The Magnificent Six and ½ - 'Ghosts and Ghoulies' (1969) - The gang initiate new members Whizz and Peewee by having him spend the night in a haunted house!
'The Magnificent Six and ½' was a British comedy film series for the Children's Film Foundation. Based on Hal Roach's popular 'Our Gang' series of shorts, 'Six and ½' followed a group of seven children on their fun misadventures. Created by Harry Booth and Roy Simpson, the series ran in cinemas from 1968 to 1972, with three series and eighteen half-hour episodes in all. Following the first two series, Booth and Simpson decided to bring their children's series to television, eventually creating a very similar series called 'Here Come the Double Deckers!'. The first series of 'The Magnificent Six and ½' starred Len Jones as the group's leader, Steve, Brinsley Forde as prankster Toby, Suzanne Togni as tomboy Liz, Ian Ellis as rather large Dumbo, Michael Audreson as the clever Whizz, Lionel Hawkes as the always hungry Stodger, and Kim Tallmadge as tag-a-long Peewee (the '½' in the serial's title).
In the first episode, 'Ghosts and Ghoulies', the rest of the gang meet Whizz and his little sister Peewee for the first time. Whizz and Peewee are allowed to join the gang if they spend the night in a haunted house.
Produced by Century Films with Roy Simpson and directed by Harry Booth, the series debuted in February 1968.
In the 1950s Hammer, England’s world-renowned production company, initiated a new style of horror film-making that transformed the genre. At the end of the 1960s, the world that Hammer had helped to create was changing fast – the once-reliable business model was unraveling and audiences wanted something new from their films.
Amid this uncertainty, Hammer’s short-term survival was secured by an alliance with American distributor Warner Bros. The films the two companies made together are among the most renowned in Hammer’s history. Classics such as Dracula Has Risen From the Grave (1968), Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed (1970) and Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970) were produced alongside the Oscar-nominated epic When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth (1970), the disturbing thriller Crescendo (1970) and the bizarre sci-fi western Moon Zero Two (1969).
The films became increasingly experimental in the 1970s, challenging the perception of traditional Gothic horror with Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972), The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973) and The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (1974).
HAMMER HORROR: The Warner Bros Years documentary features exclusive interviews with some of the key players from that period, as well as authors and popular culture historians like Sir Christopher Frayling and Jonathan Rigby. Also included are rare production stills, previously unseen film footage, Hammer’s original shooting locations, and access to previously unpublished archive documents.
The documentary is written, produced and directed by Derek Pykett and pays tribute to Peter Cushing, Freddie Francis and Roy Ward Baker. The actual documentary is essentially hosted by actor Geoffrey Bayldon, with most of the 3 hour-plus running time focusing on surviving cast and crew members, following some background information on the two producers.
Best remembered for their portmanteau/anthology features, this documentary offers us a chance to hear from such directors as Peter Duffell ("The House That Dripped Blood"), Stephen Weeks ("I, Monster"), Kevin Connor ("From Beyond the Grave"), and Paul Annett ("The Beast Must Die"), owing to the recent passing of the more prolific Freddie Francis and Roy Ward Baker. We get particularly interesting glimpses of Barbara Ewing ("Torture Garden," "Dracula Has Risen from the Grave") and Angela Pleasence, who actually worked with lookalike father Donald Pleasence in "From Beyond the Grave" (and is scared by horror films!). There are anecdotes about stars like Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Jack Palance, Burgess Meredith, and character players such as Bernard Lee, Herbert Lom, and Patrick Magee, but only minute name dropping for Michael Gough, Nigel Green, or Anton Diffring. A pity about the amateurish sound quality but never the less, certainly worth a look for avid fans of Britain's Golden Age of Horror.
Tales of the Uncanny is an exploration of the portmanteau horror film format that features dozens of filmmakers, critics and notable fans, providing brief commentary and impressions about major portmanteau titles. It's a history that expands from the silent film era to today.
For those unfamiliar with portmanteau films they consist of several short films often linked by a wrap around narrative. These stories often are adaptations of literary shorts. As expressed in the documentary, the anthology format lent itself to experimentation and freedom for filmmakers resulting in some terrifying, bizarre, funny and unforgettable segments throughout the format's history.
Tales of the Uncanny is about breadth rather than depth, which frankly is perfect since this film is likely to introduce fans to at least a few new titles. Films are generally covered quickly, often one or two segments from each film are focused on. It's apparent which films, or more specifically studio, is most influential on the pool of folks contributing to this documentary since Amicus' portmanteaus are covered most extensively. This makes sense, give the small British studio's commitment to the format and their influence over the format and genre.
Taking a mostly chronological look at the format, the first section begins in the silent era, stepping to 1945’s Dead of Night and the films Amicus and then onto Milton Subotsky’s post Amicus films such as The Uncanny and The Monster Club.
There’s a detour into the world of television anthologies next. Movies such as the 1979 Dead of Night and Trilogy of Terror are covered as are series like The Twilight Zone, Night Gallery and Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Tales from the Darkside, Tales from the Crypt and Hammer House of Horror.
Tales of the Uncanny is an enjoyable overview of a much loved film format that should offer many views a string of titles to discover and fall in love with and the blu ray is highly recommended as it contains a few very rare horror anthologies for viewers to enjoy. This is a must watch doc for any horror lover!
