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By  Will, on October 6, 2011, 5:20 am  Starring Peter Cushing, Robert Urquhart, Christopher Lee, Hazel Court, Valerie Gaunt, Noel Hood, Melvyn Hayes, Paul Hardtmuth, Fred Johnson
Directed by Terence Fisher
Expectations: Moderate. I’m excited to finally watch a Hammer movie after years of buildup, but I’m trying to remain grounded.
For my first Hammer Horror movie experience, I figured I’d begin at the film that started it all, The Curse of Frankenstein. Would you expect me to do anything else? Hammer had done some similar productions prior to this, but The Curse of Frankenstein was their first horror film in color and the one that kicked off their very successful series of revisionist horror films featuring the classic monsters. As such, it is a very impressive, competent movie, exhibiting quality filmmaking from every corner.
At this point in my life, I feel like I’ve seen enough Frankenstein movies. They are all relatively similar, and what is different usually isn’t different enough to care about. This is a big reason why I never actively pursued these Hammer Horror movies, because at some level I felt they’d just be simple retellings of the classic Universal movies, albeit in color with more daring gore. This is where The Curse of Frankenstein sets itself apart though, because in spite of all the odds stacked against it in my head, the film has such an interesting take on the story that it is not only worth watching, this is quite possibly my favorite Frankenstein of all. It definitely blows the 30s Universal movie out of the water for me, no disrespect to that movie intended. It is iconic and all that, but it can’t hang with this version of the tale in my eyes.
Continue reading The Curse of Frankenstein (1957) →
By Will, on October 5, 2011, 5:20 am  The Ghost of Yotsuya [Tôkaidô Yotsuya Kaidan, 東海道四谷怪談] (1959)
AKA The Ghost Story of Yotsuya
Starring Shigeru Amachi, Noriko Kitazawa, Katsuko Wakasugi, Shuntarô Emi, Ryûzaburô Nakamura, Junko Ikeuchi, Jun Ôtomo, Hiroshi Hayashi, Shinjirô Asano, Arata Shibata, Kikuko Hanaoka
Directed by Nobuo Nakagawa
Expectations: Moderate. Love old Japanese films, not sure what to expect here.
The Ghost of Yotsuya starts off fairly unassumingly. A man pulls back a curtain on a small outdoor stage, revealing an old woman surrounded by three ominous candles, singing a short song about the notion that a woman scorned is one of the greatest horrors. This leads into the film proper where we meet Lemon, a down on his luck samurai hoping to acquire the beautiful Iwa’s hand in marriage. He stops her father while on a nighttime walk and when the father refuses his request, Lemon brutally murders him and his companion, the father of the fiancé to Iwa’s sister Sode. Their servant runs over to Lemon with a plan for how they can avoid any problems the deaths may cause, and with that, the film is off and running.
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By Will, on June 24, 2011, 11:59 am  Fixed Bayonets! (1951)
Starring Richard Basehart, Gene Evans, Michael O’Shea, Richard Hylton, Skip Homeier, David Wolfson, Henry Kulky, Craig Hill
Directed by Samuel Fuller
Expectations: Another Sam Fuller, I’m fairly positive I’ll enjoy this, but as it’s his first studio picture I’m worried it may be watered down.
It’s no secret to frequent visitors that Samuel Fuller is one of my most favorite filmmakers. The man was years ahead of his time and his films continue to resonate just as well, if not better, than they did upon release. I approached my viewing of Fixed Bayonets! with slight apprehension though, as I feared that Fuller’s transition to the studio system (his previous three films were all independently produced) would cramp his style a bit. While Fixed Bayonets! does not have the hard-hitting social commentary and racial tension of Fuller’s other 1951 film, The Steel Helmet, it makes up for that with hard-hitting war action and survival drama. This is essentially a smaller, more localized version of Fuller’s epic The Big Red One.
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By Will, on March 25, 2011, 7:05 am  The Steel Helmet (1951)
Starring Gene Evans, William Chun, Robert Hutton, Steve Brodie, James Edwards, Richard Loo, Sid Melton, Richard Monahan, Harold Fong, Neyle Morrow, Lynn Stalmaster
Directed by Samuel Fuller
Expectations: Love it, and hoping to get some more out of it the second go-round.
After a long hiatus, I finally return to my Samuel Fuller series. I have seen this film once before, about ten or so years back, and I was simply blown away. It was the second Sam Fuller movie I had seen, but the first that I truly loved. Shock Corridor was the first for those that care, and that one is so out there that I had a hard time wrapping my head around it in any meaningful way the first time around. I didn’t dislike it, but I didn’t necessarily like it either. The Steel Helmet however, took me by the scruff of my neck and threw me directly into the fire and the passion of Sam Fuller’s best work.
Continue reading The Steel Helmet (1951) →
By Will, on January 14, 2011, 5:52 am  The Baron of Arizona (1950)
Starring Vincent Price, Ellen Drew, Vladimir Sokoloff, Beulah Bondi, Reed Hadley, Robert Barrat, Robin Short, Tina Pine, Karen Kester, Margia Dean, Jonathan Hale, Edward Keane, Barbara Woodell, I. Stanford Jolley, Fred Kohler Jr.
Directed by Samuel Fuller
Expectations: Moderate. I love Fuller’s films, this one seems like it might be underwhelming though.
The Baron of Arizona is an interesting film within the filmography of Samuel Fuller in that it isn’t nearly as upfront and in your face as the traditional Fuller picture. As a second feature, it comes off as something wholly different from his début I Shot Jesse James, showing off Fuller’s growing confidence as a filmmaker. The film is based on a true story of one of the biggest land scams in the history of the United States. While the facts here are bent for the purpose of fun storytelling, the film ultimately succeeds by portraying the characters and events in such memorable ways.
Continue reading The Baron of Arizona (1950) →
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