FTP: The Devil Rides Out (1968)

JANUARY 3, 2019

GENRE: CULT
SOURCE: BLU-RAY (OWN COLLECTION)

When The Devil Rides Out arrived from Scream Factory over two months ago I threw it in the "pile", because I thought I had seen it already. But when looking for something to put on a few nights back when it was late but I wasn't tired enough to go to bed, I read the synopsis said "Hmm I don't remember this at all?", and only then did I realize I was thinking of To The Devil A Daughter, the OTHER Hammer movie with Christopher Lee based on a Dennis Wheatley novel. That one I did see, and it's an OK enough movie (per my nearly eight year old review, it's a bit dull and the central mystery doesn't work very well), but this one turned out to be a total delight to me, so I'm happy I picked it out of the ever increasing number of movies in/around that overflowing box next to my couch where all the random screeners and trivia winnings go in hopes of becoming an FTP review someday.

In fact I liked it enough to read the book to compare for a future Collins' Crypt piece, so I won't use up all of my thoughts on the film here. But I will say that a big part of why I liked it was that Lee was not playing the cult leader - he was actually the hero for a change, one of two older men who were trying to save their pal from the satanic cult he had joined. But he doesn't do much action heroics; he leaves that to Leon Greene as the other (younger) guy. Instead, Lee hilariously smirks his way through the film's thoroughly enjoyable opening sequence, where the two men visit their pal at his home unannounced, on the night where his cult has gathered under the guise of an astronomy meeting. Lee knows damn well the guy's mixed up with satanists, but he plays along with the ruse, marveling at his friend's newly redecorated floor (satanic symbols) and such. Honestly I could watch an entire movie of this stuff, sans any horror at all.

Luckily, those elements work well, too. Since Lee is usually a villain and is occasionally vague about certain things (he gives Greene some chemically based protections, but says he has "other protections" without divulging what they are), I spent a good chunk of the movie thinking he was merely pretending to be a hero but in reality trying to build Greene's character up as an eventual sacrifice or something. So that adds a layer of intrigue that for all I know was never intended by the novel or script (adapted by Richard Matheson), and the direct/obvious horror stuff is pretty successful to boot. Late in the film, our heroes have to endure a ritual and fight off the temptations of the black magic, which reminded me of A Dark Song (something no less an authority than Kim Newman points out on an interview, making me feel a bit proud for having noticed it), another strong sequence. The effects aren't that great (Lee hilariously trashes them on the commentary) but the general ideas come across just fine, and the unusual three male hero setup (Lee, Greene, and the guy they were trying to save, played by Patrick Mower) adds much suspense as you're pretty sure one of them will probably die, but who?

The villain is played by Charles Gray (yep, two future Bond villains square off in this!), quite possibly the most sinister looking man alive. Sadly he is kind of sidelined for big chunks, focusing on Lee and Greene's attempts to free their pal (plus Greene's love interest, played by Nike Arrighi) instead of whatever the cult folk are doing in between their sacrifices. But he casts a long shadow even when he's not on screen and gets some great bits, including a hypnosis scene and a climactic scene where he nonchalantly plans to sacrifice a child. Perhaps Wheatley's book has more for him to do (it's 300 pages in very tiny font size, and the movie is only 95 minutes, so obviously they had to excise a lot), though if there's a direct confrontation between his character and Lee's I'll be disappointed it wasn't filmed, as the men rarely interact directly (Greene gets to punch him out though).

Scream's blu is packed, of course; the Lee commentary (shared with Sarah Lawson and a moderator) is older, along with a few old making of specials, but there's a new track with historians Steve Haberman and Constantine Nasr, plus Newman's interview and another exclusive one with Jonathan Riby. And the film has a new transfer, which looked quite good though of course I can't compare it to any previous releases (it appears to be the first Blu-ray release in the US, with an Anchor Bay DVD being long out of print). They have a few more Hammer movies on the way (including Rasputin, which this one was paired with on the Anchor Bay DVD) so I hope it's a sign they are being diligent about acquiring as many as they can - sure, there are some duds in that mix, but I'll sit through a few chores like The Reptile if it means occasionally getting a real treat like this.

