"The Vampire Lovers" (1970) on Netflix

"You must die. Everybody must die."

   

     Ah, Hammer Pictures, where men's collars are high and filled with starch, and women's neckline's are low and filled with cleavage. Our look at the studio at the dawn of the 1970's continues with "The Vampire Lovers". Like "Crescendo", this picture shows the studio making a strong start to the decade that would eventually give us Dracula bringing death to the love generation and a Stuart Whitman international action thriller.

     We start off with a Hammer double whammy: a fog shrouded graveyard in front of a castle at night. Baron Hartog (Douglas Wilmer) hides in the decrepit castle of the Karnstein's, waiting to take revenge on the dreaded bloodsucker's who took his sister's life. What transpires in this pre-credit sequence is everything you hope to get when you enter the world of Hammer: atmosphere, creepy set's, redder than red blood, a coffin that appears to also be a fog machine and a gorgeous vampire babe. Everything seems to be very traditional, until a shockingly gory decapitation occurs. Welcome to the 70's, Hammer.

     Peter Cushing is Hammer royalty, and he is General Speilsdorf and he is throwing a party for his niece, Laura (Pippa Steele). Into the room enter the Countess (Dawn Addams) and Marcilla (Ingrid Pitt), the eye of every man upon them. Laura comments to her beau, Carl (Jon Finch), that Marcilla seems to be checking him out. He disagrees, saying he's not the half of the couple at which the mysterious woman is looking. The Countess asks the General to look after Marcilla while she goes away and he agrees. Throughout the entire picture, but especially in this scene, we see Hammer's trademark bold use of the color red. It's in the General's uniform, the red cape worn by the mysterious man who calls the Countess away, Marcilla's dress and the uniform of the coachmen; the sanguinary hue inhabits every frame.

     Laura awakes, screaming in the night, from a dream in which she's being attacked by a giant cat. Uncoincidentally, Marcilla begins to make the move's on her, growing more intimate with each encounter. Soon, a strange sickness takes hold of Laura, who lay in bed repeatedly asking for Marcilla. Moments after she arrives in the room, Laura exits this mortal coil.

     Later, The Countess' carriage tips over while journeying through the forest. There's never a shortage of well to do men willing to aid a young lass, so she soon convinces Roger Morton (George Cole) to take in her "daughter", now going by the name of Carmilla. Pitt's sex appeal may be what this picture was sold on, but Madeline Smith, who's plays Emma, Morton's niece, is the most remarkable beauty in the film. Big eyed, with a porcelain fragility, she's like a Keane painting come to life.

     Unsurprisingly, Carmilla chooses Emma as her new prey, and no time is wasted before they are getting naked together. The big pussy cat dream makes another appearance, this time experienced by Emma. Whatever the charm's of Tudor Gates screenplay might be, subtlety and unpredictability aren't two of them.

     There's a wonderful sequence in which a funeral procession for one of Carmilla's victim's passes on the road by her and Emma. Overwhelmed by the tolling bell and religious chanting, Carmilla finds herself shaken by this mockery of her undying existence. Pitt's screen presence is a mix of Catherine Deneuve and Nico (perhaps LESS vampiric than Nico), with line readings in the kind of cavernous Teutonic monotone you would expect from that combo. In this scene, though, she is truly compelling, bordering on powerful.

     Morton goes away for some reason or other, and Carmilla takes this opportunity to use her seductive vampirism to gain power over the household. Carmilla seduces the Governess in a strongly back-lit scene that evinces true artistry. Roy Ward Baker was a Hammer stalwart, and he does some fine work here; the beginning and ending at Karnstein Castle and a scene in which the Doctor who has been caring for Emma is attacked in the leave strewn twilight forest, in particular.

     By the end of the film, the race is on as the General, Morton and Hartog try to find Mircalla Karnstein's (the true identity of Marcilla/ Carmilla) grave before poor Emma is consumed by the lust of the dark side. It all ends with Cushing, stake in hand, confronting a vampire in their coffin. So, if you've ever seen, or even heard about a Hammer film, you know how it ends.

     "The Vampire Lovers" was part of the Euro-gothic softcore vampire genre that was fairly popular in the 1970's. Other examples are "Vampyres", "Daughter's of Darkness" and a whole load of Jean Rollin (the undisputed master of the genre) and Jess Franco effort's. With the "Karnstein Trilogy" (this picture, along with "Lust For a Vampire" and "Twins of Evil"), Hammer took the lush period atmos-horror stories that were their bread and butter and just added more boob's and lesbo overtone's. Ironically, what's most memorable about this film is how well it employs the more traditional element's of the Hammer style. The shot's of Pitt walking across the fog strewn landscape are haunting and more effective than any flash of t&a might be.

     Pitt didn't appear in the other two Karnstein outing's, but would appear in "Countess Dracula" for the studio the following year. I was surprised after watching this picture and "Crescendo" at how strongly Hammer entered the era of modern horror. These two films, along with "Vampire Circus" and "Captain Kronos", made two years later, proved the studio was at their best when they made picture's in their own style without trying to ape current fad's. Despite it's more explicit elements, "The Vampire Lovers" is united with the classic Hammer film's through it's craftsmanship and timelessness.

