Saw a Takashi Miike picture called The Great Yokai War. "Yokai" is a Japanese term for monsters from folklore, as opposed to the more familiar kaiju. It's a kids' picture, about a young boy from Tokyo sent out to live in the countryside with his older sister and his intermittently senile grandfather. When a vengeful spirit appears, the boy gets caught up in a war between warring groups of yokai and must find his courage to become the "Kirin Rider", the hero who will set everything to rights. It's not a bad picture - nothing deep, but an amusing story. Some of the yokai are really trippy, Japanese folklore can get pretty "out there", apparently.
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doc photo > Jeff of Earth-JSeptember 29, 2025 at 8:21am
This story was also adapted by Disney in slightly altered form as The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh starring Patrick McGoohan as the parson/Scarecrow. I much prefer the Disney version. I re-watched it a couple of years ago on You Tube as it wasn't available on Disney Plus.
This is a movie that I watch every so often. Adapted from Ira Levin’s novel. He also gave us Rosemary’s Baby, The Stepford Wives, A Kiss Before Dying, Sliver and the lighthearted movies No Time for Sergeants and Critic's Choice, among others. He didn’t know how to write a bad story. (Included with Prime)
I have the silent version as well as the Universal Studios version starring Claude Rains on VHS, and, if I had my druthers, we'd be watching all three so I could compare them. (It's been quite a while since I've seen those two, twenty years at least.) But it was all I could do to get Tracy to agree to watch this one. All I could get out of her for the past week was that she just didn't like the story. As soon as this version was over, she commented that it was the best version she had ever seen. Then she admitted what she didn't like about the others was that they tend to focus too much on the horror of the ingénue.
Patrick Troughton had a bit part in this movie as the "ratcatcher"... for about two minutes... until he got stabbed in the eye with an ice pick and spouted copious amounts of red viscous fluid. Every once in a while I'll catch Troughton in a non-Doctor Who role and I always find myself impressed by his range. The Phantom (Herbert Lom) was familiar to me thoughout the film, but it wasn't until I saw his name at the end that I realized he played Chief Inspector Dreyfus in all those Pink Panther movies. I also recognized the orchestra conductor as Herr Seltzman from an episode of The Prisoner. Oh, Michael Gough is in it, too, in the most reprehensible role I have ever seen him play. Captain Comics watched this movie just about exactly one year ago, but he didn't like it as much as Tracy and I did. Here's what he had to say at the time:
I watched Hammer's Phantom of the Opera. Despite Michael Gough and Herbert Lom, it's terrible.
Which is not a surprise. This is not a good or interesting story. What made it famous and interesting was Lon Chaney's makeup and reveal in 1925. Every other version is terrible and un-interesting. I even had the Aurora model as a boy, and it was the Chaney version, and I knew even then there was no other version that made a model worthwhile.
Watch the Big Reveal in the 1925 version, which I did as a boy. That was AWESOME. But nothing else is.
Richard Willis added, "I tend to agree."
Oh, well. That's what makes horseraces.
One to go!
Luke Blanchard > Jeff of Earth-JOctober 4, 2025 at 1:35am
My disc of the Claude Rains version has a documentary about the different versions which is well worth a watch. Lom's part in this one was written for Cary Grant.
I suppose The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976), in which Lom's Dreyfus becomes a diabolical supercriminal, might be to an extent a call-back. The Climax (1944), with Boris Karloff, was a follow-up to the Claude Rains version.
Most of what I dislike about the story is the terrorizing of the woman. They focus so much on her fear and victimization. This Christine is not afraid, she is compassionate, and truly a wonderful performer. In this movie, we see a different villain, the faux composer, the Michael Gough character. We see shades of everyone's story and the Phantom haunting the theater is not the focus of the story. We have extra characters on the periphery that bring a wider view of Paris, which brings a kind of balance to the settings.
I genuinely enjoyed it more than the other versions I've seen.
PARANOIAC (1963): The last of the Hammers in my collection. This is another moody b&w suspense/thriller in the Hitchcockian vein. The family in this movie puts the FUN back in disfunctional. I found it to be quite similar to The Turn of the Screw. It is also very much like Hammer's Nightmare. I suspect anyone who liked Nightmare will like Paranoiac (Richard, take note), and anyone who didn't, won't. Case in point, here's what Cap had to say about it last year: "Watched Paranoiac (1963), the penultimate film in my 8-film Hammer collection. I wish I could get that hour and 45 minutes back. Hammer movies are pretty famous, so they must get better at some point. Do they get better at some point?"
Q.E.D.
Richard Willis > Jeff of Earth-JOctober 6, 2025 at 12:41am
I’m glad I didn’t read the description on Prime. It gives away too much. I thought that it was pretty good. It kept me guessing. Oliver Reed was good at playing A-holes. He just had to be himself. Towards the end, not so much.
