(1961)
Dir - John Lemont
Overall: WOOF
Michael Gough back again as another deplorable asshole, Konga is a mad scientist/giant monster bit of stupidity. A British/US co-production that was put together by American International Pictures as an Eastmancolor version of King Kong with some of their teenage horror tropes from the era also thrown in, it was shot in England with an exclusively British cast. Unfortunately it is a stuffy production, suffering from a plodding first and second act where Gough prattles on with his lazy excuses for mutating both plants and his pet monkey, meanwhile being all to quick to kill anyone who disagrees with him, (including a house cat that he shoots at point blank range). Even more silly is his housekeeper who insists that he marries her in order to maintain her silence upon discovering his atrocities, as well as Gough becoming infatuated with one of his students and her boyfriend flying off at the handle at him because of jealously, both of which happens without any warning or build up. The guy in a gorilla suite scenes are few, far between, and laughably pathetic when they do arrive, particularly in the end when it picks up an adorable puppet sized version of Margo Johns and throws her into a burning laboratory.
(1965)
Dir - James Hill
Overall: MEH
Pairing Sherlock Holmes with Jack the Ripper for the first time on screen, A Study in Terror is also noteworthy for being the only finished production from Sir Nigel Films, a company that was put together by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's estate to make their own Holmes properties. Ironically, the movie is not based on any of Doyle's works and is instead an original creation by three screenwriters, only two of which were credited. Noted thespian John Neville makes an agreeable and dashing Holmes and Donald Houston goes through the usual motions as Dr. Watson, being continually enamored by his partner's ingenious deductions. The tone bounces between lighthearted and menacing, with chipper music and breezy comic relief coupled with some gruesome details and brutal murder sequences of the Ripper doing away with prostitutes in bedrooms or on dark, fog-laden London alleyways. Though it is as well performed as could be hoped for and Desmond Dickinson's cinematography has some pizazz to it, the chit-chat is overbearing and several distracting side-arcs are given too mush screen time in place of the more sinister acts of the killer. By the time that the climax lands and the murderer is revealed, the long-winded banter on the way to get there will probably force most viewers to drop out.
(1966)
Dir - Gerald Thomas
Overall: MEH
The twelfth in producer Peter Rogers and director Gerald Thomas' thirty-one deep Carry On series and the last from the Anglo-Amalgamated's production company, Carry On Screaming! is the only one with a deliberate horror angle. Specifically targeting the country's famed Hammer movies as well as goofy American properties like The Addams Family and The Munsters, it has many common genre and British humor tropes in proper tow. There is a police detective with an overbearingly nagging wife, another police detective who goes in drag because reasons, a mummy because reasons, not one but two brutish Frankenstein monsters with bad facial hair, a Lursh-esque butler, crashing lighting, a creepy house full of cobwebs, an effeminate dead guy, a vampiric beautify with rocking cleavage, wax figure-making vats of goo, a Mr. Hyde type potion, tons of bad puns and sexual innuendos, plus Jon Pertwee as a scientist who makes goofy faces. The story is too stupid to pay attention to, but some of the laughs land even if they are strictly of the groan-worthy variety, plus Thomas keeps up a snappy pace where most of the characters are charmingly clueless and overact to their heart's content.
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