughout the entire film.  The film's biggest scares are rooted in an almost stifling atmosphere of gothic dread and are kept in the shadows.  The ghost(s) do not become overtly theatrical until the third act, when it is necessary to the story for them to do so.  

As the film came to an end, I realized that I had seen something a tad unique in this era of ADHD movies.  I had seen a methodically paced and wonderfully told story.  One that was not only filled with intelligent and well mounted scares, but that also had (gasp) a cast of well developed and interesting (and almost entirely sympathetic) characters.  I can only hope that today's "thrill-a-second" movie going audience can appreciate the movie.

The Woman in Black is almost a throwback to Hammer Studios gothic golden era.  I say almost because, truth be told, if the film was made during that era, there would have been some heaving bosoms on display and a splash or two grand guignol to spice up the first and second reels a bit more.  But even without the heaving bosoms and splashes of grand guignol, it was very easy to imagine the exact same film, albeit with Peter Cushing as Kipps, Christopher Lee as Mr. Daily, and someone like Barbara Shelley in the role of either Mrs. Fisher or Mrs. Daily.  Hammerhead's everywhere should rejoice and be happy.  The studio is finally back, with a vengeance.

Three and a half stars out of four.

TV Stuff: CBS Late Movie Double Feature (1981): Kolchak: The Night Stalker and Taste the Blood of Dracula

Like many so many other kids, I grew up watching as much television as my parents would allow me to watch.*  Being a horror/monster genre fan, and this being long before we had either cable televison or even a VCR, I would scour the TV Guide listings for the best horror, science-fiction and fantasy movies and series episodes airing that week.  The very best days for that kind of programming always seemed to be late Friday night and all day Saturday.

My genre binge viewing weekend truly began at 11:30 Friday night, when the CBS Late Movie would air a double feature of an "old" Kolchak: The Night Stalker rerun with an appropriate genre movie co-feature:

For me, there could be no better way to start the weekend.**  Kolchak: The Night Stalker, which would become my all-time favorite TV series, was fresh to my eyes then, and the horror movies never failed to disappoint (even though they did, at times).  I saw Phantasm for the first time on the CBS Light Night Movie.  I also remember watching Shock Waves, Beyond the Door, Barracuda, The Bermuda Depths, Kingdom of the Spiders, Creature from Black Lake and countless others.  One of those others, I am reasonably certain, just not one hundred percent so, includes the double bill being introduced in the above sample clip.  

Regardless, for me it wasn't the weekend until the CBS Late Movie came on.  Only then did the magic truly begin.

William Faulkner once said that "the past is never truly past."  As I grow older, I realize what he meant.  Looking back at those years of childhood magic and wonder, it feels like it was only yesterday to me, not thirty years ago.  As long as I live and can remember them, programs like the CBS Late Movie will be as fresh and new to me as when they originally aired.

*Since they gave both my brother and I television sets for Christmas in either 1981 or 1982, I think it is safe to say they let us watch a lot.

** Until KTVU Channel 2 countered the horror themed Friday night CBS Late Night Movie by airing Creature Features at 11:30, then I had to bounce back and forth between the two broadcasts.  Not fun.

The Woman in Black teaser

I love ghost stories, so...

 

 

My seeing The Woman in Black is already a done deal.  But I also have to say that this teaser trailer is one of the best "creepy movie" teasers that I have seen in quite some time.

The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958)

"They will never be rid of me."

Starting more or less where The Curse of Frankenstein ended, The Revenge of Frankenstein has the Baron Victor Frankenstein (Peter Cushing) escaping the guillotine and setting up shop in a new location, under a new name.  

Posing as the philanthropic Dr. Victor Stein, Frankenstein pretends to be a man that devotes as much time to treating the poor as he does to his paying patients.  What no one knows, but one local and like-minded doctor (Francis Matthews) suspects, is that the kindly Dr. Stein has been performing numerous and needless amputations, so that he can construct a brand new healthy body (Michael Gwynn) for his handicapped dwarf assistant (Oscar Quitak).

The suspecting doctor offers to assist Frankenstein in performing the brain transplant and the operation appears to be a success, at first.  But the new body is injured soon afterward and the unfortunate patient begins to suffer a gruesome side effect...  

 
There are only a select number of sequels to films that manage to be better or (in one way or another) to surpass the first film.  The Revenge of Frankenstein is one of them.  It is a solidly constructed movie.  One that benefits from excellent performances by its stars, sturdy direction by Terence Fisher, and a script by Jimmy Sangster (who had some assistance with the dialogue from Hurfurd Janes) that is equal parts smart and droll.

