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.

WATCH TALES OF THE UNEXPECTED : PLUS HORROR GIFS WEDNESDAY!

TALES OF THE UNEXPECTED in 1983. ....it may not ring a bell for many here, as it was a UK Television show, but it was syndicated to the US and most of Europe. Cushing's role, was one of his last performances before the camera. There would only be three more roles for Cushing after this, in 'Helen Keller: The Miracle Continues', 'Masks of Death' as Sherlock Holmes and 'Biggles', his last film performance for cinema.

KARL VON BADEN is a role that Cushing could have played in his sleep just five years previous, that is not to say it's a weak performance, but the script gives him little to do, and it's Cushing who looks weak and frail at this point. It's a story that relies on flashbacks, and much of his screen time is played sitting down. He looks tired, but that helps to bring a poignancy to his role. Cushing shares most of his scenes with another television veteran, John Bailey. Anthony Higgins who plays Cassan in the story, would go on to play Sherlock Holmes in an updated Sherlock series and would also play Moriarty in the film 'Young Sherlock'. Vorpal Blade is a tale set in a sedate rose garden and a castle in Heidelberg... the episode was directed by John Jacobs who produced the other Anglia television series 'Orson Welles Great Mysteries'...in which Cushing also appeared, a wonderful episode entitled, 'La Grande Breteche' in 1973.

NAME THE FILMS THAT the above GIFS were taken from and the PETER CUSHING ROLES in the film plus the YEARS they were produced!

DRACULAS FULL 1958 DEATH : MICHAEL'S BIRTHDAY : TUESDAY TOUGHY AND MORE

MICHAEL REDGRAVE was of the generation of English actors that gave the world the legendary John Gielgud, Ralph Richardson and Laurence Olivier, Britain three fabled "Theatrical Knights" back in the days when a knighthood for thespian was far more rare than it is today. . .  Sir Michael Redgrave. A superb actor, Redgrave himself was a charter member of the post-Great War English acting pantheon and was the sire of an acting dynasty. According to his daughter, Vanessa, and son Corin, Sir Michael's favourite film roles were in The Browning Version (1951), The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962) and The Dam Busters (1955).  Peter Cushing appeared in a 1955 stage production of The Browning Version as Andrew Crocker-Harris in London, recorded and transmitted by BBC TV.    Cushing's role as barrister, Jeremy Clayton is  neat role. Cushing plays it with an impatient sharpness , that makes you feel all the more sorry for Redgrave's 'David Graham'. Just a support role, but ine that added to Cushing's already sizeable characters he had played in theatre, radio and massiviely on television.  Redgrave's opinion about working in film, when he had made such a career of the theatre, was pretty much like Peter Cushing also felt . .'I didn't think I'd be any good in films... I couldn't imagine myself on the screen. Besides, there were such exciting things to do in the theatre, so much to learn!'. Michael Redgrave passed away only one day after his 77th birthday.

DIRECTED BY JOSEPH LOSEY, and starring Michael Redgrave as a confused alcoholic father, racing against the clock, trying to save his son who is sentenced to death...Redgrave turns in a wonderful performance in TIME WITHOUT PITY. It's a British film noir thriller, and has a very watchable cast...of which Cushing is one of the support players. Ann Todd and Leo McKern are at the top of their game, Freddie Francis is director of photography... in only the second film of his career, Lois 'Miss Moneypenny' Maxwell and Joan Plowright also make an appearance. This is a sneak peep a taster....see what you think?

ABOVE THIS WEEK'S TUESDAY TOUGHY AND BELOW, LAST WEEKS ANSWER! 

ABOVE: A REQUESTED DEATH to end the day. FOR TOMMY TWO FANGS . . . hmm Here is probably the MOST CELEBRATED scene from one of Cushing's, Lee's and Hammer's DRACULA films. COMPLETE with censored removed shots, Dracula DEATH from 'DRACULA' / HORROR OF DRACULA' 1958 . . .

OF COURSE . . .he did come back! HA!

MOMENT OF TERROR MONDAY: COMPETITON BIRTHDAYS AND MORE!

YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I LOVE this magazine. We have covered various pieces on it over the last few months and thought it was about time, we honored it with a PCAS COMPETITION too! We done competitions with Warner Brothers, Hammer films too, Lionsgate, various actors and directors too.  Even full scale legitimate publishers. So it is a real treat to find an affordable magazine, edited and written by someone, who loves what he does. MUCH of this chap you can find on this site elsewhere! DARIO LAVIA editor of CINEFICCION has donated FOUR issues of the LATEST edition of the magazine. PACKED as usual, full of great stuff. THIS issue features MUCH about the history of WEREWOLVES and WOLFMEN on the big screen ...and elsewhere! There is a fabulous colour feature too. If you liked the AUTOBIOGRAPHY editions he did on Cushing, Lee, Price, Karloff and others, you will LOVE the concept behind the regular editions. 

