THE DEMON (1963) - Daliah Lavi and IL DEMONIO

THE DEMON

(1963, Italy, original title IL DEMONIO)

For years, I only knew Daliah Lavi as the sensual, secret agent 'James Bond' in Casino Royale (1967) - to be fair, everyone in the film is called James Bond. But she has some great scenes, especially when she's up against ineptly villainous Woody Allen, whilst completely naked. If you've not seen it, she's also well known (to horror fans) for Mario Bava's The Whip and the Body (1963) opposite Christopher Lee.

The extensive Video Watchdog interview (in issue 170) with her surprised me when they discussed at length another Italian horror film where she plays a possessed woman who performs a backbending spider walk ten years earlier than Regan in The Exorcist. 

This alone made it a must-see for me, and while I wasn't expecting an unbridled exorcism shocker, The Demon has a consistent, unique quality and plenty of harsh surprises. Shortly after reading about the film, a subtitled version appeared on YouTube. This was lucky, as the film has only been available on DVD in Italy without English subtitles (above). That's a shame because it's quite mesmerising as well as Daliah's favourite of her many screen performances. 

Set in a remote Italian farming village, Puri is very unhappy that the love of her life is marrying another woman. She tries simple, elemental witchcraft to gain his affections. She performs a ceremony high on the cliffs above the church while he gets married to try and curse the couples' good luck. She stalks their home on wedding night, using dead animals to distract the guards. Is she possessed? Is she a witch? Is she mentally unbalanced?

Dressed in black, her defiant appearance and physical presence simply doesn't fit in. The villagers even believe she's a blight on their crops. They use a local faith healer to try and cast out the demon in her. His private ceremony involves trussing her up and then he takes advantage of her. 

Throughout the story, many try to cure her, usually with disproportionate violence. As her behaviour becomes more and more extreme, their methods also escalate.

The superstitious villagers use simple chants and tokens to ward her off, though her behaviour looks just as much like a distraught woman having a breakdown. Though her spider walk in a cathedral and her violent reaction to nuns and rosary beads appears to be a demonic possession.

The film has an episodic, semi-documentary look and sometimes not much explanation to link the abrupt change between locations or to examine the implications of what has just happened. But her extraordinary performance and the spectacular rural locations make this uniquely memorable.

Reading her VW interview again, this was based on a true story and Daliah met the girl she was playing! Director Brunello Rondi, a scriptwriter for Fellini, had her acting amongst (unprepared) real people in real locations, which makes it even more interesting.

THE CHANGES (1975) - post-apocalyptic children's TV!

THE CHANGES

(1975, UK, TV 10 x 25mins)

The image of a caravan in a quarry haunted me for nearly forty years!

I remember catching some of this children's TV series on one of its original showings. As a young teenager, I was open to the Day of the Triffids premise, where the whole country goes into a blind rage and destroys any and all advanced technology. To a young mind the first episode, where society completely breaks down, wasn't frightening but rather an interesting story.

It starts with everyone in a small town suddenly turning against all their electrical devices and petrol-driven vehicles, completely destroying them. When nothing is left, people start calming down but then want to flee the country because of the chaos and threat of disease. In the confusion, schoolgirl Nicky gets separated from her parents as they leave to head for the coast. Her father is more concerned about looking after her heavily pregnant mother. (All this happens in episode one!)

On her own, Nicky tries to catch up to her parents through the relatively deserted countryside, where the remaining population are already forming into superstitious, paranoid clans. She first joins up with a band of Sikhs, before running into a village full of racists, then a community of witchfinders, before finally stumbling onto the cause of all the changes...

What I didn't realise was this was in fact based on a trilogy of children's books by Peter Dickinson. The timeline of the story has been radically standardised, but many elements, like the boat Heartsease, are represented in the TV series.

Watching it all again, it's admirable that such a harsh apocalypse should be unleashed on children's television. The Tripods (1984), which had a more fantastical alien invasion, was shown in a Saturday Doctor Who slot when the whole family would be around for comfort. But The Changes went out midweek in the children's hour before The Six O'Clock News. But the series itself is about giving young people more credit for their intelligence and self-sufficiency, especially in a state of emergency.

