Hammer Horror

Start with Curse of Frankenstein and Horror of Dracula.

Or better yet, get some Amicus Anthologies.
Preferably From Beyond the Grave.

Amicus would be good for a side by side comparison of British horror of the time.

The Quatermass movies would be good to check out as well. Though not technically horror, they are some of the better Hammer films.

Definitely the Draculas. Not only do you get Chris Lee, you get Peter Cushing (at least for a few of them). And once you hit TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA, shit starts getting kinky and violent. Not Bram's Stoker's Drac by any stretch, but in some ways, more fun.

I always throught the Draculas were among the weakest of Hammer. Go for the Quatermasses, the Frankensteins, and the satanic lot like The Witches or The Devil Rides Out.
Quatermass and the Pit is probably the best thing Hammer did.

Is Karnstein Hammer or Amicus?

This one...Cushing chewing scenery can't be beat!

(oh, and another vote for ANY Quatermass..)

Cushing chewing scenery reaches its apex in FRANKENSTEIN MUST BE DESTROYED, I'd say, since there is no monster in that one and it's literally just a slasher movie with doctor Frankenstein.

The first 3 Dracula movies are pretty fun, especially considering that, all things considered, Drac is killed and resurrected 3 times in about a week by a series of completely random events.

Curse of the Werewolf was a letdown when I finally saw it at age 11, but I enjoy its slow build and weird first act a lot now.

Try to watch the Drac series in sequence, that way you can enjoy Dracula AD 1972 in all it's kitchy glory.

Brides of Dracula is a classic, even if it's not a Lee vehicle.

Also, I remember The Devil Rides Out being really good, although it's been years since I've seen it.

PLAGUE OF THE ZOMBIES is a fun Scooby Doo mystery.

HORROR OF DRACULA is erotic and edited for maximum shock effect. Cushing's puritanical, slightly insane (anti) hero: subtle but powerful. BRIDES OF DRACULA benefits from a bizarre first act that distinguishes itself from the earlier film. DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS is a total bore, and the series degenerates, though there are little things about the later entries that I enjoy (sex and class themes in TASTE THE BLOOD, Patrick Troughton's pathetic hunchback in SCARS, Drac presented as corporate bloodsucker in SATANIC RITES).

CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN...an instant classic. Cushing and Fisher nail the viciousness and cold brutality of the Baron. It's a disturbing film. The sequel is something of a departure but the protagonist isn't as compelling. At least Fisher gets it right by having the guy become his creation, literally. The asylum setting and Cushing's death scene remind me of BEDLAM (Val Lewton production). EVIL OF FRANKENSTEIN isn't nearly as terrible as claimed, as long as you accept it as a 'reboot' and ignore the Monster's awful makeup. The remaining Fisher/Cushing entries are all interesting and ambitious in their themes and character psychology. I've never seen HORROR OF FRANKENSTEIN (I've read it's an unsuccessful reboot verging on parody).

Other Hammers that I've enjoyed, or that at least stand out in memory:

THE MUMMY
CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF
THE DEVIL RIDES OUT
RASPUTIN, THE MAD MONK (filmed on the same sets, with much of the same cast, as DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS)
THE GORGON
THE VAMPIRE LOVERS
CAPTAIN KRONOS: VAMPIRE HUNTER
THE LEGEND OF THE SEVEN GOLDEN VAMPIRES (another one with a bad rep, but I found it fun)

Veers worryingly close to unintentional comedy, but it's certainly entertaining.

Tits...

For a more recent movie in the vein of Hammer Horror check out Sleepy Hollow.

This!

I'd throw in TWINS OF EVIL and LUST FOR A VAMPIRE as well - very kitschy, but the actresses are gorgeous. Both flicks were staples on Creature Features when I was a kid.

VAMPIRE CIRCUS (still unreleased on DVD) was a bizarre one, but still atmospheric Hammer.

I honestly can not get enough of the heaving-busom vamps and damsels from that period/studio.

These are some decent little dvd compilations:
http://www.amazon.com/Werewolf-Paran...9942043&sr=1-3
http://www.amazon.com/Draculas-Favor...9942043&sr=1-4
http://www.amazon.com/Countess-Dracu...942123&sr=1-14

I think everyone here has done well in recommending the best Hammer Horror films.

