“The Sorcerers” is the second of three films directed by Michael Reeves, who died shortly after making the third (“Witchfinder General”). This film stars Boris Karloff, Ian Ogilvy, and Catherine Lacey, and involves an elderly hypnotist who develops a device allowing remote control of another person’s mind, controlling that person’s actions even from a distance.…
“Hammer House of Horror” can be seen as the last offering from Hammer Studios, at least in their classic period. It ran for one season of thirteen episodes, each one telling a different horror tale. While none of the episodes were bad, there was some variety in quality as there is with any television. In…
Montague Rhodes James was an English medievalist scholar and author, employed at both Eton and Cambridge (where he eventually became Vice-Chancellor). His ghost stories are widely considered to be among the best in the English language, and they have been very influential on subsequent horror. He drew upon his own studies and work as inspiration…
I have to say, I am rather fond of found footage movies. You need to go into these with the presumption that all characters you are about to see are going to die (there are exceptions to this rule, but they’re rare) but they can be fun and creepy to watch. There is always the…
“Us” is written and directed by Jordan Peele, two years after his directorial debut in feature films, with “Get Out”. “Us” concerns the Wilson family, who go on holiday to California. They stay in the childhood home of the mother. Adelaide (Lupita Nyong’o), who remembers a childhood traumatic event at a seaside carnival. When the…
“Tales from the Crypt” is a British anthology movie comprising five short stories, with a framing story involving five people on a tour of some kind of catacombs, apparently getting separated from their group and coming across a man in a monk’s robes who makes each one of them see a story ostensibly about their…
Based on a short story by Robert Graves, “The Shout” tells the story of a man who (supposedly) has learned a mystical skill from Australian Aborigines, a shout that can kill. I am not familiar with the director (Jerzy Skolimowski) but it does have an excellent cast, headed by John Hurt, Alan Bates and Susannah…
“Overlord” is a war/horror movie based in World War Two. As part of the D Day invasion, paratroopers are sent in behind enemy lines. The group is given the job of destroying a radio tower in a French village. Only a few of them survive the landing, and they soon realise they have run into…
Starring Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing and Diana Dors, this film starts with three mysterious deaths, where the people involved appear to be murdered but without putting up a fight. The deaths are ruled as suicides, but Police Colonel Bingham (Lee), regards the deaths as suspicious. All three are trustees for a prominent orphanage in Scotland,…
I want to start this review by saying I do not like slasher films. On the whole I find them pointless – usually involving mysterious guys in masks stomping around chopping people up in gory ways just because. That makes no sense to me. “You’re Next” was recommended to me as being not that kind…
Eclectic Assemblage 