It could be also be a radical way of comforting and preparing children for the unthinkable. The Changes bears comparison to the BBC adult drama, Survivors, which began a long successful run the same year. Almost seems like the BBC were preparing us all for self-sufficiency with dramas, and with the comedy The Good Life, to reassure us that if the nuclear bombs dropped, we'd still be alright if we knew how to live off the land!

The series of course suffers from having a children's TV budget, where the logistics of getting everything filmed probably took precedent over consistent acting performances. It often feels very 'padded out' with travelling shots and sometimes feels like the story is going nowhere.

While it often feels preachy, the agenda is extraordinarily wide: meeting different cultures, learning new languages, confronting racism and drastic change, life without parents, finding independence and responsibility. An alarmingly tough way to teach these lessons!

To its advantage, unlike many BBC programmes of the time, the series was all shot on film on location, with no distracting studio interiors and lighting to break up the look.

Nicky is ably played by Victoria Williams, who has to do most of her own little stunts as well. Among the few familiar faces are Jack Watson (From Beyond The Grave, Tower of Evil) as a witchfinder's deputy, and the recently departed Bernard Horsfall (On Her Majesty's Secret Service) as Nicky's father.

According to Wikipedia, the series was repeated only once on the BBC, in 1976, and again on UK Gold in 1994. It's never been released on home video, which seems strange considering the lasting memories it imprinted on many who caught it, not to mention its value for teaching, retrospective and social study.

I've only managed to revisit this because it briefly and recently reappeared on YouTube. I can only hope that someone like Network DVD pick it up for a release.

THE GHOUL (1975) - Peter Cushing horror not on DVD

THE GHOUL

(1975, UK)

Peter Cushing, John Hurt, Freddie Francis... but no DVD

The horror films in the many themed seasons on the BBC, late on Friday and Saturday nights in the 1970s and 80s imprinted on a generation of British horror fans. But while many have appeared on DVD and even blu-ray, The Ghoul hasn't been seen since the days of VHS. While Hammer Films are getting restored and reissued, some of the company's rivals haven't been so lucky.

Champion of the Classic Horror Campaign for late-night TV horror double-bills @Cyberschizoid recently reminded me that none of Tyburn Productions' horror films have made it to DVD. I then realised that there are in fact only three! Here's me thinking that Tyburn were a major horror studio, when I've been confusing them with Tigon films all these years. They started producing movies with a splash, when I was first reading horror film magazines, so the name of Tyburn stuck with me. But that opening burst of publicity was pretty much it.

Their most famous film is probably Legend of the Werewolf, starring Peter Cushing. Yes it's a werewolf movie, but a disappointing one, despite the great make-up work.. Much more interesting is Persecution (also 1975), starring Ralph Bates battling against his domineering mother (elegantly played by Lana Turner).

Their tiny library and small independent status has probably lead to their films subsequently falling through the cracks. But I'd especially like to pimp The Ghoul for your attention. This photo certainly caught mine...

World of Horror #4 photos made this a must-see!

A drunken party of well-dressed socialites and flappers runs into trouble when they decide to race their extremely expensive vintage motor cars through the foggy country lanes. This ends in disaster, with young Daphne seeking help at an isolated manor house. For her friends to find her, they'll have to tackle the neurotic groundskeeper, the devoted housekeeper, and the thing in the attic...

While set in the 1920's, this has less of a period feel than the Hammer films and aligns itself closer to contemporary horror with a variety of shock tactics and a far stronger heroine than Hammer usually managed. Veronica Carlson's character was relatively soppy in Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed, but here she's braver and more independent.

Peter Cushing is also allowed a role with more emotional depth than allowed him in Hammer films, with an uncomfortable-to-watch level of grieving, parallelling the actual loss of his wife. The cast also boasts John Hurt, in an early role (a few years before Alien) as a feral, scheming handyman. It's a treat to see him spark fireworks off Cushing.

Freddie Francis is often mocked for his worst horror films as a director. But his strongest films are definitely strong, like this one. It's fun to see him reprise the meathook gag from Trog, though he later seems unsure as to how to stage, prolonged frenzied violence.

