If I Had a Hammer, Part V

Concluding our idiosyncratic survey of some noteworthy Hammer films and related items.

Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972): Hammer made a howling error bringing Dracula into the present with this entry in its declining series, but setting much of the story in an abandoned church helps (as do Stephanie Beacham and Caroline Munro). Adding insult to injury is the resurrection of the transparent “Alucard” pseudonym (already a mite feeble in 1943 in Universal’s Son of Dracula) for Dracula’s minion. At least the film reunites Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing as Dracula and Van Helsing for the first time since 1958, although making Cushing’s character the grandson of the original Van Helsing, who dies in battle with Dracula in the 1872 prologue, certainly strains chronological credulity. But Lee, as so often happens, is given little to do. Death to Stoneground!

Fear in the Night (1972): This psycho-thriller was written and directed by Hammer—and psycho-thriller—mainstay Jimmy Sangster. Cushing stars as the headmaster of an English boarding school that is vacant for the holidays, wed to Joan Collins (a frequent genre presence at that time); Ralph Bates plays a newly hired teacher, with Judy Geeson as his terrified, and mentally unstable, spouse.

Straight on Till Morning (aka Dressed for Death, Til Dawn Do Us Part, The Victim; 1972): I have yet to see this psycho-thriller from director Peter Collinson (The Italian Job), with Rita Tushingham as a naïve girl whose dream lover is actually a serial killer, played by Hammer’s “It Boy” du jour, one Shane Briant (Demons of the Mind, Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell).

Vampire Circus (1972): One of Hammer’s more distasteful latter-day films, with a nasty tone, no stars, and a no-name director (assuming Robert Young isn’t the same guy from Father Knows Best). For those who care, it has some feminine pulchritude on display, but believe me, that’s not necessarily enough. It depicts the depredations wrought upon a European village by the curse of the vampire count whom the inhabitants had staked years earlier. George Baxt (City of the Dead) got story credit, but told me he just sold them the title for £1,000. If that’s the case, “You go, George!”

Captain Kronos—Vampire Hunter (aka Kronos, Vampire Castle; 1974): This failed attempt to launch a new series was written and directed by Avengers alumnus Brian Clemens, with Caroline Munro as the titular vampire hunter’s sexy sidekick. It’s too bad it didn’t do better, because it’s unusual and atmospheric, with Horst Janson effective in the title role, rousing music by Laurie Johnson (also of The Avengers), and Briant and Ian Hendry in the supporting cast.

Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1974): The last film of both director Terence Fisher and Hammer’s second-longest series, exceeded only by their Dracula films. Cushing returns as the Baron, now using his fellow inmates at an asylum as raw material, with Big Dave Prowse (the body of Darth Vader) as his second Frankenstein Monster, following The Horror of Frankenstein; Briant as his assistant; and Madeline Smith (The Vampire Lovers) as the mute Angel, whom Frankenstein hopes to mate with his latest monster. Not the best, but a better swan song than their Dracula had…

The Satanic Rites of Dracula (aka Count Dracula and His Vampire Bride, Dracula Is Dead…and Well and Living in London; 1974): Lee’s last Hammer Dracula, made by the same team as Dracula A.D. 1972, with Cushing returning as Van Helsing, Joanna (The New Avengers, Absolutely Fabulous) Lumley supplanting Stephanie (seaQuest DSV) Beacham as his granddaughter Jessica, and Lee offstage for much of the picture posing as reclusive tycoon D.D. Denham, who has a weird scheme to decimate the Earth with a plague. I guess everybody needs a hobby…but why Dracula?

The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires (aka The Seven Brothers Meet Dracula; 1974): Believe it or not, the world’s first Kung Fu vampire movie is better than you’d think. It’s a co-production with Hong Kong’s Shaw Brothers, and while it doesn’t have Lee as Dracula (John Forbes-Robertson subs for him in a few, mercifully brief scenes), it does have Cushing as Van Helsing, atmospheric direction by Hammer stalwart Roy Ward Baker, and a return to a period setting. Interestingly, while Baker (who had directed Lee’s last period entry, Scars of Dracula) supplanted Alan Gibson after the ill-advised attempts to update the Count, Don Houghton wrote all three films.

