The Gorgon

I have to say that I'm really surprised that The Gorgon isn't one of the better known Hammer Horror films. Aside from the fact that it stars Hammer's two biggest actors - Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing - The Gorgon also features a fairly original cinematic monster, and it makes for a great fun watch! This film reminded me a lot of The Reptile in the way it plays out, in that it focuses on a mystery surrounding the central monster. It has to be said that, like a lot of Hammer Horror films, the plot is very simplistic; but that's hardly a problem as there's plenty to enjoy outside of the plot in this film. As the title suggests, the film focuses on a mysterious 'Gorgon', a woman with a head full of snakes that can turn people to stone just by looking at them. She's creating quite a problem for the local village, as citizens begin turning up dead - but unlike most dead people, they've turned to stone! The authorities try to cover it up, but as the murders continue, the son of one of the victims decides to investigate.

The film is very typical of Hammer in that it features a lush colour scheme and a lot of eerily Gothic settings. The Gorgon is directed by Hammer's most prolific director, Terence Fisher, and as usual - he does a solid job. The fact that this film stars both Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee is definitely to its advantage, although it is unfortunate (as is the case with many of their joint ventures) that they don't get to spend a lot of screen time together. Neither one is at their very best; but even Lee and Cushing on autopilot makes for great viewing, and neither one disappoints. It has to be said that the special effects are a bit shoddy and the monster doesn't look particularly scary; but stuff like that is part of the charm of Hammer Horror, and personally - I wouldn't have it any other way! It all boils down to a pretty standard conclusion, but while nothing about this film stands out too much next the rest of Hammer's output - it still stands up as a more than decent little horror film and I'm certain that my fellow Hammer fanatics wont be disappointed with it!

Hammer’s THE REPTILE (1966) is a semi-remake of this one, and an improvement – for which the scriptwriter of THE GORGON, John Gilling, was upgraded to director. Typically, the DivX edition I watched was plagued by artifacts and a few jump-cuts (not to mention being in the odious pan-and-scan format); however, I was very glad to have finally caught up with it – especially in view of the DD Home Video company’s recent folding (this had been mentioned as one of a possible number of Columbia/Hammer DVD releases).

Peter Cushing is rather unsympathetic and pitiful here (but still commanding as ever); Christopher Lee (playing much older than his years and who only really comes onto the scene during the last half-hour) is his usual pompous self; Richard Pasco, then, makes for an unusual hero. As for the identity of the titular creature, Megera, this isn’t much of a mystery – since Barbara Shelley is virtually the only female in sight (and, conveniently, suffers from amnesia spells during the cycle of the full moon); Hammer does seem to have had their myths mixed up here, and isn’t Cushing rather negligent in having failed to prove his theory for five whole years?! Other notable cast members include police chief Patrick Troughton, Michael Goodliffe (as Pasco’s father, who along with his other son, falls victim to The Gorgon) and Jack Watson as Cushing’s over-eager aide.

In most aspects, this is a typical Hammer product from their 1955-68 heyday: rich-looking (production design courtesy of Bernard Robinson) but essentially undernourished – the monster ‘attacks’ being centered around one family unit, while the much-feared castle seems to be situated in the immediate vicinity of the local inn! Still, most of the Hammer stalwarts (above all director Fisher and composer James Bernard) are in good form – however, the two stars only interact in one brief scene and Roy Ashton’s make-up isn’t exactly great (which Fisher, astutely, generally films from a distance and, in fact, we only get to see her full figure at the very end).

Needless to say, I’d love to see this receive an official DVD release – along with my two most-desired Columbia/Hammer properties, namely TASTE OF FEAR (1961) and THE DAMNED (1963).

One of the mythological gorgons(Megeara) is haunting a small village, and everyone in the village literally turns their faces away from the sporadic murders that occur when the moon is full. All this is discovered when a father of a dead man tries to protect his son's reputation, and is greeted with silence and hatred from the villagers. In his quest to find the truth...he does...the stone-cold truth. This is a fine Hammer film, not overly scary, but incredibly atmospheric with its swirling mists, huge cavernous palatial sets, and wonderful direction and casting. Terence Fisher does a first-rate job showing us the conspiracy going on in this village. Peter Cushing is the town's primary culprit of hiding the truth and gives his customary good performance. The film, however, belongs to Lee, who play an eccentric, gruff scholar helping the other son of the newly killed father. Lee is absurd yet brilliant in his caricature. A fine addition to the Hammer cycle.

The Gorgon may not be a personal favourite from Hammer, but it is still a film well worth watching, and along with Curse of the Werewolf it's among Hammer's most under-appreciated.