A visual exploration into the origins of witchcraft in the UK and in particular the demystification of symbolism still embedded today within many modern religious artefacts and rituals
Broadcast as a Play For Today by the BBC in 1970, James MacTaggart's Robin Redbreast remains a unique proposition in British television history.
An uneasy tale of human sacrifice deep in the English countryside and an early example of what we now refer to as 'folk horror', it has retained its power to unsettle despite the passing decades.
It can even lay claim to being a prime influence on that most seminal slice of cinematic pagan horror, The Wicker Man, which arrived in all its sacrificial glory three years later.
On 14th February 1945, the lifeless body of Charles Walton, a 74-year-old farm labourer, was discovered in Meon Hill, Lower Quinton, Warwickshire. Walton’s murder became known as the ‘witchcraft murder’ because his body was pinned to the ground with a pitchfork and there is an ancient Anglo-Saxon custom of slashing or sticking spikes into a murdered witch’s skin. This form of murder is called ‘stacung’ or ‘stanging’ – ‘stang’ being a two pointed stick witches associate with the Horned God. Scotland Yard became involved but the murder was never solved and became the stuff of local legend with added embellishments, such as a large cross carved into the victim’s chest which wasn’t in the autopsy notes.
In his book Anatomy of Crime, the detective in charge of the case wrote, ‘I advise anybody who is tempted at any time to venture into Black Magic, witchcraft, Shamanism – call it what you will – to remember Charles Walton and to think of his death, which was clearly the ghastly climax of a pagan rite.’ The witchcraft murders provided inspiration for two pieces of writing that later became known as Folk Horror. The first was a teleplay by John Bowen called Robin Redbreast (1970, James MacTaggart) and the second was a book called Ritual by David Pinner, which became the 1973 film, The Wicker Man (Robin Hardy).
Bowen wrote the play for a suspense anthology series but it was rejected and ended up with Graeme MacDonald, Producer of Play for Today – a BBC1 drama series, that ran from 1970 to 1984:
The transmission of Robin Redbreast, which was broadcast on the 10th December 1970 , coincided with an electrician’s strike whereupon millions of houses in London and the Midlands missed the end. The play was eventually repeated in February 1971 but the original screening, which was in colour, was recorded over and it is now only available in a 16mm black and white telecine recording.
John Bowen (1924 – 2019) was a prolific English novelist and playwright who worked on several long running drama strands including Play for Today and ITV Play of the Week. He also wrote two films for the BBC strand, A Ghost Story for Christmas which ran from 1971 to 1978 : The Treasure of Abbot Thomas (1974, Lawrence Gordon Clark), which is an adaptation of a short story by MR James, and an original drama called The Ice House (1978, Derek Lister). He wrote A Woman Sobbing (1972, Paul Ciappessoni) for Dead of Night, which was a 1972 BBC anthology of short supernatural films. Bowen also wrote another folk horror called A Photograph (1977, John Glenister) https://odysee.com/@Misty_Isles:a/A-Photograph-(1977):1 which can be seen as a loose follow up to Robin Redbreast.
Part Mondo movie, part countercultural artefact, 'Secret Rites' is a strange mid-length 'documentary' by exploitation director Derek Ford.
Ford l ifts the lid on witchcraft in 1970s Notting Hill. Mystery band The Spindle provide the groovy, psychedelic sounds while tentative occult enthusiast Penny and a serious-sounding narrator introduce the viewer to three ritual actsis a 1971 British pseudo-drama. It concerns the study of witchcraft and black magic, with a rare appearance by real-life occultist Alex Sanders.
'Easter 2016' by Graham Reid
2016: Ideological stand off in a Northern Ireland teacher training college on the centenary of the Easter Rising. With Bill Nighy, Colm Meaney and a young Kenneth Branagh.
Produced for the BBC's Play for Tomorrow series of 'future'-themed productions, the Ben Bolt-directed Easter 2016 predicts a sobering vision of life in a north where integrated education has been implemented under the close protection of a 'secret police'-styled security regime.
Ostensibly there to guard against attacks by sectarian dissidents, these watchdogs seem equally concerned with monitoring the lives of those attending the New Communities College of Education's heavily fortified teacher training facility at Stormont.
With College founder Dr Cyril Brown (Denis Hawthorne) and hard-headed new security director Lennie North (Derrick O'Connor) butting heads over their very different approaches to ensuring the institution's 'politically neutral' status quo is maintained, events take a drastic turn for the worse as nationalist and republican-leaning students and staff (the latter led by a young Bill Nighy) become determined to rebel by holding a commemorative Easter Rising march in the spirit of the 1960s Northern Ireland civil rights movement.
Reid's tension-winding script and a talented cast also featuring nascent Irish acting talent such as Colm Meaney, Gerard McSorley (Father Ted, Braveheart, Lethal Weapon 2), Eileen Pollock (Bread) and Lise Ann McLaughlin (The Irish RM) help ensure Easter 2016 is an engrossing watch.
'The House that Bled to Death' was the fifth episode and - due to one scene in particular - remains the most referenced of the series. It's a haunted house tale with a twist in the tail that concerns a young family who buy a house notorious for being the location of a brutal murder. Inevitably strange events begin to plague them culminating in the exuberant gorefest of the birthday party and as an aside for anyone unfamiliar with the scene who's troubled by that description of a children's party watch for the anticipatory relish on the faces of at least two of the kids moments before the blood starts flowing.