(1980)
Dir - Don Leaver
Overall: MEH
Though it boasts a cromulent premise, the Hammer House of Horror program gets off to a clunky start with "Witching Time". A condemned practitioner of the black arts who gets burned alive during the era of witch executions, only to vow vengeance and return centuries later to wreak more havoc is a premise as old as time. The Rocky Horror Picture Show's own Patricia Quinn portrays such a resurrected evil sorceress, tormenting and fornicating with a mulleted Jon Finch as he deals with some extramarital drama. Quinn's performance is fittingly caricatured, but there are numerous scenes that are handled awkwardly by director Don Leaver, providing some unintended hysterics that to not jive correctly with a tone that seems to be taking itself seriously instead of winking at the audience. The ending particularly goes off the rails as Quinn and Prunella Gee clumsily catfight and scream at each other as the later miraculously bests her opponent in unholy magic with no knowledge or skill whatsoever.
(1980)
Dir - Peter Sasdy
Overall: MEH
It takes awhile for the second episode of Hammer House of Horror to officially lay all of its cards on the table, but viewers will pick up on the ghoulish gag in a more prompt fashion. While this does not make "The Thirteenth Reunion" a waste, it does dilute its final two set pieces which should rely on white-knuckled tension but instead are pedestrian. Until the anti-climactic finish though, we are given some clever tidbits where Julia Foster's reporter is delegated to check up on a shady weight loss clinic where James Cosmo screams at fatties until they cry and one of their clients dies mysteriously after being given the green light to pork-up. As the title would suggest, we also meet a group of people reuniting for a dinner party, welcoming a snooping Foster with open arms and haphazardly letting her escape because the script is going to get her back anyway. Many of the details to said script from Jeremy Burnham do not add up, plus Hammer regular Peter Sasdy has done better work from behind the lens.
(1980)
Dir - Peter Sasdy
Overall: GOOD
A ghoulish precursor to Groundhog Day, Hammer House of Horror's "Rude Awakening" finds returning director Peter Sasdy and television producer/screenwriter Gerald Savory delivering a stream of waking nightmares for Denholm Elliott to endure. Not that Elliott's, (perhaps), unfaithful real estate agent is not deserving of his eventual comeuppance, yet the story wisely plays the psychological horror game where the protagonist succumbs to his desires due to a loveless marriage that he feels trapped in. Elliott reliving different variations of the same supernaturally-charged day, it is presented as if he is having an affair with his secretary, (Lucy Gutteridge of Top Secret! fame), but there are obvious clues along the way that he is existing in a perpetual dream state that is fueled by his already troubled mind. Though the specifics may not add up under a microscope, each sequence is full of the type of macabre inventiveness that those always wonderful Amicus anthology movies were ripe with.
(1980)
Dir - Francis Megahy
Overall: MEH
The Hammer House of Horror program knocks-off their obligatory "evil kid" story with their forth entry "Growing Pains". One of only a handful of roles for retired child actor Matthew Blakstad, he portrays the adoptee of Gary Bond and Barbara Kellerman as the typical weird and humorous child that says and does inappropriate and upsetting things while remaining annoyingly calm. A supernatural element becomes clear after awhile where more unwholesome stuff happen like various animals getting murdered, the new parents understandably regretting their decision to take in a new son as a replacement of sorts for their tragically deceased one. Though it is competently done and there is a certain level of mystery throughout the first half, little else in the story works. This is mostly due to the tricky subject matter, (asshole kids and pets getting killed are a rough combination to make entertaining), but it has a humdrum reveal, plus Francis Megahy's script shows a lack of creativity as far as set pieces go.
No comments:
Post a Comment