Also very welcome in the cast, Alexandra Bastedo (wishing she had her superpowers from The Champions) and Ian McCulloch (wishing he had a rifle from Zombie Flesh Eaters).

The Ghoul is languishing, waiting in the attic, full-frame on VHS...

Rare photos (some are definitely spoilers) and the brief history of Tyburn films over on the extraordinary Peter Cushing fansite - The Black Box Club.

THE PSYCHOPATH (1966) - Amicus horror not on DVD

THE PSYCHOPATH

(1966, UK)

A twisty, twisted tale...

Amicus Studios became successful once Hammer Films had attracted international attention to British horror in the 1950s. Continuing through the 60s and 70s, Amicus didn't copy Hammer's style, distinguishing themselves with modern settings and their 'short sharp shock' compendium horrors.

Like Hammer, most Amicus films have been released on DVD, but I've just been reminded by dedicated horror publisher Johnny Mains (on Twitter as @noose&gibbet ) that a couple have been left behind. Sometimes, when  nostalgic mini-genres are plundered, they leave out the shit ones. That's not the case here, The Psychopath deserves to be regarded as an Amicus classic.

A small group of suited men collect in a drawing room to play a music recital (it gets better). But one seat is empty, the violinist late. Because he's been savagely run down in the street, repeatedly run over by a car. The police investigate immediately, a Detective (Patrick Wymark) quizzes the victim's fellow musicians. None of them have watertight alibis, all of them act suspiciously. The killer has also left a doll at the scene of the crime, an exact likeness of the dead man. This isn't the work of a murderer, but a psychopath...

Yes, it starts as a murder mystery, but in the same way that later Italian giallo amp up the violence and variety of the murders, The Psychopath is easily elevated horror status. There's also a depiction of madness which, taken to extremes by a few masterful actors, gives us what I lazily call 'horror acting'. Many performances by Michael Gough, Conrad Veidt and Freda Jackson can be described as over-acting. To me they're reaching the glorious heights of their characters' insanity, and briefly taking you with them.

One such performance in The Psychopath reminded me strongly of the style of acting in Psychoville 2, which I've only just watched. Several other elements of the film, like the old lady talking to her dolls, and the effete owner of a toyshop, convinced me that this has to be in the collections of either Reece Shearsmith or Steve Pemberton, formerly of The League of Gentlemen.

Patrick Wymark plays the police inspector who should really be fired because so many people are dying while he's still puzzling it all out. Wymark is the anchor of the film, seedily brilliant in both Polanski's Repulsion and Amicus' The Skull, but just as happy in a wig in period horrors Witchfinder General and Blood on Satan's Claw (1971). Sad to note he passed away aged 50, in 1970 when he was still in demand for a wide variety of work.

Among the suspects are Alexander Knox, who I mainly know as the US President from You Only Live Twice. Hammer regular Thorley Walters (Vampire Circus, Frankenstein Created Women) doing less comedy schtick than usual. Judy Huxtable, so unlucky in Scream and Scream Again (1970). 

The distinctive-looking Robert Crewdson, again sporting his weird beard and grey hair - a look I thought he'd created for the alien, Medra, in The Night Caller (1965) - but this must be how he looked that year!

Particularly good to see Margaret Johnston again, after her subtle menace in the classic Night of the Eagle (1962), and a youthful John Standing before his creepy turns in Torture Garden (1967) and The Legacy (1978).

The Amicus atmosphere is evoked by a soundtrack from Elisabeth Lutyens, who did such wonderful work on Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1965), writer Robert Bloch (The House That Dripped Blood, Torture Garden and of course Psycho) and director Freddie Francis, here given time to take care over the 2.35 compositions, even though he wasn't behind the camera. There's a wonderful scene in the house of dolls that mirrors a moment in Blade Runner, when it's hard to distinguish the mannequins from the real thing.

Director Freddie Francis in a publicity shot in Kine Weekly

The vicious opening murder by car pre-empts the very similar start of Terence Young's Hollywood thriller Wait Until Dark (1967). And there's a prominently bare-backed young lady, the year before Vanessa Redgrave caused a fuss by being similarly undressed in Blow Up.