CINEFICCION is written in SPANISH. And for all Spanish speaking fans of the Horror and Fantasy genre, THAT is a WONDERFUL asset! IF only the UK had a magazine THIS professional produced! PCAS since the beginning, has always been an INTERNATIONAL society. There are many many followers of this website and our other social internet sites from all over the world. Before we closed our PCAS Facebook Fan Page, it was always a thrill to meet Cushing Fans from just about everywhere! We STILL DO have a Russian PCAS website!

THAT IS WHY it's always a honor to be friends and fellow fans of Peter's work and help OTHER too!

HERE IS HOW YOU CAN WIN A COPY! BELOW are FOUR different GIFS from films that featured a WEREWOLF or WOLFMAN. NAME THE FILM and give us the actor who PLAYED them in our GIF! HERE THEY ARE . . . 

NUMBER ONE

NUMBER TWO

NUMBER THREE 

NUMBER FOUR

SEND YOUR ANSWERS to our EMAIL ADDRESS: petercushingpcas@gmail.com THIS OPPORTUNITY TO WIN is only open until FRIDAY 23th of MARCH 2018. COMPETITION CLOSES AT MIDNIGHT GMT that evening. WINNERS will be announced the following day here, during #CHRISTOPHERLEESATURDAY! GOOD LUCK EVERYONE!

YOU CAN ORDER YOUR COPIES OF CINEFICCION HERE!

THERE ARE TWO HAMMER FILM STARS who worked with PETER CUSHING and who are sharing a birthday TODAY!  John Van Eyssen who sadly passed BUT still very much with us is SHE herself...URSULA ANDRESS. 'SHE' (1965) was the first film from Hammer to be built around a female star. Tall and statuesque, Ursula Andress was a perfect choice to play Ayesha, though in retrospect she claims to have disliked the role. 

ANDRESS HAS BEEN criticized by reviewers for her icy demeanor and aloof detachment, but these characteristics proved beneficial for playing the steely-eyed Ayesha. Costumed in a selection of warm-colored, Grecian-styled gowns and gold jewelry, she glows onscreen, partly due to the flattering, high-key lighting of cinematographer Harry Waxman.

BORN IN SWITZERLAND to German parents, the exotic-looking beauty spoke with an accent, which Hammer's producers found too distracting. Andress's entire role was then re-voiced and dubbed over by an actress named Monica Van Der Syl, who mimicked a slight Swiss accent so audiences did not suspect the truth. John Richardson's lines were also dubbed in post-production by the actor himself, perhaps to give his line readings an added emphasis, since he tended to be overshadowed by Cushing and Lee. Lee and Cushing appeared to enjoy working with Andress, and appearing in the film. Lee died with a nice touch and Cushing got to DANCE!

TODAY WE REMEMBER Hammer's first vampire hunter John Van Eyssen.Best known for starring in Hammer's DRACULA /Horror Of Dracula as Jonathan Harker. Eyssen also starred in Hammer's QUATERMASS 2 and a early Terrence Fisher Hammer film called The Four Sided Triangle in 1953. Van Eyssen did a great job of playing Harker, and went on to appear in only nine other feature films, then leave his acting career in 1961 and become the head of the Grade Organisation literary agency.  He then left the business in 65 to take up a position in the UK division of Columbia Pictures, eventually becoming Managing Director in July 1969. Finally in 1970, he was promoted to Worldwide Head of Production (ex-USA) and moved to New York.

#MOMENTOFTERRORMONDAY! IS ALWAYS a pleasure to post! We get to pick and edit, what is another classic moment from a Cushing film, and this one, might not be so well known as the Amicus and Hammer films shocking scenes, but it does do VERY well! LEGEND of the WEREWOLF has been covered many time at our website, what was once our facebook page, before THEY turned into a TERROR...and again on our PCAS You Tube Channel today. On the theme of WEREWOLVES, it ALSO TIES IN  well with our SPEEDY COMPETITION today too! 

OVER THE YEARS, it has been gaining a lot of notice, more than when it was made in 1975. Some of it may have to do with the fact that this and THE GHOUL Cushing films from TYBURN FILMS ..still has not had a legit release of dvd or Blu Ray. MANY MANY illegal and poor releases, but we still await the arrival. Cushng is smashing, Rintoul as our Werewolf is top dog and Ron Moody and Roy Castle make the film fun. Until that release arrives, here is another clip, sharpened for the TERROR factor!