Of all the films I saw last year (and let me tell ya, there were one or two) this was the one that impressed me most. A curious and improbable mix of silent movie techniques, unreliable memoir and pure audacious nonsense, this was one of only three films that demanded my attention, forcing me to put down my pen and devote all of my attention to the screen. It really has to be experienced to be believed, but the rich, textured feel of the imagery spoke to a nostalgia in me that I never knew I had. Quite simply wonderful.
Of course, this means that you can’t get it in Britain. In the US,
I Put a Spell on You by Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, from the album Portrait of a Man: a History of Screamin’ Jay Hawkins
The Rule of Death By Daniel Merlin Goodbrey & Douglas Noble.
I want to claim credit for the book. There haven’t been enough books in this comic, and it’s about time we had another. So here it is: “The Tried and True Laws and Regulations Regarding the Matter of Small Arms Fire and Public Gunplay (2nd Edition)”.
It’s Peter Cushing as Gustav Weil in 1971’s Twins of Evil.
Ah, Twins of Evil. One of the better late period Hammer blood ’n’ boobs films that the seventies had ushered in, but one that, like the title characters, seems to be at war with itself. Although the film has atmosphere to spare, it seems to get tremendously worked up whenever the Collinson twins (Yes, Playboy’s first twin centrefolds) come onscreen. It gets awfully juvenile at times, as though a teenage boy had been asked to give script notes – and those notes looked a lot like this: “OO”.
Even so, it’s a grim movie, with one of the bleakest endings of all Hammer’s vampire stories. The pile of bodies at the conclusion should leave you in no doubt of that. Peter Cushing is on fine form as the fundamentalist witch hunter, and it’s his tired, angry performance that carries the whole thing along.
