Movie Monday: To The Devil...A Daughter

For this week's Movie Monday we'll be talking about Hammer's last horror film To The Devil...A Daughter!

TTDAD was released in 1976, and was the legendary Hammer Films' last gasp at a horror film, which was their bread and butter. With the massive success of The Exorcist and The Omen, devil possession movies were all the rage.

Hammer had actually been planning on making this movie for several years, but various financial and creative difficulties kept stalling production, so that by the time it was released, Hammer looked like it was following a trend, not making them, as they had done in the 50s and 60s.

The film opens in a sparsely-attended church service of some kind. Within a few moments, we see Father Michael (Christopher Lee), so we know there's probably something sinister afoot.

The center of everyone's attention is a young "nun" named Catherine (Nastassja Kinski), who is about to turn eighteen. Her father, a man named Henry Beddows (the late great Denholm Elliott), looks nervously on.

We soon learn that Father Michael has, at some point in the past, convinced Beddows to "turn over" his daughter to the church, so she will be the host for the Devil himself (or Astaroth, as he is called here) when he returns to Earth...on Catherine's eighteenth birthday!

But Henry gets cold feet just a few days before this is all to commence, so he contacts an expert in Satanism, an author named John Verney (Richard Widmark), and convinces him to look after her when Henry sends her away.

A sort of henchman of Father Michael tracks down Henry, and tries to kill him. But Henry isn't quite the pushover he seems to be!

While Father Michael and his coven (which includes a grim-faced woman named Anna, played by Honor Blackman) try and find Catherine, they oversee the birth of another baby to use in their sick rituals.

There's a fairly lengthy birth scene, and as the pregnant woman thrashes in agony, Father Michael looks on in glee:

...gee, what woman wouldn't want to see this leaning over them as they gave birth?

Catherine begins to act all wonky under Verney's care. She has weird dreams, tries to escape, and acts like she's hypnotized. We get a glimpse of Asteroth in a mirror, which almost single-handedly dispels the mood the film is trying to create. More on that in a moment.

In the middle of the film, there's a big orgy/ritual sacrifice scene that involves Christopher Lee's naked butt (actually a stand-in), Kinski getting mounted by a giant gold replica of Asteroth, fellatio, and more fun.

Later, Verney and Father Michael have a confrontation in a church, where the latter seems to have some otherworldly powers:

Father Michael finally apprehends Catherine, and prepares for the big sacrifice. Laying on a stone slab, she has some sort of weird dream(?) where Asteroth appears, in the form of a really bad puppet.

Not only is it a bad puppet, but we get to see said puppet crawl up the stone altar, climb onto Catherine, and make its way up her scantily-clad body:

Catherine seems to be in something resembling sexual glee over this, and she grabs Asteroth by both hands and...let's just say places him somewhere very private.

As Catherine waits, Verney gets the drop on Father Michael, who is in the middle of slicing open the sacrificial infant (in a throwaway scene, kind of surprising so little of it is made, considering how horrific the act is). Verney stands outside the weird little circle Father Michael has made:

Father Michael tries to tempt Verney into "taking" Catherine, who appears to him completely naked, in a bit of nudity so gratuitous it made me laugh. It also made me shudder, realizing Kinski was only fifteen when she made this movie: and yet here she is, doing full frontal--not to mention the whole devil puppet gynecologist scene. Did Nastassja Kinksi not have parents?

Anyway, after this, Father Michael gloats his power is such that Verney cannot enter the sacred circle, or whatever. In a scene so anti-climactic its startling, Verney says something about this rock he's holding has some special properties. He throws it at Father Michael, seemingly killing him! He grabs the unconscious Catherine, and departs. The End.


According to various articles on the web, To The Devil...A Daughter was a troubled production, with last-minute script rewrites, casting problems, and lack of funds. The first half of the film works fairly well, but the devil puppet is almost Ed Woodian in its cheeziness, and the ending is so abrupt it really brings the film to a crashing halt (apparently an alternate ending was even shot, but it does not survive).

I enjoyed watching TTDAD, but to me it doesn't rank anywhere near Hammer's best. Its kind of too bad such a legendary film studio went out with a bit of a whimper, not a bang.

