HAMMER'S LAST DRACULA AND VAN HELSING STAND OFF : MOMENTS OF TERROR MONDAY!

#MOMENTOFTERROR MONDAY! Hammer films 'Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires' is another one of Cushing's Hammer appearances, where despite HE going all out, something within the production values, fall short of the feature. . . If you ever get the chance to read the actual script, it ALL sounds amazing and what could have been a imaginative and impressive departure, from the standard set up, if only by location! 

THERE ARE MANY THINGS, that are seen as not up to that Hammer standard... but you have to remember, even as far as John Forbes Robertson's 'make up' as Dracula, that were produced in the STYLE of the values of fantasy film in the country in which Hammer had joined forces with Hong Kong's SHAW BROTHERS.... Take a look at many of the 'fairy-tale-ghost-stories' produced there, and everything clicks and matches for that culture and audience. Maybe it's not what is expected by the audience in the high street Odeon in Bradford UK, but in Hong Kong, certainly. It probably helped and went someway to pulling in quite a box office smash within that culture. Sadly, missing the Kung Fu craze in the rest of the world, Seven Golden Vampires arrived a little too late.

 

 

 

BUT WATCHING IT TODAY, there is much to appreciate. A cast that includes Chinese actor David Chiang, very popular with fans of other Sahw Bros karate fighting movies. Two UK TV popular's in Julie Ege, Robin Steward and the reputation of one of Hammer's leading actors, Peter Cushing, who plays Van Helsing for the fifth and last time, despite production problems felt by director Roy Ward Baker, the film is full of action, all 'horror visuals' have to be viewed with the understanding, this is really a film produced with supernatural and vampire antics, coming from a DIFFERENT culture. 

MONEY DOES look tight, but then at this time, productions filmed in Hong Kong by the Shaw's ALL looked like this. Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires was another brave attempt by Hammer's manager Michael Carreras, to try another and different angle. Personally, I am glad he tried. What do you think?

CHRISTOPHER LEE SATURDAY: GET YOUR TICKET FOR TOMORROWS TRAIN AND YVONNE MITCHELL REMEMBERED

#CHRISTOPHERLEESATURDAY! THIS WEEKEND much of our time is more than taken making a short journey through the film 'HORROR EXPRESS' from 1972. It was film that both Christopher Lee and Cushing enjoyed making. Even though, as you will read above, Cushing was still much effected by the terrible loss of his wife, Helen, Lee managed to have Peter focus on the production at hand. The result is a film that was appreciated back then on it's release, and even today. Recent DVD and BLU RAY releases have sold well, and gained even more appreciation. The two roles that Lee and Cushing play, come over well. A change from their usual roles of one destroying the other, here we have interesting characters who are in competition, but have to pull together to destroy someone else and all their supporters!

BELOW: THIS SUNDAY sees CALLUM MCKELVIE's weekly feature focus on, HORROR EXPRESS TOO. A personal spin on his first memory of watching the feature plus we'll be uploading the ENTIRE film from our PCAS YOUTUBE CHANNEL, with many images and supporting images through out the feature. JOIN US TOMORROW! We will also be posting the FOUR WINNERS of our CINEFICCION  MAGAZINE prizes!

BRITISH ACTRESS YVONNE MITCHELL  was first and foremost a stage actress who began her career quite early as a teen. By the time of her death, she had performed under the theatre lights for over four decades. Her output in films and TV paled in comparison, but the work she put out in those mediums were of unusually high quality with mature themes. The dark-haired actress made her film debut in a key role in The Queen of Spades (1949) and proceeded to become a moving, thoughtful, often anguished presence throughout the 1950s, winning the British Film Award for her touching, sterling performance as the biological mother of a foster child in The Divided Heart (1954). A year before that, she appeared with PETER CUSHING in the BBC production of '1984' as Julia. The broadcast gained much publicity for both her and Cushing, stirring the public in it's two live performances.

THE PUBLIC WERE so upset by Orwell's story and the BBC almost uncensored production that a debate in the government  House of Commons, after the first LIVE show and the planned second live broadcast, debated if the broadcast should go ahead at all. It did. It certainly didn't mar her career, but for Cushing it set the motion of his career forever becoming tilted towards the Horror and Fantasy genre, on both the big screen and tv. Yvonne's  slovenly, cuckolded wife in Woman in a Dressing Gown (1957) won her the Berlin International Film Festival Award. Other important films included Escapade (1955), Sapphire (1959), The Trials of Oscar Wilde (1960) and Johnny Nobody (1961). On the sly, Yvonne was a novelist of both children and adult books and an award-winning playwright. She also penned an enormously successful biography entitled "Colette--A Taste for Life" based on the famed French writer. The wife of film and stage critic Derek Monsey, she wrote her biography in 1957.