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The Lodge (2019)

SEPTEMBER 28, 2019

GENRE: PSYCHOLOGICAL, THRILLER
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (BEYOND FEST)

Having missed the first few nights of Beyond Fest due to unexpected medical issues (bleeding ulcer, I'm OK now I think), I finally got to make my first trip there for The Lodge, which is an unusual way to kick things off. The fest routinely programs wild/outlandish fare (both new and old), and this film is a "slow burn" type that keeps its insanity confined to the mind of one of its characters - the sort of thing I'd expect to watch on a quiet night at home, not at the same festival that frequently employs the use of T-shirt cannons and eating contests. That said, it was an intriguing and mostly successful example of its kind, not to mention the best new Hammer film since Wake Wood, and will do well with folks who don't mind their horror to be a little on the moody and atmospheric side.

Riley Keough stars as Grace, a woman who is about to marry a man with two children from a previous marriage. The kids naturally don't like her all that much, so the dad (Richard Armitage) figures maybe spending the holidays at his cabin will help them bond a bit - especially during a three day period right before Christmas Day that he has to return to the city for some work matters. Naturally, things don't go too swimmingly - a snowstorm confines them to the lodge, which then loses power to boot. And worst of all - one morning they wake up to find all of their belongings missing, with Grace suspecting her will-be stepchildren of doing it on purpose to drive her crazy. But as it gets colder and their supplies run out, could the kids really be to blame when they're at risk as well? Is someone else in the house with them, or are supernatural forces the real culprit?

Naturally I won't spoil that for you, but I will say that up until the point we have our answer, the film works terrifically. Keough (no stranger to slow burn/isolated thriller fare, having appeared in the very undercooked It Comes At Night) has a tough role to play and she handles it well, as Grace isn't just the usual "stepmom" kind of character who oversteps her boundaries and needs to prove herself. No, she's actually the lone survivor of a Heaven's Gate-style cult led by her father (so essentially she's Jennifer Rubin from Bad Dreams!), and clearly hasn't fully adjusted to normal life yet - established by some medication she needs to take, which is of course among the things that go missing along with the rest of their stuff. So as her mind cracks even further, she switches from protagonist to antagonist, as we fear for the lives of the children - all the while remembering that they may be the true villains all along.

And it's easy enough to believe they may be, as this is from Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala. They are the team that gave us the evil child movie Goodnight Mommy, and the film shares a number of similarities - up to and including spending the entire movie wondering if we can trust its lead actress. Thankfully their approach has improved; I enjoyed Goodnight Mommy but my overall opinion was stymied by the way they handled their key twist, as I never could tell if it was even SUPPOSED to be one (in that it was so obvious to me by the film's twenty minute mark I wasn't sure if it was something they were even trying to hide). Here, it's clear that they don't want you to be that far ahead, allowing for a little more variety in the action and a little less time spent wondering how I as a viewer was supposed to be taking in this or that scene, so overall I found it to be a better film.

Unfortunately, once they do tell us exactly what happened, the movie kind of fizzles. As with Us, it almost might have been better to leave things unexplained, because by opening that Pandora's Box I found myself left with more questions (chiefly among them: what exactly was ______ hoping to accomplish?), and less engaged with the film's climax than I should have been. It's not that the answer is bad on its own, it's just that it's not particularly well developed, and even somewhat contradicts earlier information (can't really explain that one without spoiling, so I'll just say to consider an early scene involving a computer). There's also a curious lack of information about how Grace ended up with Armitage's character - the kids say she's a psychopath "from Dad's books" but his job is so vague I'm not even sure if they mean a book he wrote or a book he owned (and if he's an author, what kind of backwards ass movie writer is this where he has to LEAVE his isolated cabin to get some work done?).