I'll admit that I will watch some of these just for the bosoms. With that in mind, you can't go wrong with Valerie Leon in BLOOD FROM THE MUMMY'S TOMB.
http://www.dvdempire.com/Exec/v4_ite...ab=5#topoftabs

No love here for TO THE DEVIL A DAUGHTER? That sounds about right, that one is pretty ridiculous.

QFT...

Also, supposedly a big influence on the X-FILES (though never admitted).

Not so much. PRINCE OF DARKNESS takes place ten years after HORROR, and RISEN FROM THE GRAVE is, I think, 2-5 years after PRINCE.

Yeah, I realised that about ten minutes after posting. My childhood memories aren't what they used to be.

I'll pile on in recommending the Quatermass films, especially Quatermass and the Pit. The first two are still very good though and the second has some good ideas regarding how patriotism and "government security" can be used against the people that are supposedly being protected.

I liked your version better.

One more recommendation for the Quatermass films. I think Quatermass and the Pit is 3 hours long, but well worth it.

The 50s tv version is 3 hours, not the Hammer film.
Unusually enough, they each have their own merits while both retaining the strengths of the story- better slow tension on the tv version, better effects and polish on the film. I couldn't really call either superior to the other.

I recently watched The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll. I did not like it very much, though.

Curse of the Werewolf, though, is one of my all-time favorite horror movies.

I've got a bunch of Hammer films recently and decided with Halloween not so far away, nows as good a time as any to burn through them. So, some short thoughts as I watch them.

THE MUMMY (1959)

Perhaps the most pure remake of Hammer's as it mixes both the Karloff and latter Universal series versions.

At the heart of the film there's a great central conceit. Peter Cushing is alone in his study. And he knows there's an undead, raging monster out there that it's unlikely he can do anything against. All he can do is wait and prepare as best he can, probably futilely.

Christopher Lee is very imposing. Some perspective tricks help as he practically looks 7 feet tall in this. He's a far cry from the Universal mummies as well. He's full of rage and when he attacks he'll rip doors from their hinges.

Perhaps not coincidentally, this plays more than a bit like Hound of the Baskervilles, also made by Hammer in 1959. Same director. Peter Cushing gets to go out and investigate in a Victorian setting. The film is structured as a mystery to some extent. The supernatural, literally in this case, attacking a family through a curse. Dark swamps and a villain that meets his fate in it.

Peter Cushing is good, although it's certainly not his most memorable role. He's given a limp, but nothing is really done with it. Regrettably nothing is done with the prominent bottles of liquor and the fireplace in his study either.
Instead of playing merely victim, he goes out and plays amateur detective. And baits the villain in a deliberately obnoxious manner.

This is certainly more of a boy's own adventure story than Universal's original where Zita Johann played a prominent role. Yvonne Furneaux isn't asked to do much beyond look pretty. And display a lot of skin in the embalment scenes.

The colors really pop in this movie. Especially the reds and greens. There aren't many sets, but they're all solid. The nighttime stuff seems a bit of a wasted opportunity though. Christopher Lee clomping down a moonlit country lane never really comes off especially effective.

Overall, I thought it was a pretty solid and entertaining entry. Probably the second best Mummy movie ever, behind Karloff's.

THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF (1961)

Probably one of the Hammer films most interested in telling a story rather than delivering the shocks. It's about 45 minutes until Oliver Reed shows up and the movie is only 90 minutes long. There's a lot of backstory built into this film, 30+ minutes.

Oliver Reed is the best darn thing about the picture. I imagine Reed is what they were thinking of when they cast Benecio Del Toro in The Wolfman. Strong, good looking, and with more than a hint of an animal in him.

Even by Hammer standards the love story is rushed. Which is odd considering that 30 minutes is spent on backstory.

There's a very unique feel to this Hammer film. With its opening narration, it does feel more like a fairy tale than most other Hammer films. The Spanish setting works, at least visually. No attempt is made at Spanish accents by the British cast. So, apparently Americans aren't the only ones that think better of attempting accents.

There's an interesting take on the man/beast conflict here. None of the Gypsy folklore, but more of a spiritual monster awakened by lust, greed, etc. With love being the cure. That's a more spiritual take on the werewolf than I'm used to and a good one.

The monsignor in the film has an odd arc. He knows the secret, tries to help the family, but when the shit is about to hit the fan it's "oh, I've got a service to attend to. Gotta go."

The werewolf design is decent. Certainly it's not reminiscent of Universal's iconic design. The posters make it look blonde, which is an odd choice, although it really could be described as a light brown in the film proper.

