Showing posts with label kate omara. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kate omara. Show all posts

Saturday 11 August 2018

REMEMBERING KATE O'MARA BORN TODAY 1939


TODAY MARKS the late Kate O'Mara's birthday.... Her earliest television appearances, includes guest roles in 'Danger Man', 'Adam Adamant Lives!', 'The Saint', 'Z-Cars' and 'The Avengers'. Look carefully and you'll spot her in the crowd of ale swiggers in Cushing's / Hammer films CAPTAIN CLEGG. She also worked with Cushing in the film, CORRUPTION and in 1970, she appeared in two Hammer films films THE VAMPIRE LOVERS and 'The Horror of Frankenstein'. In the former, she had an erotically charged scene with Ingrid Pitt, in which O'Mara was meant to be seduced; the two women were left laughing on set, however, as Pitt's fangs kept falling into O'Mara's cleavage. O'Mara's work in 'The Vampire Lovers' impressed Hammer enough for them to offer her a contract, which she turned down, fearful of being typecast!


ABOVE a smashing photograph of actress KATE O'MARA, standing outside the WATFORD ODEON CINEMA back in October 1970, posing with poster of Hammer films, 'THE VAMPIRE LOVERS'.


IN BETWEEN APPEARANCES in the BBC 'Doctor Who', she played Caress Morell in the American primetime soap opera 'Dynasty'. After returning to the UK, she was cast as another scheming villain, Laura Wilde, in the BBC soap 'Howards' Way' (1989–90). Kate O'Mara passed on 30th March 2014 aged 74.



HELP CELEBRATE the memory of KATE O'MARA with everyone else at the FACEBOOK PETER CUSHING APPRECIATION SOCIETY FAN PAGE. YOU can join the page just by clicking LIKE and never missing a post and join in the fun!

Friday 17 November 2017

FREE CONTACT SHEETS 'THE VAMPIRE LOVERS' FOR CUSHING'S FEMME FATALES!


#CUSHINGFEMMEFATALESFRIDAY! This week, we present a gallery dedicated to one, who has proven to be larger than life itself, even in death . . INGRID PITT. In just over a week it would have been her birthday and the tenth anniversary of her all too soon passing . . . I have a few photographs to share here today, and whole gallery here at the website, some new and some favorite pics, of the only actress to have been friends with not only Peter..but also Helen, his late wife too . .To start the ball rolling... to mark Ingrid's inclusion in the FRIDAY FEMME FATALE GALLERY, I am giving away below, SIX rare hi res CONTACT SHEETS of rare photographs taken during the making of Hammer films 'The Vampire Lovers', for free! Join us on our NEXT #CUSHINGSFEMMEFATALES! POST TODAY, in just a few hours hours - Marcus







 

IF YOU LIKE what you see here at our website, you'll  love our daily themed posts at our PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE.  Just click that blue LINK and click LIKE when you get there, and help us . . Keep The Memory Alive!. The Peter Cushing Appreciation Society website, facebook fan page and youtube channel are managed, edited and written by Marcus Brooks, PCAS coordinator since 1979. PCAS is based in the UK and USA  . .

Friday 10 November 2017

#THROWBACKTHURSDAY! REPACKAGING THE CLASSICS : HANDS AND FANGS!


#THROWBACKTHURSDAY! REPACKAGING Cushing and Hammer films classic films for new sales and audiences, sometimes throws up the most interesting box designs . . . what do we think of the covers of these two #HAMMERFILM classics: #bridesofdracula and #eviloffrankenstein ???

UPDATE: AN INTERESTING comment on our PCASFACEBOOK FAN PAGE
from ZAK PEARSON who says, :  'I don't know why these companies don't just use the original posters, gorgeous lush hand painted posters already in existence, rather than these very clinical designs?'.



WE ANSWERED: ' . . .Some of the films the media rights, posters, stills actually are not included in the license of having rights to distribute the film. Although many dvd and blu ray distributors flaunt this fact when they include the stills and posters in the extras... in the case of many of Hammers films films, the media rights are owned by a completely different company, to who owns the rights of the actual film . .. and some differ from country and territory . .to use the poster on the cover, would mean an paying extra lolly, so easier and cheaper, to have a new and bespoke design for the release . .'   