But until then, they really had me hooked in - for proof, I stayed awake the entire time even though I was still very much low energy thanks to my hospital stay (and, as a result of the prognosis, I certainly wasn't partaking in anything sugary or with caffeine). The production design alone made the film worth watching - as with Hereditary, there's a bit of a dollhouse motif that spreads to the real sets, as everything seems just slightly off (in this case, hallways seem unnaturally narrow, while the bedrooms have awkward amounts of space between furniture), and Thimios Bakatakis' camera almost never stops gliding and slow zooming its way around the areas. And it pays tribute to its snowbound horror masters in both overt (they literally watch The Thing) and subtle (Grace's dog is named Grady, heh). Also, Keough sports some very excellent sweaters - as my rare chances to wear my sweaters are the thing I hate most about living in California, I find myself increasingly drawn to people wearing them in movies, the way wannabe gangsters idolize The Godfather and what not.

It's a shame Neon won't be releasing the film until February; its snowy look and Christmas setting would sell more tickets in November or December I'd think, but what do I know? It's the one thing I dislike about reviewing festival films - by the time it's out, I might forget a few things and not have the time for a second watch, so more people will be seeing it and I'll have trouble remembering what they're referring to, especially when by spoiler law I had to be vague with my review and won't be able to consult it for any specific reminders. The blunder in the last reel isn't crippling; it isn't the first and won't be the last movie that couldn't quite maintain its allure in the home stretch, especially among these slow burn types. Here's hoping the marketing doesn't spoil its surprises (the below trailer doesn't give too much away, though as always it's better to go in blind for these kind of films) and that it finds the folks who will enjoy it - and that Franz & Fiala's next film manages to make its ambiguous nature pay off in the end, instead of unnecessarily restraining it.

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Scars Of Dracula (1970)

AUGUST 27, 2019

GENRE: HAMMER, VAMPIRE
SOURCE: BLU-RAY (OWN COLLECTION)

At long last! I can't recall why I never got around to seeing Scars of Dracula back when this was a daily operated site, since the only other one I missed at the time was the offshoot 7 Golden Vampires (and even that I eventually got to, earlier this year), though I assume it had something to do with availability. But no matter - I can finally say I've seen this entire franchise, albeit completely out of order and spread across so many years that my memories of most entries consist solely of whatever my own review can muster up. I still long for a boxed set that will a. look nice on my shelf and b. ensure that I watch them in order for a second go around (I've only seen one or two of them a second time), but I'm sure the rights issues will keep that from ever happening.

Then again if anyone could pull it off it'd be Scream Factory, since they managed to get all of the Halloweens together and they were spread even further apart I think. Scars is the third of the Hammer Dracula series they've released (after 7 Golden Vampires and Dracula: Prince of Darkness), so they're clearly making efforts to inch us ever closer to some kind of release consistency. Now that they have a tie to Warner Bros (who controls several of the others, including the original Horror of Dracula) there's at least a decent chance they can nab them all eventually, even if they are - like my own viewing experience - released completely out of order.

However there's been an upside to this erratic order, in which I only once managed to watch two of the films in sequence (something unique to this franchise for me; I'm usually a stickler for going in order). Some of the films - in particular this one - are criticized by critics and Hammer faithful for betraying continuity in this or that way, but I was never quite sure where in the history I was, so I never noticed or even really cared much. Apparently at the end of the previous film Dracula was killed in a church, but here his bones are in his castle (where he is resurrected by a bat); no explanation is given for how they got there, but for all I knew there was nothing amiss, so I was able to watch the film by starting off on the right foot, whereas the die-hards were annoyed before the title even came up.

I'm not saying they're "wrong" to be angry - I've certainly gotten my own panties in a bunch about such things in the past (I've mellowed out a lot since). But for me personally, being blind to this kind of thing helped me enjoy the film much more than I might if I were a student of the series and knew exactly where his body should have been, and I can't help but wonder how much more I would have enjoyed something like H20 back in the day if it was the first sequel I had seen, without being grumpy that it was dismissing my beloved H4 and not resolving the cliffhanger in Curse of Michael Myers. There's a pretty believable theory that Hammer wrote the film in a vague way in case Christopher Lee didn't come back, thus making a break from the continuity to start anew with a different incarnation of the character, and then simply didn't care enough to adjust the script accordingly when Lee did in fact return for his fifth outing as the Count.

