THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (1959/Hammer/UA.) 88mins. (7772 feet)
UK.
Credits: Dir: Terence Fisher; Prod: Anthony Hinds;
Ex.Prod: Michael Carreras; A.Prod: Anthony Nelson Keys; Sc: Peter Bryan; Ph: Jack Asher;
Ed: James Needs; Art: Bernard Robinson; Mus: James Bernard. From the story by Sir Arthur
Conan Doyle.
Cast: Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Andre Morrell,
Marla Landi, Miles Malleson, John Le Mesurier, Sam Kydd, Judi Moyers, Helen Goss, Dave
Berks, Michael Hawkins, David Oxley, Francis De Wolff, Ian Hewitson, Ewen Solon, Elizabeth
Dott, Michael Mulcahy.
Holmes, (Cushing), is called upon to solve a murder apparently commited by a giant hound
that roams the moors near the Baskerville estate, but he soon discovers the real culprit
behind the Baskerville curse.
A competent, but not a horrific remake which was the first film to show Holmes in colour.
Although slightly stagey, the photography nicely builds up the gloomy atmosphere of the
moors and Cushing is well cast as the famous detective.HOUR OF THE WOLF (1968)
see Vargtimmen
THE HOUSE AT THE END OF THE WORLD (1965) see Monster
of Terror
THE HOUSE IN THE SQUARE (1951/Twentieth Century Fox) 91mins.
UK.
Aka: I'LL NEVER FORGET YOU (US). Originally titled: BERKELEY SQUARE.
Credits: Dir: Roy Ward Baker; Prod: Sol C. Siegel; Sc:
Ranald MacDougall; Ph: Georges Perinal; Art: C.P. Norman; Mus: William Alwyn.
Cast: Tyrone Power, Ann Blyth, Michael Rennie,
Beatrice Campbell, Dennis Price, Raymond Huntley, Irene Brown, Robert Atkins.
A bored American scientist, (Power), living in London travels back in time, becoming his
two hundred year old ancestor and falls in love.
Despite the slow beginning, this is an effective remake of BERKELEY SQUARE.
Begins in black and white and then switches to colour.
THE HOUSE IN THE WOODS (1957/Edict/Film Storytellers) UK.
Credits: Dir. & Sc: Maxwell Munden.
Cast: Patricia Roc, Michael Gough, Ronald Howard.
The spirit of a murdered woman returns from the grave to seek revenge.
THE HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS (1970/MGM.) 97mins. US.
Credits: Dir. & Prod: Dan Curtis; A.Prod: Trevor
Williams; Sc: Sam Hall & Gordon Russell; Ph: Arthur Ornitz; Ed: Arline Garson; Des:
Trevor Williams; Mu.Fx: Dick Smith & Robert Layden; Mus: Robert Cobert.
Cast: Johnathan Frid, Grayson Hall, Kathryn Leigh
Scott, Roger Davis, Joan Bennett, John Karlen, Thayer David, Louis Edmonds, Nancy Barrett,
Donald Brice, John Karlen.
Eighteenth century vampire Barnabas Collins, (Frid), returns to his family home in
contemporary Maine when he is accidentally revived by Willie Loomis, (Karlen), and
vampirises some of his descendants while trying to look for a cure so that he can marry a
young woman, (Scott). However, when he finally finds a cure, the medicine causes him to
become his true age of 175 and he is shot through the heart with a crossbow.
Due to the popularity of the 60's American television soap opera, "Dark Shadows"
(1966-71), Curtis transferred the story to the big screen with two feature films. This
first feature retained most of the television cast, but despite a few shudders and good
camerawork the film suffered from a low budget and a rushed shooting schedule.
Dick Smith later used the same aging techniques for Dustin Hoffman in THE LITTLE BIG MAN.
Sequel: NIGHT OF DARK SHADOWS.
HOUSE OF EVIL (1968) see Macabre Serenade
THE HOUSE OF FRIGHT (1960) see Maschera del Demonio
HOUSE OF FRIGHT (1960) see The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll
HOUSE OF MYSTERY (1960/ Anglo Amalgamated/ Independent Artists) 56mins. BW. UK.
Credits: Dir. & Sc: Vernon Sewell, Prod: Julian
Wintle & Leslie Parkyn; Ph: Ernest Steward; Ed: John Trumper; Des: Jack Shampan; Mus:
Stanley Black.
Cast: Jane Hylton, Peter Dyneley, Nanette Newman,
Colin Gordon, Maurice Kaufmann, John Merivale, Ronald Hines, Colette Wilde.
A young couple about to buy an under priced house listen to a macabre story concerning the
previous owners from a woman who mentions that they had a mysterious force eminating from
their television screen. The new couple experience psychic phenomena and strange
materializations.
