Shameless Self Expression

Newlyweds Stephanie Beacham and Ian Ogilvy move into the latter’s ancestral family home and almost instantaneously Beacham is freaked the hell out. She’s seeing things that no one else is, and they’re really scary things. With Ogilvy worried about his wife’s sanity, psychologist Peter Cushing is called upon to investigate the matter. Guy Rolfe turns up as the family solicitor, and Geoffrey Whitehead plays a woodsman named Silas whose ghost is seems to be haunting poor Beacham.   This 1973 Amicus film from director Roy Ward Baker ( “A Night to Remember” , “Quatermass and the Pit” , “The Vampire Lovers” , “Asylum” ) was one of the studio’s non-portmanteau films, and thus isn’t as well known as say “Asylum” or “Tales From the Crypt” . That’s a shame because I really like this one. It’s actually a really tragic, sad, and bleak story but it’s also my kind of horror movie: Atmospheric. It might even rank as the best horror film Amicus ever made (their best films overall however be...

Soldiers at a quarry dealing with the handling of radioactive materials are badly burned when a huge crack opens in the ground under them. Dean Jagger is a scientist at a nearby research facility who looks into the incident. Before long a series of attacks leave the victims badly burned if not completely melted. What on Earth – or anywhere else perhaps – is going on here? Anthony Newley and Michael Ripper play soldiers, Leo McKern is an investigator, John Harvey plays a military Major, and William Lucas plays Jagger’s right-hand man.   Directed by Leslie Norman (1958’s “Dunkirk” ), this 1956 Hammer sci-fi film was intended to be a spin-off from Nigel Kneale’s Quatermass series. However, since the screenplay was written by Jimmy Sangster ( “Horror of Dracula” , “The Snorkel” , “The Nanny” ) and not Kneale, the latter refused the use of his characters, thus the final product comes with some character alterations. It’s Quatermass in all but name, and frankly a lot better than Hamm...