AIP Week

Meant to drop this last week. Oh well.

The Raven (1963)

"Such perfection of treachery fills me with admiration." - Scarabus.

Quite a cast for this Poe comedy from Corman, Matheson, and AIP. A duel of sorcerers with lots of animation effects, my Amicus weekend lacked two stars of yesteryear trading competitive gestures with their various wizardry...Price and Karloff. Add to that a particularly devilish and delicious tasty dish villainous Hazel Court and cowardly, punning pudgy drunk, Lorre, as further accomplices to the hijinks and it is quite a show.

I think it was clear that this was clearly a lark for writer Matheson and director Corman. For the exception of a tweety-birds-spinning collapse after a bonk to the face by his butler and some wink-wink playfulness in the climactic battle with Karloff, Vincent Price plays it fairly as the straight man because Lorre is clearly taking nothing at all seriously. His irritation with his raven difficulties thanks to Karloff’s dark magic, and Price’s lack of knowledge in how to transform him back, with his later drunk fog trying to outwit a far and away better sorcerer, Lorre is cast for his ad-libbing and shenanigans. Jack Nicholson as Lorre’s son, the two spend a majority of their time at each other’s throats when not attempting to avoid Karloff’s plotting and scheming against them. Olive Sturges as Price’s daughter and Nicholson serve as young lovebirds trying to keep Price and Lorre from ending up victims of Karloff and Court’s wickedness. Court, having often been a damsel in distress (Twilight Zone’s The Fear & The Curse of Frankenstein), gets to really vamp it up…she is so much fun, she almost steals this film from Lorre. The raven included is a nice addition although it seemed to cause Nicholson fits on set. I have to admit that I kind of like The Terror a bit more than this because I’m more partial to the serious Gothic horror melodrama, but this was still easily watchable and nothing too demanding. But the story itself is merely held together by duck tape and glue, more of an excuse for the cast to goof around and effects team to come up with ways for the sorcerers to use their magic to show off. Karloff, sad to say, appears quite on the decline. He seems to be the most sincere of the participants in putting out a character of some considerable depth, and the dialogue provided he tinges either with deceptive façade or relishing malice. The castle setting is definitely familiar if you have watched The Terror as many times as I have. Speaking of The Terror, despite having watched it earlier this year, I almost want to watch it again just as a companion to this film. I might just do that this week, since I decided earlier in the afternoon just to have me a little AIP week. To show us how tongue-in-cheek this film really is, Corman, despite featuring yet again the “castle falls apart into rubble and flames” conclusion, before returning to Price’s own castle, has the structure collapsing around Karloff and Court yet they escape unscathed, carefully concealed by concrete sculpture. 3/5 

Considering how intense and tragic so many of Corman’s Poe features are with Price, a comedy that is anything but that doesn’t hurt at all.

Premature Burial (1964)
I had an entire paragraph put together that was lost due to "computer error". Ugh. So Milland steps in Price's spot due to production troubles where AIP and Corman (and Pathe) were sort of briefly unaligned, doing so with aplomb. He has the uncanny ability to be understated when need-be and outburst with just the right amount of austere clarity with the exact touch of mania behind the eyes. I like being able to see the wheels turning and Milland sells that well.

I had plenty written about Court (I felt her mannerisms and eyes sort of telegraph the twist at the end), graverobbers (in the style of Burke and Haire, who we see turn up in Hammer films a lot, too), the ebbs and flows of Milland’s experiences in the film (just when he tries to keep his shit together something else encourages his fear of premature burial to be stirred up again), the art/set decoration of the film (the reds and browns of curtains and drapes, candles, the carpeting, portraits on the walls, the walls, furnishings, furniture, etc. of Milland’s manor, as opposed to the spider-webby, claustrophobic vaults in the basement, where cells, creaky doors, dingy walls, and deteriorating conditions make it pale in comparison to the elegance up above), with special mention to the dead trees with their distorted frames and skeletal branch arms reaching outward and compounding and thickening fog in the woods outside the castle. I felt that practically every shot in the film is of such aesthetic Gothic and atmospheric artistry by Corman and his team that you’d think the production was far more expensive than it really was. I often wonder just what Corman and his production team could have done with the budgets of today. Crimson Peak and its ilk really owe a bit to Corman and these Poe films, as well as, Universal in its prime. Milland introducing Court and Ney (the doctor friend worried about Milland’s worsening emotional state, seesawing and alternating like a pendulum swing) to his mausoleum “escape room” is absolutely the film’s highlight while Corman’s colorful tinted nightmare where Milland’s fool-proof burial chamber is nothing but a rat trap fallen to ruin is such an innovative alternative.