#THROWBACKTHURSDAY: WHAT AN INTERESTING, unusual painting and study for artists Sharon Wong to have painted...? I had to share it with you today . . .I have added quote by Peter's late wife, Helen Cushing on her observations about Peter, from the very first time she met him...and fell in love. . . taken from Peter's autobiography, it may have provided the inspiration for the painting perhaps? What do you make this? - Marcus


#THROWBACKTHURSDAY! AND FINALLY, here's a smashing photograph of actress KATE O'MARA, standing outside the WATFORD ODEON CINEMA back in October 1970, posing with  poster of  Hammer films, 'THE VAMPIRE LOVERS', in which she starred with Ingrid Pitt, Peter Cushing and Douglas Wilmer. Good for her!





IF YOU LIKE what you see here at our website, you'll  love our daily themed posts at our PCAS FACEBOOK FAN PAGE.  Just click that blue LINK and click LIKE when you get there, and help us . . Keep The Memory Alive!. The Peter Cushing Appreciation Society website, facebook fan page and youtube channel are managed, edited and written by Marcus Brooks, PCAS coordinator since 1979. PCAS is based in the UK and USA  . .

Saturday 2 July 2016

THE HORROR OF FRANKENSTEIN : MINUS CUSHING AND D.O.A.


While not a Peter Cushing  film, the Horror of Frankenstein is included here because it is part of the Hammer films Frankenstein series and while Cushing didn't appear in the film, it's of interest as an example of how Hammer tried to experiment with a winning formula . . .  and failed.
CAST:
Ralph Bates (Victor Frankenstein), Dave Prowse (The Monster), Kate O’Mara (Alys), Veronica Carlson (Elizabeth Heiss), Graham James (Wilhelm Kastner), Dennis Price (Grave Robber), Bernard Archer (Professor Heiss), Jon Finch (Lieutenant Henry Becker)


PRODUCTION: 
Director/Producer – Jimmy Sangster, Screenplay – Jimmy Sangster & Jeremy Burnham, Photography – Moray Grant, Music – Malcolm Williamson, Make up – Tom Smith, Art Direction – Scott MacGregor. Production Company – Hammer/EMI.


SYNOPSIS:
VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN, a cold, arrogant and womanising genius, is angry when his father forbids him to continue his anatomical experiments. He sabotages his father’s shotgun, causing him to be killed. Inheriting the family fortune, Victor uses this to enter med school in Vienna but is forced to return home when he gets the dean’s daughter pregnant. There he sets up laboratory, starting a series of experiments into the revivification of the dead. Eventually, he builds up a composite body from human parts, which he brings to life.



COMMENTARY:
THE HORROR OF FRANKENSTEIN was the fifth film in Hammer’s Frankenstein series. By 1970, Hammer had regurgitated most of their monster themes several times over. The Horror of Frankenstein came at the point Hammer were starting to inject new blood into their product. The influence of the younger generation was making itself felt and Hammer were casting younger stars, recruiting young directors, not to mention placing an open emphasis on sexuality in films.



WITH THE HORROR OF FRANKENSTEIN, screenwriter Jimmy Sangster was brought back to rewrite his script for The Curse of Frankenstein (1957), which started the series and Hammer’s reputation as a horror industry leader off thirteen years before, while he was also allowed to make his début as director. The role of Frankenstein was given a facelift and Peter Cushing was unceremoniously dumped from the role in favour of Ralph Bates whom Hammer were grooming as a new horror star at the time.


PUBLICITY STILLS were shot on the set with Ralph Bates and Peter Cushing shaking hands to announce the change. The future of the Frankenstein series seemed to be heading in a new direction ... only The Horror of Frankenstein was a disaster and the Hammer Frankenstein series failed to go in any new directions.



