muswellmovies

This was available on YouTube for a while but is otherwise quite a rare find having been produced for Direct To Video release in the '80's. Director Ray Selfe a largely unsung contributor to the golden age of British exploitation cinema told me that Vincent Price's footage was shot in one day but the budget seems to have stretched to a change of jacket for Mr Price which might have been to boost the production values or Ray may have been mistaken and taken two days to shoot Prices on camera sequences. Apart from VP's presence to tell the history of cinematic horror and in similar fashion to another Ray Selfe production "The Casting Couch" everything else is made up of Public Domain footage from Ray's archive with some stuff from Dick Randall the Producers back catalogue which brings this almost up to date for the time this was made. plus a wild card excerpt from Paul Hart-Wilden's "Horror Film" according to the films credits, which may be "Horrorshow" (1990) from Hart-Wilden's IMDb page. PHW also provided the original story for another Randall epic, "Living Doll". The end credits give 1989 as the copyright date for this but IMDb give 1985 as the production date which seems more likely. Ray also claimed to have been the original , unaccredited, editor on "Friday the 13th" which provides some clips here and suggests some Randall/Spectacular involvement in that not mentioned on IMDb. Which might suggest "Friday the 13th" is actually a British Production!!!

BTW about the same time as this Ray was working on a video release of "Phantom of the Opera" (Chaney) with a music track by Rick Wakeman! another rarity

As a youngster this was a must see show for me. Now largely unsung and forgotten Bernard Braden was a TV genius who addressed the camera from behind a desk with somewhat satirical humour. His urbane insight into the weeks events made him a genial TV Host. But it was the appearances by Peter Cook in the role of EL Wisty performing surreal comic monologues which were the highlight for me. Before his double act with Dudley Moore hit the screen these pieces by Cook ended up on an LP and I still treasure my copy. The format was refined into a later show called Bradens Week sans Cook but with featured reports from one Esther Rantzen who "adopted" Bradens Format as her own in a show called "Thats Life" which ran for 20 years. With magnificent foresight Braden filmed a number of interviews on colour film with leading lights of the late '60's scene. These were followed up, years after his death with new interviews with the same people amazed at their former selves the result called "Sex Drugs and Rock 'n' Roll: The 60s Revealed" well worth seeking out.

This "documentary" was produced in the era of the VHS "sell through" title and tells a lot of well worn tales of a Hollywood for which the parade had long passed by. The production is based on a book of the same name by "Selwyn Ford" a pen name for the team of Derek Ford and Alan Selwyn whose work in the exploitation movie world of 1970's UK has some followers. Their volume covers much the same ground as Kenneth Angers "Hollywood Babylon" books. But as the title suggests the focus is on those whose rise to fame was aided by trading sexual favours for parts. Susan George acts as presenter in the links filmed in a Soho preview theatre basically introducing clips culled from Public Domain titles. Some like Hedy Lamarr's nude debut in a film which her husband attempted to suppress, ultimately unsuccessfully, have a well documented provenance. Others like Joan Crawford's rumoured appearance in a stag film remains unsubstantiated by the clip used here where the identity of the young lady involved is masked by the poor quality of the image. Legend has it that Crawfords rival Bette Davis was the only female star not to provide her favours for advancement. However gossip especially the salacious kind about the gods of the silver screen is always saleable. As a long line of publications like Confidential magazine testify. So thanks to the joy of market research the Producers discovered they could make a profit from a minimal investment and this project was born. The subjects of this film were long gone 20 years ago when this was made so they are probably unknown to modern movie fans of today but if you're a nostalgia nut this is worth seeking out. Kenneth Anger has promised a new volume of "Hollywood Babylon" when the subjects have passed away and therefore cannot sue so maybe an update is due.