Classic Movie Madness

Search
Go to content

Main menu

Movie of the Month Banner
Nosferatu - Max Shreck as Count Orlok

Nosferatu (1922)
eine Symphonie des Grauens

Title

Nosferatu - eine Symphonie des Grauens

Year of Release

1922

Starring

Max Schreck, Greta Schroeder
Gustav von Wangenheim, Alexander Granach

Director

F. W. Marnau

Studio

Prana Film

"You will have a marvelous journey. What matter if it costs you a bit of pain - or even a little blood!"

Nosferatu! Vampire, the undead bringer of death. A word steeped in as much mystery as the creature it describes. Most sources readily attribute the etymology of the word to stem from the old Slavic "nesufur-atu"(or nosufur-atu) in turn to be derived from the Greek "nosophoros", meaning plague-bearer. An alternate,

and somewhat more plausible, route to the word as we know it can also be found through the anglicisation of the Romanian terms "nesuferitu" and "nefârtatu". Meaning the insufferable one and devil respectively. Or, ever "necuratu" which translates as the unclean and is typically used in reference to the occult.

Regardless of the word' exact origins Vampire and Nosferatu have become nearly  interchangeable in modern language. With the latter suggesting a more unworldly, grotesque and monstrous incarnation than the prior. The very sub-title of the movie supports this idea : "eine Symphonie des Grauens" or "A Symphony of Horror"...

 
 
 
 
 
 

Read More ...
Posted 06 April 2013



 
screen legends banner
price headshot

Vincent Price was many things : gourmet chef, author, family man, voice over artist, stage performer and champion for the arts. Yet for all of that he will assuredly and most fondly be remembered by horror movie fans as the iconic pencil-moustached-silken-voiced star of some of the most beloved horror movies of all time. Quite an impressive number of which have achieved cult status with fans of classic movies over the years.

However, Vincent Price was not merely a stock performer in the kind of B-horror films for which he became so famous for. Vincent Price was a prolific actor with nearly 200 title credits to his name, spanning TV and film over nearly six decades... oh and that does not include his radio or theatrical work.

Vincent first appeared on stage to portray the role of Prince Albert in the play “Victoria Regina” at the Broadhurst Theatre in New York on December 26 1935. At the time he was 24 years old. The production was a resounding success running for nearly two years for a total of 517 performances, and as they say : “a star was born”! ...

 
 
 
 
 

Read More ...
Posted 1 March 2013



double feature banner
A Trip to the Moon

A Trip to the Moon (1902)
(Le Voyage dans la Lune)
(Star Films catalogue # 399 - 411)

Title

A Trip to the Moon

Year of Release

1902

Starring

Georges Méliès, Bleuette Bermon
Jeanne d'Alcy, Victor Andrè

Director

Georges Méliès

Studio

Star Films

 

"This play is surely not one of my best, but people are still talking about it thirty years later! It left an indelible trace because it was the first of it's kind. In Short, it is considered my masterpiece – I can only bow and agree."

- Georges Méliès

 

Georges Méliès wrote the above quote in the mid 1930's so I think that it is safe to assume that he would be quite pleased that today, more than a 110 years after it's release, people are not only still talking about his masterpiece but it it is perhaps better known that ever.

 
 
 
 
 

Read More ...
Posted 19 April 2013



reviews banner
House on Haunted Hill Poster

House on Haunted Hill(1959)

Title

House on Haunted Hill

Year of Release

1959

Starring

Vincent Price, Carol Ohmart
Carolyn Craig, Elisha Cook, Richard Long, Alan Marshal, Julie Mitchum

Director

William Castle

Studio

William Castle Productions, Allied Artists


"So far the ghosts have murdered only seven people. So won't you come and make it... Eight?
Hurry, or you'll be late for your own funeral.
"


Horror movie fans(and let's be honest here – if you are reading this then odds are, that means you) are very familiar with the stuck-in-a-spooky-old-place-and-can't-get-out scenario. That's the haunted house sub-genre of horror films for the uninitiated.

I honestly don't think I'm taking too many liberties when I say that few other films, that match the above

description, are so well known and so well loved by horror movie fans than  William Castle's "House on Haunted Hill".

I honestly don't think I'm taking too many liberties when I say that few other films, that match the above description, are so well known and so well loved by horror movie fans than William Castle's "House on Haunted Hill"...

 
 
 
 
 
 

Read More ...
Posted 3 March 2013



 
reviews banner
 
kinetogram cover

Frankenstein(1910)

Title

Frankenstein

Year of Release

1910

Starring

Charles Ogle, Augustus Phillips
Mary Fuller

Director

J. Searle Dawley

Studio

Edison Studios

Monster movies are hardly new, especially to horror movie fans, and if you think of the icons of monster movies then surely "Frankenstein" will rank right at the top of most people' lists. Mary Shelley's misguided scientist and his monstrous creation have been terrorizing mountain-nestled villages and their inhabitants for ages.

Everyone is familiar with the image of Boris Karloff's 1931 depiction of Frankenstein's monster, replete with neck-bolt and stitches. But

 

long before Kenneth Brannagh and Robert de Niro, before Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee even before the immortalized image of Boris Karloff as our beloved monster - there was Charles Ogle. Now you shouldn't feel bad if you don't recognize the names of Ogle, Dawley or Fuller. Admittedly you have to be a special kind of obsessed, anally retentive film nut to know these names off hand. But luckily for you, that's where your classic movie master comes in...

 
 
 
 
 
 

Read More ...
Posted 16 March 2013



 
Cast and Crew Banner
Willian Castle

"Step Right Up, I'm Gonna Scare The Pants Off America", as his 1975 autobiography is entitled, may well serve as the most fitting epitaph to the man who was loathed by critics only in equal measure to being adored by his fans. William Castle is today perhaps better remembered for the  gimmickry he employed in promoting his films than the actual movies themselves. Alhough, one could easily argue that therein lies the true measure of Hollywood's last great showman.

 
 
 
 
 

Read More ...
Posted 08 March 2013



Cast and Crew Banner
 

The story of Carol Ohmart reads like a script from one of her movies, but this story is true and here fact is indeed stranger than fiction. As we delve into Carol Ohmart's past, an often bizarre, sometimes tragic, but mostly cautionary tale unfolds.




Read More ...
Posted 01 March 2013



 
Back to content | Back to main menu