THE HORROR OF FRANKENSTEIN starts in with a promising sense of black humour. However, the opening tapers off and Jimmy Sangster thereafter seems uncertain whether he is delivering parody or straight melodrama. The effort turns out dismally where all that Sangster ends up doing is weakly echoing The Curse of Frankenstein in a plot that seems more interested in Frankenstein’s sexual dalliances than his medical obsessions. The sets seem flatly lit. Dave Prowse, the bodybuilder who later played Darth Vader in Star Wars (1977) and sequels, turns the monster into a mindless brute. The best thing about the film is Ralph Bates’s cold and arrogant Frankenstein but the rest of the show is dreary and dull.


THE SADDEST THING about The Horror of Frankenstein is that it comes from Jimmy Sangster who did such a fine job in tuning the script for Hammer’s The Curse of Frankenstein. There is such a gulf between The Curse of Frankenstein and the loose remake here in terms of quality with Sangster seeming to understand so little about what made the original work that the success of Curse can only be placed down to director Terence Fisher.



The other Hammer Frankenstein films are:– The Curse of Frankenstein (1957), The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958), The Evil of Frankenstein (1964), Frankenstein Created Woman (1967), Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed (1969) and Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1973).
REVIEW: Richard Scheib
IMAGES: Marcus Brooks




#FRANKENSTEINFRIDAY EVERY FRIDAY HERE AT OUR WEBSITE AND AT

Sunday 30 March 2014

KATE O'MARA 1939 - 2014


Very sad to hear of the passing of actress Kate O'Mara today. Probably best known for playing Alexis Colby's scheming sister Cassandra 'Caress' Morrell in the US soap Dynasty during the mid 1980s, along with appearances in Dr Who, Triangle and Howard's Way. But, for us she stands out in two films where she worked with Peter Cushing. In 1971 she played Mme Perrodot, The Governess in Hammer films 'The Vampire Lovers' and Val Nolan in the Robert Hartford-Davis film, 'Corruption' (1968).

Friday 16 August 2013

PEDRO DE QUEIROZ PERGUNTA: 'A FACE DA CORRUPCAO' BAIXARIA OU QUALIDADE?


“A FACE DA CORRUPÇÃO” – BAIXARIA OU QUALIDADE?

Chavões, sensacionalismo, visual banal. Não dá pra negar que este veículo para Peter Cushing dirigido pelo especialista em apelação Robert Hartford-Davis em 1967 tem isso tudo. Também não dá pra negar que o filme é uma experiência única e poderosa, nem por aqueles que detestam sua força. Por que?


A trama: Sir John Rowan, um cirurgião brilhante, tem que matar pessoas periodicamente para extrair delas um soro capaz de restaurar o rosto desfigurado de sua noiva – um clichê de filme de horror (“Raptor de Noivas”, 1942, um filme B da Monogram com Bela Lugosi, é um exemplo) executado com a mesma ênfase em cirurgia explícita vista pouco antes no respeitado  “Os Olhos sem Rosto”(1959) de Georges Franju, e já imitado no não-tão-respeitado “O Terrível Dr. Orloff” (1962), de Jesus Franco. Sir John sai por aí carregando uma maletinha de instrumentos médicos a la Jack, o Estripador e matando mulheres. Depois de um final explosivo, o filme, aparentemente por falta de solução melhor, plagia o epílogo de outro clássico, “Na Solidão da Noite” (1945), da Ealing.



Partindo dessa plataforma surrada, o roteiro de Donald e Derek Ford – que já tinham abordado Jack, o Estripador no ótimo “Névoas do Terror” (1965), em que o famigerado assassino vitoriano encontra Sherlock Holmes – se concentra em seus próprios interesses. Pra começar, caracterização e nuances psicológicas. Sir John é um caso clínico de perfeccionismo patológico. Antes dos créditos iniciais terminarem, nós o vemos suando na mesa de operações, comentando que “quanto mais sucessos, mais se temem as falhas” e cochilando numa biblioteca abarrotada dominada por um busto imponente – dele? -  Ã  meia-luz, com um livro ainda aberto em seu colo.