I think I've liked Oliver Reed in everything I've seen him in (except Tommy; he, Ann Margret and Jack Nicholson didn't have an octave of range between them). In these Hammer movies, the young Oliver Reed reminds me a bit of Malclom McDowell (another actor known for playing A-holes).
Replies
This story was also adapted by Disney in slightly altered form as The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh starring Patrick McGoohan as the parson/Scarecrow. I much prefer the Disney version. I re-watched it a couple of years ago on You Tube as it wasn't available on Disney Plus.
The Boys from Brazil (1978)
This is a movie that I watch every so often. Adapted from Ira Levin’s novel. He also gave us Rosemary’s Baby, The Stepford Wives, A Kiss Before Dying, Sliver and the lighthearted movies No Time for Sergeants and Critic's Choice, among others. He didn’t know how to write a bad story. (Included with Prime)
TRAILER
Back to the Hammer films...
PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1962):
I have the silent version as well as the Universal Studios version starring Claude Rains on VHS, and, if I had my druthers, we'd be watching all three so I could compare them. (It's been quite a while since I've seen those two, twenty years at least.) But it was all I could do to get Tracy to agree to watch this one. All I could get out of her for the past week was that she just didn't like the story. As soon as this version was over, she commented that it was the best version she had ever seen. Then she admitted what she didn't like about the others was that they tend to focus too much on the horror of the ingénue.
Patrick Troughton had a bit part in this movie as the "ratcatcher"... for about two minutes... until he got stabbed in the eye with an ice pick and spouted copious amounts of red viscous fluid. Every once in a while I'll catch Troughton in a non-Doctor Who role and I always find myself impressed by his range. The Phantom (Herbert Lom) was familiar to me thoughout the film, but it wasn't until I saw his name at the end that I realized he played Chief Inspector Dreyfus in all those Pink Panther movies. I also recognized the orchestra conductor as Herr Seltzman from an episode of The Prisoner. Oh, Michael Gough is in it, too, in the most reprehensible role I have ever seen him play. Captain Comics watched this movie just about exactly one year ago, but he didn't like it as much as Tracy and I did. Here's what he had to say at the time:
I watched Hammer's Phantom of the Opera. Despite Michael Gough and Herbert Lom, it's terrible.
Which is not a surprise. This is not a good or interesting story. What made it famous and interesting was Lon Chaney's makeup and reveal in 1925. Every other version is terrible and un-interesting. I even had the Aurora model as a boy, and it was the Chaney version, and I knew even then there was no other version that made a model worthwhile.
Watch the Big Reveal in the 1925 version, which I did as a boy. That was AWESOME. But nothing else is.
Richard Willis added, "I tend to agree."
Oh, well. That's what makes horseraces.
One to go!
My disc of the Claude Rains version has a documentary about the different versions which is well worth a watch. Lom's part in this one was written for Cary Grant.
I suppose The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976), in which Lom's Dreyfus becomes a diabolical supercriminal, might be to an extent a call-back. The Climax (1944), with Boris Karloff, was a follow-up to the Claude Rains version.
Most of what I dislike about the story is the terrorizing of the woman. They focus so much on her fear and victimization. This Christine is not afraid, she is compassionate, and truly a wonderful performer. In this movie, we see a different villain, the faux composer, the Michael Gough character. We see shades of everyone's story and the Phantom haunting the theater is not the focus of the story. We have extra characters on the periphery that bring a wider view of Paris, which brings a kind of balance to the settings.
I genuinely enjoyed it more than the other versions I've seen.
Lom's part in this one was written for Cary Grant.
Ooh, that would have been interesting.
The Climax (1944), with Boris Karloff, was a follow-up to the Claude Rains version.
Tracy and I are both really big Karloff fans, but we have never even heard of this one. We'll have to seek it out.
(Tracy liked the Hammer version so much she's even considering watching the other two version we have to compare them.)
PARANOIAC (1963): The last of the Hammers in my collection. This is another moody b&w suspense/thriller in the Hitchcockian vein. The family in this movie puts the FUN back in disfunctional. I found it to be quite similar to The Turn of the Screw. It is also very much like Hammer's Nightmare. I suspect anyone who liked Nightmare will like Paranoiac (Richard, take note), and anyone who didn't, won't. Case in point, here's what Cap had to say about it last year: "Watched Paranoiac (1963), the penultimate film in my 8-film Hammer collection. I wish I could get that hour and 45 minutes back. Hammer movies are pretty famous, so they must get better at some point. Do they get better at some point?"
Q.E.D.
I’m glad I didn’t read the description on Prime. It gives away too much. I thought that it was pretty good. It kept me guessing. Oliver Reed was good at playing A-holes. He just had to be himself. Towards the end, not so much.
I think I've liked Oliver Reed in everything I've seen him in (except Tommy; he, Ann Margret and Jack Nicholson didn't have an octave of range between them). In these Hammer movies, the young Oliver Reed reminds me a bit of Malclom McDowell (another actor known for playing A-holes).
SPINOUT (1966):
There are two Kings I can always count on: Elvis and Godzilla.
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