A History of Horror - Home Counties Horror
Mark Gatiss continues his celebration of horror cinema by uncovering the stories behind the films of the 1950s and 60s, an era dominated by Hammer Films.
From the late 18th century to the flowering of the Queen Victoria reign, there was a tonne of gothic literature around, and in turn, this splashed onto cinema screens and the
home counties became the heartland of horror. Bray Studios aided the creation of Hammer films and the
science fiction genre, the same genre that almost killed off horror, was about to revive it.
The Quatermass Experiment seemed to point to a horrific new future for Hammer, who originally focused on radio drama production. Now, they were remaking classic Frankenstein with the new creation 'The Curse of Frankenstein. 6'4 actor Christopher Lee demanded a startling prescence on screen. It was found that Universal, the original creators of the first Frankenstein film, had copyrighted nearly all of their creation, meaning Hammer had to create something innovative for their production.
The new Frankenstein was not merely a re-tell of the original story, it was a revolutionary new approach to horror cinema. It's most striking concept was it's use of colour. The film was the first British horror film to be made in colour and producers became obsessed with the new opportunities open to them. For example, in one scene, they painted leaves in the foreground red so they stood out more. This was also one of the first films to introduce shockingly groundbreaking shots of gore.
Next, Hammer decided to revisit other classic, Dracula which reportedly made 70 times as much as it's production cost. A lot of early horror films got laughed at due to boring openings etc, and the new Dracula sought to put an end to that by being one of the first films to show gore in the first scene. At the premiere of the film, the audience were shocked! It was also the first mainstream Dracula film to use proper fangs which were also dripping with blood.
Cause of moral constonation - Times were changing, and Dracula was now portrayed to be sexually interested in his victims too. Sexually provocative scenes were attempted to be cut from the final production but Hammer refused to cut them, stating they were not showing anything indecent. This brought a new energy to the genre. Horror had been reborn after it's post-war lull.
This horror boom made it onto our tv screens and it began to influence a whole new generation.
Peter Crushing - arguably one of the most underated British screen actors. He was clever, whilst playing a role in another new frankenstein movie, he consulted his local GP to ask how to best go about performing a brain transplant. The actor was quoted saying "If you don't believe it yourself, then they (the audience) never will".
Hammer pioneered the mix of heavy sex & death in horror films. Inspired by British horrors, Italian producer Mario Barva mixed Hammer's use of colour and blood with Universal's original black and white style. This paved the way for the start of Italian Horror and Black Sunday was one of his first films!
The masque of the red death touched on more dreamlike horror which made it even more genuinely frightening to audiences. The film captured the sense of a genuine nightmare. More and more films began to touch on complex themes which played on people's intrinsic fears; for instance the slow torture death in the 1961 film Pit and the pendulum, which also unveiled the first real graphic shock to an audience - pivotal moment of the horror genre.
Britain began to become the location for a number of tense supernatural chillers, which changed the industry completely.
Jacques Tourneur, prodigy of Val Lewton broke his predecessor's law stating that the monster should never be revealed, but audiences found that Tourneur's scene showing the demon on the London to Southampton rail line terrific!
Other following films agreed with Lewton's law, suggesting that fear comes through suggestion and the classic ghost story 'The Haunting' was made into a film in 1963. In the film, power derives from a number of unsettling sounds and images. Use of distorted camera angles and sudden noise helped to create a sense of dread. Narrator Gatiss believes though - "It is difficult to do justice to a film like the haunting, which is all about building an atmosphere" and this is something we considered when choosing our sub genre of horror for our teaser trailer.
In the 1960s, a memorable performance from Barbara Shelley also proved that female vampires can be more than just a decoration. In 1965, Hammer experimented with re-using sets and casts, most memorably, Windsor House.
Portmanteau - During the mid 1960s, new horror concepts brought forward portmanteaus, ie clips of horror put together in a story like fashion to avoid boredom. Studio Amicus developed many of these films including Dr Terror's house of horrors and The asylum. Portmanteau's were a mix of short sequences all with their own twists, and so if you didnt like one particular story, then there would be another along 10 minutes later. Actors also liked this new idea due to the fast production rates.
Hammer began to struggle to keep up with the changing times, and eventually left Bray Studios. It appeared that the theme of sex had started to become mroe important than horror itself.
Lust of a Vampire showed nude women and more and more films began to do this to capture audiences. Director of the film, Michael Style, made it abundantly clear what a horror film now needed.
"A lot of murders, a lot of blood, more than 5 gallons of blood was used in this picture alone, a good strong villain (has to be villainously looking), a good hero, a certain amount of sex, lots of action and lots of pretty girls. That's your story".
A new version of Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde surfaced in the medias eye and there was huge speculation over how director Roy Ward Baker would breathe new life into the story - but he did. Hence, Dr Jekyl and Sister Hyde. The transformation scene is a brilliant spin on the single shot scene in the 1931 production.
Hammer squeezed every drop out of 19th Century gothic, and faced a constant struggle to bring their horror up to date. Experiments included kung fu vampires and taking Dracula to London, but both were flops. Coming years saw a decline in British Horror which seemed pretty much irreversible. However, a new generation of film makers avoided the gothic cliches by stepping even further away from the modern world. Hello FOLK HORROR.
Arguably, the most classic and notable folk horror film was the Wicker man, which played out it's horrific final conclusion in broad daylight.
An interesting effect the documentary made me aware of - In the opening scene of the 1970 film Blood on Satan's claw, we see an eye in the groun so for a majority of the rest of the action, there is emphasis on the use of low camera angles to create a sense of the characters being watched from beneath the soil, like the Devil. The director admitted that they digged a lot of holes for the camera to go in!
The film also showed a breakdown of morals by filming a rape scene. Director Piers Haggard states that when you bring a new, innovative idea to the table, you often get seduced by your own idea, so you need to be careful. Looking back on including the rape scene in the final product he stated "looking back, it was probably too strong of a scene".
