THE BURST WATER-PIPE SCENE : GETTHECUSHIONSUNDAY!

#GETTHECUSHIONSUNDAY! THE BURST WATER PIPE SCENE: 'Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed' (1969)  In this week's scene, we have Veronica Carlson, who plays ANNA the keeper of a boarding house where Frankenstein decides to hide out and perform his experiments. Veronica Carlson has never been better.

It is without doubt, one of the best scenes, in a film, packed with tension and moments. - It's a simple premise, but very effective. It features Anna having to haul a body out of a makeshift grave in a flower garden after a water main has burst.... But talk about bad timing! This happens, as the local police are running a check on the house, after tip offs, that THE BARON, maybe staying there.  Under Fisher's masterful direction, the scene is as tense as anything in a Hitchcock film, and Anna ends up completely drenched, but successful in transferring the corpse to another hiding place so the police can't find it. It's an extraordinary scene and Carlson is exceptional in it.

'THE BURST PIPE SCENE' : There were many scenes in films from Cushing's career that were complex  to set up or were quite a spectacle. The drama of the preparation of the execution, has been in many cases lost. However, not in this case! We are fortunate that the studio stills photographer, was on hand and caught it all!

#GETTHECUSHIONSUNDAY! ABOVE A SHORT compilation of behind the scenes images of Peter Cushing, cast and crew during the making of this week's #GETTHECUSHION! theme : Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed'

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#GETTHECUSHION! REVENGE ON THE DEAD!

#GETHECUSHIONITSCUSHING! This week's clip is one of my personal Amicus favorite scenes... it stars Ian Ogily and Peter Cushing, 'And Now, The Screaming Starts' ...it's THAT scene in the cemetery! The rain, the thunder..the skeleton! It's a weird film, a bit of sprawling script, in being Amicus films only ghost story, it could have been helped a little with a more subtle title. 'An Now, the...' etc was Max Rosenberg's idea. He, The King of Subtly'..said nobody....ever. The Bride of Fengriffen' the title of the book that the script was based on, would have been much better, I feel....what say you?

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OUIJA BOARDS, ACID BATHS AND A BULLS EYE! ALL GIFS TODAY!

#GIMMETHEGIFWEDNESDAY: And so...for the last time in his cinema career Peter Cushing nails Count Dracula...unfortunately it was not Christopher Lee in this Hong Kong Kung Fu Hammer Films Mash Up, but as usual Peter Cushing gives it his all in the climax of The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires (1974).... Btw, Dracula's make up wasn't the result of an over enthusiastic make up artist, but this Dracula was presented in the style of the traditional Oriental Theatre make up of the villain...just saying!

#GIMMETHEGIF : A warning from the grave for Peter Cushing's iconic Arthur Grimsdyke in 'Tales From The Crypt' probably number three or four in most people's TOP FIVE CUSHING FILMS... or is number one for you?

#GIMMETHEGIF: Vincent Price and Christopher Lee in 'Scream And Scream Again'.... Price plays Dr. Browning and Lee as Fremont, both doing a very good job in their roles, so all the more surprising when all three stars, Lee Price and Cushing admitted to not understanding a word of the script or the story... 

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#MONSTERMONDAY : FRANKENSTEIN'S CREATION MONSTER OR VICTIM?

TEXT ‪#‎MONSTERMONDAY‬ this one isn't maybe as easy or obvious as it may first look... So, the last thing you see, is the floor flying to you, as you hit the marble floor of the home of Frankenstein, next thing you wake up, with one mega headache, and a body that certainly isn't yours.. I think I'd be a little 'annoyed' too ha! Well... Monster OR Victim??

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TROY HOWARTH'S 'THE AMICUS FILMS OF PETER CUSHING' : 'WANDERING HANDS AND MANNEQUINS'

For their next collaboration, Cushing and Amicus would once again revisit the anthology format.  Asylum was a jigsaw puzzle of a confection written by Robert Bloch.  Like The House That Dripped Blood, it was structured as a mystery, with the linking segment helping to build the film to a final, shocking reveal.  The four segments were of higher-than-usual caliber: “Frozen Fear” tells of a husband (Richard Todd) who chops his wife (Sylvia Sims) into little pieces and is understandably perplexed when the pieces (neatly wrapped in brown paper) come back to life.