YVONNE MITCHELL, changed her name legally in 1946 from Yvonne Frances Joseph to Yvonne Mitchell (Mitchell was her mother's maiden name). She also deducted a decade from her age, which is why many sources have listed 1925 as her birth year. She married author and critic Derek Monsey in 1952, the couple would later divorce, only to be reconciled. They would remarry in late 1978, just months before Monsey died of a heart attack on 13 February 1979, with Mitchell dying of cancer just over a month later.

EXTENDED REQUESTED STAY: #TBT: REMEMBERING MELISSA STRIBLING AND THE SPECKLED BAND

REMEMBERING: Melissa Stribling who was born today November 7th 1927. Stribling appeared in just the one film with Peter Cushing...but boy did she pick the right one! She also got to play in one of Hammer films most iconic scenes in their 1958 'Dracula', where Christopher Lee's Count, in the dead of night, visits her home and..without a word.. seduces her. 

THE SCENE is so super charged with sexual tension, it almost crackles off the screen and as a result got the scissors treatment from the censors at the time. In 2013, in Hammer's restored print the exorcised footage was replaced, giving us the full picture of what Director Terence Fisher, Stribling and Lee had originally intended and created.

 

I'VE READ IN SEVERAL reviews of 'Dracula' both from the time of the films' release in 58 and in more recent times, that Stribling was a curious choice for the role of Mina Holmwood, that compared to the likes of Valerie Gaunt and other Hammer actresses, even though she was only in early 30's when she appeared in Dracula, many thought her slightly ordinary and plain. I totally disagree...but if that was the case, I can't help thinking that, director Fisher's choice in Stribling was intentional. That subtext in the story of Arthur Holmwood's wife being frustrated and bored, suddenly being charmed and seduced by the exotic and erotic Count, Stribling was...the perfect choice.

CHRISTOPHER LEE SATURDAY EUNICE HAS A BIRTHDAY AND LEE HAS A TALL TERRIBLE TALE!

TODAY WE WISH a happy birthday to the lovely Eunice Gayson. Best known for playing Sylvia Trench, James Bond's girlfriend in the first two Bond films (Dr. No 1963 and From Russia with Love 1963). Originally, Gayson was to be cast as Miss Moneypenny, but that part went to Lois Maxwell instead. BELOW we have great part of the series that we produced with BRUCE G HALLENBECK on the actresses tht appeared with PETER CUSHING in the HAMMER FILMS Frankenstein series of film, of which EUNICE was indeed one . .

EUNICE GAYSON WOMEN IN GOTHIC : PART TWO : HERE!

AN INTERVIEW feature we made with CHRISTOPHER LEE a while ago, some of you have emailed about, having problems finding, to repost! So, for your entertainment (!!) here it is again today on CHRISTOPHERLEESATURDAY!  Enjoy!

#CUSHING GIF WEDNESDAY! VINNIE PERTWEE AND MARSHA THE MAD!

IF YOU HAVE ANY COMMENT TO ADD TO THIS PAGE POST OR QUESTIONS, JUST EMAIL US AT PETERCUSHINGPCAS@GAMIL,COM AND I WILL ADD IT TO TO THIS POST!

WEDNESDAY'S would have returned to FREE GIF day over at our CLOSING FACEBOOK PAGE this week, instead of us giving away rare contact sheets and colour Cushing, Lee and Price photographs for you collectors out there. THOSE great gifts will resume here at the website soon. Lots to give you, I think you will like! In the meantime GIFS. They are back on Wednesday's! I always love posting images of Vincent and Christopher here. Good friends of Peter's and always fun to share here. Especially, in THIS film. Not everyone liked it. Personally, I LOVE it. Vincent, despite not being happy with the finished production . . .still performed so well and Lee, come the end, was truly terrifying!!! You KNOW this one... and  what did you think of it...and were they right to be cast together in this special one? This GIF was requested by Dylan T! Hope you like it Dylan, it IS just as you asked for!

JON PERTWEE ONLY APPEARED I think, in just ONE Amicus film. His role in 'THE HOUSE THAT DRIPPED BLOOD', has always been popular. Assisted by Ingrid Pitt playing Carla Lind, playing his, Paul Henderson's girlfriend in Segment 4 'THE CLOAK' Pertwee was great. Probably the ONLY actor to have delivered a line about Christopher Lee playing the role of DRACULA, in a mocking way...and got away with it! CUSHING's role as Philip Grayson in his story with Joss Ackland, 'WAXWORKS' I always find a little trying to enjoy. Cushing was at this time, nursing he very ill wife, Helen. 

HE TRIED to leave the commitment of the film, so he could be with her. Stubbornly, the producers said no. Cushing life Shepperton studios, every night, to travel to Whitstable, to be with his wife, to leave early the following early hours, for the next days shoot. This great GIF was requested by Paula Dean.  