Muitos reclamam que não faz sentido ele se apaixonar pela vaidosa e desagradável Lynn Nolan (Sue Lloyd, da série de TV “The Baron”). Vem cá, admitindo que esse solteirão travado de meia-idade não chegou aonde está sem uma bela dose de renúncia pessoal, o amor de uma linda modelo muito mais jovem que ele bastaria pra deixá-lo bobo (“obcecado” por ela, diz seu colega Dr. Harris, com razão). Não só ele está indo atrás do tempo perdido, mas ela é um troféu, outro “sucesso” em sua carreira. Quando o rosto dela é queimado num acidente por culpa dele, não há do que não seja capaz para resgatá-la.

Ele não precisa matar mulheres desejáveis. É escolha. Pode-se argumentar que são mais fáceis de dominar que um homem, mas quando a vítima em questão é uma garota mais jovem cuja vida ainda não é “perdida”, ele resiste. “Jurei preservar a vida, não tirá-la”, ele diz, o rosto subitamente iluminado por um abajur. Presume-se que uma vida inteira de contenção alimentou uma agressividade contra mulheres sexualmente excitantes. O filme não é misógino, o protagonista sim.



Quanto a Lynn, nem o roteiro nem a atriz força a mão em seu papel de mulher fatal como, digamos, Hazel Court nas adaptações de Poe feitas por Roger Corman. Acreditamos em seu tormento físico e emocional (“Gente virando o rosto quando me vê...” Ela é modelo! Os diálogos têm a inteligência de aproveitar a experiência profissional e de vida dos personagens para intensificar o drama) e ela parece sincera quando diz que escolheu John pelo “homem”, não o título ou o dinheiro. Steve Harris é um achado. Herói nominal do filme, ele é bastante esperto para descobrir as ações e entender os motivos de John, mas sua impertinência de Grilo Falante é ineficaz, e quando ele finalmente age no clímax, faz de modo tão equivocado e desastrado que precipita a catástrofe. De uma tacada, os realizadores criam um personagem verossímil, subvertem um clichê básico e fazem um desaforo aos moralistas e censores.

O filme dá novo sentido à história velha ancorando-a firmemente na realidade e ambientes prosaicos da “swinging London”, resultando principalmente num contraste entre o velho mundo representado por Sir John e o panorama emergente nos anos 60. O último ato, quando a casa é invadida por “beatniks” (uma apropriação menos evidente, esta de “O Tesouro de Sierra Madre”, de John Huston, mas totalmente filtrada e legitimada) é notável por mostrar cada grupo horrorizado com o outro. O loucão Groper (David Lodge, conhecido pela série cinematográfica “Carry On”) é uma paródia diabólica e corpulenta de John Lennon usando um uniforme de Sgt. Pepper, só que preto, sugerindo o lado destrutivo da vida pé na estrada. Curiosamente, Corman tinha feito o mesmo de forma diferente em “O Segredo Negro” (1959).



Um filme tão focado na erupção de instintos violentos em contextos diversos não poderia ser encenado de forma suave. Sua agressividade tem razão de ser, assim como os ambientes derrubados e ordinários. Hartford-Davis se aproxima tanto quanto possível dos princípios expressionistas sem fugir desses limites na grotesca distorção do semblante e do entorno do protagonista pela lente grande-angular; na sequência de abertura com os médicos mascarados e os equipamentos se fundindo num único mecanismo; e na imagem final - o perturbador close dos olhos de Peter com os gritos das mulheres como trilha sonora. A última sequência funciona menos para nos pegar com um final-surpresa que para realçar o desequilíbrio potencial de John.O mesmo cuidado foi tomado com as conotações simbólicas dos objetos e locais – o laser, a beira-mar, as gaivotas voando ruidosamente...