Movie Monday: Patterns

For this week's Movie Monday we'll be talking about Rod Serling's Patterns!

Patterns was a teleplay Serling wrote for live television in 1955. A year later, it was expanded with mostly a new cast and turned into this film. Like most things Serling put his name to, its fairly offbeat.

The film opens on the streets of Manhattan, where the skyscrapers loom over their tiny inhabitants, scurrying from place to place like ants.

We follow Fred Staples (Van Heflin) as he reports for his first day at the corporate headquarters of Ramsey & Co., a huge conglomerate. Staples has been running one of the company's plants out in Ohio, but has been handpicked by Walter Ramsey himself to come to the home office, having him leap several rungs on the corporate ladder.

Upon moving into his new, lush office, he is met by the amiable William Briggs (Ed Begley), who is nominally Staples' new boss. Briggs and Staples take an immediate like to one another, even if it seems that Briggs--being much older--is feeling less secure at the company than he used to.

Not everyone is as friendly as Briggs, however: Staples' secretary Marge is polite but cool. She was Briggs' secretary for seven years, and is now being transferred to work for Staples. She's extremely loyal, but realistic: when Staples offers to let her go back to working for Briggs, she declines.

At the first meeting of the board with Staples, it becomes clear that old man Ramsey (the great Everett Sloane, who played Mr. Bernstein in Citizen Kane) has little to no respect for Briggs. When Briggs objects to a plan that would close a plant that resides in a small village on the basis it would decimate the town, Ramsey angrily berates Briggs in front of everyone.

To make matters worse, Ramsey lavishes praise on Staples, embarrassing Briggs. The rest of the board stares at their shoes while Ramsey clearly pits his two employees against each other.

This tense situation continues for a while. Staples' star rises in the company, and Briggs continues to falter. At one point Staples asks why Briggs doesn't just quit, since he's clearly being pushed out the door. Briggs, not knowing what else he could even do, refuses to leave. Also, he believes in the principle of it: he was one the company's original men, and can't stand to see what's become of it under the son of the original Ramsey who founded it.

Staples is put in charge of a major report about the company's future, and during a party he and his wife (Beatrice Straight) throw, the report is handed to Ramsey, who goes off into a room to read it. Staples' wife is the one who orchestrated it, much to her husband's disapproval.

Ramsey is complementary in the extreme to the report, heaping more praise onto Staples. When he tries to make sure Briggs--whom he worked with on the report--gets sufficient credit, Ramsey blows him off and refuses to believe it. After leaving, Staples' wife seems to side with Ramsey, wanting continued upward mobility, frustrated at her husband's stubborn refusal to grab the proverbial Big Brass Ring for just for the sake of another man.

During the report's official unveiling in front of the board, Ramsey again praises Staples, leaving Briggs out. Staples tries to defend his friend, but it won't work. Ramsey berates Briggs as a useless old man, filled with old, useless ideas. Shortly after the meeting, Briggs drops dead in the hallway of the building.

With Briggs' now gone, Ramsey slides Staples into his job officially. Staples is sick to his stomach over this, and flatly refuses to take it. In fact, he quits, berating Ramsey to his face.

But Ramsey refuses to accept Staples' resignation, mocking his the "halo" he's trying to earn by quitting. Staples is convinced into staying, but only after he gets Ramsey to agree to certain terms, ones that allow him more say in how the company operates, and the ability to take on Ramsey directly. Surprisingly, Ramsey agrees to all of this.

Staples emerges from the meeting, where his wife is waiting for him so they can go out to dinner. She's thrilled at her husband's new position, and as they head out onto the streets of Manhattan, the film comes to a close.


Whew! While my write-up might make Patterns sound like a lot of boring talk, it is anything but. Director Fielder Cook keeps the tension ramped up throughout the film's 84 minutes, as Staples seems to fight for his very soul.

Rod Serling as a writer was hardly subtle, and he's not subtle here, but his sense of pacing and ear for dialogue helps make his stories compelling, even if The Message is being delivered via brick. That was true on The Twilight Zone, and its true here.