The Psychopath is for fans of the Hammer 'psycho' films, 1960s British horror, German krimis and early giallo. I believe it's shown by Turner Movies in some countries. Sometimes, it appears on YouTube, slightly cropped at the sides. Of course, I'd really love it on blu-ray. Amicus boxset anyone?

Update, November 2013
A Twitter colleague suggested this Italian DVD of The Psychopath, titled La Bambola Di Cera. It has English audio, but with the same tight framing at the sides (from 2.35 to 16:9?). The picture is also soft and the colours weak. But it's the only known DVD out there. Until a properly framed restoration happens I'll still, cheekily, list this as not-on-DVD.

ALL THIS AND WORLD WAR II (1976) - a history lesson with The Beatles

ALL THIS AND WORLD WAR II

(1976, USA)

A 90-minute documentary feature attempting to cover the whole of World War II, all set to songs of The Beatles.

Not a completely crazy idea after the acclaimed documentary Buddy Can You Spare A Dime? (1975) had taken a similar approach to America's Great Depression. But closer comparison could be the That's Entertainment compilations that made use of studio archives to create new movies - the cinematic equivalent of a TV 'clip show'.

In the UK in 1977, I only knew the movie because of the vinyl double-album cluttering up the soundtrack section of the record shops. Being at school, I wasn't about to be tempted into the cinema for a history lesson, not that I ever noticed it playing anywhere locally. Ironically, this was around the same year that I'd stop studying history. At my school, the only way to learn about 20th century history was to take the 'A' level, which I didn't. Decades later, I decided to fill in some of the vast gaps in my education, particularly the World Wars, by watching two extensive documentary series (The World At War and The Great War).

Despite a generous budget, All This and World War II wasn't at all popular, with no known home video release and only a few TV showings. Luckily a truncated version recently appeared on YouTube, otherwise I'd never have seen it. For this to get a DVD release would require a huge outlay for music rights from a wide range of record companies, not to mention clearance of the movie clips.

I was mainly curious about the music, all Beatles songs, but cover versions from a wide range of rockers. The results are far more successful than the hideous treatments trotted out in Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (which I narrowly avoided in 1978 and, again, only caught recently). So many good tunes murdered... it was a musical massacre.

Again, The Bee Gees are in there, but there are also great covers by Elton John (Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds), Helen Reddy (The Fool on the Hill), Bryan Ferry (She's Leaving Home), Jeff Lynne (of ELO), Tina Turner, Frankie Valli and many more! The soundtrack album made more money than the movie...

With a backdrop of Beatles' songs, the entire film is made up of newsreel and movie clips, at a time when music video had hardly started as a form. Synching footage to existing music was still a novelty or an interlude. The cover versions are given a cinematic boost by being backed by the London Symphony Orchestra.

The opening reel worked best for me, with the grim descent into war portrayed without commentary as Nazi Germany sweeps across Europe invading country after country, poignantly set to 'The Long And Winding road'. The editing complements both the music and lyrics, the choice of newsreel footage pertinent and often fascinating.

But after a great start, there's more and more use of spoken word, with Presidential speeches, lightweight interviews and movie stars enlisting. What I wasn't expecting was the extensive use of clips from wartime movies, blurring the difference between real and recreation. The cutting speed also slows down and the flow of music is interrupted. worse still by funny clips and an over-reliance on excitement from epic movies like Tora Tora Tora and The Longest Day. Hollywood spectacle and propaganda at odds with the reality of the war. I'm also very confused by the use of 'I Am The Walrus' over the attack on Pearl Harbor...

The lyrical juxtaposition could have been weightier. Simply portraying Hitler as a 'Fool on the Hill' is consistent with him being a figure of fun at the time, with most TV comedians. For the dictator to be used for comedy nowadays is seen as risk-taking and edgey, as in South Park. I prefer it when filmmakers attack Hitler with more enthusiasm, like Quentin Tarantino did in Inglourious Basterds.