But I'm glad he did, because it's the most active he's been in one since the original. He talks more here than in the last few combined, I think, and does more Stoker-y things (like climbing on the walls), giving the character (and in turn, Lee himself) a better showcase than most of the other entries, despite whatever issues one might take with how it compares to the others. Yes, it's a bit odd to see him acting so violently here, but I'll take it over him barely appearing or speaking and let everyone else carry the movie. As for the others, it's yet another guy named Paul (the third, at least, in this series), his brother Simon, and some villagers, plus Simon's fiance who fills the obligatory "lady that Dracula is obsessed with" role. I particularly liked the priest (he's not given any name) played by Michael Gwynn, who (SPOILERS FOR 50 YEAR OLD MOVIE AHEAD!) kind of fills the Van Helsing role to some degree, making it a fun shock when he's killed off with 20 or so minutes to go.

It's also got a little more adventure-y action, with both Paul and Simon scaling the castle, a runaway coach scene, etc - it feels like part of Hammer's attempt to modernize the brand, and I bet the film would pair nicely with Captain Kronos (as opposed to House of Frankenstein, the film it was actually shown with upon release). With Lee doing more and all of this other stuff, it's easy to see why it played so well for me, and it's a shame that the Hammer gatekeepers couldn't have much fun with it. Indeed, the commentary by the usual historian, Constantine Nasr, is downright nasty at times as he lambasts the continuity, the violence, Roy Ward Baker's direction, etc. It'd be like me doing one for Freddy's Dead or F13: New Blood: presumably amusing to those who shared my less than glowing opinion of those films, but a bummer and even kind of obnoxious to those who enjoyed them. He does give it credit on occasion (such as the quite good matte painting for the long drop from the castle) and still provides the usual historical background and anecdotes (he even has Baker's copy of the script with him, with handwritten notes and such), so it's not a total waste of time, but I do wish one of the other Hammer folks could have been roped in, assuming at least one of them enjoyed the movie more.

The other commentary is an older one by Lee and Baker, moderated by Marcus Hearn (another Hammer expert). Hearn wasn't even really needed here; the two men rarely pause as they talk about the film, the state of Hammer at the time, etc., while Lee chimes in with other random observations like his favorite Benny Hill sketches (when that show's cast member Bob Todd shows up in a bit part here). As always these British gents are delightfully candid which makes some of their stories bluntly hilarious, and at the very end Lee admits he's never even seen the movie before, so it's just a treasure - I'm glad Scream Factory carried it over from whatever release it was recorded for (in 2001 or so, based on Lee's saying he hasn't made a Hammer film in 25 years as his last one at the time was 1976's To the Devil a Daughter). The transfer is also spectacular; as is often the case perhaps a bit TOO good as you can often see the wires holding the giant bat that frequently attacks our heroes.

I started this franchise in the early days of HMAD, with Brides of Dracula in 2007, and am just now finishing it up, just shy of a full twelve years later. Needless to say, my memories of the ones I watched more than a few years ago are practically non-existent, so I wouldn't begin to try to rank them or anything. That said, re-reading my reviews it seems I was often mildly charmed by the majority of them, with Dracula AD 1972 being the only one I seemed really "into" beyond appreciation for what it was doing at the time it was doing it. Maybe if I watched them all in order I'd feel differently? Who knows. All I know is I had a good time watching this one and was happy to end my Hammer Dracula viewing on a high note. Here's hoping you find it as enjoyable!

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FTP: The Witches (1966)

APRIL 10, 2019

GENRE: CULT, HAMMER
SOURCE: BLU-RAY (OWN COLLECTION)

Maybe from now on I'll stay away from anything Hammer made in 1966. I like Plague of the Zombies OK but it's partially my nostalgia driving that one (first one I saw), but The Reptile was possibly my least favorite and now The Witches gets pretty close to that territory as well. On paper it sounds fine (incidentally, it's adapted from a book), telling a Wicker Man-ish story of a lady taking a job as a schoolteacher in a town where everyone is "off", but the movie never has a pulse until its final ten minutes, and that stuff isn't scary or thrilling - it's just ridiculous, which is an improvement over "plodding", sure, but certainly isn't what anyone would probably want when they sat down for a Hammer movie about witches.