Ramsey, while initially seeming like the movie's villain, the cold-hearted corporate boss, is a bit more complex than that. Yes, all he cares about is profits, but in the final scene with Staples we see he has an almost messianic view of The Company--people, including himself, are just cogs for it to use up and spit out, according to its needs. He gleefully wields the power he has, but is perfectly willing to give it up if it means the company will thrive. He's trying to show that to Staples, who doesn't buy in to that philosophy...for now.

I really enjoyed Patterns, enjoyed watching its three main actors (Helfin, Begley, and Sloane) go at it for 84 minutes. The film has virtually no soundtrack, and it ends on what seems like a happy note--Staples has been promoted, on his own terms, what's not to love?--but the dead silence over which the credits roll leaves the viewer with a different feeling: quite possibly, despite all his best intentions, Staples will end up just like Ramsey.


I missed last week's Movie Monday, thanks my trusty old computer dying on me unexpectedly. But now that I've got a new set-up, and things are easier and faster than they've ever been, I hope to keep Movie Mondays going for a long time. Thanks to everyone who stops by!

Movie Monday: Thor

For this week's Movie Monday we'll be talking about the brand-new film Thor!

I didn't plan on doing a review of a new film, but my ancient, diesel-powered computer finally up and died on me earlier in the week, leaving me unable to pull stills from the film I had planned to watch instead.

Then it dawned me that I was seeing Thor twice in three days (taking two different nephews), so I thought it'd be fun to write a real time, two-part review: my impressions upon seeing the film for the first time, then coming back to finish off the post having seen it again.

I'm not going to get into the specifics of the film's plot, not wanting to spoil it for anyone who might be reading this and wants to see it. So I'll just hit the high points:

Odin (Anthony Hopkins), having achieved a fragile peace with the Frost Giants (a race of warriors who, if allowed, would swallow up the universe, including Earth), is now prepared to name is heir: his oldest son, Thor (Chris Hemsworth).

But when Thor, along with his brother Loki and fellow warriors Sif, Volstagg, Fandral, and Hogun, go to the Frost Giants world to extract some revenge, Odin casts his son to Earth to teach him some humility. Unfortunately, it is right at this moment that the Frost Giants (along with an Asgardian secretly on their side) are preparing to attack Asgard once again!

Thor lands on Earth, sans powers, and is met by the comely and indefatigable scientist Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) who is taken by this stranger. Also arrived on Earth is Thor's hammer Mjolnir, which can only be moved by one who is worthy.

The U.S. Government is also interested in Thor's hammer, and try to find a way to move this source of immense power. They haven't seen anything yet, though: the Frost Giants send a being known as The Destroyer to Earth, and only Thor can stop him!


I found Thor a lot of fun--director Kenneth Branagh (an inspired choice to direct a movie such as this) keeps the film moving at a crisp pace, but also knows when to slow down and let the characters breathe. He eschews the machine gun pace of a lot of big budget CGI spectacles, that just throw things at the viewer so fast they hope you won't notice you don't really care about anyone on screen.

Chris Hemsworth does a good job as Thor, though unfortunately there's only a few moments where he gets to kick butt, Thunder God-style. He doesn't project a whole lot of depth, but neither did Thor in the comics, either.

Natalie Portman is lively as Jane Foster, having to lay a lot of pipe but managing to keep it from getting too dull. There's one or two scene where she lasciviously looks at Thor, which just a touch of sexual heat that you don't see much in big comic book movies: sure, there's attraction, but Portman gives Hemsworth an occasional "I wanna do this guy" look that was gave their scenes just a little extra edge.

The effects, as to be expected, are top-notch, but as I said Branagh keeps things from getting out of hand. I still find most CGI worlds to be grey and muddy, and not at all realistic, but they looked pretty good here. The battle with the Frost Giants is well staged and a pleasure to watch. There's also a couple of in-geek gags that only die-hard comic fans will get (like the billboard seen on the side of a building in a couple of shots), but they don't self-consciously call attention to themselves.

The ending is surprisingly quiet and low-key, instead of the usual bom-bom-bom-BOM! final moments you would expect--even Thor and Jane's first kiss is not what you think, making for a nice wrap up to the film.


