For those hording toilet paper

I must admit that although I think Cushing and Lee in a cast could be considered serious firepower for a production company looking to appeal to the base and make a profit, Amicus' The Skull was a bit much even for a die hard fan of theirs. It isn't that either one of them aren't equipped with the right kinds of performances and characters. If anything, in The Skull, they were given that rare opportunity to be friendly. They were just so often foes, that seeing them as competitive art collectors (mainly of the occult; Cushing's library/study and Lee's poolroom are examples of how devoted both are to collecting artifacts/statuettes regarding the darker nature of human life and representatives of spirits worshipped) was refreshing. Lee once occupied the skull of the Marquis de Sade, but "allowed" it to be stolen by a sketchy sort who likes to sell Cushing items for profit (he obtains them more often than not through theft or other nefarious means). Cushing disregards Lee's advice to avoid purchasing the skull...Lee believes the skull (as was Marquis) was possessed by an evil spirit, perhaps a demon. Cushing is a practical man and considers that mere superstition...the rest of the film proves just how wrong Cushing is. Cushing has one of those tour-de-force moments where he must act his ass off to sell a skull's terrorizing him. It is a wonderful piece of acting I immensely enjoy. The bummer ending seems fitting, because that damned skull can never be trusted. It's evil, dammit! Evil! Anyway, the film has a plot that really I consider laughable, but Cushing might just have one of his best performances (or at least one of his most unheralded) in it. Amicus doesn't exactly shell out a hell of a lot of money for The Skull, but with Cushing and Lee in your cast, sometimes that might not matter as much. The starpower is needed to convey just what happens when two people have encountered an evil that can possess the owners or those in its trajectory. Freddie Francis often shoots from INSIDE the skull, having us look out through its eyes (a visual trick that is rather neat, I must admit); concentrating on victims it might eventually threaten, we are placed in the demon's perspective. There's not a lot of special effects or wizardry; it is Cushing telling us in his performance that he is under attack from dark forces that aren't to be messed with. You know, Cushing and Amicus were a damn good team...some of his best performances (or at least he was given some good characters to bring to life; even in The Beast Must Die, he had a considerably good part in an otherwise merely okay werewolf film mining William Castle audience tricks) were for them. The Skull, while certainly not one of my favorite films featuring Cushing and the horror company, benefits substantially by their star.

Besides the weird scene where an insurance agent is documenting the items left by a victim of the skull (the man who took the Marquis' head from his body after digging up his grave!), feeling compelled to stab the dead man's girlfriend, The Skull basically allows us to see Marco attending the same auction that Lee and Cushing compete for artifacts at. Marco gains access to the skull and seizes a chance to dangle it to Cushing like a forbidden fruit. He had sold a book on the Marquis (with illustrations) with the lining made from human skin. Marco gives Cushing history lessons on how the Marquis was a deviant, perhaps a worshiper of the devil, taken to writing books about very naughty, violent acts. Lee feels the need to explain that the reason he was so driven to pay a ridiculous price for a series of statues representing the various forms of the devil at an auction was that the skull told him to. Then comes, around the 40 minute mark, a nightmare sequence (it is really bizarre and odd) has two plain-clothes police officers confiscating Cushing (he's being arrested for a reason unexplained; they basically whisk him from his home without giving him time to even write his wife a note), taking him to a building that isn't even the police dept, and he is forced to play Russian Roulette through the order of this mute magistrate (complete with white colonial wig). He then is tossed in a room with walls closing in, toxic air spraying from vents, with the skull (in mid air) coming towards him. Awakening completely somewhere else, Cushing believes he was "compelled" from his home to Marco's. All of this notwithstanding, Cushing still buys that skull!

I did balk to myself as a critique against The Skull regarding why Cushing’s occult researcher would allow himself to be anywhere remotely near that damned skull of the Marquis when time and again warning signs let out a shriek (bodies that die seemingly because of it), then it came to me…like Lee before him, he is “compelled” by it to gain possession of it. He is possessed by it to have possession of it. Like others who were in possession of it, Cushing would reap the same unfortunate ends as his predecessors.\

The levitating skull. Yeah, kind of a bit cheesy. Especially, when the skull “makes its way” to the room where it plans to kill Cushing. What I find so impressive is how director Freddie Francis and actor Cushing have to tell a lot without words. The skull’s possession of Cushing and his periods of resistance and subterfuge are acting and visual expression as well as could be accomplished considering the plot absurdities involved. There are moments where Cushing’s face goes from weak indifference to cold blooded subservience. After taking the demon statuette that represents the demon possessing the skull, Cushing, who seems to have no control, smashes Lee over the head with it, returning home. Returning momentarily to see bloody gloves and the statuette now in his study, Cushing realizes what the demon did with him “while he was away”. The skull then insists he kill his wife, with only her crucifix necklace saving her from a dagger plunge to the heart. Cushing continues to fight the demon regarding its persistent urging to kill his wife, and in not following orders condemns himself. In a masterful stroke, an hourglass turns on its own with director Francis signifying to us that Cushing’s time is numbered. As Cushing bangs on doors locking him in a bedroom, his wife unable to hear as she sleeps, the skull on its way to finish him off, it symbolizes fate’s closing in. This whole sequence happens in a night while most are asleep; Lee had warned Cushing, but it did no good.