Things are amiss almost instantly. The film begins in Africa, where our protagonist Gwen (Joan Fontaine) is desperately trying to escape from some approaching witch doctors, due to events we're not fully privy to. The masked doctors crash through the door and approach her, seemingly to kill her, and then the movie fades to credits, only to come back in England where she's meeting about the schoolteacher job - she's apparently just a bit rattled by her experience that seemed to suggest she was about to be murdered. I actually spent a chunk of the runtime thinking maybe she was dead and this was some kind of Jacob's Ladder kind of deal, but as the movie dragged along I realized that would be too exciting a conclusion for this particular story.

Oddly enough, the most fun I got out of the disc was the historian commentary by Ted Newsom (the package says he'd be joined by Constantine Nasr, but while Mr. Nasr is mentioned a few times he's not there). I tend to find most of these a bit too dry for my liking when they're solo, but Newsom doesn't seem to think too highly of the movie either, so instead of rattling off filmographies and mildly amusing anecdotes from the production he's actually just kind of complaining about it half the time. He rightfully lambasts the inexplicable decision to include an amnesia detour at around the film's 50 minute mark (tellingly for how dull the movie is, Newsom says it happens 90 minutes in - clearly it just felt that way, since the movie is only 90 minutes long entirely), notes how "dowdy" everyone looks every few minutes, and laughs at some of its rare attempts at suspense. He also doesn't seem to be reading from notes the whole time, another thing that made it more lively than some others.

I should note that this is a recent "pile" acquisition; it only came to disc like three weeks ago. The problem with this new experiment is that more stuff keeps coming in, so I'm trying to balance it between newer arrivals and ones that have literally gotten dust on them because they've been there so long. I hope you guys don't mind the shorter reviews, but honestly for movies like this I don't think I could find enough to say to make it standard length, so I'd probably end up saying nothing and this site would be a ghost town that much longer. It took me five attempts to watch it because I kept dozing off; it was only the allure of the Hammer brand that kept me going because I was sure it'd get better. And technically it did (the climax is truly goofy), but too little too late. Oh well.

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The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (1974)

APRIL 9, 2019

GENRE: HAMMER, VAMPIRE
SOURCE: BLU-RAY (OWN COLLECTION)

My attempt to go through the entire Hammer Dracula series in the old days of the site (can you believe it's been six years since I "quit"? That's as long as I ran it in the first place!) was not successful - I am only just now catching The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires, and I *still* haven't seen Scars of Dracula. But I chalk this up to seeing them all out of order (not as much by choice as by availability); it makes it hard to remember which ones I was missing, and in at least one instance I obtained one I thought I had missed only to discover not only had I seen it, I already reviewed it! I vow though, come hell or high water - I will see Scars this year! Or at least in less than six years from now.

Anyway I knew this one was kind of the black sheep of the series due to having someone else play Dracula besides Christopher Lee, and also for making it a hybrid between vampire movie and kung fu flick, as the latter was very much in vogue at the time. So I was surprised to discover it was actually quite a bit of fun; the plot is nonsense, yes, but it's never dull for a second - if there's ever more than maybe five minutes of plot stuff, a fight will break out and last an equal (or longer) amount of time. And it's good fighting too - although uncredited, Cheh Chang brought his considerable experience (The Flying Dagger, The One-Armed Swordsman) to make sure the fight scenes were authentic, with Hammer stalwart Roy Ward Baker's team giving them the lighting/editing polish the kung fu flicks often lacked, so it's like a best of both worlds kind of scenario more often than not.

Of course, in the usual martial arts films there would be a bunch of normal humans fighting, whereas here we have undead vampires on one side of the battles, making it look more than just a little goofy at times. As is always the case, you'll see bad guys waiting their turn to get their ass kicked by the hero because they never think to rush him as a group, but it's far more ridiculous a sight when he's got a skeleton face and (as vampires tended to do in these things) is jumping up and down while he waits. But the choreography and stunt work doesn't seem to be much affected by their costumes, making all of the battles exciting (if somewhat repetitive) and in turn giving the entire film a pulse most Hammer films only really reach in their final reel.

