Recently saw FEAR IN THE
NIGHT an overlooked Hammer Horror movie from the early 1970’s with an exquisitely
creepy Peter Cushing and a malevolently bitchy Joan Collins. A variation on DIABOLIQUE, I enjoyed this
movie’s twists and turns and its neat ending.
Peter Cushing was the flip side
of Christopher Lee, his co-star in many films (I wrote about Lee here http://rgdinmalaysia4film.blogspot.com/2013/05/why-christopher-lee-is-best-count.html .
As threatening as Lee was, Cushing was grandfatherly and reassuring and
never openly evil even when he played bad men such as Dr Frankenstein (The best
performance of his career IMO was in CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN).
His power in these roles came
from a quiet authority. It could be cold
like any number of mad scientist he played, not just in FRANKENSTEIN but also
in CORRUPTION and a number of other roles or it could be adversarial like the
many times he went against Christopher Lee as Van Helsing in the DRACULA films or
the rival scientist in HORROR EXPRESS or it could be the quiet elderly victim like Grimsby in TALES FROM THE CRYPT.
In FEAR IN THE NIGHT, he is
pervy and creepy at first then crazy and harmless then sharper and more dangerous
than we realize. It’s a multifaceted
role and it is to his credit as an actor that he is able to pull it off.
He was also a dynamic
Sherlock Holmes and seemed to get the analytical side of the character down
without turning the production into a hamfest unlike many of the other actors who have attempted Holmes.
Peter Cushing – What a great
actor from a time of great actors. I
hope we see his kind of actor again one day especially in horror films.
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