Hammer Horror! Dragon Thrills! The First Kung Fu Horror Spectacular! Shit Acting! Little Script To Speak Of! All on CD!

The far more entertaining than it should be Hammer fag-end Dracula spectacular without Chris Lee in it Legend Of The Seven Golden Vampires always had one thing going for it... a really rather good soundtrack, and completely awesome specially narrated story album voiced by star and all-round good egg Peter Cushing. And come June 7 you can hear it for yourself on CD thanks to a company called BuySoundTrax, which I'm sure isn't as dodgy as it sounds.

Here's the Gen, straight from the hooved animal's vocal chords...

BUYSOUNDTRAX Records will be releasing LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES. The soundtrack features music composed by James Bernard for the 1974 horror film directed by Roy Ward Baker (THE VAMPIRE LOVERS, QUATERMASS AND THE PIT), starring Peter Cushing as Van Helsing, Julie Ege, David Chiang, Robin Stewart, Shen Chan and John Forbes-Robertson.

In THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES, Hammer’s ninth and final Dracula film, Count Dracula rises from the grave in 1804 Transylvania and assumes the form of his Chinese disciple, Kah. A century later, Professor Van Helsing (Cushing) is in Chungking, lecturing a group of cynical students about the legend of Ping Keui, a small village terrorized by vampires wearing golden masks. Hsi Cheng, one of his students, takes the story seriously and begs Van Helsing for help in defeating the monsters. Van Helsing joins his son, Leland, a wealthy widow, Vanessa Buren (Ege) and Hsi Cheng on an expedition to Ping Keui. They travel with Hsi Cheng’s five brothers and one sister, all martial artists, to challenge Kah and meet their fate in Ping Keui.

For THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES, legendary Hammer Films collaborated with the equally legendary Shaw Brothers in Hong Kong to create a fascinating hybrid of both horror and martial arts genres. To score the film, the Shaw Brothers originally intended to score the film as they would their other kung fu films, using stock music licensed from music libraries or liberally lifted from already available soundtracks. Hammer’s production executive, Michael Carreras, thankfully insisted on an original score by James Bernard, the composer most associated with Dracula at the time through his music for the other Dracula films produced by Hammer. For THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES, Bernard composed one of his most engaging scores, blending his recognizable style with elements of traditional Chinese music.

BUYSOUNDTRAX Records presents this premiere release of the original motion picture soundtrack to THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES along with the contents of a 2 sided storyteller album released in 1974 of the story of THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES, narrated by Peter Cushing himself, both newly mastered by Digital Outland. THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES features music composed by James Bernard and arranged and conducted by Philip Martell and is presented by BUYSOUNDTRAX Records continuing in the tradition of our incredible series of soundtracks from the Hammer vaults. THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES is a limited edition of 1000 units.

Release Date: June 7th 2010

http://buysoundtrax.stores.yahoo.net/leof7govaors.html

 You can read my review here.

And the first Hammer on Blu-Ray is...

...Paranoiac, for fuck's sake.
Still, it's certainly a well-made thriller, if nothing else, and the crisp black and white cinematography should look mighty fine on HD, one supposes. Here's Olly Reed doing what he did best, in said filum...

You can read my somewhat sparse review here, and find out more about the new R2 Blu-Ray release here.

New Brit horror - Spiderhole

They're coming thick and fast at the moment, aren't they? Here's another heads-up on a BHF coming your way later in the year...

UK distributor Soda Pictures has snapped all rights to British horror Spiderhole for the UK and Ireland.

The horror, written and directed by Daniel Simpson, follows four art students whose utopian ideal of living as squatters turns into a nightmare when they discover their apparently abandoned mansion is concealing a hidden terror.

Spiderhole features a cast of up-and-coming British talent, including Emma Griffiths Malin (The Hole) and Reuben-Henry Biggs (Starter For Ten) and will be released in cinemas Autumn 2010.

That sounds original, eh? Let's hope there's a bit more to it than that... Reasonable excuse to show the above picture of Ms Griffiths Malin, anyway.

Here's 1... Back2Hell, in 3d, 4 you. Gimme 5!

Now here's a thing... Jacob Marley has posted news of a new Brit(ish) horror on the BHF board with a cast which will be of interest to anyone who's reading...

Los Angeles based Fantastic Films International, recently announced the cast for the 3D stereoscopic, live action film Back2Hell, which is part of a multi-picture deal with U.K.-based production outfit House of Fear.