Shatter (aka Call Him Mr. Shatter; 1974): Hammer honcho Michael “Mr. Mediocrity” Carreras replaced a behind-schedule Monte Hellman as the director of their second and last collaboration with the Shaw Brothers, also written by Don Houghton. Stuart Whitman—a non-star if ever there was one (would you believe he got a 1961 Oscar nomination for something called The Mark?)—is the eponymous assassin (“That’s not a name.” “Yeah—more of a way of life.”), complete with cheesy ’70s theme song, who gets double-crossed in Hong Kong. Even “guest star” Cushing (in his last film for Hammer) and Anton Diffring (the star of Baxt’s Circus of Horrors and Hammer’s The Man Who Could Cheat Death years earlier) can’t do much to salvage a lame Bruce Lee knock-off.

To the Devil a Daughter (aka Die Braut des Satans; 1976): Hammer’s last gasp in the genre is a thoroughly unpleasant yarn based on the novel by Dennis Wheatley (author of The Devil Rides Out), with Lee as a Satan-worshipping priest, the briefly unclothed Nastassja Kinski as the object of his Rosemary’s Baby-esque scheme and writer Richard Widmark as the opposition; it’s a sad finale.

Hammer House of Horror (1980): A friend sent me copies of all thirteen episodes of this mystery and suspense anthology series, but alas, I have yet to find time to watch any of them. I do know one, “The Silent Scream,” stars Peter Cushing, for whatever it’s worth. But that’s all I can tell you.

The World of Hammer (1994): Narrated by the late Oliver Reed, this series is not quite a documentary, as it provides no biographical or background information. It’s really more of a clip-fest, with such thematically grouped episodes as “Christopher Lee,” “Frankenstein Films,” “Mummies, Werewolves and the Living Dead,” “Peter Cushing,” “Sci-Fi,” and “Wicked Women.”

Flesh and Blood (1994): Not to be confused with Paul Verhoeven’s Flesh + Blood, Ted Newsom’s superb feature-length documentary is narrated by Hammer’s two biggest stars, Christopher Lee and, shortly before his death, Peter Cushing. It can’t cover everything in 100 minutes (yes, Richard Matheson is mentioned as the screenwriter of The Devil Rides Out and the abortive Night Creatures, but not Fanatic), yet it does admirably recount the studio’s rise, glory days, and decline with an abundance of clips, trailers, and interviews with director/fan Joe Dante and a “Who’s Who” of Hammer: Roy Ward Baker, James Bernard, Martine Beswick (misidentified as “Beswicke” despite posters showing her name), Veronica Carlson, Michael Carreras (aka Henry Younger), Hazel Court, Freddie Francis, Val Guest, Ray Harryhausen, Anthony Hinds (aka John Elder), Andrew Keir, Francis Matthews, Caroline Munro, Ingrid Pitt, Jimmy Sangster, and Raquel Welch.

Addendum: The good folks at Watching Hammer (http://watchinghammer.blogspot.com/) have instituted a new weekly feature in which they get well-known experts to write about their Top Ten Hammer films.  By a bizarre coincidence, the first three are all people who were kind enough to allow me to quote generously from various published interviews in Richard Matheson on Screen:  Ted Newsom (see above), journalist Alan Jones of Cinefantastique fame, and Little Shoppe of Horrors publisher Richard Klemensen.  Since I knew them to be nice guys on top of their other credentials, my expectations were high but, if anything, exceeded.   Their intensely enjoyable lists achieved the same effect I strive for here at BOF, combining informed viewpoints on films, filmmakers, and film history with personal reactions that, I hope, make for a good read; theirs sure did.

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