A History Of Horror With Mark Gatiss... Coming soon to BBC Four.

Great show, could have done with two parts on classic hollywood to cover all the classic universal series plus the Val Lewtons. Then two more on the late 50s to early 70s period to cover the emergence of Hammer and then the roger corman/amicus/wicker mans it inspired.

John Carpenter came across as a twit I thought. He's obviously bitter his career went down the toilet in the nineties. Yes, John, that's because your films became unwatchable crap:D
 
Which commentary are you referring to? The Mark Gatiss/League of Gentleman one is on the The Tigon box set only.

Also, when talking about 'The Night of the Demon', Gatiss said the director was criticized for revealing the demon at the end of the film. This is strange because there was more uproar when the demon was shown at the beginning of 'NOTD' on the orders of the film company/distrubtor!

For anybody who is interested, the R2 dvd of 'NOTD' has finally been released this week!
 
I remember wondering at the time why it had so many graphic clips in! I caught it by mistake one late night while in bed.
The BBFC have made some strange cuts in the past I hope the BBC shows the programme again with the cuts restored. My memory is awful so I can't remember much about the content or the year it was on:o
 
Fantastic episode, glad to see some of my favourite horrors (Night of The Demon, Plague of the Zombies, Dracula Prince Of Darkness and Witchfinder General) got a mention.

'Blood on Satan's Claw' was released as a single dvd and part of a box set called 'The Tigon Collection'. For the latter, Mark Gatiss and his 'League of Gentleman' cohorts did a documentary and recorded a commentary for the 'BOSC' dvd!

The documentary was shot while Gatiss and co. were filming their own big screen 'epic' which referenced 'BOSC' and had David Warner in!
 
Thought it was fantastic... loved the tribute to Frankenstein in the programme's opening. It was also wonderful to hear the memories of the survivors of that golden age of horror. I can understand some people being narked at the lack of Nosferatu but ultimately this wasn't an A-Z of horror, it was the presenters own personal retrospective look at the horrors that had an impact on him through his life, and this opening episode was set around his memories of seeing the old Universal films on tv in his youth. I'm of a similar age to him and I can't remember ever seeing Nosferatu on tv back then, but the old Universal films were a staple of tv movies in those days.
Anyway, it was a joy and I can't wait for next week's Hammer episode. Fab! :)
 
I even had (actually still have) that self same book he had. Along with its companion books on action and fantasy. Where does time go?

RegarRAB

Mark
 
I thought the second instalment was excellent also. It is amazing the number of films Hammer turned out and the apparent lavishness of the sets despite working on a small budget.
 
It's about rights ....... Bride of Dracula was already shown recently on BBC4, and "Dawn" was the only Romero film available ........

Meanwhile, Suspiria keeps cropping up on film4, and Driller Killer and Little Shop were on Showtime .......

John Carpenter? Well, Halloween established a genre, and The Thing is good (truer to original than Howard Hawkes) ..... and The Fog was wonderfully atmospheric (but crap ending, I must admit).
 
Try young Frankenstien - which is a marvellous parody (Mel Brooks' best film) - then go back to Bride ........

However ...... it's a shame they can't show the original Frankenstein, far and away a better film.
 
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