Milland’s revenge (Court receives the same treatment as him, revealing her treachery when trying to seduce Ney), with his sister (she never wavers in her suspicions of Court, eyeing her questionably, which sort of also takes some pop away from the twist) having to stop him is enough tragedy to add some melodrama Corman’s Poe Gothic horrors  almost always include. Alan Napier as Court’s father actively robs graves for “research”. The opening with the poor soul frozen in fear with his spindly fingers stuck in place while trying to claw out of the coffin sets the tone wonderfully morbidly. This sort of scene is what really puts the Poe in Corman’s Poe Cycle. I personally love this film. It doesn’t have Price as the tormented painter with the fear of being buried alive, but Milland equips the character with plenty of depth because he’s a pro. And if you are going to replace Price, doing so with Milland (before he was offered almost exclusively grumpy misanthropes) isn’t a bad choice. 4/5

Scream and Scream Again (1970)

Peter Cushing is wasted in a two minute cameo where Marshall Jones’ vicious, tactical thug arrives with plans to “rest” control of their communist regime in an area not too far from London, it seems. Cushing might have a page’s worth of dialogue. Why even bother hiring him for such a minuscule part besides the name on the poster? I mean, is that the extent of his worth? Not enough meat on the bone for Cushing to do something with more substance? Anyway, Price gets a fun mad scientist part [natch] while Lee is the head of a British government agency with the power of hypnosis, as seen at the end when Price is unable to resist his stare, willing to go right into a tab of acid!Alfred Marks, as the crude and blunt-force Detective Superintendent, gets the most lines and focus, as does Christopher Matthews as the young pathologist who figures out that Price is perhaps up to no good when a serial killer drops himself in acid after a lengthy, intense car-and-foot chase with the authorities. The aforementioned chase is in the middle of the film and is a good twenty minutes, far and away the best part. The poor runner who keeps losing limbs to Price's experiments is morbidly dark comedy. Sallis, much like Price, of Hammer films such as Taste the Blood of Dracula and The Curse of the Werewolf, is wasted as another victim of Jones' Vulcan Shoulder Grip. The multiple subplots do converge where Price, Matthews, Lee, and Marshall all serve as glue that brings them together. The typical master race plot machinations are truly what all the seemingly separate threads have as binding. I think this might be of interest for those reminiscing about London of the last 60s and early 70s, with the “swinging” side very much elaborated in club scenes where the statuesque “vampire killer” chooses his delectable dishes to strangle and mutilate. That chase—despite how I might feel about the disposable use of great names in the film—is really exciting. Price walks on the screen and, no matter the material, makes the most of it. I think he was given just the basic Mad Scientist role and he has a way of words, what a true master of the craft…no matter if the craft truly deserved him. 2/5

 The Terror (1963)

“Perhaps we’re both mad.”

While I do think the story in The Terror is as piecemeal as the film’s production itself (and the film also), its myriad of production challenges and numerous hands trying out in the making of it, somehow I find myself quite taken with it. Casting is all over the place, from Nicholson’s unconvincing Napoleonic soldier to Sandra Knight’s aloof phantom, to Karloff’s weary baron who is supposed to be the son of witch Dorothy Neumann (the age disparity for this bit of nonsense is hilarious), but for some reason I like the film because of its mishmash. It never feels quite real. It all feels like something out of a dream and I think that is why it isn’t so completely lost in time. Yes, it was used in Bogdanovich’s Targets (1968) so there is an appearance to remind us of Karloff’s “bogeymen”, but I have noticed that the film has its share of admirers, my Gothic horror-loving peers seem also quite smitten with it. The castle, its crypt with the Baron's wife's name informing Nicholson that she was indeed dead, the history of the husband finding his wife with her lover and the mother conjuring the spirit of the wife to get revenge for the loss of her son that lover, the sea, the raven that acts in favor of the witch seeking vengeance for the death of her son, and the twist involving who actually died despite the story told to Nicholson all factors into the overall melodrama. Instead of fire, this time Corman uses a flood to bring down the house. Karloff, his aging Baron quite a pitiful wreck overcome by years of torment, fits his part exceptionally well. Nicholson's investigation just moves the witch's plans forward with some greater speed. Knight's deterioration and Neumann's "poof" demise are quite bizarre. There is even eyes pecked out of a gravelly voiced local who tries to stop the witch's plans and pays for it and Dick Miller as Karloff's butler and lone friend who can't seem to save his master no matter how hard he tries. This, to me, is the kind of film that kids growing up watching late night television remember fondly. If ever there was a film built for 3 AM insomnia, it is this one. I would like to see it in a drive-in as it was once tailored. 4/5