Tag Archives: Christopher Lee

Lee, Carradine, Cushing and Price

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I’ve seen this photo and others like it a lot in recent days since the death of iconic horror film actor Christopher Lee.

This pic and similar ones show Lee, John Carradine, Peter Cushing and Vincent Price – probably half the pantheon of horror film greats (the others being, arguably, Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi and Lon Chaney Sr. and Jr.) in one photo.

The four appeared in only one film together, the 1983 thriller “House of Long Shadows.” The movie was – for such an old-fashioned assemblage of actors – an old-fashioned story about mysterious goings-on in a “haunted” house and was based on the 1913 “Seven Keys to Baldpate” by Earl Derr Biggers.

I saw the movie in theaters – i was reviewing back at the time – and remember enjoying that it included the four actors in the cast but didn’t think much of it beyond that. It starred Desi Arnaz Jr., for pete’s sake.

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But with Lee’s passing being a reminder to us that an era is over – maybe a couple of eras, considering that Carradine’s time in movies extended back to “Bride of Frankenstein,” as the huntsman who scares Karloff’s monster out of the blind man’s cottage – “House of Long Shadows” takes on special affection and significance for us.

Christopher Lee: Last of the legends

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When I heard earlier today that Christopher Lee had died at age 93, I thought, “That can’t be right, can it?”

After all, it was only within the past few years that he was playing the evil wizard Saruman in the “Lord of the Rings” and “Hobbit” movies, and just a few years before that when he played Count Dooku (sigh) in the “Star Wars” prequels.

This was a man who – even though he had certainly earned his rest at 93 – had always seemed invincible.

During World War II, Lee fought on the side of the angels, serving in various British military roles and, most amazingly, as a Nazi hunter for Britain’s Registry of War Criminals.

His film career was as lengthy and varied as his contemporary and frequent co-star, Peter Cushing, who often played Van Helsing to Lee’s Dracula in Hammer films beginning in 1958.

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Although Lee had a busy career in recent years, it was as Dracula – and Frankenstein’s monster and the Mummy – in Hammer films that made his reputation as an actor in horror outings. Sometimes Lee’s Dracula was little more than a snarling creature, but in his last outing as the Count – “The Satanic Rites of Dracula” – he had something of a dual role, playing a reclusive billionaire who wanted to bring about the end of the world … and just happened to be Dracula.

I still vividly remember going to see the 1973 movie, which was released stateside as “Count Dracula and His Vampire Bride,” at a theater here in Muncie. I was almost alone in the theater. Maybe Hammer’s brand of horror seemed old fashioned by that point. After all, “The Exorcist” was released that year and introduced a new type of horror movie to the masses.

But Lee – and Cushing, and Vincent Price, and all the rest, gone now – will always typify the horror genre to me.

We’ll miss you, Mr. Lee.

Classic shlock: ‘Curse of the Crimson Altar/Crimson Cult’

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In the final years of his life, before his death at age 81 in February 1969, Boris Karloff had become a beloved figure in movies and TV. The man who played Frankenstein’s monster in 1931 continued working for decades, ensuring himself a place in entertainment history not only with his early work but with vocal performances aimed at children and the entire family, as in “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” in 1966.

Although he was in frail health late in life, Karloff continued working, turning out four movies that were released in 1968 alone. One was “Targets,” a poignant drama in which Karloff played a veteran horror movie actor whose fate is intertwined with a modern-day horror, a murderous sniper.

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1968 also saw the release – at least in the United Kingdom; the U.S. release came in 1970 – of “Curse of the Crimson Altar,” known in the U.S. as “The Crimson Cult.”

This movie’s plot is familiar to those who remember “The Wicker Man” and other movies about cults that thrive in small-town England: An outsider comes to town looking for his missing brother. Little does he know that the lord of the manor who welcomes him into his home is the leader of a crazy cult (is there any other kind?) that worships a long-dead witch. The crusty local professor is able to help provide some clues, but it’s only a manner of time until our hero is trussed up in a dungeon, waiting to be sacrificed.

Mark Eden is fair to middling as the hero, but the reason for this movie to exist are the headliners who draw from two generations of horror film superstars.

Karloff plays Professor Marsh, the witchcraft expert, and Christopher Lee is Morley, the leader of the cult. Karloff is frail here, spending much of his time in a wheelchair. But his voice is as rich and strong as it was at any time in his career and he brings a touch of class to the movie.

Lee is likewise good as the cult leader, although anyone hoping to see him invoking demons and sacrificing virgins had better look elsewhere. Lee skulks through his mansion, urbane and threatening by turns, but the cult scenes for the most part look like they could have been shot anytime and anywhere. Except for the presence of Eden in a couple of them, the cult scenes look like they could have been shot years and miles apart from the rest.

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At least those scenes are presided over by Italian horror superstar Barbara Steele. Steele’s painted green here, for some reason – more witchlike? – but looks great.

The movie has many of the loony elements you’d expect from a movie about sinister witch cults released in 1968: A witch (that’s a given), a cult (well …) human sacrifices in a dungeon, implements of torture, women in pasties with whips (!) and guys in, well, I’m not sure how to describe these outfits. Maybe leather onesies with the arms cut out?

Random observations:

The movie, upon release in the U.S. by American International Pictures, was rated “GP,” the forerunner to PG. And while it’s hard to believe now, the movie shared one quality with other PG-rated movies of the 1970s and even 1980s: Nudity. It’s not much more than you can see on some cable TV shows right now, but if a PG or even PG-13 movie came out today and contained nudity, people would go nuts.

Likewise, the movie features scenes of “wild and groovy” parties, complete with dancing girls in mini skirts and people painting each other. In retrospective, the scenes come off like something from an “Austin Powers” movie.

Although Karloff comes off all gruff and sinister – and he’s Boris Karloff, after all, the original Frankenstein’s monster – he’s on the side of the angels here. Despite the looming, grimacing visage in some of the movie’s posters.