IT'S COMMON KNOWLEDGE whatever role Milton Subotsky suggested to Peter Cushing in any of his AMICUS FILMS, with the exception of  a few starring roles, the script was always open, if there was a role Peter preferred to play. In TALES FROM THE CRYPT, Grimsdyke was NOT the role he was originally offered. Cushing was originally intended to play Ralph Jason, but after looking at the script he suggested to Subotsky that he would do more justice to the role of Mr. Grimsdyke. Subotsky never considered offering Grismdyke to Cushing, because of the connections with Cushing's own wife, Helen having passed, just months before. 

THE ROLE OF THIS chap though, so Milton told me, was something Peter very much liked. On receiving the script, Peter told Milton he could supply most of the costume, and would be very happy to play it. It's one of Cushing's most amusing and yet a little dark too. The perfect combination for Cushing. Something that would make us, uneasy about a man who himself was the kindest and so much loved. Terri Beale this is YOUR requested GIF! 

MARSHA A HUNT, is known to have had a good time when making Hammer films 'DRACULA AD 1972' and when the camera was off, she liked to have fun, and didn't take Christopher Lee's playing of the Count off camera and his authority, that seriously or respectfully at all. BUT when it came to shoot her scenes with his DRACULA, there was no shortage of, what appeared to be TRUE concern. HA!  This GIF is requested by Dawn Hughes . .

REMEMBER! 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: CUSHING WOULD HAVE LOVED THIS . . .

#TOOCOOLTUESDAY! OUTRAGEOUS. FUNNY. WONDERFUL. Peter Cushing would have LOVED THIS..

REMEMBER! 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

#MONDAYMOMENTSOFTERROR : INDICATOR HAMMER FILMS BOX SET WINNERS AND SHERLOCK RETURNS FOR A LIMITED TIME!

CONGRATULATIONS to our TWO Competition WINNERS DAVE PAYN and PETER DUNNE! Both have won the INDICATOR BOX SETS Hammer films 'Volume Two Criminal Intent' . . .which includes Cushing's Cash On Demand, along with some REALLY superb extras 🙂 THANK YOU to every one who entered and hopefully had fun too. BOTH DAVE and PETER must get in touch HERE ON or OUR PCAS FACEBOOK PAGE within 48 hours, or the prizes will be REDRAWN. Prizes arrive with 28 days, first class. MANY MANY thanks to Indicator for sponsoring all our com petitions over the past few weeks, excellent releases. VERY generous and provide SUPERB releases 🙂 Thank you again, everyone!

MOMENT OF TERROR MONDAY: TO HEAD UP ONCE MORE... that we are bringing some PC SHERLOCK HOLMES posts BACK to Sunday's for a short while, here is a great little clip of Peter Cushing as Sherlock and Nigel Bruce as Watson from his much loved series, that he made for the BBC back in the late 1960's. This was one of the better episodes, a traditional one, that's been made for the big screen and small many times..but this one, is quite cool too! BASKERVILLES! 🙂 Do you have a favorite episode from Cushing's BBC series, and how do RATE Cushing's BIG SCREEN Sherlock performances compared with this entire TV series?? Lots of the TV series eps to be found on our PCAS YOUTUBE Channel, by the way 🙂

STARTING NEXT SUNDAY for a LIMITED TIME ONLY . . . Peter Cushing as Sherlock Holmes. New features, clips, films and rare photographs. ONLY at the Peter Cushing Appreciation Society Website . .

REMEMBER! 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

#CHRISTOPHERLEESATURDAY! HOWLING! YOUR SISTER IS A WEREWOLF!

#CHRISTOPHERLEESATURDAY: When Sir Christopher Lee relocated to US to avoid typecasting in the late 70's he appeared in a number of different genres of films comedy's, musicals . . . He did however make a few horror films during this period..Here is one of the more stranger ones, 'The Howling 2' . . . a sequel to Joe Dante's 1981 werewolf classic 'The Howling'!

WHEN LEE WORKED with Dante in 1991 in Gremlins 2: The New Batch, one of the first things he did was apologize to director Joe Dante, for being in this film! Here is a fun clip of the finale of the film with Lee's confronting the werewolf Stirba. Are you a fan of this rather 'out there' film?

THIS OUR LAST COMPETITION to be ever launched or posted at our PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE...it will close TONIGHT AT MIDNIGHT! So if you are going to enter, NOW is the time!! ALL competitions after this one, will be held ONLY at THIS PCAS WEBSITE..where they are not hidden and crushed from reaching...er..over 33,000 people who supposingly have joined the Peter Cushing page . .Good Luck with this competition, it's a GREAT release from INDICATION! YOU can ENTER HERE by posting YOUR answer to our WEBSITE email : petercushingpcas@gmail.com . . . .

REMEMBER! 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