Por fim e não menos importante, “A Face da Corrupção” é grande entretenimento – e MUITO profissional. Seu prosaísmo intencional não deve ser jamais confundido com amadorismo. É, sim, um resultado deliberadamente atingido pelo trabalho de uma equipe de alto nível, que inclui o cinegrafista Peter Newbrook (“The Asphyx”, 1970), o compositor Bill McGuffie (cuja trilha de jazz, indo do mais relaxante ao mais frenético é nada menos que a voz do filme) e praticamente todo o elenco: Peter, Sue, Lodge, a emblemática e bela Kate O’Mara no papel da heroína e, talvez especialmente, porque nunca reconhecida, Valerie Van Ost como a vítima no trem. A moça daria uma interpretação ainda mais notável em outro filme de Peter – “Os Ritos Satânicos de Drácula” (1973) – passando com enorme versatilidade e facilidade de secretária introvertida a vítima sacaninha e vampira selvagemente sensual .

Wednesday 31 July 2013

FANTASTIQ'S PETER CUSHING CENTENARY MONOGRAPH LIMITED RUN: TAKING PRE ORDERS NOW


Here's some great news just in from Tony Earnshaw and Fantastiq. It's a very interesting Peter Cushing Centenary publication, with an impressive line up of contributors. Snap them up before they all go, it's a limited run. 

"The first Fantastiq monograph is a 20-page centenary tribute to that gentle man of horror, Peter Cushing. Illustrated with portraits and behind-the-scenes photographs, it includes a complete filmography and features contributions from filmmakers and co-stars such as Bernard Cribbins, Kate O’Mara, Peter Sasdy, Kevin Connor, Peter Duffell, John Hurt and Val Kilmer. Limited to just 250 copies, this one-off publication is available for £5 including P&P in the UK, and £10 including P&P elsewhere in the world. We are taking pre-orders now. Payment by bank transfer, cheque and Paypal. Send your order to: tony@reelsolutions.co.uk " 

News on Fantastiq's three day film and TV festival focusing on fantasy, sci-fi and horror. - coming up later....

Sunday 5 May 2013

A VERY NASTY BUSINESS : PETER CUSHING SUE LLOYD KATE OMARA 'CORRUPTION' AKA 'CARNAGE' TROY HOWARTH REVIEW AND GALLERY


In 1959, Georges Franju’s Eyes Without a Face made a tremendous impact on audiences. The film offered an odd mixture of the up market and the down market, with a poetic sensibility mixed with instances of graphic gore. Indeed, the film pushed the envelope further than anything Hammer Films had done at that time, yet Franju’s credentials with the art house crowd ensured that it was taken in a more serious manner. It also set the template for a series of “surgical” horror films, many of which borrowed the basic concept of a surgeon driven to madness by love. Spanish filmmaker hit pay dirt with his own variation on the formula, The Awful Dr. Orlof (1961), establishing himself – and Swiss-American character actor Howard Vernon – as a fixture in the horror genre. The British came to the party a bit late, but when they did so, via Corruption (1967), they managed to outdo the competition in terms of sheer sleaze and gratuitous violence.


The film came at an awkward period in Peter Cushing’s career. Cushing had established himself as a household name in the UK due to top lining a number of celebrated live TV productions, and he parlayed this into big screen infamy by aligning himself with Hammer Film Productions. The double-punch of The Curse of Frankenstein (1957) and Dracula (1958) showed him to be an actor of tremendous versatility, equally at home in roles that were villainous and heroic, and he was soon inextricably linked with the horror genre. It was a role Cushing accepted with some reluctance, knowing full well that it would deprive him of more mainstream recognition – but it provided a steady income, and this was something that he and his beloved wife Helen were desperately in need of. Helen’s health had always been problematic, and by the time the mid-60s rolled around, her emphysema had deteriorated to a noticeable degree. Cushing was panic-stricken by the notion of possibly losing her, and the costly treatments she required insured that he was able to bank very little of the money he was making in his film work. Thus, he accepted virtually every role he could cram into his schedule – and though he took the work very seriously, he was only too aware that he was sometimes accepting projects with a less-than-distinguished pedigree. The actor had appeared in quite a few indifferent pictures through the years, but never in his career would he be faced with a project quite so sleazy and down market at Corruption.