Overall, I thought Thor was one of Marvel's best adaptations--maybe even as good as IronMan. This film doesn't have the flinty anchor that was Robert Downey Jr.'s performance as Tony Stark, but I think the film itself might be just as good!

Okay--it's twenty-four hours later, and I have just seen Thor for the second time. I was entertained all over again, not really bored in the least; always a good sign for a film's longevity.

One thing I noticed this time around is how similar these Marvel films are to one another; no matter who the filmmakers are. As directors, Jon Favreau (IronMan), Louis Letterier (Hulk), and Kenneth Branagh are very, very different, yet the resulting films have a similar feel. Of course, that's on purpose, since Marvel is so determined to have all these movies inhabit the same universe.

Any comics fan from the 60s-90s would tell you that, as comic book companies, DC and Marvel were very different: Marvel had a distinctive house style, while DC did not. So its interesting to see that reflected in the movies that spring from those two companies: all of Marvel's films (even the Spider-Man ones, which aren't officially part of the eventual Avengers crossover) are of a piece, while DC's output--Superman Returns, The Dark Knight, Jonah Hex, Catwoman (*shudder*)--could not be more different. Like the comics themselves, the DC films have no "house style."

That's not meant as a criticism, in either direction, just an observation. Though I will say I wish Thor had a little more of Branagh's personal touch--something I guess is nearly impossible when you're part of a multi-multi-million-dollar enterprise.

All in all, I enjoyed Thor very much: it treats the characters with respect and delivers laughs and action with a relatively light touch. I would definitely be up for another solo Thor film if this one (and The Avengers) is a big hit. Aye, verily!

Movie Monday: Jonah Hex

For this week's Movie Monday I thought I'd take a giant risk by watching notorious bomb Jonah Hex!

As a long time comics fan (30 years +, yo), I was happy to hear they were making a Jonah Hex movie. I was less than happy when I started hearing details about it, which made it sound...well, wrongheaded at best, let's say. No longer just a scarred gunslinger, the movie Jonah Hex would have some sort of supernatural ability. Wait, what?

By the time the movie came out, word-of-mouth was awful, and the fact that it was cut down to a mere 82 minutes seemed to confirm the studio was trying to take the money and run. And since movies made from comic books are no longer unique (like they were when I was a kid, which meant you watched everything with a superhero in it, no matter how bad it was), I decided I wouldn't even bother seeing Jonah Hex at all.

But I have to admit, I was still really curious about the movie, so I decided to sit down and give it a chance. Is Jonah Hex as bad as everyone says? Or maybe, just maybe, is it secretly awesome? Let's find out:

Jonah Hex opens with what is essentially Hex's (Josh Brolin) "secret origin": he's a Confederate solider, under the command of Quentin Turnbull (John Malkovich). He turns on Turnbull when Turnbull orders a Union hospital burned to the ground. In the melee, Hex is forced to kill his best friend, Turnbull's son Jed.

Years later, we find Hex tied to a post by Turnbull and his crazy right-hand man Burke (Michael Fassbender). Turnbull is getting his revenge on Hex by "taking everything away" from him: namely, Hex's family, whom Turnbull has burned alive, as Hex screams in agony, forced to watch.

As if that's not enough, Turnbull brands Hex, turning his face into a scarred, pulpy mess. As Hex screams in agony, the film cuts to an animated sequence:

While the sequence looked kinda cool, I thought right off the bat we were on shaky ground: just a few minutes in, Jonah Hex felt more like a supernatural horror movie than a western.

We flash forward a few years, and learn that Hex is now a bounty hunter who shoots first, then doesn't ask questions later. After being stiffed by his employers, Hex kills them and takes his reward from the pockets of the dead men. He later spend some of it on a local prostitute named Lilah (Megan Fox), whom he clearly has something of an ongoing relationship with.

We soon learn that Turnbull, whom Hex believed was dead, is planning on stealing a massive gun, one that destroy entire cities with just a few hits. President Grant (Aidan Quinn) decides to hire Hex to stop him!