The only lesson that the Baron Frankenstein has learned from the events of the first film is to not use a damaged or deceased brain.  Other than that, he is completely unrepentant and unchanged.  Well, the good Baron has also learned to avoid any and all contact will the fairer sex that could compromise his ability to perform his experiments.  (Which is pretty much what happened in the first film, and what sent him to the gallows.)  While the Baron manages to avoid unnecessary romantic dalliances in this series entry, his deformed assistant's attraction to one particular lady (the radiant Eunice Gayson) does lead to some unfortunate complications in the final act.

Baron Frankenstein is every bit as driven and ruthless in this film as he was in the first.  He does not see his supposed charity patients as people, he only sees them as potential donors for parts to construct a body of his own making.  Nonetheless he seems to have built up a lucrative and popular practice, so he must have some people skills.  These skills are hinted at early in the film, but are quickly brushed aside so that the Baron and his eager assistant can commence with the brain transplant.

Up to this point The Revenge of Frankenstein has been nothing more than a worthy sequel.  It is what comes after the transplant has been performed that elevates the film above Curse.  When making the first film Hammer had to go to great lengths to avoid any and all elements that could be seen as being inspired or drawn from the Universal Studios films, so as to avoid being sued for copyright infringement.  (They succeeded, obviously.)  Their most obvious departure from those films (at least the first three) were in creating a vicious and murderous monster.  But Revenge finds a unique and touching way to present the "monster" in a tragic light.  

Karl (Michael Gwynn) survives the transplant and appears to be on the way to making a complete recovery.  That is until he learns that he will be put on medical display after he recovers.  He escapes, but is later injured in a fight with a sadistic janitor when the man catches Karl destroying his original body.  That fight causes a degenerative brain injury and Karl is very much aware of his regression into cannibalistic savagery.  That he is tortured by this knowledge and his complete and utter inability to stop it makes him a far more sympathetic creation than the first film's brainless monster. 

Although the Baron is aided by a sympathetic partner in this outing, the story not once attempts to show him as anything but driven and ruthless.  But he is also smart and wily and has learned from his past experiences, so he is one step ahead of those around him.  That foreknowledge sets up an ending that no other Frankenstein film Hammer produced managed to surpass.  Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell, the last film in the series, certainly tried and it came very close to doing so.  Close, but not near close enough.  When it comes to the Baron Frankenstein and his monster, this film is Hammer Studios' most successful creation.

Four stars out of four.

Wake Wood Quad Poster

Here is another offering from the revived Hammer Studios:

 

I have absolutely no idea what this movie is about.  It looks like it could be a zombie movie just as easily as it could be a ghost movie.  I would prefer it to be the latter rather than the former, just to shake things up a bit.  The advertising image leaves me a tad cold, but - judging from those blurbs - some critics seemed to have liked it.  Then again, some of those quotes could be taken out of context.  Yet I do not think that you can take four stars out of context, unless it is four stars out of five, or out of ten. 

So it goes. 

In addition to having no idea what the movie is about, I also have no idea as to when (or how) this movie will be released here in the United States.  I always hope for a theatrical release, but Hammer's return to motion picture production has been a rocky one.  Their premiere effort, the critically praised vampire thriller Let Me In tanked at the United States box office and their sophomore effort, the psychological thriller The Resident, is going direct to DVD.  The most I can hope for right now is one of those Video on Demand with a limited theatrical release deals that Magnet/Magnolia is so fond of.  Although I still prefer watching a movie in a theater,  I have also come to embrace the Video On Demand option, as it saves me both time and money.  Most of these limited release movies only play for a week at an art house theater in Berkeley, and gas and parking are not all that inexpensive these days.  Neither is BART, come to think of it.

Nonetheless, no matter how Wake Wood is eventually released here in the United States, I will be seeing it.  For I am (and shall no doubt always remain) a devout Hammerhead.

The Resident poster

 

 
Man, that is some serious bland they having going on there.  This poster could just as well be for any number of direct-to-video movies from the late 1980s or early 1990s.  You remember those, right?  They were marketed as "erotic thrillers" and starred downward spiraling stars like Tanya Roberts (or never stars like Shannon Tweed) and Wings Hauser and/or Andrew Stevens (who also would have written, produced and/or directed it). 

The more things change...

So it goes.

A Moment of LOL

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