#MOMENTSOFTERRORMONDAY! SHOCK WAVES : FRIGHTENED CHASED AND A SCAR!!

#MOMENTSOFTERRORMONDAY! OUR usual MONDAY POST, but this week chosen one of the more unusual films that PETER CUSHING starred in during his long career, SHOCK WAVES. Everything about this low budget film is divided within the FAN community. It's a film that people either LOVE passionately, or simply HATE. In someways, you can understand why. It's still a mystery why CUSHING committed to a film, that on a brief paper synopsis, SHOULD have gained the same reaction he and his agent gave to John Carpenter's HALLOWEEN a few years later. BUT for no more really than his travel fair, bed and breakfast, CUSHING gained very little, at the time. 

ABOVE : PETER CUSHING reflected in the MAKE UP mirror, having his facial scar

applied to his look of SCAR in 'SHOCK WAVES' (1975)

LATER AFTER HE RETIRED, CUSHING explained he committed to the film, as he wanted to help, what appeared to be a team of dedicated amateur film makers. Considering CUSHING was a man who had always pushed AGAINST any proposed film work, that took him OUT of the country...MIAMI was a long way to go, when he was no longer a young man, and his health wasn't the best. BUT HE did it. And for those who LOVE this film, that is not their gain, but in later years, just like other characters like Tarkin, Dr Who and Sherlock Holmes...it helped bring him ANOTHER following. 

SHOCK WAVES was shot on 16mm, but later given the full treatment by BLUE UNDERGROUND who remastered the master print, cleared the sound, and presented the quite amazing BLU RAY of the film, to a HUGE SUCCESS. BLUE UNDERGROUND did even more with another, of the radar PETER CUSHING film called CORRUPTION. Remastered, and presented with a HUGE extra features support, BOTH films, are some of the best jobs ever made on a lesser known PETER CUSHING film . .

THE DEEP END OF HORROR: CALLUM MCKELVIE REVIEWS SHOCK WAVES

Throughout his film career, Cushing played Nazis a surprising number of times. From Rudolph Hess in a 1953 episode of You Are There, to Heinrich Haussner in Son Of Hitler (1977) and Martin Blueck in the Hammer House Of Horror series, missing several in between and after. Of course tht's not even including close cousins such as Major Heinrich Benedek in Scream And Scream Again or Grand Moff Tarkin in Star Wars (1977). And can anyone forget that striking poster for the unmade The Savage Jackboot, featuring an image of Peter  dressed as an SS officer and brandishing a whip? 

Perhaps the most obvious Cushing Nazi role is that of the unnamed 'SS Commander' in Shock Waves...... despite him having very little screen time. Shock Waves has certainly build something of a reputation for itself, in spite of being incredibly low budget and essentially utilizing a tired slasher format. Of course what Shock Waves is most remembered for re-introducing the concept of Nazi Zombie popular in the 1940's and doing successfully. It doesn't really need to stated, that excluding some excellent offerings post 2000 (Dead Snow I'm looking at you) the Nazi Zombie film sub-gene is primarily made up of some pretty awful films, euro-horrors Zombie Lake and Oasis Of The Zombies (both 1981) spring to mind. Shock Waves is often thought of as the best of these, avoiding a straight up Romero rip-off in that it's Zombies are calculated, trained killers that never stop rather than flesh eating monsters.

The film tells the story of a The film tells the story of a group of tourists cruising on a small boat skippered by genre favourite John Carradine. After encountering a strange orange haze and a possible Ghost boat, the ship begins to take on water and the group find themselves evacuating to a nearby island. The island is deserted aside from an aged SS Commander (Cushing), who lives in self-exile in a deserted hotel. Cushing tells the group the story of the Death Corps, a group of undead super soldiers developed towards the end of the war, who unable to die have lain in the hold of the sinking ship, until the tourists crashing into it released them. One by one the group are laid to siege by the unstoppable killers.

It’s an incredibly simple film and as I stated before works using the format of a slasher film above anything else. Characters are introduced. Threat is introduced. Characters are picked off by threat one by one until only one/two survive. That’s it. However that’s not to say Shock Waves is bad. Far from it. Where it succeeds is atmosphere and heaps of it. The island setting is incredibly evocative and the hotel where director Ken Wierderhorn filmed is particularly creepy (apparently he payed $250 to rent the entire building, it’s now a luxury hotel which charges significantly more than that per room per night). 

The Nazi zombies themselves look INCREDIBLE, the simple design giving them a sleek appearance that makes their stalking scenes particularly effective. The shots of them underwater are one of the highlights of the film and are genuinely chilling.

And what of Cushing? Well as ever he attempts to imbue his character with some pathos but there really is far too little of him on-screen to even really comment on his performance. His monologue is one of the most chilling sequences in the film and easily the highlight and he does manage to at least deliver a menacing presence for the 5+ minutes we actually see him. 