As the plot lurches forward, we're treated to more scenes that feel like they're from a horror movie than a western. Hex visits a sort of ad hoc fighting ring where people watch some poor bastard fight what looks like a mutant from another movie entirely:

In this movie, Hex also has superpowers: he can communicate with the dead. This comes in handy, and there's one scene that's so loaded down with exposition, with poor Brolin explaining just how his power work, that I chuckled during it. Any resemblance to the comic book Jonah Hex is purely coincidental at this point.

Turnbull has Lilah kidnapped, and trusses both she and Hex up as he plans to launch the weapon on July 4th:

Thanks to a hidden pick, Lilah frees herself, then Hex. They shoot and strangle their way to Turnbull, whom Hex fights and eventually kills when he jams the gun, causing it to explode.

Later, in Washington D.C., President Grant thanks Hex for this work and offers to make him a sheriff. Hex turns him down, but offers his services if he's needed again:

...Hex then meets up with Lilah, and they walk off together. Via voiceover, Hex explains that maybe he's not quite ready to cash in just yet. Let the sequels commence!


Of course, there will never(?) be a sequel to Jonah Hex, because the movie was a giant flop. Cut down to a lean 82 minutes, the film still feels too long, mired as it is in action scenes, dimly lit scenery, and a wall-to-wall pounding rock score.

I tend to think of comic book movies needing two elements to work for them to be successful: conception and execution. There's nothing inherently wrong with the execution of Jonah Hex: the effects are fine, the acting is okay (except for Megan Fox, whose line delivery throughout the film is so flat its sort of startling), but the movie simply went wrong from the start: the filmmakers clearly had no interest in making a western, of any kind, so they stuck their western hero in a supernatural action thriller. Jonah Hex seems so out of place in his own movie that the results are jarring.

Too bad; I always liked the Jonah Hex comic, and there was a good movie to made from this character; unfortunately this wasn't it.

Famous Monsters of Filmland: Underground #1

As I'm talking about over on my illustration blog today, I did some work as both artist and writer for the new Famous Monsters of Filmland: Underground magazine, which was a real thrill!

Aside from creating the mag's logo, I wrote a capsule review and some movie "blurbs" for this debut issue's "Repressed Memories" feature. Here's my take on the 1983 film House of Long Shadows:

I also wrote eight blurbs--super-short, 100-words-or-less reviews of some other 80s horror flicks. Given the layout, it's easier to read them just as text, so here they are:

The Beast Within (1982) stars Ronny Cox and Bebe "Mrs. Captain Kirk" Besch as the MacClearys, a couple who get stranded on a back country road when their car breaks down. Mrs. MacCleary is attacked and raped by some sort of creature, and seventeen years later their son Michael starts showing the same murderous tendencies.

For a film with somewhat of a name cast, The Beast Within is surprisingly gory, almost gleefully so. Its pulpy fun, even if it doesn't feature anything you haven't seen before. Features one of the greatest coitus interruptus scenes in movie history. Woof! Woof!


Dario Argento's The Church starts with a group of knights who slaughter a village of "witches" and then build their castle on the site the bodies are buried. Bad idea! Centuries later, a group of tourists are attacked by the evil spirits of the villagers when a crypt's seal is broken.

Featuring some trademark gory set pieces (as well as a young Asia Argento), The Church isn't as stomach-churningly captivating as Argento's other classics (maybe because he didn't direct?), but its still a fun stew of religious balderdash, pretty women, and internal organs being reduced to a bloody pulp.


Dead and Buried, an underrated film from 1981, is set in the (thankfully) fictional town of Potter's Bluff, where a series of gruesome murders occur. The sheriff (James Farentino) investigates, but he's facing a stacked deck: not only does the local mortician take a grisly delight in all the new business, but most of the town itself seems to be in on it--possibly including his wife.

Despite a troubled post-production, the film casts an eerie spell, as we get drawn further into the nightmare that awaits Sheriff Gillis. The final few scenes in particular pack a nightmarish, unsettling punch.


I, Madman (1989) is a playfully offbeat mix of genres: thriller, horror, fantasy, with even a little stop-motion animation thrown in.

Mousy bookstore clerk Virginia (Near Dark's Jenny Wright) becomes obsessed with a series of cheap, lurid horror novels; written by a mysterious author. Eventually her real life starts copying some of the things she's reading about--like being stalked by a deformed killer. Is all this really happening, or is Virginia just wound a little too tight?