Overall it's a good movie, although perhaps not delivering where Hammer is most known for. The long back story prevents the main story from gathering much momentum. The werewolf proper doesn't really show up until the last 30 minutes.

Hammer's output (actually almost ALL British output) marks a huge hole in my horror education, and I've only recently begun to catch up. I just finally broke down and bootlegged Quatermass and the Pit because even Netflix didn't have a copy. Stupid Anchor Bay not losing their license on that stuff, and stupid WB not picking up the re-release slack. Or whatever caused such a discrepancy in availability.

THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1957)

This isn't really the beginning of Hammer horror, but it's the breakthrough film that gave them their signature style. Lee, Cushing, heaving bosoms, bright colors, and blood. And it's still tremendously entertaining. You can't do much better as a starting point.

Cushing really is tremendous. Nothing like Clive Owen (Edit. Strike that. Nothing like Colin Clive) and making him into an out and out villain works great. The story is told from his p.o.v., a story where he's responsible for two deaths directly and a couple indirectly, and yet he somehow expects that it will win him sympathy. And yet, he's always a welcome presence on screen. Pure charisma.

Christopher Lee doesn't have as much to do. He certainly doesn't have the character that Karloff has. Or the focus. He's more a literal symbol of Frankenstein's internal corruption than a character. But, he works as that. There's enough off kilter in him movements that he just doesn't look natural. The makeup, particularly the eyes, adds to that effect.

I have a hard time making heads or tails of Robert Urquhart's role of Paul. He's supposed to be Frankenstein's tutor and friend and yet he doesn't appear to know him very well. He's supposed to the erstwhile hero, yet he doesn't do much except pass judgement on Frankenstein. And, as the Baron rightly points out, he played more than a small role in the creature being a brain damaged monster. Robert Urquhart is certainly solid, but I don't think that the screenplay fully knows what to make of his character.

Hazel Court as Elizabeth and Valerie Gaunt as Justine, Victor's maid and mistress round out the main characters. American horror movies of this period were still pretty chaste, but Hammer certainly was willing to make up for it. I find it an interesting decision that Frankenstein isn't merely an intellect gone wrong but someone that pursues a lustful affair outside of his scientific interests with Justine. Both the women are worth lusting after, although I prefer Justine. Justine has a little more to do than the average Hammer secondary female as she gets to be a love interest, a scorned vengeful woman, an investigator, and a victim.

This really is an efficient production. Really only 5 significant parts. Mostly taking place in two rooms on the lower floor, a stairway, a hallway, and two rooms of a laboratory. Yet, it doesn't ever feel cramped. I think a lot of that is due to Terence Fisher's direction. It's briskly paced and the camera really has some nice fluid movement to it. Close attention reveals that the sets aren't really high budget, especially the lower rooms, but their nicely dressed, the colors really pop, and there's enough focus on the characters that small inconsistencies, like doing nothing more than slapping a board across a broken balcony railing months after it's broken, don't really bother. The unveiling of the monster is also really nicely handled, right up there with Whale's reveal.

Perhaps not quite up there with Whale's classics, but not too far away either. This one deserved to make a stir. It was an instant classic.

Channel 9 in NY used to run this at 3AM, and as a kid I never made it to the first transformation scene. Always pissed me off.

Yeah, I could see how that could be a problem with CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF. Most of the Hammer Films get to the good stuff quickly enough that they're pretty solid late night viewing. Not that one though.

Cushing and Owen are both really hurt by what you wrote... but Colin Clive is downright pissed at you.

I hate to sound like a broken record, but I realize this isn't a Hammer film. Nevertheless...

D'oh. Yeah, Colin Clive.

THE REVENGE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1958)

In many ways the sequel is a better film than it's predecessor. The supporting characters are more interesting, it's a bit more thematically complex and morally gray, the plot is a bit tighter, it doesn't have the strained conceit of the earlier film that noone sees the monster except the Doctor and Paul, and it has a whopper of an ending. It's a sequel that doesn't just repeat what the first one did, only bigger, but has something new to say. OTOH, it doesn't deliver the shocks that the first one did and Cushing is less of a memorable bastard in this one.

It stays pretty tightly with the continuity of the first one except that it throws away the "no one believes Frankenstein created a monster" conceit. I think wisely as it ups the stakes for discovery. And we see how that plays out at the end of the film in the ward.

