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The first Hammer movie I saw was late one night at my grandparents' house, back when horror double bills were a Friday night TV staple. Mostly these were old Universal flicks, but occasionally if I was lucky there'd be a couple of Hammer horrors. I found these much more exciting than their earlier American counterparts, in fact I still do; vivid colour, actual gore, and an undercurrent of sex that provoked definite interest in young Dave. Also, better acting (there, I said it) and none of those awful Hollywood cockney coppers, gor bloimey Guv'nor. From then on, I was predisposed to see any Hammer film that came along, but this was pre-DVD (it was even pre-VHS, which makes me feel very old) so opportunities were limited. A few years and one wonderful technical revolution later, I discovered a video tape in Dad's not-too-secret 'special' pile. It was Countess Dracula, not exactly a typical Hammer film, but it introduced me to the vision of loveliness that was Ingrid Pitt. More importantly it introduced me to Ingrid Pitt's boobs. That was it; I was lost.
All posts by Dave T
Regular readers to this site may have noticed my curious affection for the DTV martial arts flick. Thus it would be churlish of me to ignore Bloodmoon, a 1997 example of the genre, seeing as it features not one but TWO of my fellow Brits. A handful of Britkickers have made names for themselves as nasty roundeye bad guy types in Hong Kong martial arts films; the likes of Mark Haughton, Sophia Crawford and Jude Poyer have all spent time getting beaten on by Asian stars du jour. Probably the most successful of these is one Gary Daniels, a remarkable martial artist who has a Judge Dredd-style square jaw, the physique of Schwarzenegger and amazing kung fu/karate/kickboxing skills, coupled with the acting ability of a wooden badger. Daniels has appeared in some 30-odd films, but is still best known as the imposing 'Pony tail fighter' in Wong Jing's lame Jackie Chan vehicle City Hunter.
The Tell-Tale Heart
Yes, it's yet another review where I talk about a British movie company that isn't Hammer wherein I mention Hammer every other word. Sorry about that, I'll try and get it out of my system early on. Hammer Hammer Hammer. The problem is, most writing on the lower tier of British film companies in the 50s and 60s was on H*****, since they were the most successful both commercially and artistically. Other companies that made genre films, such as Amicus, have garnered critical interest by association through shared casts and crews. Part of this is because Hammer (and Amicus too on some occasions) could take a B-movie budget and create something that looked like an A-movie, um, movie. But beneath Hammer there were a whole strata of other companies that made real B-movies, the ones that were only ever destined to be second features or, with a bit of luck, entries in cheap TV anthology shows. It's only recently that these films have gained any sort of academic and collector interest.
Legend of the Werewolf
As the only contributor to Teleport City who resides in the fine country of Great Britain (and it is fine, despite most of it seeming to be on fire as I write this), I like to be able to bring you the occasional bit of Brit weirdness. Of course the brilliant minds at T.C. are already familiar with much of the classic and cult cinema exported by the likes of Hammer, Amicus and others, but today I'm going with something a trifle more obscure. Today's review subject is one of the few releases by an ill-fated outfit named Tyburn Film Productions.
Blood of the Vampire
I just happened to throw this movie on the other day, not planning to review it, just in the mood for a bit of 50s gothic horror. The next day, the news broke of the sad death of the film's writer, Jimmy Sangster. As one of the small group responsible for The Curse of Frankenstein, Dracula (Horror of Dracula as it's known in the US) and The Mummy, Sangster helped change the face of horror movies. He penned many other excellent films both for Hammer as well as other studios, not to mention TV scripts and novels. He was also a witty and engaging speaker, happy to hold court on his life and work. He's one of those people who, although he lived to the ripe old age of 83, you can't help feel went too soon. So by way of a personal and entirely inadequate tribute, here's my review of Blood of the Vampire.