Admittedly, the story is absurd and occasionally could have been more eventful. The ending felt rushed and abrupt. And while the Gorgon was scary at first, by the end she did look rather cheaply made-up and more goofy and menacing. The snakes agreed did look fake, and the true identity of the Gorgon was made a bit too obviously too early.

On the other hand, the Gorgon aside, The Gorgon is quite well-done visually, with splendidly Gothic sets, sumptuous period detail, shadowy and bold lighting and beautiful and atmospheric photography. Fisher, the most frequent of Hammer's directors and for me their best, directs with a fine sense of atmosphere and dread, some parts are incredibly suspenseful, while not forgetting to make things fun too. Hammer regular James Bernard provides a music score that's jaunty but also booming with hauntingly thrilling effect, a highly effective score that fits with the mood like a glove.

The script is poetic and thought-provoking, with a number of funny and menacing lines from Meister that don't feel out of place (Meister's line about using long words and his answer to Heitz's 'I've been ill' did get a good laugh). It also didn't feel too talky, like some Hammer films can do, and the suspense level is never dropped too much. As silly and absurd the story can be, it very rarely harms the atmosphere which is tense and unnerving and didn't feel too predictable. While the characters are not the most well-developed, they are ones that are not too hard to care for.

It is because of the great performances from a talented cast that play a large part of as to why that is. Peter Cushing's dignity and restraint was very much appreciated and Christopher Lee performs with terrific gusto, and relishes his dialogue. Richard Pasco has fun too, Prudence Hyman horrifies as the Gorgon and Barbara Shelley has got to be Hammer's best ever femme fatale. Patrick Troughton, more than just a cameo this time, is great as well.

All in all, The Gorgon is not flawless but it's a good film with a lot of merits, and has to be one of Hammer's most under-appreciated. 7/10 Bethany Cox

The Gorgon ranks among Hammer's very best. Its premise is daring and imaginative - a female spectre so hideous that all who gaze on her are turned to stone, a power even more unnerving than the physical ferocity of lycanthropy or vampirism.

It boasts a wealth of Hammer expertise: Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee are at their peak; John Gilling scripted lucidly; James Bernard's score is one of his finest, the familiar overwrought strings underlaid with a spectral organ effect; and Michael Reed's pathecolor photography defines the Hammer ‘look', all sombre interiors and gorgeous autumnal forests. But the triumph is finally director Terence Fisher's.

The film begins beautifully with the credits superimposed against the twilit battlements of Castle Borski. Other touches fleetingly capture the mood of gothic-romantic literature. Professor Heitz beguiled into the forest by the Gorgon Magaera's distant siren-call. Her reflection glimpsed through the dead leaves floating on a mill pond. The encounter by moonlight in the graveyard between Richard Pasco and Barbara Shelley.

The Gorgon is certainly one of Hammer's most pessimistic entries. The setting is turn-of-the-century Middle Europe and the production-design more Teutonic than ever (Hammer, ever economical, transposed the monster of Greek classical myth to their familiar Germanic milieu). When we join the story the village of Vandorf has been under Magaera's baleful spell for seven years. Much of the action takes place in a repressive asylum. And Castle Borski is not the richly appointed seat of other Hammer films but a broken windswept ruin.

Characterisation is equally unrelenting. Cushing's Dr Namaroff is a more ruthless and maniacal variation of Van Helsing. Lee's Professor Meister , though gruffly benevolent, is overbearingly fatalistic. Meanwhile the most sympathetic characters - Carla, Paul, his father and brother - are all killed.

OK, inevitably the Gorgon's makeup is weak (though it scared me when I first saw it at age 11). The sickly green palor and spidery wrinkles are good, but the snake-hair just looks like she washed it the night before and couldn't do a thing with it. Half-glimpsed, her first appearance is remarkably effective, though. Her graceful tiptoe from behind the cobwebs in ghastly counterpoint to what we know will be her terrible visage. A sudden shock close-up and she disappears - almost glides - back into the shadows in long shot, a sequence as well done as anything Fisher has ever constructed. Alas, audience expectation (something Hammer usually deferred to) demanded a full-facial exposure at the end.

The temptation would be to say that The Gorgon might have worked better in black and white - but that would be to deny Michael Reed's disciplined use of colour. Perhaps only today's enhanced computer-graphics could properly pull off the effect required.

That flaw apart, The Gorgon survives as an early Hammer classic that can stand alongside Dracula, Brides of Dracula and The Hound of the Baskervilles.