THE STRANGER LEFT NO CARD (1952)
Alan Badel gets off a train, in full Gandalf outfit, to bamboozle and entertain the locals in a sleepy town. As a semi-regular to this tradition, Badel’s talents are well documented. Before his untimely death in the 1980s, his piercing eyes haunted viewers of The Medusa Touch, Children of the Damned and The Three Cases of Murder. Even in less horrific roles, such as Day of the Jackal, or his shades of grey in This Sporting Life, he’s got a hundred mile stare that works so well, it is little wonder he was so often cast as ghosts or ghouls or, as in the case of Will Any Gentleman?, a hypnotist. He was still creating nightmare fuel by his mere presence on TV and film before his death of a heart attack in 1982, aged 58, and can now be summoned by repeating his name five times.
And, as he wins the children of this town over, I am reminded about William Hartnell’s comments about the role of the Doctor combining that of the Wizard of Oz and The Pied Piper. It would fit Alan Badel’s Stranger here to a T, and I wonder if Hartnell ever saw this short film.
The Stranger Left No Card was written by Sidney Carroll, who collaborated with Ray Bradbury, and went on to write the screenplay for The Hustler. It was directed by Wendy Toye, the acclaimed stage director and dancer.
Over the course of a week, The Stranger’s antics win him a fond place in the locals hearts. He performs with marching soldiers, and signs his name in at the hotel as Napoleon Bonaparte. All week he presents himself as a slightly eccentric loonie and is taken as such. And all the while, he plans to meet an old friend, for one last time.
This blew the critics away in 1952 when it was released. It won the Best Fiction award at Cannes, and launched Alan Badel as a major British film talent. This entire beast is his showcase, in every facet of The Stranger character.
It was adapted later as an episode of Tales of the Unexpected, starring Derek Jacobi in the lead role, but that lacked the charm and underlying menace Badel gives things, or the way Muir Matheson’s jaunty music juxtaposes with the second act.
CARNIVAL OF SOULS (1962)
Mary (Candace Hilligoss) and her friends are driving dangerously and crash into a river. A desperate rescue attempt finds a sole survivor, a mud soaked Mary. She attempts to adjust back into society after the disaster only to find herself haunted by… something.
I mean, Carnival of Souls is oft watched each October for good reason. It’s a classic of the filmed ghost story genre. Candace Hilligoss, who is still with us, is astonishingly good as Mary, representing her hopes, fears and nightmares with equal relish. There is a pervading sense of doom, led by the organ music, all throughout, so even moments which in other films would have been the lighter prelude to horror become threnodic and sinister. It’s as if everyone knows something the audience doesn’t.
Some might compare it to The Sixth Sense, but I get the sense that Mary is aware something is badly wrong, she just tries to avoid dealing with it. Until they arrive. Art Ellison’s Minister proudly exclaims that Mary’s organ playing could stir the spirits, and, well, they seem to summon the presence of The Man, a ghoulish reaper like figure whom only Mary can see. This figure is played by director Herk Harvey, as this film was so low budget he couldn’t afford another actor.
Unfortunately, Carnival of Souls only got its reputation, well deserved, long after the fact. At the time of release it was seen as a failure, and as such, Hervey never directed another film. Which is a tragedy, as his camera work, his unsettling dream like narrative, his potential to a be a horror master is all there. Even if he became Angus Scrimm and a recurring silent villain. At least, while he is no longer with us, he lived long enough to be validated, experienced the early 90s renaissance in interest in his film, and its rightful ascension into the pantheon of great horror.
Because there are two types of people reading this. Those who have seen Carnival of Souls, and are nodding in agreement. And those who are yet to watch it, for whom I implore you to do so.
TALES FROM THE CRYPT (1972)
Five strangers find themselves visiting an old catacomb on a tour, and wind up bumping into a mysterious old Crypt Keeper, played by the legendary Ralph Richardson, who can foretell deaths. Yes, its time for some good fashioned Amicus portmanteau horror!
We start with Joan Collins bumping off her husband. This story, “And All Through the House”, came from Vault of Horror magazine. It seems to have inspired The Santa by Jessica Amanda Salmonson, an eighties short horror story beloved of the late, great Richard Dalby. The husband was played by Martin Boddey, who many here will recognise as civil servant Walker from The Sea Devils. He didn’t get much to do, walloped in the head with a fireside poker while trying to read the newspaper.
Collins sets about cleaning the house of her crime, and not letting her young daughter know what happened, all the while an escaped homicidal maniac in a Santa suit lurks nearby.
Good schlocky fun, though the motivations of Joan’s character are never really made clear, and its all here for the obvious twist. Still, it allows Joan Collins to move swiftly from calculating villainess to terrified victim.
Next up in “Reflection of Death”, Ian Hendry leaves his family so he can have it off with his secretary. They’re involved in a car crash. He wakes up from the burned wreck and tries to get home. I feel like I saw this exact story in Carnival of Souls a few nights ago! Again, it reminds me of a Dalby favourite, Christmas Past by David Belbin (who went on to write grim 90s young adult police series, The Beat). I suppose that was the point of the Crypt style comics, the loose archetype stories remind you of many in a similar vein. But not in a literal similar vein, that’s Midnight Mess with the Massey family, and its in the Vault of Horror film instead!
Ian Hendry is his usual dependable self (on screen at least, he was already in his self-destructive downfall off screen) but like Joan Collins, gets very little to do. He doesn’t even get his nookie.
Third story in is the one everyone remembers from this film. Lonely old Peter Cushing gets depressed and kills himself. Worryingly, this was filmed during a period in his life when we now know Peter Cushing was badly depressed and did try to kill himself, so one wonders exactly how little acting the role required. The character of Grimsdyke here is even depressed because his wife died young. Bit close to the bone. And just like Peter Cushing, Grimsdyke dabbled in the occult.
Wait, what?
Well, there is that story from Stephen Fry about Peter Cushing summoning Christopher Lee at dinner.
No, wait, sorry, he phoned him. Always mix those two up.
I mean, everyone is hear to see Peter Cushing. He’s the master of horror. He can play an evil Nazi (Star Wars, The Silent Scream) as well as a Van Helsing figure, or here, a victim of an odious smear campaign. There’s no reason to like Edward and James here. They are rich, and the poor dust man is not, so they try to ruin the latter’s life. If you read M.R. James’s entire collected ghost stories, its incredible how few of his victims haven’t done something to ire the dead. Mr Abney is a child murderer, Mr Sampson committed some unspecified crime in his past, Archdeacon Haynes almost certainly sped up the demise of his predecessor, and even Paxton removed one of the three crowns that protected England. James would have considered the demise of James as overstepping the line of acceptable nastiness, but then, think of Paxton’s fate and remember that Monty was a bit of hypocrite. (And that’s why we love him!)
Also the best thing about this performance by Peter Cushing is that, as low as he is here, we all know he did bounce back somewhat, and produce another two decades of fine roles. And it was shortly after filming this that Christopher Lee staged the sort of intervention only Christopher Lee could – that’s right, Lee, Cushing, Telly Savalas, and a whole bunch of dead corpses in Horror Express, the greatest film ever made out of CBT sessions!
What follows is a rather one note take on The Monkey’s Paw (with bonus Roy Dotrice) and another tale of a man being mean to a dog.
A classic in the portmanteau genre, Tales from the Crypt lacks the standout tales that Asylum, Dr Terror, Vault, etc have for me. It does however have some fine actors getting to act, however briefly in their segments. Personally I’d have cut the last two segments and given more backstory and time to the first three. As it is, Joan Collins and Ian Hendry are but ciphers in the night.
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