The story deals with a distinguished surgeon, Sir John Rowan (Cushing), who succumbs to madness when he accidentally causes his lover, Lynn (Sue Lloyd), to become hideously disfigured in a freak accident. In an effort to restore her lost beauty, via a series of unsuccessful skin grafting operations, he turns to murder…


Say what you will about the film itself, it still offers one of Cushing’s most intense and deeply felt performances. The actor was deeply uncomfortable appearing in some of the scenes that were required of him, but this does not manifest itself in a negative manner on screen. True, the scene of Cushing lost amid a sea of hippies at a very 60s “flower power” party is jarring – but it is sensibly played for laughs, with Cushing conveying a sense of being a fish out of water, desperately trying to appease his younger love interest. After the accident which destroys Lynn ’s face, Cushing becomes determined to correct his inadvertent actions, and in the process he loses control and succumbs to his worst impulses. There’s a particularly strong scene wherein Rowan, trying to keep his mounting frustration and rage under control, finally snaps at his young assistant (Kate O’Mara). Cushing plays the sequence for all the punch and pathos it is worth – it doesn’t even feel so much like acting as a moment of cathartic release, as if his own personal demons and anxieties were spilling over into the character.


Cushing would later decry the film for its excesses, but he recognized that it had the germ of a worthy dramatic concept. It’s possible that he entered into the film hoping that it would explore the dynamics of the relationship between Rowan and Lyn, but any such idealism surely faded soon into the production. When the time came to film a sequence wherein Rowan murders a prostitute, it surely must have felt like a very bleak day. The scene was filmed twice, once in a more conventional manner befitting the censorship mores of the UK and the US marketplace, and then in a more risqué manner, which depicts the “gentleman of horror” forcing a topless actress (played by Marianne Morris; she is substituted by a clothed Jan Waters in the more commonly available edit of the film) to the ground, slashing her with a knife, smearing blood over her naked breasts, and then beheading her. It’s a very intense set piece, though director Robert Hartford-Davis’ concept of how to best capture the insanity of the moment was to go wild with the fish-eye lens effects. Clubfooted direction to one side, it’s Cushing who gives the scene its impact - partially because it seems so very out of character, and partially because he conveys a sense of going over the edge that is almost unique in his body of work.


Sadly, the film isn’t worthy of Cushing’s efforts. As noted above, Hartford-Davis’ direction is flat and functional at best. He would go on to direct Cushing in an even more unfortunate project - Incense for the Damned, aka Bloodsuckers (1970), an incomplete hodgepodge of vampirism and flower power mysticism that was largely filmed on location in Greece - but his most interesting and accomplished picture remains The Fiend (1971), a demented slice of religious mania featuring typically intense performances from Tony Beckley (When a Stranger Calls) and Patrick Magee (A Clockwork Orange). His emphasis is squarely on the sensational in this context, however, which creates a dramatic vacuum where a far greater sense of emotional investment would have been appreciated. Nowhere is this more evident than in the depiction of the character of Lynn, played by Sue Lloyd. Lloyd is a capable and photogenic actress, but her portrayal is unsympathetic - and this is very much as she appears to have been written. Lloyd doesn’t manage to invest any real pathos into the character, regardless, thus making Cushing’s obsession with her seem bizarre and misplaced. It’s truly as if the two actors were making two different films - Lloyd picking up a paycheck for playing a bitchy femme fatale, and Cushing trying to capture a far greater sense of heartfelt sorrow and heartache. The remainder of the cast is similarly uninspired, with even the normally reliable character actor David Lodge (something of an unofficial member of the Peter Sellers “rep company,” having appeared in many of the great comic’s films, including A Shot in the Dark and I’m All Right Jack) coming off quite poorly as a goon who roughs up Cushing’s character at one point; the actor was miscast and likely knew it, and he resorts to broad overacting to compensate. Add in one of the most truly horrific music scores to be found in British horror (“courtesy” of Bill McGuffie, who really oughtn’t have bothered) and the end result is as offputting as it is poorly made. 


Even so, Cushing fans are still encouraged to give it a try - the “full strength” edition isn’t so easy to find, but certainly the tamer US/UK edit is easy enough to come by. If ever there was proof of Cushing’s utter commitment and professionalism in even the most unsavory of projects, Corruption most certainly fulfills that function. 
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