#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  . 

#GETTHECUSHION! CHILLING SCENE FROM NAZI COMMANDANT SCAR IN SHOCK WAVES

#GETTHECUSHIONITSCUSHINGSUNDAY! whew.... 'Yes, I killed him, and your Captain too, perhaps...But not in the way you think.' Peter Cushing's chilling lines from the 1977 SHOCK WAVES. The character of SCAR is an interesting one, and this film too has an interesting history. There's a BIG feature on it at our website. We have chosen this clip, as there is little really of PC is the film, but what there is, he certainly makes the best of his screen time. Is SHOCK WAVES a winner with you?

  

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!

NEWS: ONE OF THE FIRST ELECTRONIC MOVIE SOUNDTRACKS GETS VINYL RELEASE

RICHARD EINHORN'S 100% analog synth score for Nazi zombie cult classic Shock Waves makes its vinyl debut via WAXWORK. The film, which starred Peter Cushing, was released in 1977 and featured one of the first-ever electronic music soundtracks.

THE SCORE will be released on sea foam green-colored vinyl and features liner notes from Einhorn, as well as writer/director Ken Wiederhorn. Sadist Art Designs and Ghoulish Gary Pullin created the artwork, which you can check out, along with previews of the score, below. You can order now from Waxwork.

THE TERRIFIC 2014 REMASTERED blu ray release from BLUE UNDERGROUND is still available and can be ordered HERE. Our REVIEW, GALLERY and FEATURE can be found HERE 

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COMMANDER SCAR DANGEROUS OLD DUFFER FROM FLORIDA OR COOL KEEPER OF AQUA ZOMBIES?

IT'S #MONSTERMONDAY, where we start the week looking into the souls of the poor unfortunates who give us the fright factor in some of Peter Cushing's most chilling cinema classics! This week, for those of you who managed to catch Cushing's performance in the 1977 under water zombie fest 'SHOCK WAVES' ..we ask you to consider the following...was his character SCAR, a Monster? A Murderer and all-round -World War II Bad Egg OR the sad remnant of a terrible time in world history, just left alone to rot along with those 'sea bobbin' zom-bods? OR is SCAR a totally first class chap and ahead of his time, bringing us the very first Nazi-zombie genre flick, the terrifying cinematic concept of underwater -all-swimming-all flesh-munching-aqua-zombies?? YOU decide!

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'SHOCK WAVES : OUR WINNERS BAG BLUE UNDERGROUND PETER CUSHING ZOMBIEFEST REMASTERED BLU RAY PRIZES!

Congratulations to our THREE WINNERS! A very popular competition! 'SHOCK   WAVES' is released on TUESDAY 25th NOVEMBER 2014 and is available for PRE ORDER right NOW! ORDER HERE