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Post by Johnlprobert on Apr 23, 2010 6:36:31 GMT
It would probably be ITV's Mystery & Imagination from the late 1960s: www.networkdvd.net/product_info.php?cPath=28&products_id=866We've been watching these at Probert Towers over the last couple of weeks. Each episode is 80 minutes long and purports to adapt a piece of classic gothic fiction. Like Wordsworth books they're cheap and cheerful and you never feel as if your time is being wasted. You get six 80 minutes TV films and an extras disc with more stories on that I haven't looked at yet. Stories adapted are: The Curse of the Mummy - Bram Stoker's Jewel of Seven Stars with Isobel Black (Hammer should have used her more), Patrick Mower and Graham Crowden doing his usual mad professor act Sweeney Todd - Truly bizarre with an off the wall performance by Freddie Jones Dracula - Denholm Elliot as the count! Very low budget and really quite odd. Uncle Silas - melodramatic stuff with that annoying girl out of Dr Jekyll & Sister Hyde The Suicide Club - the absolute jewel in the crown of the series - a tale of swashbuckling derring-do in deepest darkest London I haven't seen Frankenstein (with Ian Holm), Fall of the House of Usher or any of the others yet but I'll post a note when I do. |
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Post by David A. Riley on Apr 23, 2010 7:09:44 GMT
I used to love the Mystery and Imagination series. I wish they would put them out on air on one of the channels again. They were brilliant, especially the earlier ones.
I think by the time they did these more ambitious longer stories it had passed its peak and I never did care for them as much, but I should imagine, with the passage of time especially, (and compared to much juvenile fodder thrown to us these days by the TV companies) they will look excellent. So this is a must have set of dvds!
I hope - probably forlornly - that some of the earlier series will come available sometime. One of my favouites was The Tractate Middoth, which gave me the shudders when that was first broadcast. And, of course, the truly brilliant Casting of the Runes.
David
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Post by Johnlprobert on Apr 23, 2010 7:19:52 GMT
The booklet inside does make you long for the episodes that are allegedly lost. I for one would love to see Jane Merrow as Carmilla!
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Post by David A. Riley on Apr 23, 2010 7:40:09 GMT
I just remembered another one which I think was possibly the creepiest of the lot: Lost Hearts. This was far more scary than the later BBC version broadcast as one of the M. R. James Christmas Ghost Stories. It was that good, in fact, that when I later read the original story I found it disappointing!
David
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Post by cw67q on Apr 23, 2010 9:31:52 GMT
I think I used to own a paperback anthology that tied in with this series, but I've never seen any of the actual episodes.
- chris
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Apr 23, 2010 14:05:55 GMT
Was that the one with the two kids and the holes in the chest. Scared me senseless
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Post by David A. Riley on Apr 23, 2010 14:09:38 GMT
That's the one, Craig. Glad it affected you too.  |
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Apr 24, 2010 0:20:36 GMT
Yes David. I watched them all and it was the one that really chilled the soul. Superb direction.
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Post by dem bones on Apr 26, 2010 14:29:05 GMT
I think I used to own a paperback anthology that tied in with this series, but I've never seen any of the actual episodes. - chris (Fontana, 1968) Weird and gruesome tales from ABC Television's top-rating seriesR. L. Stevenson - The Body Snatcher
M. R. James - Room 13
Vernon Lee - The Phantom Lover
M. R. James - Lost Hearts
Edgar Allan Poe - The Fall of the House of Usher
Oscar Wilde - The Canterville Ghost
M. R. James - The Tractate Middoth
J. Sheridan Le Fanu - CarmillaBlurb (in case it's a little faint) THE BODY SNATCHERS … Doctors whose enthusiasm for surgery knew no bounds …
LOST HEARTS … The brilliant scholar had all that he needed: money, a beautiful house, peace – except hearts – other people’s hearts.
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER … Edgar Allan Poe’s classic story of a horror: a great house … its haunted heir … and the sister he loved more than life itself …
THE PHANTOM LOVER … She was obsessed by a ghost … a ghost who reacted out of the past to take her …
ROOM 13 …. How could there be a shadow dancing wildly on the wall? A reflection from a room that didn’t exist …?
AND OTHER MAGNIFICENT TALES from the TV series that is enthralling millions of viewers.despite the familiarity of the content, this is a lovely collection and i'm particularly irked to find my treasured, seriously battered copy has either crumpled to dust or gone walkabouts. As the front depicts a scene from The Tractate Middoth i was tempted to add it to the M R. James thread - blackmonk identified the stills on the back; they're "from The Fall of the House of Usher aired February 1966" - but it deserves one to itself. thanks to blackmonk for coverscans & contents. |
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Post by Johnlprobert on Apr 26, 2010 20:36:46 GMT
Well last night we watched the 'freely adapted' version of The Fall of the House of Usher which was pretty well done, with superb sets, a superbly mad Denholm Elliot as Roderick Usher & a very fetchingly mad Susannah York as Madeleine. I'll be sorry to get to the end of this set but I may well have saved the best for last as it stars...John Laurie!!!
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Post by The Lurker In The Shadows on Apr 26, 2010 22:48:29 GMT
I've really enjoyed this series, though the enjoyment of the ones that still exist just leads to a deeper regret over the ones that are lost - that surviving 3 minute clip of "Casting the Runes" is so bloody tantalising, and if the M&I version of "Lost Hearts" is (as I've seen many say, and as David confirms) better than the brilliant Lawrence Gordon Clark version, then it's really a major loss.
Favourites out of the remaining episodes are "Sweeney Todd", for its barking mad central performance from Freddie Jones, one of my favourite actors, "Dracula", for an interesting performance from Denholm Elliot (another favourite), and Susan George being thoroughly, thoroughly gorgeous, and "The Suicide Club", which must have influenced adapter Robert Muller's later "Supernatural" series, with its mysterious club setting and gaslit murderers aplenty.
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Post by Johnlprobert on May 1, 2010 15:50:52 GMT
We've just reached the end of the set & I'll reiterate that this programme is well worth a look for any fans of 'classic' horror fiction. Something I normally never both with on DVDs is the still gallery but this one is a treat, with plenty of colour pics of the episodes that are now lost which makes them look as if they'd be well worth watching!
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Post by killercrab on May 1, 2010 17:07:55 GMT
I watched my old dupe of THE OPEN DOOR last night. Thought it superb - I really like the ABC versions - perhaps USHER tonight.
KC
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Post by killercrab on May 1, 2010 17:08:51 GMT
I haven't seen Frankenstein (with Ian Holm >>
Me neither - any good?
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Post by Johnlprobert on May 1, 2010 17:22:38 GMT
It's actually not bad at all, and a very different version from the way Hammer took things.
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