The most noteworthy release of the week comes from Sony/Columbia, who put 6 Hammer movies out in an "Icons of Suspense Collection". There's no real weak link in the bunch, both in terms of style and content. Four of the films' names alone are grabby in a way movie titles rarely are anymore: Stop Me Before I Kill!, Never Take Candy From a Stranger, These Are the Damned, and the so-odd-sounding-it's-brilliant The Snorkel.
Peter Cushing after getting smacked in the mouth (Cash on Demand)
All six titles in the collection are interesting, gripping, or noteworthy in some respect, with These Are the Damned anchoring the set as The Big Deal. As petty and materialistic as it sounds, one of the things I liked the most is a case button innovation I'd not yet seen: all three discs are stacked on one center button in a single-width Amaray case. I've wanted some sort of space-saving technology like this for years, and at long last it's here in the declining years of DVD.
The releases are no-frills, eschewing any substantive docs or featurettes, which I'm fine with. The writing of Glenny Kenny and Dave Kehr on the set are more than enough when it comes to "expert opinion", and I defer to them as far better scholars of the genre. I will, however, tease the lot of them.
Stop Me Before I Kill! (aka The Full Treatment, 1960) features a husband and wife who open the movie in the aftermath of a car wreck. He's been concussed and has this overwhelming urge to violence (hence the title). They meet a psychiatrist who seems to have more than a passing interest in the missus.
Cash on Demand (1961) stars Peter Cushing in a twist on the setup of A Christmas Carol. Cushing plays a cold, selfish bank manager whose wife and daughter are kidnapped by a thief who wants to rob the bank.
The Snorkel (1958) sees a girl trying to convince everyone of something she knows but they don't believe: her stepfather is a murderer! Wages of Fear actor Peter Van Eyck stars.
Maniac (1963) a drifter (The 7th Voyage of Sinbad's Kerwin Matthews) falls for a young woman and then for her mother, who enlists his help in freeing a murderer--her estranged husband.
Never Take Candy From a Stranger (1960) is the definitive precursor to the sub-genre that involves some creepy man taking advantage of young girls.
These Are the Damned (aka The Damned 1963) is difficult to sum this film up in a capsule. It's about gang violence, nuclear war scares, and plans to repopulate the planet. Suffice to say that this movie, available uncut for the first time on DVD, is reason enough to buy the entire set. I'll likely have more to say about it on Friday.
Amazon has it for $22.49, which averages out to $3.75 for each film.