Showing posts with label mickey rooney. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mickey rooney. Show all posts

Friday 22 May 2020

COMPETITION WINNERS AND LEE CUSHING AND ROONEY FEATURE REVIEW COMING UP!


#KINOLORBER HAS A NEW blu ray release of this #PeterCushing guesting, #ChristopherLee starring film and we have a FULL gallery of #BEHINDTHESCENES photographs and review of the BLU RAY here shortly . . .


SOMETHING TELLS ME, #ChristopherLee, #MickeyRooney and #PeterCushing had a fun time on the set of 'Arabian Adventure' ...



CONGRATULATIONS Dermot Harris (US) and Sue Dagnell (UK) A big thank you to EVERYONE who entered! There's something 'special' a-comin' on May 25th .. I may have to get me some 'super size roll' gift wrap! 😳😵😃 - Stay safe everyone! Marcus


Tuesday 24 May 2016

CHRISTOPHER LEE : MONSTER MONDAY : EMMA SAMMS AND FLYING CARPETS!


THIS WEEK'S ‪#‎MONSTERMONDAY‬ candidate comes from Joe Arnold who makes an interesting suggestion... a film that many forget about when listing the films in which Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee have both appeared in..alas not together, but it was great to have the treat of seeing those names in the cast credit.



COSTUME DESIGNER, Rosemary Burrows attends to Peter Cushing's costume during the making of ARABIAN ADVENTURE (1979) , pretty much the  same way she did on countless Hammer films,  over the past twenty years!


ALWAYS up for a giggle... Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing on the set of 'Arabian Adventure' (1979)


PETER CUSHING'S time may have been brief on the set on 'Arabian Adventure' ...but he managed to fit in a meeting with friend, Christopher Lee.


CHRISTOPHER LEE, OLIVER TOBIAS AND PETER CUSHING... 'I was working on a live tv programme in Bristol, way back in 1984 on which Oliver Tobias was a guest. He was really charming, made time afterwards to chat and had only good things to say about his memories of the few scenes he shot with Peter on Arabian Adventure...he mentioned the glove, which funny enough, is in the photograph of him with Peter and Christopher Lee on set'... - Marcus Brooks


A YOUNG EMMA SAMMS as Princess Zuleira  in Arabian Adventure in 1979, her very first film!


SO, 'ARABIAN ADVENTURE... Star Wars with Magic Carpets...the poster campaign claimed. Well, maybe not quite...but fun, just the same. The highlight is of course Lee's evil, Caliph Alquazar ...who banishes, Cushing's Wazir Al Wuzara to the dungeons... I wont give away anything else, as this is one many have not seen . But remember, 'It's for the KIDS!' No blood, no gore...nothing too disturbing, but with Emma Samms, Mickey Rooney and Oliver Tobias, it's worth a view and Lee's Caliph Alquazar , a MONSTER and a Tyrant.??..You decide ...


JUST ONE LAST behind the scenes photograph from 'ARABIAN ADVENTURE'   this time with director, Kevin Conner joining the photo op. Lee making this film marked the first time he had returned to a British studio to work for over two years,  'Arabian Adventure' also gave him his first 'baddie' role in almost eleven years! I chose this pic more so though, for that look on Peter Cushing's face....


You can find MORE on the cast and the film 'ARABIAN ADVENTURE' in our FEATURE and GALLERY elsewhere on our website, here is a quick link! HERE


LOTS OF PHOTOGRAPHS, FEATURES AND LINKS on the PETER CUSHING SHERLOCK HOLMES CONNECTION : EVERY MONDAY here at the website and our FACEBOOK FAN PAGE

Wednesday 18 January 2012

PETER CUSHING CHRISTOPHER LEE FLYING CARPETS AND EMMA SAMMS!


SYNOPSIS:
Set in the Arabian city of Jadur in mystical times past. The three principal characters in this adventure are the evil magician Caliph Alquazar who lives in the palace; Majeed, a poor young Arab boy who arrives in the city looking for water; and Prince Hasan of Baghdad who comes to the city hoping to meet the beautiful Princess Zuleira who lives in the palace. Majeed and the Prince briefly meet up and exchange kindnesses before going their separate ways.


Alquazar is Princess Zuleira's stepfather who has become corrupted by evil and made the once benevolently ruled city a harsh place to live. Alquazar has a secret chamber in which he keeps a magic mirror which enables him to remotely view any location. Alquazar's aspiration is to possess the fabled Rose of Ilil, a talisman so powerful it will enable him to rule the world - but because of his evil he cannot fetch it for himself, it must be delivered to him by someone noble of purpose.


The mirror alerts him that the very person has arrived in the city and shows him an image of Prince Hasan in the company of a young Arab boy. Alquazar sends his guards to capture the Prince - not an easy task because the Prince is a valiant fighter, but eventually he is apprehended. Alquazar says he will permit Hasan to marry Zuleira if he first goes on a quest to bring back the Rose of Ilil. Hasan agrees and Alquazar sends him away on a magic carpet. Along the way Hasan is unexpectedly joined by Majeed who is transported to the carpet by his guardian angel genie Vahishta as a way of evading some city ruffians.


The carpet delivers them to the island of Ilil where there are a number of dangers to overcome as they encounter various protectors of the Rose. Eventually they find the magical Rose but it turns out to be young Majeed who was the noble one that the mirror was showing as able to pluck the glowing crystalline Rose.


The travellers return to Jadur but it soon becomes clear that evil Alquazar is not intending to honour his bargain and is planning to kill them once the Rose is handed over. Majeed works out what to do to defeat the wizard and throws the Rose of Ilil into Alquazar's magic mirror which sucks the evil one inside and reverses all his evil spells.


The kingdom is restored to its previous happy glory and the deposed former ruler is released from the dungeons to reign again. Prince Hasan and Princess Zuleira are married.


COMMENTARY:
This is a movie about the classic 1001 Nights. It was very much overlooked at the time it came out and still is, I guess. For a British low-budget movie it had a big cast: Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Capucine, Mickey Rooney, Milo O'Shea, Emma Sams, Oliver Tobias (well, some of them are or were big). Most of all, this is a tribute from Christopher Lee to Conrad Veidt in The Thief of Bagdad (1940). And he does a marvelous job, clad in black and looking as sinister as in his best Dracula- or Fu Manchu-movies.


Peter Cushing could be called mostly waisted in a small cameo-part, but that was his choice to sign up for a part in it anyway I guess; Mickey Rooney does his usual buffoonery but not totally out-of-place in this movie. The special effects vary from shoddy to amazing. The mechanical fire-breathing monsters don't look too convincing.


The flying carpet-scenes on the other hand are very well executed, in some moments even breath-taking (considering this movie was made in 1979, 2 years after Star Wars and clearly some of the flying carpet-scenes were executed with the knowledge they had already learned from Star Wars). If one compares this movie with the original The Thief of Bagdad from 1940, of course the special effects in An Arabian Adventure are better, even on a small budget. It is a children's-movie, for most parts. Or a family-movie. Not a masterpiece, but very entertaining in its own right.

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