HORROR EXPRESS 1972 (SINISTER CINEMA)

Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee and Telly Savalas star in this excellent winner of a film.

The print from Sinister is beautiful and I can actually read the credits on the film for the first time ever.

Lee stars as Alexander Saxton who has discovered a frozen corpse of prehistoric man and is attempting to have it transported back to England via the Trans Siberian Express.

Mysterious deaths occur even before the creature is loaded aboard. A police inspector boars the train to investigate and before you know it the train is off and running, and the creature escapes. An ancient alien life form has inhabited the body of the creature and uses it as a host.

It absorbs the memory of it's victims who die and have blood running from their eyes and their brains boiled!! Cushing is Dr. Wells who must help Saxton find a way of finding which body the creature has inhabited ater the police inspector, Mirov shoots is and fatally wounds it.

This is an excellent thriller which is very claustrophobic as it confines the action to a train speeding across the frozen countryside. This film has been available on many various labels for years and as I said before, this is the best print I have ever seen of this film.

The supporting cast includes Savalas as a Cossack who boards the train to investigate the murders, but in in turn killed along with all of his troops, Helga Line is beautiful as always, Silvia Tortosa is a gorgeous Russian princess.

This is a highly recommended horror film that really deserves more exposure than it is given.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO....

Sam Elliot is 73, and Lexi Kaufman is 26.

RIP GLEN CAMPBELL 1936-2017

A legendary music performer has died.

Campbell was a mainstay on pop radio during the 60's and 70's with such hits as "Rhinestone Cowboy", "Country Boy" and "Sunflower" which was my personal favorite.

A very accomplished guitarist he had a very successful TV show and was a top attraction all across the country for over 40 years.

He has been suffering from Alzheimer's for a long time and thank God that finally came to an end today. Campbell was a one of a kind person in the music industry and one that will indeed be missed.

He was 81.

LEGEND OF HORROR 1972 (SINISTER CINEMA)

This film has a rather bizarre production history, but is still a well made thriller.

This movie is part US shot footage and part Argentinian footage from a 1961 film called "Tell Tale Heart". The US footage is newer and may have been shot in and around 1965.

The US footage concerns an elderly man in prison and his escape attempt with a young prisoner, and they other footage is told in "flashback" as to how he got there.

This isn't the usual "patchwork" film and it work very well. The original footage of "Tell Tale Heart" is very effective and very twisted.

If you haven't seen this gem I recommend you do. It was released in 1972 on a double bill with "The Dracula Saga" and touted as being filmed in "Blood Chilling" realism of "Magicmation". What is "Magicmation"? It is simply that the final two scenes, which lasts about 8 seconds is done in color, and that also works well for an ending you'll not soon forget.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO...

Connie Stevens is 79, Nita Talbot is 87, Richard Anderson is 91, Rena Mero is 50, and Tom Reese is 89.

CROWHAVEN FARM 1970 (SINISTER CINEMA)

Another top notch TV movie from the 70's.

Hope Lange and Paul Burke are a couple who inherit a small farm from her dead father and soon find themselves entangled in a bizarre web of horror.

It seems the farm is haunted by ghosts of witches who were betrayed by Lange in a past life, and now they want revenge.

Director Walter Grauman gets a lot of mileage from his cast in this TV thriller which many monster kids remember and still talk about.

There are some very interesting sexual overtones in this film that make it even more interesting considering it was made by Aaron Spelling Productions.

The rest of the cast includes John Carradine, Ross Elliot, William Smith, Lloyd Bochner, Patricia Barry, Milton Selzer and Cyril Delevanti.

I hadn't seen this for years and for me it was just a good as the first time. I recorded this onto a DVD-r many years ago off of The Mystery Channel if I'm not mistaken. Recommended horror film.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO....

Evi Marandi is 76.

THE STRANGER 1973 (SINISTER CINEMA)

Quirky made for TV film.

Glenn Corbett stars as an astronaut who crash lands back on what he thinks is Earth, but he begins to notice subtle little differences.