As for the Hammer part of the equation... well I can see how the die-hard purists would be disappointed. Even if it was Lee in the role I can't imagine too many folks would be satisfied with his use here - he's only in the film's opening and closing scenes, seemingly thrown in just to tie it into the series as opposed to anything particularly necessary to the story. And it's hard to even think of it as a sequel anyway - not only does the timeline throw off what passes for continuity in these things (in a prologue set before any of the other films, Dracula takes the form of a Chinese man and isn't reborn in his usual form until the end - in a scene that takes place after most of the other entries), but Peter Cushing is playing a different Van Helsing than he played in the others. In AD 1972 it made sense that he'd be playing his own descendant, but that doesn't seem to be the case here - he's just a generic "Van Helsing" (no first name) that does the same things but doesn't appear to have any connection to the one we knew from the previous films. Unless it's like a Halloween (2018) thing where they were ignoring some of his entries? If so it's not made clear.

Anyway, like Dracula Van Helsing's role in the proceedings isn't particularly necessary - he's a professor who tells his class that vampires are real, and are terrorizing a village somewhere, but only one of them believes his story. And for good reason: he's the grandson of a man who killed one of the vampires (leaving six), and is planning to head there and kill the rest (excellent timing for the syllabus on Van Helsing's part!), inviting the professor to come along. They're joined by Van Helsing's son (an obligatory handsome young man, interchangeable with the ones who appeared in other Hammer films of the era), a rich lady (read: Hammer Glamour) who funds the trip, and lots of redshirts who help make the fights more epic. Why Helsing is needed is unclear; it's only in the final few minutes that he does much beyond watch the fights, maybe waving a torch around every now and then.

But on the other hand, it actually does offer plenty of legit horror stuff - the scene where the undead vampires rise from their graves is actually pretty effective, and it's got some surprising (at times even gratuitous) bloodspray if that's your bag. And there's even a surprising death or two in the climax, so I found myself continually surprised that while the kung fu aspect was clearly the focus, Baker and his team weren't dropping the ball when it came to the genre elements. As with AD 1972, they clearly realized audiences wouldn't be much interested in another "Dracula rises and seduces a lady in his castle" kind of movie, so the change of scenery (and in this case, faster pace) gives it an adrenaline shot most franchises would die to have in their 9th installment.

Alas, it was also the final installment - while another "exotic" sequel was planned that would send everyone off to India, it was never made, due to both the film's mixed reception and Hammer's own problems as a whole. So at least it went out on a high note - it may not be the best of the series, but it's an exciting and memorable entry all the same, which is more than I can say for what ended up closing off the likes of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Paranormal Activity series. And Scream Factory gives it a proper Blu-ray; in addition to the fine transfer, it's got a solid historian commentary, which is loaded with anecdotes about the film's tense shoot (the two crews didn't mix well together; Baker is actually referred to as a "racist" at one point) and some context for the period that will help explain why Dracula is palling around with martial arts gurus for the unsuspecting viewers.

It also has the incomprehensible US cut of the film (under the title The 7 Brothers Meet Dracula, which isn't even accurate), which chops at least fifteen minutes out and rearranges key scenes, while also reducing Cushing's role even further - it reminded me of certain Dimension productions of the 1990s, in fact. Even having seen the proper version the day before, I often found myself baffled as to what was going on, and can't imagine how it would play to a fresh viewer. I love when they include this sort of thing - there's no real use for it anymore, but it's fun to try to put yourselves in the shoes of a ticket buyer in 1974, who didn't have the internet or a Blu-ray commentary to explain why things were the wacky way they were. I try my best to go in blind to every movie I see, but in this era it's too easy to find out what went wrong - how long did the US audiences (those who cared anyway) have to wait until they found out who anyone was, since this cut omitted most of their full introductions? What a time to be alive!

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