It’s also interesting to see him acting in what is clearly a film that fits more comfortably into the ‘Horror New Wave’ style of the 1970’s than it does into any of the more classically based horror that he usually appears in. It’s a pity he had no scenes with Carradine however, though just as with every other horror star from the 50’s/60’s/70s you can always catch them together in 1983’s House of the Long Shadows. 

However if your intending to watch Shock Waves for Cushing alone, maybe give it a miss.   I recommend Shock Waves. It’s no genre classic and certainly slogs considerably once the nature of the Zombies is revealed and it turns into standard slasher fare. That said however, its ninety minutes of genuinely well-shot atmosphere. If you enjoy that indie 70’s grunge horror, then give it a watch. For genuinely excellent Nazi Zombie horror- watch Dead Snow .

IF YOU LIKE what you see here at our website, you'll  love our daily themed posts at our PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE.  Just click that blue LINK and click LIKE when you get there, and help us . . Keep The Memory Alive!. The Peter Cushing Appreciation Society website, facebook fan page and youtube channel are managed, edited and written by Marcus Brooks, PCAS coordinator since 1979. PCAS is based in the UK and USA  . 

#TOOCOOLTUESDAY: A SCREAM CAPTURED AN AUDIENCE FOR HAMMER TV SERIES

#TOOCOOLTUESDAY... Many think that 'Shatter' was Peter Cushing's last appearance with Hammer films... Not at all, back in 1980, Hammer under the guidance of CEO Roy Skeggs produced a great television series entitled, Hammer House of Horror, hour long dramas, all in a contemporary setting.

PETER CUSHING APPEARED in the seventh episode (broadcast on October 25, 1980 ) entitled 'Silent Scream' a twisted little tale that also starred a young Brian Cox and Elaine Donnelly. 

DURING THE WEEK leading up to the broadcast, very little was known about the story of the episode. Hammer were cute in their publicity, all that was released for the press to use in the editorial, was a chilling photograph of Peter Cushing screaming in terror...but at what, we would have to tune in, to find out! Peter gave gave several interviews to newspapers and Sunday supplements, which again ran the photograph.

OVER AT THE PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE we'd interested to hear any thoughts you may have on the episode, how it compared with the other episodes in the series etc... What I do remember of the episode was it was very COOL and even better on DVD in a great little box set!

IF YOU LIKE what you see here at our website, you'll  love our daily themed posts at our PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE.  Just click that blue LINK and click LIKE when you get there, and help us reach our 30K following total for Peter Cushing BIRTHDAY on MAY 26th 2017 AND Help Keep The Memory Alive!

 

#THROWBACKTHURSDAY: SCARS ZOMBIE HIDEAWAY BACK TO FORMER GLORY!

#THROWBACKTHURSDAY: If you've ever had the chance to watch Peter Cushing in SHOCK WAVES, you could have helped but be impressed with the settings. Apart from the nightmare swamps and the shore line that hides the very frightening 'Troops of Death'...there is the actual site of where Cushing's SCAR hides out.

THE MIAMI Biltmore Hotel, was in a pretty bad shape at the time the film set up camp there, and it suited the look that director Ken Wiederhorn and crew were looking for. The glamour of the place had long gone...BUT, not for too long. Now it's looking magnificent, as from 2007 the whole place was returned back to it's former glory.... and nope, not a zombie troop insight!

 

IF YOU LIKE what you see here at our website, you'll  love our daily themed posts at our PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE.  Just click that blue LINK and click LIKE when you get there, and help us reach our 30K following total for Peter Cushing BIRTHDAY on MAY 26th 2017 AND Help Keep The Memory Alive!

LITTLE PET SHOPPE OF HORRORS : HAMMER HOUSE : MARTIN BLUECK

#MONSTERMONDAY : Requested 'Monster' by Lexi Conroy .Twisted Tormentor? Visionary? War Criminal and Murderer? ... nice old guy, who owns a pet shop?? You decide! Peter Cushing's performance for me personally was the highlight of Hammer films return to the small screen 1980, after an absence of some ten years, when they made another classic tv series, 'Journey Into The Unknown'. The Silent Scream is the standout episode, with some real suspense, and a real twisted plot, and killer lines! A young Brian Cox also stars!

UPDATE: At the FACEBOOK FAN PAGE, the vote is in : MONSTER! #monstermonday : When one usually thinks of an 'evil' role Cushing played in his long career...Frankenstein in 'Must Be Destroyed' and Tarkin in Star Wars come to mind... but here is someone who because it was a tv series, many may not be aware of? As featured in our earlier #monstermonday post.... Peter Cushing as Martin Blueck... if you were undecided about his credentials to be pure evil, take a look at this gif..... what a monster! 

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