An effective B-movie with just the right amount of creepiness.
HOUSE OF TERROR (1959-1965) see La Casa del Terror
THE HOUSE OF THE BLACK DEATH (1965/Tauius) 73mins. BW. US.
Aka: BLOOD OF THE MAN-DEVIL; NIGHT OF THE BEAST; THE WIDDERBURN TERROR.
Credits: Dir: Harold Daniels & Reginald De Borg;
Prod: William White & Richard Shotwell; Ex.Prod: Eldon C. Tollett;Sc: Richard Mahoney,
Ph: Murray De Atley.
Cast: John Carradine, Lon Chaney Jnr.,
Andrea King, Tom Drake, Dolores Faith, Sabrina, Jerome Thor, Sherwood Keith, Catherine
Petty, George Andre, Kathrin Victor, Margaret Shinn.
A devil cult led by Belial, (Chaney), desires the De Sade family's black magic powers that
are denied them by Henri De Sade, (Carradine). Meanwhile, Valerie De Sade summons two
doctors to try and help her brother Paul De Sade overcome the curse of lycanthropy. Henri
has to vanquish Belial and his followers and save Valerie from their power so he confronts
Belial, causes him to explode and then sends himself to hell.
Despite the presence of the two stars, this awful film never puts both of them in the same
shotsuggesting that they filmed their scenes at different times. A terrible script just
adds to the confusion and inconsistencies, while some pointless dance sequences seem to
imply devil worship.
Never released until 1975 when it was sold straight to television.
HOUSE OF THE DAMNED (1963/TCF.) 62mins. BW. US.
Credits: Dir. & Prod: Maury Dexter; Sc: Harry
Spalding; Ph: John Nickolaus Jnr.; Mus: Henry Vars.
Cast: Ronald Foster, Merry Anders, Richard Crane,
Erika Peters, Richard Keil.
Circus freaks who live in the secret chambers of a large old house like to give people the
impression that the house is haunted so that they will be left alone. A surveyor,
(Foster), arrives at the mansion and the freaks try to scare him away.
Atmospherically produced by the same man who directed The Day Mars
Invaded Earth.
THE HOUSE OF USHER (1960/AIP./Alta Vista) 85mins. US.
Aka: THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER (UK).
Credits: Dir. & Prod: Roger Corman; Ex.Prod: James
H. Nicholson; Sc: Richard Matheson; Ph: Floyd Crosby; Ed: Anthony Carras; Art: Daniel
Haller; Sfx: Ray Mercer & Pat Dinga; Mu: Fred Phillips; Paintings: Burt Schoenberg;
Mus: Les Baxter.
From the story by Edgar Allan Poe.
Cast: Vincent Price, Mark
Damon, Myrna Fahey, Harry Ellerbe, Bill Borzage, Mike Jordan, Nadajan, Ruth Oklander,
George Paul, Philip Sylvestre, David Andar, Eleanor Le Faber, Geraldine Paulette, John
Zimeas.
Philip, (Damon), travels to the isolated house of the Ushers to see Madeline, (Fahey), who
he met while at school and meets her brother Roderick, (Price), who tells him that the
Ushers suffer from a terrible curse that prevents them from ever leaving the house.
Despite several mysterious attempts on his life, Philip stubbornly remains, but one
morning he discovers that Madeline has died and that Roderick has already buried her.
Later, Roderick begins to hear Madeline's tormented cries of insanity inside her crypt
believing that he might have buried her alive and becomes completely insane when he finds
that Madeline has broken from her tomb to confront him. Roderick fights with her
apparition while the whole house crumbles around them and Philip makes his escape to watch
on in disbelief.
Matheson's script, although leagues away from Poe's concept, manages to maintain the
spirit of the classic tale while Crosby's proficient lensing adds nicely to the mouldy
gloom.
Corman's first successful film that sparked a career of cheap and quickly made projects
for AIP. This was filmed in only 15 days and cost $200 thousand.
HOUSE OF WAX (1953/Warner) 88mins. 3-D. US.
Credits: Dir: André De Toth; Prod: Bryan Foy; Sc:
Crane Wilbur; Ph: Bert Glennon & Peverell Marley; Ed: Rudi Fehr; Art: Stanley
Fleischer; Sets: Lyle B. Reifsnider; Mu: Gordon Bau; 3-D Supervisor: M.L. Gunzburg; 3-D
Consultant: Lothrop Worth; Mus: David Buttolph. From a story by Charles Belden.
