amal:

nice

John O'Hara:

Hi Richard,

I would just like to say a big thank you to you and Sarah for organising the Frighten Brighton film festival.
Emily Booth was great fun and a good sport and very knowledgeable about the films.

I managed to make the first four films but couldn’t last out for “Phantasm”, which was ironic, because
it was around 1980 that I stopped going to see that many horror films as they all got a bit too graphic
for me. Although I wasn’t averse to seeing the odd Argento or Bava film in my youth.

A great day and brought back many fond memories for me. I only came across the festival by chance
and was hugely pleased to see such a packed event as I spent most of the 60′s and 70′s sat in various
flea pits throughout Greater London watching horror films.

At the late night showings quite often I was the only one in the cinema who wasn’t either trying to get
their leg over, or come in for a kip or shouting drunken jokes at the screen. I actually went to watch the
films. Mind you, some of the films were so awful I might have been better off joining in the aforementioned
pursuits!

No matter how bad the film was, when they showed the trailer for the coming horror films, I couldn’t wait
to see them. A lot of times the poster for the film was better than the film.

My local cinema was The Classic in Erith and often had a whole week of horror films with two different
films each night. Some very strange double bills, it was like someone drew the films out of a hat! You could
get “The Stranglers of Bombay” on with something like “The Camp on Blood Island”, neither of which were
really horror films?

They always showed a late night double bill on Saturdays. Normally early Roger Corman or Bert I. Gordon
productions. The local ABC was more upmarket and showed all the Hammer films when they came
out and the more modern Roger Corman Poe films.

A lot of them were not that scary, it was more like you had a cosy second family that you visited as
you always knew you were in for an entertaining evening once you saw the usual familiar faces. Peter
Cushing, Christopher Lee, Michael Gough chewing the scenery, the lovely Barbara Shelley or Barbara
Steele, Vincent Price, Boris Karloff, Lon Chaney Jr, Bela Lugosi and all the great character actors such
as Andrew Keir, Andre Morell, Michael Ripper, George Woodbridge, Charles Lloyd Pack, Dick Miller
Jonathan Haze etc etc…

I would sometimes get on about four buses to go miles away to see horror films. One night I remember
going to see “Frankenstein 1970″ on with “Castle of Evil” only to find when I left that most of the buses
had finished and I had to walk about 5 miles home.

One Saturday in the early 70′s I went to the Granada Woolwich in the afternoon and saw “The Thing
from Another World” with “Castle of the Living Dead” with a very young Donald Sutherland in it, then
came out and walked across the road to the Odeon and saw “The Whisperers” and “Bunny Lake is
Missing” and on the bus back thought I might as well stay on the bus and go to the late night double
horror bill at the Classic and duly saw “Wasp Woman” and “The Beast from Haunted Cave”.

Every now and then you would stumble across something like “Psycho”, “Night of the Demon”,
“Night of the Eagle”, “Night of the Living Dead”, “Dead of Night”, “Onibaba” or “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”
which would scare the living daylights out of you. Remember back then there was no video, no dvds,
you had to wait 5 years before a film was shown on TV after its cinema release so we were not saturated
with them, which tends to remove their shock value.

You were basically sat on your own in a dark cinema and then normally had to walk home in the dark.
I vividly remember seeing “The Horror of Dracula” for the first time and being very nervous walking home
afterwards waiting for Dracula to appear from a bush!

If you were very unlucky you found yourself watching a Jess Franco horror film with the awful zooming in
and out shots which made it look more like an advertisement for european holidays. How he got so many
made is a miracle in itself but credit to him that he did. I remember the Producer Harry Alan Towers
saying of him after he made the last Fu Manchu film for him, something along the lines of Jess has
managed to do what no one else has so far and that is to kill off Fu Manchu. That is a bit rich coming
from HAT, bearing in mind his track record.

In the 60′s I used to go into Woolwich which had what was quaintly referred to in those days as “a
dirty book shop” simpy because they sold “Famous Monsters of Filmland”. What was funny was that
they always gave it to me wrapped in a brown paper bag the same way they wrapped all the dirty books
up. I’ll bet everyone though I was a right perv coming out of there every month clutching my bag. I still
have Issue Number One.

My Brother and I religiously watched the BBC2 horror double bills on a Saturday night which is where I
discovered the fantastic old Universal films so it was great to see you wanted to try to get the Beeb to
bring these back. I am sure they would prove popular. Looking back now, it does seem quite bizarre that
they put things like the cricket highlights in between the two films???

I really wanted to get up to London to see the two films on the 2nd September but I promised my daughter
I would take her to see “North By Northwest” which is on at The Duke of Yorks on the same day but I
will definitely keep my eye out for any future events. I have only seen “Corruption” once, which was
at the NFT from a very bad print, the NFT seemed to specialise in bad prints years ago! My Brother
would always say to me before the film started, I wonder if they have taken the scissors to this one.

I have seen “Island of Lost Souls” once many years ago on BBC2 I think it was? Great to see you are
showing them at The Scala as I used to go to see horror seasons there in the early 70′s when it
was in a basement (I seem to remember?) in Fitzrovia off Soho. That was the first time I saw Ed Wood
films. An experience never to be forgotten. Haha.