The people have never heard of Paul Revere, the United States and there are three moons!! Everyone is left handed and because of that the viewer will be reminded of "Journey To The Far Side Of The Sun".

Cameron Mitchell is a Government man who to kill Corbett. The Government deals with people who has free thought by re-programming them or killing them.

This movie was a proposed pilot for a series that never came to pass, and that is a good thing because you can only work with an idea like this for so long.

There is a great cast which includes Lew Ayres, Tim O' Conner, Dean Jagger, H. M. Wynant, and Virginia Gregg. The print is a little washed out, but it's no big deal. I hadn't seen this since 1973 and it was good to revisit it after all of these years.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO...

Lisa Boyle is 53, Louise Sorel is 77, and Sarah Lawson is 89.

CASTING THE RUNES 1978 (SINISTER CINEMA)

Very well made for British TV horror film.

Based on the M.R. James story of the same name, which by the way is the same tale from which "Curse Of The Demon" was derived from.

A young man is found torn apart in an open field and a young female TV producer investigates. She finds that a mysterious man named Karswell might be responsible and to her horror finds that he has passed an ancient paper to her and she is also slated to die.

Iain Cuthbertson is excellent as Karswell and Jan Francis is Prudence Dunning, the next victim. The story build up is very well done for the 47 minute TV broadcast and the ending is a very cleaver one indeed.

I don't want to say too much here as I think every horror fan should actually check out this little gem. Leave it to Sinister to bring out this unseen jewel.

Highly Recommended.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO...

Tawny Kitaen is 56, Loni Anderson is 72, John Saxon is 82, Wanda Ventham is 82, and Joan Weldon is 84.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO...

Richard Belzer is 73, Margret Lee is 74, and Vera Day is 82.

TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE: THE MOVIE 1990 (PARAMOUNT)

Paramount has re-released this little horror anthology.

The TV show was a huge hit in syndication and so the team behind it decided to make a movie for the big screen where they were able to show things they could never do on TV.

There are three tales and a wrap around. The wrap around tale concerns a young boy held in a cage by a witch who plans on cooking him for dinner.

The young boy tempts the witch (Deborah Harry) with stories from her favorite book which happens to be "Tales From The Darkside". The first tale is entitled "Lot 249" based on a story by Arthur Conan Doyle. Steve Buscemi is a very poor college student who brings in a mummy for study, but actually ends up using it to destroy the rich students who cheated him out of his scholarship.

There are some pretty graphic scenes in this story and it works quite well. Christian Slater and Robert Sedgwick are the students who get a most vile comeuppance.

The second tale is called "Cat From Hell" and was written by George A. Romero who also produced the TV show by the way. David Johansen stars as Halston, a cold blooded hitman hired by a wealthy old man named Drogan (William Hickey). His mission is to kill a cat that Drogan believes has been responsible for for three deaths so far.

Halston spends the night in a mansion with the cat and he finds that the cat is much more than he ever imagined..

The third and final tale is by far the best, and it's called "Lover's Vow". In this tale a man Preston (James Remar) sees his friend killed in an alley by a hideous gargoyle monster. The creature lets him live as long as he promises to NEVER tell what he has witnessed.

he agrees and heads for home and that same night he meets a beautiful woman who seems to be lost. Her name is Carola (Rea Dawn Chong) and they soon fall in love.

the two are eventually married and Preston enjoys fame and fortune as an artist that he never had before he met Carola. They have two children, and ten years into their marriage Preston breaks down and tells Carola his long hidden secret. That is a mistake he lives to regret.

Remar and Chong play off of each other very well is this standout story. The payoff is something you'll never forget. I highly recommend this film as well as the TV show.

I am pleased that Paramount reissued it, but I have wondered why they also didn't reissue it on Blu-ray. Oh well, it's great to see this movie once again.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO....

John Landis is 67.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO....

Butch Patrick is 64, Apollonia Kotero is 58, and Susan Denberg is 73.