Cast: Vincent Price, Frank
Lovejoy, Phyllis Kirk, Carolyn Jones, Paul Picerni, Roy Roberts, Angela Clarke, Paul
Cavanagh, Dabbs Greer, Charles Buchinski (Bronson), Reggie Rymal, Philip Tonge, Ned Young.
"The most astounding motion picture since motion pictures began! Man turned
monster stalking show world beauties! The Ultimate dimension in terror!"
Professor Henry Jarrod's, (Price), greedy partner wants to claim the insurance on their
failing waxwork museum and promptly sets the place alight injuring Jarrod and possibly
burning him alive. Months later a series of mysterious murders occur in the area near a
new wax museum, but the bodies are never found. Visiting the museum, Sue Allen, (Kirk),
recognises the Joan of Arc display as Cathy Gray, (Jones), one of her missing friends and
approaches the crippled proprieter who secretly wants Sue's corpse to display as Marie
Antoinette. Sue has to fight for her life, but as she pounds her fists on Jarrod's face,
it crumbles away to reveal the horribly scarred tissues underneath his wax mask. The
police arrive and Jarrod perishes in a vat of boiling wax.
A polished remake of The Mystery of the Wax Museum (1932)
that emerged as one of the best 3-D films of the decade. Price performs his part
deliciously while a young Charles Bronson can be spotted as Jarrod's mute assistant.
André De Toth had only one eye which gave him no three dimensional sense whatsoever.
For promotional purposes Price replaced his wax image at Buena Park wax museum and
squirted visitors with water from his syringe. He also paid an unscheduled visit to a
movie theatre featuring the HOUSE OF WAX and sat behind two women who almost fainted when
he asked them if they enjoyed the film.
THE HOUSE ON BARE MOUNTAIN (1962/Olympic) US.
Credits: Dir: (R.) Lee Frost; Prod: Bob Creese, David
Andrew & Wendon Bishop; Sc: Denver Scott.
Cast: Jeffrey Smithers, Bob Creese, Warren Ames, Laura
Eden, Angela Webster, Ann Meyers, Hugh Cannon.
"20 terrified teen lovelies tastefully unattired!"
Granny Good's School for Good Girls is established by a bootlegger, (Creese), dressed in
drag and an assistant who suffers from lycanthropy. Frankenstein's monster, (Ames), and
Dracula, (Smithers), make an appearance at the school dance.
A nudie film complete with nude art classes, sunbathing and naked jogging invaded by
monsters, all on a budget of $72,000 making it one of the most expensive adult films of
all time.
HOUSE ON HAUNTED HILL (1958/Allied Artists/Castle) 75mins.
BW. US.
Credits: Dir. & Prod: William Castle; Ass.Prod.
& Sc: Robb White; Ph: Carl E. Guthrie; Ed: Roy Livingston; Art: David Milton; Sfx:
Herman Townsley; Mu: Jack Dusick; Theme tune: Richard Kayne & Richard Loring; Mus: Von
Dexter.
Cast: Vincent Price, Carol
Ohmart, Richard Long, Alan Marshall, Carolyn Craig, Elisha Cook Jnr., Julie Mitchum, Leona
Anderson, Howard Hoffman.
Frederick Loren, (Price), hires a creepy old house with a haunted reputation for a party
to which heinvites five guests and offers anyone who can stay the night $10,000 which they
can collect in the morning.Loren tries every trick he can think of to scare the wits out
of his guests.
A well produced film with just the right amount of black humour amid the ghostly screams.
Castle, who has a reputation for gimmicks, paid cinemas to enact what he termed
"Emergo". During the film's performance a plastic skeleton would appear from a
corner of the cinema and dangle over the audience when Price turned a handle on screen.
The prototype that Castle demonstrated to Allied Artists executives weighed 15 pounds and
broke the wire, hitting one of them on the head. Castle redesigned the device and opted
for the more practical inflatable skeleton.
THE HOUSE ON MARSH ROAD (1959) see Invisible Creature
THE HOUSE THAT DRIPPED BLOOD (1970/Amicus/Cinerama) 102mins.
UK.
Credits: Dir: Peter Duffell; Prod: Max J. Rosenberg
& Milton Subotsky; Sc: Robert Bloch; Ph: Robert Parslow; Ed: Peter Tanner; Art: Tony
Curtis; Mu: Harry Frampton & Peter Frampton; Mus: Michael Dress. From the stories
"Method For Murder", "Waxworks", "Sweets To The Sweet" and
"The Cloak" by Robert Bloch.
Cast: Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Ingrid Pitt, Jon
Pertwee, Chloe Franks, John Bennett, Joss Ackland, Geoffrey Bayldon, John Bryans, John
Malcolm, Denholm Elliott, Joanna Dunham, Richard Coe, Tom Adams, Wolfe Morris, Robert
Lang, Nyree Dawn Porter.