Short of seeing the odd one at The Dukes there is a decided lack of venues to see these great old
films in the format for which they were made. They did recently show “Eyes without a Face” and
“Frankenstein meets the Wolfman” at the Dukes. On the latter film, I seem to be one of the few people
who enjoyed the recent remake of “The Wolfman” but maybe that is because it is such a great story.
Some people said they found it hard to believe that Anthony Hopkins could be Benecio del Toro’s Dad.
Try believing that Claude Rains is Lon Chaney Jr’s Dad!!!!

In the late 60′s I was lucky enough to have my first job when I went to work in Soho, where I worked
for around 30 years running a small airfreight company which dealt with the media. My offices were
at 143 Wardour Street and I was facing Warner Brothers UK Offices and about 100 yards down from
me was Hammer House. It was not unusual for me to go to lunch and walk out and see famous
film stars every week. I saw Clint Eastwood, Robert Vaughan, James Coburn, Leslie Caron, Omar Sharif,
Norman Wisdom, Roger Moore, Paul McCartney the list was endless but that never really rocked my boat.

I would only really get excited if I saw someone like Victor Maddern or Michael Ripper. I once walked
straight into a lamp post after getting a big smile from Ingrid Pitt. Talk about Mr.Cool!

One of my Clients was David Reed, Oliver Reed’s less drunken Brother. You would often see Ollie
in the pubs locally. He was a lovely man. I think people forget that Ollie had a long career with Hammer
before moving on to becoming more famous (or should that be infamous?)

My local was The Ship Pub in Wardour Street and Edward Judd used to drink in there, or Eddie as he
liked to be called, and he was a real flamboyant character, always kitted out in a sports jacket, cravat
and his bad wig and always ready to regale you with a story (preferably if you bought him a drink). Such
a shame he did not get much work towards the end of his career as he made such a good start.

Another of my Clients was a Distributor who bought the rights to distribute “Godzilla v The Smog Monster”
which he thought would make him a millionaire, but unfortunately he was the only one who went to
see the film. Well, apart from me of course.

The Office above me housed the great Arnold Miller, who is still going strong in his 90′s, who made a lot of
shall we say “Naturist” films, which proved very popular. He then moved into horror films and produced
the great “Sorcerers” and “Witchfinder General” and the not so great “Blood Beast Terror”. I used to have some
great chats with him and his business partner, Leslie Berens, about films.

They also produced shorts, sort of boring Look at Life type of features which used to be shown with major
films once cinemas stopped showing double bills. I remember getting in the Lift with them one day and
when I asked Arnold how it was going he said really well as they had a feature on with some film about a shark
which was proving to be really popular. It was called “Jaws”!

Arnold used to work with Michael Klinger, the film producer, and I also remember Michael Klinger when
he produced “Repulsion” saying that he thought he was going to get a Mini of a film and Roman Polanski had
presented him with a Rolls Royce of a film.

One of my Customers was Butchers Films, which was one of the oldest established film distributors in
the world and the very aged Mr.Butcher asked me to go to a basement in Old Compton Street to look
at a load of film which he had from the early 1900′s and which he wanted sent to the Bundersarchiv
in Berlin. Now Mr.Butcher was a big bald headed man who spoke and looked like Erich von Stroheim
in “Sunset Boulevard” and when we got down to the basement there were masses of film cans dripping
with nitrate. Upon seeing this, I mentioned to Mr.Butcher that in view of this it might be wise for him to
remove the large cigar he was smoking in case we both went up in flames, to which he replied “Don’t
worry. It is probably out”.

I also dealt with the lovely late Bill Chalmers from Planet Films, who produced “Night of the Big Heat”
and “Island of Terror” and “Devils of Darkness” and I used to send prints around the world for him
of these films.

One day I went to the bakers to get some lunch and Vincent Price was in there ordering a load of
doughnuts and making all the ladies who worked in there laugh. He seemed a real gentleman.

Another time I went out and saw Christopher Lee trying to hail a taxi down, it was shortly after he
had made “Scars of Dracula” around 1971? I nervously asked him for his autograph but then had
to root around for some paper and found I had none and all I could find was my wage slip. I then
couldn’t find a pen and finally he produced a pen and autographed the back of my wage slip.

He has missed about 3 cabs by now and I apologised to which he replied “That is not a problem
at all. Thank you” in his stern voice. He is quite frightening in real life but again, a total gentleman.

My only regret is that I never got to meet my favourite of all of them, the lovely Peter Cushing.
But heigh ho, I still have all the great legacy of films to watch which he did.

Anyway, hope all this hasn’t bored the pants off you and maybe will get to see you at some future
showings, in the meantime you will certainly have my support and keep up the good works.

Yours gratefully!

John O’Hara

John O'Hara:

Thanks Richard, I look forward to the next Frighten Brighton one hopefully this year and will try to get up to some of the London ones. I am sure you have already seen it but Reece Shearsmith is presenting a screening of Theatre of Blood starring VP on March 6th at the BFI (NFT) in London.

Cheers

John

Mark Mawston:

Hi, this is Mark. I’ve attended a couple of your shows and put some links up on Cinema Retro who I write and photograph for. I also work with the Harryhausen Foundation. I informed them of your double bill show. Can you confirm who the special guest is and I’ll pass it on and see if i cant get it on Rays official site.
Best
Mark