Stylishly shot and unselfconscious, I, Madman is an engrossing curio for those who enjoy genre film tropes being affectionately tweaked.


Michael Mann's The Keep (1983) is that rarest of film genres: the psychedelic Nazi ghost story.

Set in a spooky Romanian castle during WW II, inside of which a squad of SS soldiers take up residence. Soon after they are killed off by some sort of malevolent force now set free.

Featuring a notable cast (Ian McKellen, Scott Glenn, Jurgen Prochnow, Gabriel Byrne, who makes a scarily-good Nazi), The Keep doesn't always make a lot of sense--reportedly the studio cut Mann's original 3 hour-plus cut in half. But the film is never boring and at times visually compelling.


Pin (1988), uses the always-fertile world of ventriloquism to tell a story of sexual repression, arrested development, obsession, and, finally, madness.

Siblings Leon and Ursula grow up around a life-size plastic model named Pin, which their father (Terry O'Quinn) uses as a sort of surrogate parent. When he is killed, the seeds of madness take root in Leon, who comes to believe Pin is real.

Less a horror film than a psychological thriller, Pin is a disturbing portrait of mental illness passed from one generation to the next, using some familiar horror trappings to make it a unique filmgoing experience.


1980's The Silent Scream (definitely not to be confused with the graphic anti-abortion video, Googlers beware) centers around a group of college students who take up residence in an old boarding house run by a Norman Bates-ish young man named Mason and his seldom-seen mother. Soon enough bodies start piling up, and detectives Cameron Mitchell(!) and Avery Schreiber(!!) have to figure out who and why.

Fairly low-key for a slasher film, The Silent Scream uses icon Barbara Steele in an effective way during the film's final third. Certainly no classic, but Steele's hypnotic stare is always worth your attention.


The Stuff (1985) is Larry Cohen's goofily po-faced satire of American consumerism, militarism, and advertising. Starring Michael Moriarty (the DeNiro to Cohen's Scorsese), the film is about a white goo that is discovered bubbling from the earth's core.

Before you can say market share, its being sold as a food stuff that quickly takes over the minds of those who eat it, leaving just a few people bravely trying to keep The Stuff from gobbling up the whole country.

Fast-paced and subtle as a brick, The Stuff is a fun tweak of the heavy-handed message genre films of the 1950s.



Writing these blurbs was so much fun I couldn't believe it. Once I settled into a rhythm--which was to write about triple what I needed, then hack away at it (to use horror movie parlance) until I got it under a hundred words--I just wrote as many as I could.

I had a list of movies to pick from (provided by my pal and editor April Snellings), and I just searched Netflix's Watch Instantly database, devouring and then reviewing every film available.

Being a long time monster/horror fan, I'm overjoyed to have my words (and art!) associated with the legendary FMOF franchise. I hope I get to do more work like this in the future...

Movie Monday: The Return of the Vampire

For this week's Movie Monday we watch Bela Lugosi return to a familiar role in The Return of the Vampire!

Even though Bela Lugosi is forever, inseparably associated with Dracula, he actually only played the part twice--first in the original classic, and then once again in Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein.

But he did play vampires that were an awful lot like Dracula, in a number of films that range from not bad to absolute dreck. Let's see how this one measures up!


Return of The Vampire opens imaginatively, before the title, with a close-up of a scared-looking woman. As she backs away from the camera, a familiar-looking caped figure comes into the foreground, filling the frame. The woman screams, and the credits begins!

The camera pans across a foggy cemetery, surrounded by dead trees with branches that loom overhead menacingly. A lone figure enters the frame, and gets close to the camera. We see...its a werewolf!

The werewolf enters a crypt, and inside it is his "master", who awakens from his coffin. It is, of course, Bela Lugosi, playing Dracula in all but name. The werewolf tells his master that his latest victim has been taken to a nearby clinic.

We then cut to that clinic, where the young woman's condition baffles two doctors--Lady Jane Ainsley (Freida Inescort) and Professor Walter Saunders (Gilbert Emery). Professor Saunders stays up all night reading a book on vampires (by Dr. Armand Tesla), which Jane dismisses.