"Terror waits for you in every room."
Four stories follow the investigations of a detective into the disappearance of vampire
actor Paul Henderson, (Pertwee), who was the last occupant of an old house.
"Method For Murder".
A writer, (Elliott), rents the creepy house to work on his latest creation, a story about
a maniacal murderer. The character seems to come to life and attack him and his wife
driving the writer to insanity until it is revealed that his wife's lover is dressing up
as the character to try and kill him. The lover so enjoys playing the demented strangler
that he then strangles the wife.
"Waxworks".
A man, (Cushing), seeking solitude moves into the same house and visits a nearby waxwork
museum where he sees a waxwork of Salome with the likeness of someone he feels he used to
know. An old friend arrives and becomes equally obsessed with the waxwork, but as their
suspicions grow the museum's proprieter attacks them and the man's head becomes part of
the display.
"Sweets To The Sweet".
Jane, (Franks), is a sweet little girl whose father, (Lee), forbids her to play with any
dolls, or go to school. When he hires a governess to tutor Jane she starts to question the
father's behavior until he explains that the child's mother was a witch and the girl has
inherited her power. The girl finally throws a wax effigy of her father into the fire
while he dies in agony upstairs.
"The Cloak".
Continuing with his investigation of the horror film actor's disappearance the detective
discovers that the actor purchased a mysterious cape in preperation for a role as a
vampire, but the cloak transformed him into a real bloodsucker. The detective goes to the
house and falls victim to the fiend.
A well made anthology that excells itself in the first and last stories.
THE HOUSE THAT SCREAMED (1969) see La Residencia
THE HOUSE THAT WOULDN'T DIE (1970/Aaron Spelling/Paramount) 90mins. TVM.
Credits: Dir: John Llewellyn Moxey; Prod: Aaron
Spelling; Ex.Prod: Norman Henry; A.Prod: Steve Kibler; Sc: Henry Farrell; Ph: Fleet
Southcott; Ed: Art Seid; Art: Tracy Bousman; Mus: Laurence Rosenthal. From "Annie
Come Home" by Barbara Michaels (Barbara G. Mertz).
Cast: Barbara Stanwyck, Richard Egan, Michael Anderson
Jr., Katherine Winn, Doreen Lang, Mabel Albertson.
When Aunt Petunia, (Stanwyck), inherits an old house in Pennsylvania Amish country she
discovers that it is haunted and must face witchcraft, black magic, and ghosts.
A standard haunted house tale enlivened by Stanwyck's first television film performance.
HOW AWFUL ABOUT ALLAN (1970) 72mins. TVM. US.
Credits: Dir: Curtis Harrington; Prod: George Edwards;
Sc: Henry Farrell. From a novel by Henry Farrell.
Cast: Anthony Perkins, Julie Harris, Joan Hackett,
Kent Smith, Robert H. Harris.
A guilt ridden semi-blind mental patient, (Perkins), is released from the asylum and goes
to live with his psychotic sister, (Harris), who torments him because he killed their
father in a fire.
A disappointing film for which Farrell re-uses the plot from his book Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? with only slight character
changes.
HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER (1958/AIP.) 75mins. BW. (with an 18 minute colour
sequence) US.
Credits: Dir: Herbert L. Strock; Prod: Herman Cohen;
Ex.Prod: Samuel Z. Arkoff & James H. Nocholson; Sc: Kenneth Langtry & Herman
Cohen; Ph: Maury Gertsman; Ed: Jerry Young; Art: Les Thomas; Mu: Philip Scheer; Mu.Fx:
Philip Scheer; Mus: Paul Dunlap.
Cast: Robert H. Harris, Walter Reed, Gary Clarke, Paul
Brinegar, Gary Conway, Malcolm Atterbury, Dennis Cross, Morris Ankrum, Paul Maxwell, Eddie
Marr, Heather Ames, Rod Dana, Robert Shayne, Jacqueline Ebeier, Thomas B. Henry, Voltaire
Perkins, Herman Cohen, John Ashley.
"It will scare the living yell out of you!"
Threatened with the loss of his job after twenty five years as a horror studio's make up
artist, Peter Drummond, (Harris), embarks on a scheme to murder the studio executives who
want to change their film output to musicals. During his last assignment on the film
"Werewolf Meets Frankenstein", Drummond creates a drugged form of makeup that
when placed on the actors portraying the teenage Werewolf and the teenage Frankenstein
causes them to become killers. Drummond is eventually killed by his creations when he
threatens to have them stuffed and mounted.
AIP. utilises it's monsters including the She Creature, and many
of the props from their early horror films.