     

     

"Crescendo" (1970) on Warner Archive Instant

"There's so much atmosphere. I hardly know where to begin."

     Hammer Films in the 1970's was a strange beast. The violent Technicolor elegance that had once enthralled horror fans in the late 50's/ early 60's had come to be viewed as quaint and dated as the Universal horror's. Forced to survive in a post- "Night of the Living Dead" genre landscape alongside titles such as "The Exorcist", "The Last House on the Left" and "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre", Hammer desperately tried to remain relevant by upping the sex and gore quotient; cashing in on post "Exorcist" satanic panic with "To The Devil a Daughter" and even teaming with kung-fu magnates the Shaw Brothers for a couple co-productions. They managed to create some entertaining work during those twilight years. "Captain Kronos- Vampire Hunter" is a fun vampiric swashbuckling tale and "The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires" features Peter Cushing going on a kung-fu adventure (if that's not something you're interested in, you're reading the wrong blog). To that list of noteworthy late period Hammer productions you can add the sleazy Gothic thriller "Crescendo".

     Originally a project of the Brian Jones of British horror, Michael Reeves, "Crescendo" finally came to be made at the turn of the decade under the direction of Alan Gibson, with a script rewritten by old Hammer standby, Jimmy Sangster. The picture opens with slow motion horseback riding and smooth sax, not exactly how you'd expect a thriller to start. It all soon turns into an Argento-esque fever dream, though, as a man has a shotgun pointed at him by his mirror image and he discovers the girl he's been laying with has become a corpse. The man suffering the dream is Georges Ryman (James Olsen), a wheelchair bound ex tennis player, who lives in a large French chateau with his mother, Danielle (Margaretta Scott). Throughout the film, Georges repeatedly experiences the dream, with the imagery staying basically the same, changing only slightly as fact's are slowly revealed.

     Into their life enters Susan Roberts (Stefanie Powers), a grad student there to do her thesis on the late Mr. Ryman, who was a renowned composer. Initially enthusiastic, Susan is slowly drawn into the bizarre psychodrama of the Ryman's and their servant's Lillianne (Jane Lapotaire) and Carter (Joss Ackland). Georges takes a liking to Susan, but suffers spasms only curable through heroin, usually administered by a naked, sadomasochistic Lillianne, who desires to marry him for his family's fortune and wishes Susan to be gone. One evening Susan hears piano coming from the music room, played by an unknown hand. Her fruitless journey to find out who it is ends with her discovering a disfigured mannequin head of her own visage. The classic monsters of Terrence Fisher, this is not. With a heavy air of Gothic mystery, the picture plays like a chamber drama directed by Mario Bava.

     Susan finds the clothes she has been wearing (since her own luggage disappeared under questionable circumstances) are those of an elusive woman from Georges' past, to whom she bears a resemblance. Georges urges Susan to leave the house, but Danielle wants just the opposite. As the baroque power struggle builds, people begin to get killed and Susan finds herself at the center of it all. Powers is great as a woman losing her innocence while trying not to lose her identity as well as her mind. The picture's climax is a clash between Eros and Thanatos in the form of mother and son, with a shocking twist worthy of classic Brian De Palma.

     Indeed, this film also shares De Palma's obsession with Hitchcockian body doubles, with Susan being groomed in a "Vertiginous" manner to resemble Catherine, and Georges' continual nightmare in which he confronts his own image. If De Palma's work can be considered the American echo of the modern Italian giallo as ushered in by Argento, then "Crescendo" can be viewed as the Anglo counterpart. Released early in the cycle, the same year as Argento's tide shifting "Bird With Crystal Plumage" and three years before De Palma would enter his "red period" with "Sisters", "Crescendo" fulfills most of the genre tropes: blood, nudity, twisted psychology, red herrings,  stylish camerawork, and a twist ending (the only thing missing is a black gloved killer). The American distribution for the the film was delayed by two years, when it was ignobly dumped on a double bill with "Dracula A.D. 1972", just months before De Palma would gain worldwide recognition by employing many of the same elements.

     The ending to the picture is tense and unsettling, as we wade waist deep into the killer's insanity within a room full of mannequin's. There is something intensely satisfying about a mystery thriller that knows how to stick the landing with a satisfying conclusion, rather than giving the audience a flaccid or sloppy letdown. It's a tough thing to do. Hitchcock knew how to do it, Depalma (in his younger day's) knew how to do it, Argento (in his younger day's) knew how to do it, and, in "Crescendo", Alan Gibson knew how to do it. That's reason enough to learn his name. Visually, the film is multi layered and evocative, with a great sense of movement and the final shots directly anticipate the ending's to Argento's "Suspiria" and "Inferno".

     "Crescendo" is the best example of Hammer bringing their style into the nasty, dirty 70's; taking the Gothic atmosphere they built their name on and adding sex, drugs and harder violence in a manner that doesn't seem desperate or forced. The master himself, Alfred Hitchcock, would pull off the same trick a couple years later, when he stepped back onto the street's of London and gave us "Frenzy".