The Vampire Lovers (1970)

 "They were all evil, and remain evil after death."

I've seen and blogged a previous adaptation of Sheridan Le Fanu's Carmilla in the form of Crypt of the Vampire but this, Hammer's version, is fascinatingly different, and not only in the fact that it stars, sort of, Peter Cushing as opposed to Christopher Lee. 

This film, like its predecessor, is a fairly faithful adaptation. yet it is fascinatingly different, and not only because of the greater emphasis on the lesbian attraction between Carmilla and Emma which looms large over the entire film. To begin with, there is no red herring, or at least not for the audience; the characters may suspect Kate O'Mara's governess, but we know Carnilla is a vampire from an early stage as we are made aware of an earlier victim. This is far less of a straight character drama and far more of a sensationalist horror grand guignol with sex and violence as the selling points... and it works. This is a significantly better film.

It helps that the cast is so superb. Ingrid Pitt and Cushing excel as ever, but they are ably supported by a very young Kate O'Mara ad an almost unrecognisable George Cole. The direction and production similarly recreate the familiar Mittel-European setting (this time rural Austra in the 1780s) with real aplomb.And yes, of course there's a tavern full of suspicious locals.

Yes, this is the start of '70s Hammer horror, using sex and sensation to sell in a way they'd never so explicitly done before. It has to be said, though, that it bloody well works.

Scrooge (1951)

"Humbug!"

Mrs Llamastrangler suggested that, as Gremlins counts as a Christmas film only on a technicality, I ought to do one (interpret that how you will) before the Chrimbo Limbo concludes. I think she had Jack Frost in mind, but heigh-ho...

Anyway, this is bloody good. Alastair Sim proves that actors associated with comedy can be truly arresting at straight drama- although his comic side is of course very much on display at the end..The entire cast is magnificent, though.

While bits are expanded from Dickens’ original novella, chiefly concerning how Scrooge got his wealth, this is a faithful adaptation, on the whole. The film deserves top marks, in particular, for taking care to include Dickens’ social commentary; the unreformed Scrooge refuses to forgive a debt, potentially forcing his unfortunate debtor to spend Christmas in a debtor’s prison, and announces that prisons and the Poor Law, cruel though they are, are a suitable response to poverty. Also it’s clear, in what we see of Scrooge’s past, that his hardness is a response to a perceived hardening of the world from the ore-factory age, when money wasn’t everything, to now (1843-ish?) where money is progress and traditional considerations for the less fortunate have fallen by the wayside. It’s very much about the problems of industrialisation, but it has much to say to That her’s children in this new age of austerity. And it’s heartening to see Christmas being set against all this, rather than as another commercial pressure.

It’s all full of Dickensisms, of course, from those inimitable character names to the poor working class family that inexplicably speaks RP, but that’s all part of the fun. This is the finest adaptation of A Christmas Carol that I’ve seen, very much including those with Muppets in...!