Skip to main content

Tower of London (1939) - Roland V. Lee

Tower of London is a quasi-horror movie that is set in the medieval times; the movie follows the rise of King Richard III who took his seat on the throne by systematically killing everyone ahead of him. The film has some stellar performances from Basil Rathbone and Boris Karloff, and we even get a young Vinny Price as the timid Duke of Clarence.

The movie is historically accurate, but of course it embellishes to shock and entertain. The movie is pretty epic and its battle sequences are heralded as some of the greatest ever made; there have been two remakes of this film and instead of reproducing the battles scenes these remakes actually reused the battle footage from this movie.

This movie is strange in the fact that it uses drama to get the "horror" point across. The movie is in no way scary, but I can see how it may have been in the past. There are numerous murders committed by "The Executioner", played by Karloff, but the creepiest part is that 35 year old Richard III has a doll house with figurines that represent everyone who stands in his way. When he has the Executioner kill someone, he removes a doll and throws it in the fire.

The movie shows various ways of medieval death, usually at the hands of the Executioner. The deaths are, however, very tame by today's standards. It is hardly scary and doesn't really have any stand out scenes that stuck with me. In fact I don't see myself watching this movie ever again. Like I said above, the acting is great, but the content is too bland. You may want to watch this movie if you are really into historic horror movies, or horror movies with no supernatural element, or fans of Vincent Price; but this movie made me want to fall asleep.

You're a God to Me!

S!D

  • The movie went $80,000 over budget
  • The battle scenes were insane to shoot. They filmed it all in Tarzana, CA (That is crazy in itself) they had rain machines and fog machines that were going nuts. They say that the temperature was upwards of 100 degrees. All of the extras had cardboard armor and it dissolved in the conditions.
  • The film had two remakes including one where Vincent Price stepped into Basil Rathbone's role.



Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ju-On (2000) - Takashi Shimizu

Watching Japanese horror is similar to watching British comedy. If you enjoy dry whit then you probably enjoy the boys of Monty Python in drag. That's the joke, they're dressed like women. Get it? Well, that's British humor. But if you're like most Americans you probably prefer Adam Sandler farting his way across a football field and hooking up with chicks that are way out of his league. Americans usually prefer this more in your face, crass brand of humor. My point is funny in England is different from funny in the US. The same goes for J-Horror. What the Japanese consider scary is very different from what Americans consider scary and it shows in this horror film. Japanese horror is generally slow (a little too slow sometimes), suspenseful and creepy. Ju-On is a creepy effing film. The movie has almost no soundtrack. It is incredibly suspenseful and the pay-offs are pretty awesome, but I think that it was done better in the American version (cultural t...
Post a Comment
Not scared yet? »

Humanoids From the Deep (1980) - Barbara Peeters and Jimmy T. Murakami

This is your standard old drive-in Creature Feature that has tons of gore and boobs. It's great if your in for a cheap thrill. This film goes right up along side any Roger Corman produced picture from the eighties. It's rumored that Joe Dante was approached to direct this movie but he turned it down. Humanoids from the Deep, also known as Monster, is a strange but forgettable piece of exploitation that failed to make it's notch in history. Don't let that detour you though. This is a really fun little film that doesn't fail to be entertaining.  A small sea town in California is terrorized by some mutated creatures from the deep. They look like some sort of mutated fish, merman-thing. They seem to have one goal in mind and that is raping and impregnating the females of the town. Also the town is being taken for a ride by a shifty businessman and his new corporate cannery. Could this evil cannery corporation be responsible for the Extreme Creatures of the B...
2 comments
Not scared yet? »

Escape From Tomorrow (2013) - Randy Moore

This review may contain spoilers. An American independent horror movie from filmmaker Randy Moore. It stars Roy Abramsohn, Elena Schuber, Katelynn Rodriguez, Jack Dalton, Annet Mahendru, and Alison Lees-Taylor. It premiered at the official selection of Roger Ebert, at the Sundance Film Festival on January 18th, 2013. Synopsis Jim is a depressed middle-aged man that despises his family life but wants to try to hold it together for a vacation to the Walt Disney World Resort. Jim receives a call before they leave and, unfortunately, Jim has lost his job as well. It proves too much to handle as this trip to the Magic Kingdom becomes a hellish nightmare. Jim’s mind cracks as we watch him deal with Disney’s seedy underbelly. Complete with elaborate corporate conspiracy, undercover sex workers, and demons. Oh and two very young French girls that Jim lusts over. It’s gross. Analysis The acting is amateurish. It’s nothing that’s going to win any awards or anything. The wri...
Post a Comment
Not scared yet? »