But I guess this was a family-friendly lesson in who-invaded-who. Despite The Beatles involvement and playing out with 'Give Peace a Chance', this is less anti-war than most dramas of the time. Peace also wasn't an option with the Axis forces set on world domination. In the end the most stirring passages are the propaganda and heroism from the movie clips, especially Dana Andrew's terrific climactic speech from The Purple Heart. I don't even think you can spot any dead bodies. Some war.

In contrast, TV documentary The World At War (1973) had already shown dead bodies, horrific piles of them, many of the diverse horrors of war from the testaments of eyewitnesses. The difference in approach is obviously stark. Showing soldiers marching to war, but not what can happen to them? Hearing about the war from a Prime-Minister rather than a footsoldier.

Still, the film might have held a few surprises for mid-seventies audiences, like the vintage colour footage. Had I gone to see it, I'd have also been unaware about the female workforce called into munitions factories and heavy manufacturing. There's footage of squads of all-African-American troops that counters most war movies' all-white casts. And I'd not seen any newsreel of the Japanese-American citizens being moved to internment camps, before even now.

The version I saw on YouTube is ten minutes short of the (default) 90 minutes running time mentioned on IMDB, and I'm curious if there's any mention of the concentration camps in the original. Another huge difference from the portrayal of the war nowadays. The bombing of Hiroshima is also reduced to one distant shot. Instead, you learn more about which movie stars went to war...

So... All This and World War II works as a quick overview of what happened, for the impatient, and many of the songs interplay well with the images - the allies landing at Normandy against 'Life In A Day' is tremendous. This also teases up some of the great war movies, and the cover versions hold a great many surprises for fans of 70s rock and pop.

But 'I Am The Walrus'. Really? Ask if they'll play that at the U.S.S. Arizona Memorial and see what happens to you...


Here's an original trailer...

WIPED! DOCTOR WHO'S MISSING EPISODES (2010)

Missing, presumed lost - over a hundred episodes of Doctor Who...

Some of my earliest TV memories are of being frightened by the many monsters of Doctor Who. Daleks, Cybermen and Yeti lived on in my nightmares, memories mingling with images I thought I'd seen on TV. I saw many Patrick Troughton stories and must have seen some William Hartnell episodes before that (I was only five when his reign as The Doctor ended in 1966). 

1973 magazine that listed every story to date -
before some of them were lost forever

Through the years, Doctor Who novelisations, photos and comic strips kept these early stories alive in my imagination and occasionally a clip or a repeat would appear on TV. Eventually, many years later with the coming of home video, there was the chance to see them again, measured against my childhood memories. The BBC also started transmitting archive shows on the cable channel UK Gold, and thankfully showed every complete Doctor Who story that they had at the time. 

This 1972 behind-the-scenes paperback also teased us
 with its catalogue of early adventures

But this revival was tempered for me by the awful news in the September 1986 issue of 'Time Screen', that the BBC simply didn't have many of the recordings any more. They'd been wiped, dumped or lost. After many years of piecemeal news and rumours, comes the complete story of how so many episodes survived.

"In the 1960s, the BBC screened 253 episodes of its cult science-fiction show Doctor Who, starring William Hartnell and then Patrick Troughton as the time travelling Doctor. Yet by 1975, the corporation had wiped every single one of these episodes. Of the 124 episodes starring Jon Pertwee shown between 1970 and 1974, the BBC destroyed over half of the original transmission tapes within two years of their original broadcast", Richard Molesworth's thoroughly researched book 'Wiped! Doctor Who's Missing Episodes' declares on its back cover.

The Evil of the Daleks - six out of seven episodes are missing

The book describes as fully as possible the history of these recordings, how the BBC worked through the decades and how so many shows could disappear. Even to non-Doctor Who enthusiasts, this is a thorough description of television production and recording techniques from the 1950s to the 1980s.

The original videotapes of all the Hartnell (1963-1966) and Troughton (1966-1969) stories were indeed wiped, because early videotape was so expensive, and the recordings were only really necessary for a single transmission. During the two years respite before the tape was reused, filmed copies were made for overseas sales. In most cases, these black and white 16mm prints returning from overseas are the only surviving versions of many episodes. They even account for some of the Jon Pertwee season (which was entirely filmed in colour), during which the automatic wiping of master tapes thankfully ceased, but not before 108 Hartnell and particularly Troughton episodes had been lost, perhaps forever.