But she changed her mind when the vampire comes to the clinic and attacks the young woman again, leaving two bite marks on her neck. The two of them head to the cemetery to find the vampire's coffin.

The main cemetery set is quite gorgeous to look at, with its varying levels of depth and spooky lighting:

The two doctors find the coffin, and drive a stake into the vampire's chest. This makes the werewolf turn back to normal. He's a simple, kind man named Andreas, whom Lady Jane takes under her wing.

The film then flashes forward 24 years (which means we're now in 1967!). Prof. Saunders has just died, and his journal relating the events is being read by a member of Scotland Yard, Sir Fredrick Fleet (Miles Mander). He is shocked by what he reads, and plans to dig up the corpse(!) to see if Lady Jane committed murder.

Lady Jane says that even if the body is exhumed, it won't have decomposed, proving that it was really a vampire. But before that can happen, there's an air raid by Germany, and the cemetery is bombed.

Two gravediggers find the unearthed body of the vampire, stake intact. Assuming the stake ended up there due to the bombing, they remove it. Bad idea!

The vampire returns to normal vampire-y behavior, and goes after the now-grown daughter of Lady Jane, a woman named Nikki. The vampire's return inspired Andreas' curse to also return, and he becomes a werewolf once again.

The werewolf, wanting to be free of the curse, begs the vampire for help. No longer needing him, he shoves Andreas into a corner, dismissing him as if a dog.

As the vampire is about to bite Nikki, Andreas finds a crucifix in the dirt and finds the courage to step in:

This stops the vampire for a moment, and then more bombs hit the cemetery, including the tomb.

A few hours pass, and its now daylight. The werewolf, now back in human form, drags the vampire's body into the sunlight so it will decompose. Lady Jane Sir Frederick arrive, to watch the vampire slowly disintegrate in a surprisingly effective (and kinda gory, for 1943) series of effects shots:

Sir Frederick still doesn't quite believe they were dealing with a real vampire, and asks two plainclothes policemen if they buy into this whole story. They say they do, and Sir Frederick looks right into the camera and asks if we, too, believe in vampires:

...The End!


Return of the Vampire is a lot of fun, loaded with some really atmospheric touches. Bela Lugosi's face is not seen for almost a half hour--the vampire is seen only in shadow or over the shoulder, with only Lugosi's voice being heard. Even though we all know who the vampire is of course, its still an effective bit of staging.

Its kind of odd that there's so much discussion over whether vampires are real, but no one seems to have a huge problem with a werewolf running around.

The final effect of the vampire crumbling to dust is remarkably well done, keeping with the film's general level of dry realism. Only the final, goofy scene with Sir Frederick talking to the audience breaks the spell.

Movie Monday: Cat People

For this week's Movie Monday we snuggle up alongside some Cat People!

I vaguely remember seeing Cat People once on cable when I was a kid; since then I allowed the general consensus on the film--that it's a deeply flawed film that can't hold a candle to the original--to shape my view of it every time I saw it mentioned.

But I figured why not give it another shot?

Cat People opens in some unknown place and time, where a barren landscape seems to be populated only by large, fearsome cats and a small band of tribal people:

These shots are quite beautiful; scary and menacing. I couldn't help but think they probably cost more than the entire 1943 original movie.

Anyway, we view some sort of sacrificial ritual going on, where a beautiful woman is put in front of a large, growling cat. Nothing is said, but you don't get the sense that this whole thing is not about the woman being used as food.

We fade from the woman's face to another face, this time belonging to Irena (Nastassja Kinski):

Irena is on her way to New Orleans, to visit her brother Paul, whom she has not seen since their parents died and she was sent off to a foster home.

Paul (Malcolm McDowell) is warm and friendly, as his housekeeper Female (yes, that's her name, played by Ruby Dee). But after Irena falls asleep, Paul leaves:

We cut to a seedy motel where a prostitute meets up with a prospective "John". She undresses, but instead of a man waiting for her under the bed is a leopard! It grabs at her, chasing her down the hall.

She falls down the stairs, and turns to look at her attacker. There's a moment where the woman's bra pops open, which made me laugh because it looked so gratuitous. Probably not the reaction the filmmakers were looking for at this moment.