 “The Weird Tailor” tells of a mysterious gentleman (Peter Cushing) who hires a tailor (Barry Morse) to make him a most unusual suit; “When Lucy Comes to Stay” tells of a young woman (Charlotte Rampling) whose friendship with Lucy (Britt Ekland) leads to disastrous consequences; and “Mannikins of Horror” tells of an inventor (Herbert Lom) who creates mechanical homunculi.  The film is capped-off by the surprise reveal of the deranged doctor whom the protagonist (Robert Powell) has been searching for.

Bloch’s inventive screenplay ensures that every piece of the puzzle fits together to create a satisfying whole.  Roy Ward Baker, directing his first film for the company, handles the material with style and flair.  Baker, whose past credits included A Night to Remember and Quatermass and the Pit, never seemed much at home in the horror genre, but Asylum proved to be a notable exception.  Clearly inspired by the witty and suspenseful material, he pulls out all the stops and delivers one of his best films.  The cinematography by Denys Coop is appropriately atmospheric, while Douglas Gamley’s score makes inspired use of barnstorming classical music to set the right Gothic tone.

The stories are very effective on the whole, with “The Weird Tailor” emerging as the weakest of the bunch. Even so, it benefits greatly from the fine performances from Cushing and (especially) Barry Morse.  Cushing’s portrayal of the guilt-ridden “Mr. Smith” again allows him to channel his sense of real-life loss into the role he was playing, but his screen time is limited.  There are also fine performances from Herbert Lom, Patrick Magee, Robert Powell, Richard Todd and Charlotte Rampling. The film proved to be another hit for Amicus, and they were only too anxious to continue their association with Cushing; happily, the feeling was mutual.

David Case’s novel “Fengriffen” was a Gothic mystery in the mold of “The Hound of the Baskervilles.”It caught the eye of Milton Subotsky, a voracious reader, who optioned it for a film adaptation.  Surprisingly, he didn’t elect to pen the screenplay himself. Instead, he entrusted the writing to TV veteran Roger Marshall.  Once the script was in place, Subotsky and Rosenberg assembled a top notch cast and a skilled crew, headed by director Roy Ward Baker. The end result proved more problematic than Baker’s previous sojourn into the world of Amicus horror.

The story tells of a young couple (Ian Ogilvy and Stephanie Beacham) who return to the groom’s ancestral home to start a new life together. On the night of their wedding, the bride is attacked and raped by an unseen presence. She believes the supernatural is at work, but the husband is skeptical. Eventually, the sage Dr. Pope (Peter Cushing, of course) is called in to investigate.

The cast does the best it can under the circumstances, but veteran actors like Cushing, Herbert Lom and Patrick Magee have too little to do.  Cushing plays Dr. Pope like a variation on Sherlock Holmes.  He doesn’t enter into the story until fairly late, however, and he is given little to do beyond fiddling with his props.  Lom makes a strong impression as the debauched nobleman who brings a curse upon his family, but his screen time is limited, while Magee is completely wasted as the family doctor who lives in fear of the curse.  Ian Ogilvy, who had risen to genre stardom as the juvenile lead in Michael Reeves’ three horror films (The She Beast, 1965; The Sorcerers, 1967; Witchfinder General, 1968) is very good as the distraught husband, while Stephanie Beacham (who had recently played Cushing’s granddaughter in Dracula AD 1972) is inclined to overact as the hysterical wife.

And Now The Screaming Starts! comes off like something of an Amicus copy of a Hammer film: the period setting and emphasis on shock effects would not have been out of place in one of their films, the use of Oakley Court for the exteriors is very much a Hammer touch, and the single narrative sets the film apart from Amicus’ usual fare.  If nothing else, it served to show up just how difficult it was for Hammer to do this kind of material as successfully as they did.  Slow, plodding and predictable in the extreme, And Now The Screaming Starts is one of the less successful collaborations between Cushing and Amicus. 

Written By Troy Howarth

Edired and Images By Marcus Brooks