I think the escape from the guillotine was as well done as possible in order to continue the series. Pretty solid graveyard entrance too.

In CURSE Frankenstein is a womanizing, murdering bastard in addition to his experiments. Other than some arrogance, and one suspects being a little too willing to order an amputation, he's a whole lot tamer in this movie. Heck, arguably he's the best and most effective doctor in town. He even seems too busy to be bothered by womanizing when he has the opportunity. And he certainly seems to have some affection for his assistants.

Carl the "dwarf" assistant is the central figure of the experiments as the Doctor endeavors to transplant his brain into a good body. And it seems to be working at first. The idea that Carl still has an emotional attachment to his old body and doesn't want to see it ridiculed is a tremendously good one along with the disposal of it. And the things that go wrong are certainly pitiable, albeit a bit arbitrary. I never quite bought the cannibalism thing and his death seems out of the blue. I was reminded a little bit of THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT with the creature turning into a limping, club handed, hunched over being instead of a man. Pretty solid acting by both Oscar Quitak as the before and Michael Gwynn as the after.

The bit where the new Carl starts to resemble the old Carl is a pretty interesting point. Suggesting that the brain does more than just direct the body.

Eunice Gayson was a solid presence. Perhaps she doesn't have as much to do as would have been liked, but she's good at what she was asked. Plus, just a few years later she'd be a Bond girl which is something you don't anticipate in a Hammer film.

I thought Francis Matthews as Frankenstein's assistant doctor did a fine job as well. Certainly you don't see competent assistants often in these types of films.

Dr. Stein is a cute nod. The fact that Frankenstein deals with the name thing with a perfectly logical explanation helps sell the obviousness of it too. Decent payoff at the end as well. It also feeds into the Doctor's arrogance. He thinks he can outreason and outthink everyone around him. The ward scene proves that reason only gets you so far.

The colors pop a little less in this film than in the previous. The sets aren't as memorable either. They're probably better overall, but nothing matches the laboratory of the original. It's also a more setbound movie than the first with little outside shooting.

Overall, a solid sequel. Maybe without the shock value of the original, but still an interesting premise to carry on with. It makes a nice bookend with the first one and hints at the possibilities for the franchise with its moral murkiness and some intriguing philosophy. Certainly there seems more room to explore than in the Dracula sequels.

THE EVIL OF FRANKENSTEIN (1963)

Most certainly some sort of reboot of the series, as the flashbacks flat out contradict CURSE. And, honestly, this entry has more in common with Universal's series than it does with the previous Hammer films. And I don't think that's a coincidence. Hammer reached some agreement with Universal in the meantime and EVIL OF FRANKENSTEIN is filled with a flat headed, green colored monster with electrodes that clomps around, lightning sparking laboratories, and pitchfork wielding mobs. Along with an evil hypnotist and a mute girl. If you had cast someone other than Cushing as Frankenstein, there'd be no question that it was an altogether different franchise.

Of course there's nothing wrong with a takeoff on Universal's movies. They're iconic for a reason. Unfortunately, EVIL is more along the lines of GHOST OF FRANKENSTEIN than Whale's classics. The biggest problem being that the script makes no sense. One moment Frankenstein acknowledges the fact that he has to remain in disguise, the next moment he's openly challenging the officials that banished him. One moment they can't go to the chateau for fear of the authorities, the next they're set up in the chateau without worry or precaution. One moment the police are after Frankenstein, the next they're sitting around in disbelief that there's a creature out there. Zoltan, the hypnotist, is evil except when he's not and things just got carried away. There's plenty of incidents, but no logical string to them. REVENGE at least had an interesting philosophical bent to it, which is completely absent here. It's an empty hodge podge.

It also doesn't help that the updated makeup for the creature is just awful. Not much in the performance either. It's a central part of the film that just doesn't work.

OTOH, the film certainly is pleasant to look at. The earlier films are much more claustrophobic. This one really opens up with mountainside escapes, caves, much more expansive laboratories, forest scenes, and a rather big village with a carnival going on. Lots of extras too. The colors, especially the blood, don't pop as much in this version, but it looks like it has an actual budget and is one of the more pleasing looking Hammer entries.

