Review: A Hammer Horror Double Feature

Happy Halloween! This year, I celebrated the holiday by catching a Hammer Horror double feature at Metrograph:

The Curse of Frankenstein

This extremely loose adaptation of Mary Shelley’s original novel (even compared to the earlier Universal production directed by James Whale) is nevertheless entertaining for how pragmatically it manages to stretch its obviously limited budget—the sets are so exquisitely framed, lit, and decorated that the viewer barely notices there are only approximately three of them (prison, laboratory, drawing room). What truly elevates the experience, of course, is Peter Cushing’s magnificent performance as the title character; his version of Baron Victor Frankenstein is aristocratic entitlement incarnate—ambitious, amoral, and utterly lacking in psychological complexity. He doesn’t really have a concrete motivation for wanting to create life; he simply believes that he deserves to wield the power of a god. Christopher Lee likewise excels as The Creature (particularly in his physicality; his every movement appears labored, as if his limbs have been made stiff and clumsy by rigor mortis), though his talent is a bit wasted on the role, which the script reduces to a mere plot device. Despite this minor blemish, however, the film delivers plenty of fun, creepy imagery—blood has never been so violently red, nor shadows so darkly sinister.

The Horror of Dracula

The sophomore effort in the studio’s “unofficial remake” era improves upon its predecessor in every conceivable way—and, in the process, codifies a great many genre conventions that are now taken for granted. The eponymous count is explicitly reimagined as a sex symbol—the personification of temptation, seducing innocent women to indulge in their taboo desires (one victim literally trembles in anticipation as she unlatches her window to invite the nocturnal predator into her bedroom). Vampirism is portrayed as a metaphor for addiction—a supernatural compulsion that deprives the afflicted of agency, willpower, and self-control. And finally, Abraham Van Helsing graduates from an aged, eccentric paranormal researcher to an ass-kicking holy warrior. Indeed, the narrative trims the basic structure of the source material to the bone, distilling Bram Stoker’s story to its action movie essentials. Cushing clearly relishes the opportunity to play a swashbuckling hero, swinging from chandeliers, tearing down curtains, and pummeling his undead foes with every improvised weapon within arm’s reach. The result is a lean, relentless, immaculately paced thrill ride: full-throttle, pedal-to-the-metal, never a dull moment. In short: the perfect popcorn flick to savor in the company of an enthusiastic crowd of cinephiles on Halloween.