A few hours later, the police and local zookeepers arrive, seeing as how somehow there's a leopard pacing around a motel room! The head zookeeper, a man named Oliver (John Heard) climbs up a ladder and shoots a tranquilizer dart into the leopard.

The next day, Irena finds herself outside the leopard's cage, and that's where she meets Oliver. He is immediately taken with her, and offers her a job at the zoo's gift shop. They go on a semi-date where Irena is receptive but also guarded and sad.

After the leopard mauls another zoo worker by ripping its arm off, it escapes. Soon after, Paul reappears, telling his sister the truth about their family: they are were-cats--half-human, half-leopard. They can only mate with their own kind (ewwww!), for if they don't they transform and end up killing their lovers. Only by practicing incest are their transformations kept at bay.

As you might imagine, Irena is less than thrilled to hear this, and takes off to go on a getaway with Paul at a small cabin. They almost make love, but Irena calls it off. After Oliver falls asleep, Irena goes outside to hunt (getting fully naked in the process). She attacks a rabbit, and next we see her, its during the film's one genuinely scary moment that wasn't directly inspired by the original. Oliver wakes up when he hears a noise, and turns on a light, only to see:

Irena screams, smacking the lamp to the ground, returning the scene to total darkness. Its a great "jump" moment, probably the best scare scene in the movie.

Paul decides to kill Oliver so he can have Irena for himself, but Oliver is waiting for him and shoots him. When Oliver does an autopsy on the cat, he cuts it open to find just Paul's severed arm inside.

(There's an interesting little goof during this scene: as Heard slides the real-life leopard onto the autopsy table, he lets its head bang on the metal table a little too hard. If you listen closely, you can hear a crew member exclaim "Easy!" to Heard)

Irena is now trapped: without Paul, she will now turn into a leopard if she ever makes love, which means she will have to kill to become human again. Irena does eventually make love with Oliver, and she does indeed turn into a leopard. She leaves Oliver, turning to killing the cabin's crusty inkeeper to revert.

In a scene that doesn't make a whole lot of sense dramatically, Irena stalks Alice (Annette O'Toole) who works with Paul at the zoo. Its a direct recreation of the pool scene from the original, except for the fact we see O'Toole naked:

Like I said, the scene doesn't really make a lot of sense in this context: as a human, Irena is quiet and sad, but here she stalks Alice like a serial killer, suddenly becoming the heavy. But any scene that features the adorable Annette O'Toole topless is not going to generate a lot of criticism from this reviewer.

Oliver discovers that Irena has killed, and she begs him to let her "be with her own." Oliver ties Irena to the bed, and makes love to her, knowing this will trigger a final transformation.

Time passes, and we find Oliver back at the zoo, now in a relationship with Alice.He wanders by the leopard cage, and stares into the cat's eyes:

He reaches in, and strokes its fur. The cat responds, and in this quiet moment the film ends.


Watching Cat People again after so long, I was surprised that I liked it as much as I did. In the commentary track by director Paul Schrader, he admits the film is more of a "sex movie" than a horror film during the second half, and he's right: Kinski is constantly taking off her clothes, and there really aren't too many genuine scares.

The film is a remake in only the loosest sense: it features the core characters from the original (Irena, Oliver, Alice), and a few set pieces, but most of them are in a very different context (though Schrader does use the Val Lewton-inspired "bus" gag to drum up a simultaneous laugh and scare). This Cat People is trying to tell a very different story than the original.

All in all, I enjoyed Cat People a lot: it goes on a little too long and doesn't quite hang together (this film is almost double the length of the original), but the performances are good and it kept me engaged. So its reputation as a failure or cheap knock-off isn't really deserved.


Its funny to ponder that, even amid all the periods where Hollywood has gone remake or sequel-crazy (a period we're going through right now), only one of Val Lewton's 11 horror films have ever been remade. There's been talk of redoing I Walked With A Zombie, but so far only Cat People has ever undergone the remake treatment.

Maybe if the film had been a bigger hit we would have been "treated" to a slew of Lewton remakes, filled with sex and gore. But for now, Cat People remains an interesting asterisk to Lewton's legendary career.