Peter Cushing, ironically, doesn't do anything particularly evil in this movie. O.K. there's a bit at the beginning where he's paying for a fresh corpse and there's still the "affront to god" stuff, but in Shelley's story he commits the additional sin of abandoning his creation. In the Whale and Fisher versions, he's consumed by his monomania and puts a damaged brain in his creation. He does none of that in this version, even being shown staying up and feeding the creature. None of the sadism of Cushing's earlier performance, he seems content to observe and record his findings. That takes away some of the balance of the story as Cushing comes across as much more of the wronged hero than villain in this version as he's upstaged in the evil department by Zoltan.

However, one thing that's unique about this movie is the physicality that Cushing gets to display. He's almost swashbuckling at times. He makes a daring bedroom escape from a high balcony (which the monster just clomps in from later in the movie, again the script doesn't even get basic geography right) to the delight of a bosomy beauty, he's diving over desks to avoid getting speared, driving a pair of horses standing up with his shirt open, and swinging down on a chain to confront his monster in a raging inferno. EVIL OF FRANKENSTEIN might be dumb, but it's not boring.

Overall, a pretty mediocre film. Never really scary, pretty dumb, and featuring a monster that doesn't work. Still, a physical Cushing, lots of incidents, and some lush sets and photography make it a decent enough diversion, although hardly a necessary one.

Brides of Dracula has one of the all time greatest bat attacks ever put on film. EVER.

To understand Hammer films one must understand the times they were made. Horror films in the fifties were all pretty much low budget black and white films. Most were meant for the Drive-in and not much thought was put into them. These were the most extreme films and very different than anything else. CURSE OF FRANKENSTIEN and HORROR OF DRACULA ( my all time favorite film) just came out of no where and changed film. They were kind of like RESERVOIR DOGS and PULP FICTION. They were almost too much for kids, they were very adult. I think they have aged fairly well.

FRANKENSTEIN CREATED WOMAN (1967)

Definitely one of the more unique entries from Hammer, FRANKENSTEIN CREATED WOMAN dips deep into metaphysics with the Doctor literally capturing and transferring a soul in the course of the film. That alone makes it one of the most ambitious films philosophically that Hammer ever made. Of course, that metaphysics is fitted to a fairly standard revenge/slasher plot so it's never really explored in any depth or the full potential on another soul in a body, but I give them plenty of points for throwing in interesting ideas.

Unfortunately the horror elements are pretty tepid in this one. A couple of guillotinings, some suggestive cuts before murders, and a decapitated head being the sum total of it.

This seems like yet another reboot in the Frankenstein series. The Baron has burned hands, from the climax of EVIL OF FRANKENSTEIN, yet isn't in hiding and seems to have made himself at home in this village for a long time. Cushing is, of course, quite good in this one, waxing philosophical. He's still arrogant and fixated, but he's hardly the coldhearted bastard of CURSE and REVENGE. Asked about the potential ill effects of one of his experiments, he replies he doesn't really know, but it will be interesting and informative, that's enough. It's almost a Sherlock Holmes attitude. Perhaps added to by Thorley Waters as the Baron's assistant Dr. Hertz who almost has a Dr. Watson air about him, the lovable bumbling Watson that is. There's a nice chemistry between the two of them.

Susan Denberg and Robert Morris as Christina and Hans, the doomed lovers and later vengeful creation, have equally hefty roles. Denberg is quite lovely, and gets to display a lot of skin in one scene, but probably can't be described as more than adequate. Robert Morris comes off a little better, he has lots of energy, but he doesn't hold a candle to Cushing.

There's a lot of buildup in this one. The vengeance doesn't start until well into the last half hour of this one. But, as always, it moves along from plot point to plot point in an efficient manner. There's some rather nice cinematography in this one, including a nicely menacing guillotine filmed from appropriately eerie angles, and the movie is less setbound than some other Hammer films. Or, at least, there's enough outdoors filming to make it seem bigger than it is.

I enjoyed this one more than EVIL OF FRANKENSTEIN. Yeah, they don't do enough with the metaphysics, but at least it's there. That alone makes it more interesting than many a horror movie. Unfortunately, not real scary with a rote revenge plot and a decided lack of gore holds it back.

Well it might have been my mood at the time, but I tried watching it yesterday and my God... what a crushing bore. Nothing ever happens for about 90 minutes, then it ends.
Seriously, I liked Cronos, the Quatermasses and a good deal of the Dracula's but this? Severely outdated.

I like how there's always a mute in these movies.

Bummer. I love the original book, which is mostly a Boy's Adventure type story with a supernatural opponent. There's a lot more chasing around and seeking out manuscripts than actual combat in it, though, perhaps this is a bigger problem when put on film?