(1980)
Dir - Francis Megahy
Overall: MEH
Boasting a female slasher premise, (meaning a woman who is a slasher killer, not your typical male killer who slashes women), "Carpathian Eagle" packs in a few sleazy and singular tweaks, even if it still ends up being unremarkable. Suzanne Danielle is ideally cast as the enticing vixen who leads a double life and seduces a slew of horny men merely by walking down the street and swaying her hips, only to bust out a sacrificial blade to remove their hearts once she makes them close their eyes and promises them a "surprise". Several episodes of Hammer House of Horror featured the bad guys/monsters getting away with their deeds, and the final act here provides an adequate surprise in this regard, even if some of the Easter European yarn-spinning is not delivered upon. A young Pierce Brosnan shows up too for what it is worth.
(1980)
Dir - Don Sharp
Overall: GOOD
For "Guardians of the Abyss", John Carson once again plays a practitioner of the black arts in a Hammer production. Instead of utilizing such magik for zombie slave labor as he did in 1966's The Plague of the Zombies, Carson is up to an even more sinister deed here, trying to resurrect a demon that is, (as the title would suggest), hell's guardian. Specific rituals that are at the whim of the screenwriter, upside down crosses, robed cult members, hypnotism, ancient relics, and a twist ending of sorts that spells our hero's doom, it has the usual ingredients except wields them in a consistently sinister manner. Doctor Who writer David Fisher and Hammer director Don Sharp each showcase a penchant for such genre material, (the type of material that the studio was often times best at in their heyday), and it plays like an updating of the exceptional Dennis Wheatley adaptation The Devil Rides Out.
(1980)
Dir - Peter Sasdy
Overall: MEH
Ruined by a perpetually grating performance from Dark Shadows' Kathryn Leigh Scott, (as well as Simon MacCorkindale playing her ill-tempered and aggressively annoyed boyfriend, even if understandably), Hammer House of Horror's "Visitor from the Grave" at least has some atmospheric menace that director Peter Sasdy manages to conjure up. This was the third and last episode of the show that Sasdy was behind the lens on, but the script by Anthony Hinds, (the son of Hammer founder William Hinds and a producer for the company himself), unfortunately leaves little for Scott to do besides act hysterical and scream in an unhinged fashion in practically every scene. Even if a guy with half of his face blown off who is supposed to be dead and buried keeps tormenting her and anybody would be upset with such business, it makes for a labored watch. The scheming gaslighting may be predictable, but it does manage to deliver a supernatural comeuppance coda, so that is something.
(1980)
Dir - Alan Gibson
Overall: GOOD
A doppelgänger/Invasion of the Body Snatchers hybrid with a title that references Hammer's 1960 Robert Louis Stevenson adaptation The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll, "The Two Faces of Evil" has some predictable beats here or there, but it is also consistently eerie and plays one of the genre's most frequented narrative cards of "this poor upset woman must be suffering a mental strain and ergo what she is ranting and raving about cannot actually be happening" better than most. The opening scene has a family on their way to holiday picking up a man in a trench-coat who nearly runs them off the road in the pouring rain, and after such a bad decision on their part is made, things gradually spiral from there. Cinematographer Frank Watts, (who shot nine episodes for the series), does some splendid work with long hallways and tweaked lenses, plus writer Ranald Graham makes the sinister presence undeniable yet still manages to throw enough psychological doubt into the proceedings to keep us guessing until the final set piece which is the most creepy.
(1980)
Dir - Don Leaver
Overall: MEH
Hammer House of Horror gets around to its inevitable Anti-Christ/"Book of Revelations"/The Omen installment with the closer "The Mark of Satan". While Dan Shaw's script is not specifically concerned with unleashing its own Damien on the planet, it does reference the usual motifs such as bible verses, an obsession with numbers, (nine here instead of six, being the inversion of the latter), and a conspiratorial plot where no one can be trusted. Peter McEnery plays the hapless sap who undergoes such paranoia, and at no point does the supernatural become tangible, which renders this a psychological tale where one man goes insane, possibly due to a viral outbreak. There are a few ghastly moments sprinkled around, and director Don Leaver stages a Rosemary's Baby-styled hallucination scene full of warped camera angles, cackling white people, and Vaseline on the camera lens. Tone wise it steers away from camp as much as it can, but it still fails to be as evocative and unsettling as it should be.
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