Master of the Flying Guillotine
Jimmy Wang Yu was one of the most colourful figures ever to emerge from the Hong Kong movie scene. He made his debut in Temple of Red Lotus in 1965, but it wasn't until a couple of years later that he became a megastar. The vehicle was Chang Cheh's film The One-Armed Swordsman, a movie that gave birth to a new, bloodier and more anti-heroic trend in Hong Kong movies. Jimmy played the main character Fang Kang, a man who loses an arm and then has to learn a devastating one-limbed sword style. The film was so successful that it spawned an official sequel Return of the One-Armed Swordsman in 1969, also directed by Chang Cheh. Then in 1970 Jimmy appeared as The Chinese Boxer, in a movie considered to be the first 'real' kung fu film, beating Bruce Lee's The Big Boss to Hong Kong screens by a year. But the one-armed swordsman persona wouldn't leave him, and in 1971 he appeared in Shaw Brothers' collaboration with Japan's Daiei Motion Picture Co. Zatoichi Meets the One-Armed Swordsman, the 22nd entry in the popular series about a blind Samurai played by Shintaro Katsu.
I Don't Want To Be Born
I have a shocking confession to make: I don't own many movies featuring dwarves. When our fearless leader Keith suggested submitting a review to the little people roundtable, I was forced to confront this deficiency. A couple of my kung fu flicks might feature cameos by short actors, and sure I've got the Weng Weng spy epics, but those are already well served by reviews here. Willow? Too obvious. Seven Dwarfs to the Rescue? Too awful — and given the venerable members of the B-Masters, one that's quite possibly been covered elsewhere. So I have been forced to fall back on a movie from my home country of Great Britain's 1970s, one which resides variously under the titles The Monster, I Don't Want To Be Born, Sharon's Baby* and A Colossal Bag Of Concentrated Suck (one of these might not be real).
Black Lightning
As the kind of pop culture savvy, switched-on individual who reads Teleport City, I assume you're familiar with Sam Raimi's excellent 2002 adaptation of Spider-Man. But in case you're not or just need reminding, here's a quick recap of the plot. Peter Parker sees the girl of his dreams being wooed by a wealthy jock with a flash car. Deciding what he needs is a cool set of wheels, he uses his recently acquired spider powers to enter a wrestling contest for money, only to see through his inaction, his beloved Uncle Ben shot and killed. The 2009 Russian film Black Lightning (produced as all Russian movies apparently are by Night Watch's Timur Bekmambetov) uses the same plot, but asks the one important question Spider-Man left dangling; 'what about the car? What about the car??'
Dr. Mordrid
At time of writing (February 2011), the movie arm of Marvel Comics has three big budget summer blockbusters due out this year. Thor, starring Black Swan and Captain Kirk's dad; Captain America: The First Avenger, starring Agent Smith and Johnny Storm; and X-Men: First Class, starring Mr. Tumnus and January Jones's tits. Marvel has become quite the movie powerhouse since the first X-Men movie over a decade ago. This is all a far cry from back in the day, when Marvel was giving away the rights to their properties for the price of a deli sandwich, and not even a good deli either. This led to such classic fare as the Nicholas Hammond Spider-Man series, Albert Pyun's unique take on Captain America and that Roger Corman version of The Fantastic Four that was too awful to be released – of course the same could be said of the big-budget Tim Story version, but that didn't stop them.
Amazing Captain Nemo
Nostalgia. It's a dangerous thing, especially when applied to something you haven't encountered for over 30 years. Take, for example, my favourite TV show as a kid; I lived and breathed The Six Million Dollar Man. I had two different Steve Austin action figures (one with a grippy hand, one without), a rocket ship thing that folded out into a bionic surgery table, some sort of evil robot with a claw and interchangeable face masks*, and even a Jamie Sommers action figure (it was not a doll. Shut up. SHUT UP!). I would spend hours during school playtimes attempting to run in slow motion while making the nininininini…. noise. I'm sure I looked like a complete buffoon, but I didn't care.