'Wiped!' goes into incredible technical detail about the formats they were recorded on and precisely how every restoration has been achieved. There's also enough information for what detectives around the world should keep their eyes out for in film and video archives (as well as collectors' circles), including a checklist of missing episodes as of 2010.

BBC Home Video (now called 2Entertain) teamed up with Doctor Who fans to restore the quality of their remaining archives, including adding back the colour to many Pertwee episodes. Only 'The Mind of Evil' remains in black and white now. Without any surviving colour elements, only an expensive colourisation process could restore it. The book helps explain the variable quality of the surviving episodes in the ongoing programme to release every complete story on DVD.

The episodes that remain lost that hurt me the most are the two stories 'The Abominable Snowmen' and 'The Web of Fear', which I enjoyed being frightened by in the 1960s. The collective interest in all the lost stories have thrown up some remarkable retrievals and reconstructions. Besides ardent fans, the British Film Institute also joined in the hunt for lost footage, and interest is still high enough for new finds to quickly make money! But what if they're never ever found?

The earliest way of reliving the episodes were the novelisations of each story, which started publishing in the 1970s. Normally these would just be adapted from scripts, but the authors also tried to see the recordings again to refresh their memories, but even then some had already been lost.

Even better were the successful recovery of audio recordings of all the missing episodes, usually from fans recording off their TVs at home. These have now been released on CD, sometimes with linking narration to turn them into 'audiobooks'.

The many publicity photographs taken on set for Radio Times help fill in the gaps and some are better quality than the original transmissions anyway. 'Doctor Who: The Sixties' and '...The Seventies' are two glossy large-format books full of the best photos and behind-the-scenes stories.

More precise memory-joggers are the "tele-snaps" - photos taken off the television of every scene as they were being transmitted. Before home video was affordable, directors and actors would buy these as visual examples of their work. These surviving early 'screengrabs' are now available on the BBC website, and are of course complementary to the audio recordings. Above is a tele-snap from 'The Web of Fear' - Yeti in an abandoned London Underground...

More recently, the cyberman adventure 'Invasion', an eight-episode Troughton story had two missing chapters rebuilt with animation, using the tele-snaps as a visual guide. This was very expensive, but meant that it can now be enjoyed on DVD. (I reviewed it here.)

Individual episodes and fragments have also been released, particularly in the Lost In Time boxset, covering the Hartnell and Troughton series. This was the first and only opportunity I've had to see the two surviving Yeti episodes. This DVD boxset, also available in the US, includes orphaned episodes, clips and even censor cuts that have been recovered.

Poor organisation and a lack of money or foresight are all easy to pinpoint in retrospect, but this huge example of how lost programmes later became valuable can be applied to many other television archives then and now. Not to mention a warning of whether you'll remember anything you seen or hear on the Internet in a few decades time...

Do you want to know more?

Any further recoveries of lost British film and TV will appear here on the Wiped News website.

An interview with Richard Molesworth, the author of the book Wiped!

BBC website - Doctor Who tele-snap 'photonovel' reconstructions.

An example of a BBC CD - audio-only release of the lost story Evil of the Daleks, recovered from superior fan recording.

The 1970s Doctor Who novelisations are being reprinted and made available for Kindle.

SKY RIDERS (1976) - best ever hang gliding action movie...

SKY RIDERS(1976, USA)


This article has now been updated - with news of the widescreen DVD release

What's the most dangerous way to liberate hostages?
A definitely 70s action movie centred on a fad, that's not related to disco or skateboarding. With a great cast and a Lalo Schifrin score, shot in 2.35 widescreen, this movie could still fly today (if it were ever given the chance of a DVD release).

A gang of Baader-Meinhof (style) terrorists, disguised in hockey masks, invade a wealthy industrialist's home and kidnap his wife (Susannah York) and two kids. For a lot of money and ammunition he can buy them back, but the Greek police (led by Charles Aznavour) don't want to give in to their demands. So while the husband (Robert Culp) is dealing with the police, ex-husband (James Coburn) tries to sneak into the baddies' hideout, high in a mountain-top monastery, and free the hostages by himself. How on Earth is he going to do that?

