settima

horror

The Devil Rides Out (Terence Fisher, 1968)

Apr

29

The Devil Rides Out (1968)

The menacing Mocata (Charles Gray). DP: Arthur Grant.

– Do you realise what today's date is, Rex?

– April the, er, 29th, why?

Misterios de la magia negra [Mysteries of Black Magic] (Miguel M. Delgado, 1958)

Apr

12

Misterios de la magia negra (1958)

Two well-dressed women, one of them prostrated on a stone slab. DP: Víctor Herrera.

Devil Doll (Lindsay Shonteff, 1964)

Mar

15

sandwiches

Devil Doll (1964)

A large knife amongst rather minuscule triangular tea sandwiches. A miniature wooden barrel holding toothpicks is right there for your sandwich stabbing convenience. DP: Gerald Gibbs.

3615 code Père Noël [Deadly Games / Dial Code Santa Claus] (René Manzor, 1989)

Dec

4

Santa's List Day

3615 code Père Noël (1989)

A letter to Santa on Santa's List Day (USA). A man in a grey overcoat and yellow scarf at a public Minitel terminal. On the display the code 3615 and an 8-bit illustration of Santa Claus carrying his bag with presents. The sack holds a smaller Minitel device with the text PERE NOEL. DP: Michel Gaffier.

Aah France… Land of old wine, old cheese, old art, and Internet access in the early 80s. Prestige project of Président Giscard, France was determined to take a technological leap. Any French man, woman and child could borrow a Minitel – a PC-like videotex device – from the national telecommunications services. For those who didn't have landline there were numerous public terminals throughout the land. The machine gave the people access to a phonebook (convenient!), the news (smart!), same-day delivery shopping(!) and sexting (ooh la la!). All these services were accessible via a code starting with 3615 followed by a string of letters. Dial 3615 ULLA to text with a sexy lady – some telecom employee pretending to be one – and 3615 PERE NOEL for Santa Claus. The real one, of course.

 

9 year old whizkid Thomas (Alain Lalanne aka Alain Musy) is dead set on proving that Santa is real and not some weirdo looking for a gullible kid to play with. A trap is set, and the boy waits.

“You know Mum, I don't have to write to Santa anymore. There's an easier way, through Minitel.”

– Thomas

3615 code Père Noël is definitely not your cutesy little Christmas romp. The violence is not cartoonish, the bandit is more Manson than moist. The boy's disillusionment in the adults around him is a perfect mirror of “Santa's” lonely attempts to communicate and be accepted. However, Thomas' mom didn't lie about one thing; that seeing Santa on Christmas Eve turns you into an ogre. Or an adult, as the grownups call it.

The Unknown (Tod Browning, 1927)

Dec

3

Let's Hug Day

The Unknown (1927)

Someone's hugged on Let's Hug Day [sic]. Target girl Nanon (Joan Crawford) hugs her circus partner, Alonzo (Lon Chaney) the knife thrower. Her tight embrace may reveal his secret. DP: Merritt B. Gerstad.

Nanon Zanzi (Joan Crawford) is mortally afraid of men. Of their grabbing, grasping, groping hands. This is why she only trusts her knife throwing partner Alonzo the Armless (Lon Chaney). What she doesn't know is that Alonzo and his 4'10”/1,47 m accomplice Cojo (that great staple of precode horror Tufei Filhela aka John George), use the #circus to hide from the long arm of the law, who is looking for a murderer with a deformed thumb. Who would suspect an armless man?

“Men! The beasts! God would show wisdom if he took the hands from all of them!”

– Nanon Zanzi

As mighty as Alonzo may be, the incomparable Lon Chaney owes much to armless violinist and knife thrower “Judge” Paul Desmuke. Story goes that Desmuke taught Chaney his knife act in two months. More probable is that some of the more impressive close-up scenes show the Judge's, not Chaney's, feet.

 

Like Alonzo, The Unknown has lost some flesh. Until 1968, only mangled bootlegs were available; a complete print was considered non-existent. Five years later, news broke about film reels of unknown origin labelled inconnu – [the] unknown, somewhere in the bowels of the Cinémathèque Française.

 

Some 14 minutes, outlining the Armless' background, are still missing. Do check your attic.

The Big Shave [The Big Shave… or, Viet '67] (Martin Scorsese, 1967)

Dec

2

Safety Razor Day

The Big Shave (1967)

A young man (Peter Bernuth) shaving in front of a mirror. The bathroom is clean, white, with chrome fixtures. DP: Ares Demertzis.

Someone shaves on Safety Razor Day (USA).
Accompanied by the sweet tunes of Bunny Berigan and Ira Gershwin's I Can't Get Started, a young man shaves his face. The Big Shave is a short commissioned film which contains many of the hallmarks of Martin Scorsese's later, more accessible work.

“I've been consulted by Franklin D., Gretta Garbo has had me to tea, Still I'm broken hearted, Cause I can't get it started, With you”

–Ira Gershwin, I Can't Get Started (1936)

There's also the obvious influence of #KennethAnger to be found, in nostalgic show tunes, the fetishisation of chrome and clean lines, followed by lustful, by ways erotic, violence. #Scorsese theme here is not homoeroticism, not on the surface at least, but the carnage laid upon so many young men sent off to the smouldering battlefields of #Vietnam. There'd be another six years of that. And meanwhile, some young men came back. And some picked up a job, driving a cab.

X the Unknown (Leslie Norman + Joseph Losey, 1956)

Oct

24

scoff

X the Unknown (1956)

Two soldiers on nightshift ready to eat. One of them hands a mess tin with grub to the other when there's a sound. DP: Gerald Gibbs.

– What's that? – Tea.

Die schwarze Spinne [The Black Spider] (Mark M. Rissi, 1983)

Oct

20

Die schwarze Spinne (1983)

Christine (Beatrice Kessler) and her junkie friends eating the old man's food. DP: Edwin Horak.

“Nur ein leichtfertig Knechtlein, dem es gleichgültig war, regne oder sonnenscheine es in der Ernte, wenn nur das Jahr umging und der Lohn kam und zu jeder Essenszeit das Essen auf den Tisch, griff zum Löffel und berichtete Christine, daß noch keine Buche gepflanzet sei und alles gehe, als ob sie verhext wären.”

– Jeremias Gotthelf, Die schwarze Spinne (1842)

Maciste all'inferno [Maciste in Hell] (Guido Brignone, 1925)

Oct

17

sinners

Maciste all'inferno (1925)

A demon eating a poor sinner. Numerous scenes are directly taken from Gustave Doré's illustrations of Dante's Divina Commedia, chapter Inferno. DPs: Ubaldo Arata, Massimo Terzano & Segundo de Chomón.

Медвежья свадьба [Medvezhya svadba / The Bear's Wedding] (Konstantin Eggert + Vladimir Gardin, 1925)

Sep

28

Медвежья свадьба (1925)

In preparation of the bear's wedding, a cook – wearing not much more than an apron and a toque blanche – stirs a huge kettle over a roaring fire. DPs: Eduard Tisse & Pyotr Yermolov.