Principal photography for Back2Hell recently began with a cast that includes Michael Madsen (Kill Bill I & II, Reservoir Dogs), Bai Ling (The Crow, Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow, Star Wars III), Lysette Anthony (Krull, Husband’s & Wives, Look Who’s Talking Now), Patrick Bergin (Sleeping With The Enemy, Patriot Games, Lawnmower Man 2), Oliver Tobias (The Stud, Arabian Adventure, King Arthur), Sylvester McCoy (7th Doctor in Doctor Who, Dracula), Dudley Sutton (The Devils, Football Factory, Lovejoy), Robin Askwith (Confessions series, U571, Britannia Hospital), Colin Baker (Doctor Who, Young Indiana Jones ), Robert Llewelyn (Red Dwarf, MirrorMask ), and Christopher Lee (Dracula, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings) as the Narrator.

Back2Hell is described as a 3D gothic tale of legendary occultist Alistair Crowley with a touch of HP Lovecraft. It is the final installment of the Raven Series which began with Evil Calls.

House of Fear is also in post production on Eldorado, the first British movie shot in 3D and in pre-production on two other live action 3D films, including Wolfman in 3D and a comic book fantasy titled Watchmen of Hellgate.

Now, call me an old cynic, but is this ever going to get made? Answers on a postcard, please...

Shrieking Sixties book launch in Derby - this Friday

Brit horror aficionado par excellence and all-round good egg Darrell Buxton (pictured above, with his mum) is launching his latest opus, The Shrieking Sixties, with a shindig at Derby's QUAD (which I'm assuming is a cinema of some sort). Now, this book is ace - I know this because not only are some of my reviews in it, but I've got a copy.
Darrell will be doing a Q and A and then introducing top Hammer devil-athon The Devil Rides Out on the big screen. And (ahem) I will be there, lurking in the background. Providing I can find the place. And Derby.
Why not go along, buy a copy of the book, treat yourself to some genuinely good 60s Brit cinema, and have a chat?
The details, courtesy of the QUAD itself:

On Friday 21st May at 8:30pm we are going to have a very special event featuring a Q and A with Darrell followed by an introduction to the classic Hammer film The Devil Rides Out by the man himself.

See you there!

Panic Button set to mushroom (button? mushroom? Ah, please yourselves)

Terrified about Social Networking? I am. If only because today at work one of the silly bints I work with accessed Facebook through her iPhone and showed everyone a load of photos of me from 20 years ago. Excruciating. And somewhat my own fault.
But that fear of online networking is soon to be played upon in Brit horror / thriller Panic Button, one of those "everyone send us a quid and we'll make a film eventually" productions we're all so keen on.
The story runs thus:

“Four young people win a trip of a lifetime to New York, courtesy of their favorite social-networking-website – All2gethr.com. As they board the private jet, they are asked to relinquish their mobile phones and take part in the in-flight entertainment – a new online gaming experience.

But this is no ordinary game. Trapped at 30,000 feet, they are forced to play for their lives and the lives of their loved ones by an invisible captor, who seems to know all their most intimate secrets.

With no escape and no one to trust, they are about to learn that putting your life on-line can have deadly offline consequences …”

Producer John Shackleton: “It is our intention that the situations and moral implications portrayed within the film will strike a chord with parents, young people and most users of internet technologies. It is sure to spark discussion amongst viewers by presenting a message that may even cause them to reassess their own online behaviour.”

Chris Crow ('Devil's Bridge' - nope? Me neither) is directing (from original screenplay by Frazer Lee), John Shackleton is producing for Movie Mogul Films.

You can find out more about the film, and how you can bung 'em a bit of cash (probably), at:
http://www.panicbuttonmovie.com

And while you're at it, get all post modern here:
http://www.all2gethr.com

Or just go a bit ironic (given the film's raison d'etre) here:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=208800284215&ref=ts

New spooky filum announced

BBC films are (apparently) set to make a new Stephen "Ghostwatch" Volk-penned ghost story, called The Awakening.
The synopsis runs thus:

Set in post-World War I England in 1921, the film follows a skeptical woman who travels to a countryside boarding school to investigate rumours of an apparent haunting. Just when she thinks she has debunked the ghost theory, she has a chilling spectral encounter which defies all her rational beliefs.

Sounds just up my alley, so to speak. It'll star Dominic "The Wire" West and Rebecca "Dorian Gray" Hall (pictured).