Amicus Productions may not have had the longevity and fame of their distinguished competitor, Hammer, but they frequently proved their worth time and time again with their series of anthology movies – a film type that the other, more established studio never really tried to crack throughout their endless Dracula and Frankenstein sequels. However, what doesn’t manage to get the respect they probably deserve are the non-anthology movies they made, that ironically were usually assumed to be Hammer movies by the uninitiated.
To be fair, you could see how some people could make that mistake, especially when it came to Amicus’ first non-anthology horror, The Skull. Released right in the midst of Hammer’s reign, featuring Hammer regular, Freddie Francis in the director’s chair and boasting a stable of various, famous faces also usually employed by Hammer, you could suggest that the studio cheekily was trying to sneak their product under the noses of filmgoers to steal a little bit of their rival’s thunder. Thankfully, regardless of all of this, The Skull generally proves that it has a good head for business.
Our tale begins in the 19th century when reckless phrenologist, Pierre, has the bright idea to secretly have the body of the legendary sadist, the Marquis de Sade, exhumed and decapitated in order to study his depraved cranium. However, after bringing the severed bonce home with him and placing it in an acid bath to reveal the bone underneath, he meets with an unfortunate – and unseen – fate that leaves him just as lifeless as the Skull that now impassively views his body.
After a quick zip to modern day (well, the 1960s at least), we find Christopher Maitland in an auction house bidding on various items of the arcane as he’s a prolific collector and writer on the occult. However, in the midst of bidding for statues of demonic entities, he can’t help but notice that his friend and fellow enthusiast, Sir Matthew Phillips, looks to be going through a rough time. Matters get all the more sinister when Maitland is approached by shifty antiques dealer, Marco, who may lack in scruples, but makes up for it by being the current owner of that malevolent skull of the Marquis de Sade. It turns out that he’s actually stolen it from Phillips and is looking to hock it for a hundred pounds, but Maitland smells a rat when Marco seems to be quite happy to knock the price down in order to shift the skull quicker (it’s a Marquis de Sale at twice the price!).
Soon the well meaning Maitland gets drawn into the skull’s influence and when more deaths occur, he soon finds he now also has an obsession to own the titular head. However, at hand with a warning is Phillips, who knows a thing or two about the skull as it was he that Marco stole it from in the first place. But with the thing broadcasting evil vibes all over the place, can Maitland resist its ungodly urgings and not be driven to kill?
Adapted from a short story by Robert (Psycho) Block by Amicus co-founder, Milton Subotsky, The Skull is something of a perfect example of how Amicus could simultaneously pass as Hammer while still enthusiastically doing its own thing. While most of the horror output from the other studio was mostly content to remain in a period setting, this film starts in the 19th century only to move to more modern times once the threat is established. It was a smart way to differentiate the two studios, even when your cast list reads like a who’s who of Hammer affiliates, and it’s important to note that Hammer movies weren’t the only times we’d get the double act of Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee on screen at the same time. In fact, not only do the two legends share the screen and wax lyrical about the nature of evil skeleton parts, we even get to watch them (badly) play snooker as good chums, which is something countless outings as Dracula and Van Helsing could never have given us.
Anyway, when stripped down to its essence, The Skull is something of a good, old-fashioned ghost story that sees the possessed skull try and get whomever it can to do its evil bidding and indiscriminately take lives wherever it can. Considering that a skull already carries an instant creep factor thanks to the constant reminder of our mortality due to the fact that it’s what we’re all going to look like one day when our coverings are removed, Francis gets a gargantuan amount of mileage out of the leering little bone head, granting it close ups, underlighting it whenever he can and even getting it’s evil influence across by framing shots of his cast through the eye sockets of the offending appendage as it glares at them from across the room. Of course, when he isn’t filling up the screen with hot, skull action, Francis is giving us an eyeful of Cushing and Lee as they – as always – remain the consumate professionals even when things get extra hokey.
While their union has often been marked by them playing deadly enemies, I’ve always gotten a warn glow when movies would cast them as unlikely allies or as old friends, and while their friendship here is ultimately scuppered by the machinations of a disembodied head, it’s still worth the price of admission to see them just vibing. Joining them in far smaller roles are the recognisable faces (and voices) of the likes of Michael Gough and Patrick Magee, but while these and other velvet-throated thespians put in the hard graft to make the concept of an evil skull actually feel formidable (Cushing in particular is working overtime to sell the gradual eroding of his soul), it’s chiefly down to Francis and some spooky ambience to truly pull this off.
While modern audiences brought up on more spectacular fare may find all the harsh angles and skull close-ups a bit twee, the filmmakers do actually manage to make the villain something of an eerie presence. Scenes of the skull quietly levitating down the hall sound potentially quite ludicrous and should play far better on the page. And yet watching the boney bastard hover through a dark room does actually manage to still generate genuine chills thanks to how well the film realises it’s abilities to leech the good out of a man like the fifth wheel at a party sucking the life out of a room.
Relying nicely on vast amounts of old school atmosphere and the ability of its leads to treat even the silliest of concepts as the gravest thing you’ve ever experienced, Amicus’ maiden, non-anthology horror may not be a household name in terror, but it’s easily one of the best killer skull movies around by a country mile…
Proving that there’s no school like old-school, Amicus delivers a film positively heaving with classic horror prestige (Bloch, Subotsky, Francis, Cushing and Lee all on the same poster?) that manages to make the most out of its short story origins. But while it sometimes feels like a half-hour concept stretched to feature length, all those sinister angles and ominous lighting guarantees that we all know what it’s like to get skull-fucked.
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