I love classic horror films. Partly the love comes from a love of classic film generally but also from a feeling that black and white is inherently more eerie than color. And I like having a certain amount of the 'action' be left to the viewer's imagination. To paraphrase something I read in a review in the NYT recently - I like the shiver rather than the splatter
In this diary I'm going to focus in on the work of one man whose work in the horror genre is finally being more widely appreciated, over 60 years after the last of his horror films were made. His name was Val Lewton and he was definitely, although somewhat reluctantly, the master of the shiver. Lewton was placed in charge of the horror unit at RKO studios in the early 1940s, his official role was producer. Typically a producer is an executive, administering the film and not highly involved in the creative aspects. Lewton was different - he wrote scripts, mentored new directors and generally made the films of his unit a product of his vision. He was a very talented man and he had artistic ambitions to match his talent.
So what makes a Lewton film special? Two characteristics are frequently mentioned and to some extent they are linked to one another. First Lewton was a master at making quality films on very low budgets. All of his films are short and take place on a handful of sets but the end product never looks cheap. Second Lewton creates the 'horror' in his films by suggestion and by mood. Violence is almost never shown on screen but very effectively suggested to be happening just out of sight. They are not films for adrenal junkies or people who like to be shocked. They are films for people who think enough to realize that uncertainty is the most disconcerting thing of all. There are some excellent scenes of suspense, but the most powerful aspect of his films is a prevailing sense of unease. This unease comes from the intrusion of what the more analytical reviewer might call the irrational, but what a romantic like myself prefers to call the eerie or weird, into the everyday world.
So what would be a good dose of Lewton for this weekend? To some extent it depends on your taste. So I've provided an overview of the 9 films Lewton made with the RKO horror unit. They can be conveniently if somewhat arbitrarily split into 3 groups of three. I'm going to try and avoid revealing much in the way of plot points in my discussions. However I cannot obviously avoid spoilers in the videos so watch at your own risk. At least three of these films were/are being shown on Turner Classic Movies either on Friday or Saturday. Also showing on TCM Saturday afternoon is the excellent Martin Scorcese documentary: 'Val Lewton: Man in the Shadows'.
I. The Tourneur/Lewton films. The first three films Lewton produced were all directed by Jacques Tourneur. On a visual level these films are outstanding. Tourneur's directorial style meshed brilliantly with Lewton's ideas. The imagery is elegant, sensuous, and spooky all at once. The first film, Cat People, is Lewton's most famous and what put him on the map. Typically of his movies the horror element is very ambiguous but this is probably, of all his films, the one that most closely approaches what we would consider a typical horror film of the era. There are some very suspenseful scenes and the sense of physical danger is more pervasive than in some of his other works. It is showing late Saturday afternoon on TCM and is well worth watching.
Cat People was remade in the early 1980s. In many ways the two versions are complete opposites. Lewton showed us almost nothing, leaving our imaginations to fill in the spaces. The 1980s version leaves nothing to the imagination. It does feature an amazing song by David Bowie. I know I will sound like an old fogie - but why don't we hear music like this any more?
The second of the Tourneur films just might be my favourite. It is also one of the most misleadingly titled films in history: 'I Walked With A Zombie'. To a large extent the plot is a reworking of aspects of 'Jane Eyre' but the film itself is an astonishingly beautiful, mournful, dreamlike reflection on love and death cunningly disguised as a B movie. Lewton makes the tall, gaunt, dead eyed figure of the (possible) zombie Carrefour a figure of beauty and empathy as well as being really unsettling.
The final film of the Lewton/Tourneur collaboration is 'The Leopard Man' which seems to be, in part, an attempt to capitalize on the success of 'Cat People'. The opening and closing scenes of this film are very powerful but overall it is dwarfed by its two predecessors. The common theme of this film and 'Cat People' makes it likely that Lewton was not all that fond of pooties.
II. The Karloff/Lewton films. At the end of Lewton's time heading the unit at RKO Boris Karloff was signed to a contract by the studio and the last three Lewton horror films all starred the aging horror star. These films were also similar in that they are all period pieces and all of the earlier Lewton films had contemporary settings.
One of these films, 'Isle of the Dead' I have not seen and cannot comment upon. It was shown Friday on TCM but I missed it.
'Bedlam' is set in England in 1761 and is 'inspired' by the painting 'The Rakes Progress' by Hogarth. It was the last RKO film made by Lewton and has been criticized for being overly wordy and high-toned. It has its moments but is not Lewton's finest hour. Somewhat ironically the actual terror scenes in the asylum are the closest that Lewton would ever come to the modern conception of horror.
'The Body Snatcher' is based on a story by Robert Louis Stevenson and is an excellent film adaptation of an old-fashioned 'ghost story'. Karloff's performance is the icing on the cake, his combination of roguish good nature and cold-hearted violence is quite compelling. Bela Lugosi has a minor role in this film which I believe is the last time the two titans of classic horror ever appeared together.
III. The other films. The three films between the Tourneur and Karloff series are all oddballs, unusual films even by Lewton's standards.
'The Ghost Ship' was the only Lewton film I've watched that didn't grab my attention. There are some scenes on the deck of the ship which are quite amazing for a low budget film. My wife really liked it so perhaps I was just not in the appropriate mood and should give it another chance.
'Curse of the Cat People' gives 'I Walked With a Zombie' a run for its money for having a misleading title and might even win. The studio assigned Lewton to make a sequel to 'Cat People'. 'Curse of the Cat People' features a couple of the characters from the earlier film but otherwise there is no relationship at all. What we get is a wonderful film about the power of fantasy in childhood. This film is being shown in the early evening on Saturday on TCM
Finally there is 'The Seventh Victim'. I had the great privilege of seeing this on a big screen my first time. It is a hard film to categorize. Unlike the other films described there isn't the slightest hint of the supernatural. It is almost a film noir, but one with a satanic cult. This film is really beyond my power to describe. In a strict sense not all that much happens - but the dark current of unease and foreboding that permeates the film is incredibly powerful. The last minute of the film is really quite amazing especially when you consider the rather stringent rules of the Production Code.