Continuing in the vein…

Another good horror film that probably won’t get remade (though it might be nice) is Eye of the Devil. It was a kind of companion piece to The Wicker Man: basically, French vineyard owner discovers that he is expected to do a William Rufus to stop the drought killing his vines, and his wife objects. It starred David Niven, Deborah Kerr, David Hemmings and the late Sharon Tate among others, and would have been so much better in colour. It was nicely done, though, and there’s a rhythmic figure in seven-four that underpins the whole climactic sequence that I like a lot. And there’s a harp scene at the beginning.

It’s sad that something people have put creativity and energy into can vanish into limbo like this. I finally tracked down a copy of the book on which this film was based, “Day of the Arrow” by Philip Loraine, just last month, and it’s good too…but it’s never been reprinted from that day to this, and probably won’t be, and it’s also exceedingly unlikely the film will ever get on to disc.

And then there’s Chelmsford 123…