Hang gliders. For a while they were everywhere. James Bond had a high-flying stunt in Live and Let Die (1973). But the film that top hang glider experts recommend is Sky Riders for some of the best and most dangerous footage of the sport in its early days, before the fliers wore parachutes!

The skateboard movie 'genre' was aimed at kids and teens (encouraging them to try dangerous stunts like riding under moving lorries on their skateboards). But this pitches itself as a tough, adult thriller, completely contrary to the serene feeling of flying high in the sky without an engine. Hang gliders as action vehicles are also limited by their close resemblance to sitting ducks.

The opening kidnap is dramatic enough, with a detectable censor cut excising the death of one of the staff. There's then a long lull in the action as the rescue mission is planned, practised and mounted. Though it's fun to see some experts pretending to glide badly, standing in for Coburn's character as he's learning how to fly.

The fantastic, barely accessible location of the monastery, surrounded by natural sheer-walled mountains, is visually spectacular. Note that in the above photo there is more than one monastery. According to the Wikipedia entry, there are actually six surviving clifftop monasteries in the Greek valley of Meteora, each one perched on a natural sandstone pillar. One was used in the finale of For Your Eyes Only (1981) and maybe the same one was in the live action Tintin and the Golden Fleece (1961). Horror fiction fans take note that Max Brook's novel World War Z also uses Meteora, a very handy place for hiding from zombies. I'll leave you to work out which monastery was in each - the Wikipedia article has handy photographs of each one.

The gliding mission would be more exciting if we knew how technically dangerous it all is. No real hints are given as to how hard these flights are as they glide between the mountains, and luckily the armed guards seem oblivious to the whole exercise, as they sneak up to the fortress. Unluckily, their escape plan gets complicated.

The action ramps up as the police decide to storm the fortress as well, regardless of the fact they're endangering the hostages, oblivious to the rescue plan already underway. This loophole logic is purely to get as much firepower on the screen as possible. An astonishing 'high' point of the movie is James Coburn performing a perilous stunt hanging off a helicopter hundreds of feet in the air.


Not essential cinema, but a reminder of when big action scenes had to be shot for real. The story of the making of the film would probably be equally interesting. But this has a strong cast, stronger than the storyline anyway, and a gung-ho finale.

Robert Culp (the original star of the TV show I Spy) looks convincing on the big screen, at a time he was fighting to escape endless TV movies, and the story starts as if he's going to be the central character. But James Coburn (Our Man Flint, A Fistful of Dynamite) sneaks in later to steal the movie and all the best scenes! Seventies Brit-chick Susannah York (The Shout, Gold, Superman - The Movie) gets good mileage out of facing up to her female captor. Eccentrics Kenneth Griffith and Harry Andrews pep up the cast list but only get one scene each. Hunky John Beck (between supporting roles in Rollerball and The Big Bus) is largely wasted, despite being in the rescue squad.

I'm not a slave to auteur theory, but director Douglas Hickox did give us several cult movies that still endure - Brannigan (1975, John Wayne as a Dirty Harry-style cop wreaking havoc in London), Behemoth the Sea Monster (1959, another dinosaur wreaking havoc in London) and the marvellous Theatre of Blood (1973, Vincent Price as a Shakespearean serial killer wreaking havoc in London).

After catching most of Sky Riders on TV in the eighties, I wanted to try the whole film again, only to discover the VHS was going for silly prices on eBay. I can only blame the hang gliding fans, but it also renewed my interest. It isn't on DVD in the UK or US but I'd really like to see it in the original 2.35 widescreen. I've only ever seen this as a cramped pan-and-scan version on TV and on laserdisc.

The best pictures and posters online, used for this review, are also for sale at MovieGoods...
Everard Cunion's hang gliding site reviews the film with notes about the hang gliders and stunt pilots.
This might be available as a legit DVD release in Spain, but there's no clues if it's widescreen, otherwise I'd pounce on it, like tiger.

The only clip on YouTube is this hang gliding display that gives Coburn's character the idea of how to rescue his family...