Underground Folklore Talk

 

There have been over 200 bookings so far for the talk on 8 December.

As it's a virtual talk on TEAMS there are plenty of places left.

Booking here.

It will probably be the last occasion to buy a hardback copy of Secret Tunnels of England: Folklore & Fact as there are less than 10 copies left and I imagine they will all sell on the night.

Accumulator Press books can be bought here or keep an eye out on eBay.

I heard on Radio 4 the other day about an online folklore project (The Everyday Lore Project) that could be of interest to some. 

See here. 

When I was working on my book The Folklore of London I tried to attend as many folklore events and ceremonies in London in one year as I could, work, family and eligibility permitting. I imagine this year very few of them went ahead. Let's hope that some of them will be taking place once more in 2021.

30/11/20 I've been told that there have now been over 600 bookings for the talk! There are still places left. I'll have to start doing some serious preparation!

08/12/20  There area now over 1000 people booked for this talk, which is very impressive, if intimidating.

Corruption and Frightmare

An online double bill of horror last night - both films can be found in very watchable versions, but I won't give the links as they are available to buy, with extras.

Corruption is a 1967 British film starring Peter Cushing who was apparently ashamed of being in it, but nevertheless gives a great performance. The plot is based on the French film Eyes Without a Face, which I saw a couple of years ago and has similar gory surgery scenes. One of the chief attractions for me is the period in which the film was made - there's a wonderful swinging 60s party at the beginning in which Cushing's character, an eminent surgeon, shows how old-fashioned and square he is, although his beautiful girlfriend (played by Sue Lloyd, memorable from The Ipcress File) is a fashion model about 25 years younger than him. Her photographer - played by Anthony (later father-in-law to Tony Blair) Booth in an obvious homage to David Hemmings in Blow Up - gets into a fight with Cushing and in the melee a spotlight gets knocked onto Lloyd damaging her face. The surgeon then discovers a way of recovering her beauty, but it involves taking the pineal gland from living female flesh and the use of a laser; his (and soon her) obsession with retaining her looks leading to him becoming a Jack the Ripper style serial killer.

The murders are pretty graphic for the time - apparently there are more violent and nude versions that were shot for the overseas market - and are filmed with distorting lenses making Cushing look even more twisted and malevolent. One takes place on a train going from Seaford (where Cushing has a charming clifftop cottage) to Lewes, a journey I've made many times. This scene reminded me of the old railway carriages that had separate compartments where you never knew who you might be sharing with. About half an hour from the end there's a really abrupt change in the plot when a gang of thieves invade the cottage and threaten Cushing and his girlfriend - an unusual performance from David (Pink Panther) Lodge as a psychopathic mute. The ending is truly bizarre, as the laser, which just happens to have been brought down to the cottage (they must have had a lot of trouble fitting all that equipment into the back of his sports car), goes haywire and destroys everything. Then in the final seconds it appears to have all just been a bad dream. Despite the nastiness and misogyny (see the poster above) it's worth watching, especially for fans of Swinging Sixties cinema. The hip jazz score (Bill McGuffie) would sound good on its own, but is too intrusive and inappropriate in the way it's used here.

More information can be found here and here.

I'd read quite a lot about Peter Walker's films but never seen one, so I decided to finally dip a toe in the water and Frightmare (1974) was better than I was expecting. The story of London-based sisters who have a cannibal mother living in a country cottage, it was well shot and acted and had some unpleasant murder scenes involving an electric drill - this is a few years before the notorious Driller Killer. 

Opening in an atmospherically filmed empty Battersea Fun Fair (mentioned earlier in this blog with reference to the film Mutations) we see the murder of Andrew Sachs, which is the beginning of the mother's cannibal spree. After spending a period in an asylum she is deemed 'cured' and released back into society - the film, written by David McGillivray seems to be an indictment of liberal justice and the middle classes - I can imagine a large Media Studies phd industry being based on Walker's films. The film stars an impressive Sheila Keith as the mad mother and Rupert Davies as the father, with an appearance by Paul (Rosie) Greenwood - the 'good' sister, played convincingly by Deborah Fairfax, reminded me of Katherine Parkinson - the ending is a bummer. The film was not greeted well by critics - 'A moral obscenity' The Telegraph, 'A despicable film' The Observer.

More information here and here.

The Return of Fu Manchu

 

I watched The Blood of Fu Manchu last night. Known in the USA as Kiss and Kill and also Kiss of Death and Against All Odds (?). Released in 1968 and directed by Jesus 'Jess' Franco, it's not very good and I got bored after about half an hour. The cast is fairly star-studded: Christopher Lee reprising his yellowface role (there were 5 FM films starring Lee), Richard ('Robin Hood riding through the glen') Greene as Nayland Smith, Fu Manchu's arch enemy and upholder of British values and Howard Marion Crawford as Dr Watson, sorry, Dr Petrie (looking unwell and as if he was on the bottle, it was no surprise to find out that he died the following year at 55). 

There's even an unusual appearance by Bond girl Shirley Eaton in a short scene which seems to come from an entirely different film - in fact it did come from another film, The Girl From Rio (a Franco-directed film based on the character of Sumuru, also created by Sax Rohmer, essentially a female Fu Manchu) and Eaton only found out years later and never got a fee. 

Starting promisingly, a group of beautiful women are brought to an ancient South American temple where Fu Manchu is hiding out with his daughter Tsai Chin and 'Dacoit' henchmen - cue plenty of gratuitous whipping, bare breasts and hanging from chains. They are bitten by a poisonous snake, whose poison has the rare quality of preserving their life but spells death to anyone they kiss. The glamorous girls are sent around the world to give the 'kiss of death' to Fu Manchu's enemies, all of whom suffer, except for Nayland Smith who is blinded but survives. He travels thousands of miles to find the temple and a possible antidote.

Unfortunately the film soon changes tack and turns into a bandit film for about half a boring hour with the chief, named Sancho Lopez, straight from central casting - at least he doesn't say "Badges! We don't need no steenkeeng badges!"

We also have to put up with risible dialogue like: 

"Dr Wagner is dead." 

"Completely dead?"

"Yes, completely dead."

In the film's favour the ambassador's residence is an interesting set and the proto-Indiana Jones archaeologist played by Gotz George is quite fun and some of the locations, such as the waterfall at the end, are pretty. However, if you've never seen it you haven't missed anything. The sequel The Castle of Fu Manchu (also directed by Franco) makes it look like Citizen Kane and is truly awful. Recycled footage from A Night to Remember is used to show the sinking of an ocean liner by the evil genius and this film essentially sank the entire franchise.

The DVD I watched was a twofer of Blood and Castle, but was obviously hastily produced, as on the box the plots of the two films are mixed up. The reason I'm writing this is that a new box set has been released by Indicator of all 5 Fu Manchu films - the first three of which are worth watching (Dublin often standing in for London) - with tons of extras. The other Indicator films I have are excellent packages. Despite that enticing prospect I'm probably going to stick with the DVDs I already have. It seems unfortunate timing to bring this set out at a moment when the role of China in world affairs is held in mistrust and suspicion and Fu Manchu will always be a deeply racist character who most people under 40 have probably never heard of, but who refuses to go away. Time to also plug the book Lord of Strange Deaths.

A very detailed review here has made me change my mind about acquiring the boxset, if only for the extras - maybe a Christmas present?