The Many Moods Of Jason King

10/30

Telly Looks At...Art

I am obsessed with the 1981 short film 'Telly Savalas Looks At Birmingham' and have been for some time. This incredible period piece, filmed in 1979, was the work of prolific director and producer Harold Baim, and it tickles and enthralls me for a number of reasons: it's extremely funny, hugely informative and very redolent of the world at the time I was growing up and starting to take notice.

I'm not from anywhere near Birmingham, but I know the second city quite well thanks to an ex-girlfriend from Harborne, and I think it's a very under-rated place which just happens to be full of the urban architecture I'm utterly fascinated by, especially the pre fucked with civic centre, a magnificent mess of the long gone and future past, a ramshackle and run down modernist vision characterised by a sign reading 'Paradise Place' affixed to a concrete ramp leading up to the Ballardian library complex.

Anyway, I'm incapable of not sharing gold like this, so let's start as we mean to go on - randomly - with some shots from the Gerald Irvine exhibition held at the premier Strathallan Hotel.

What does Telly have to say about this dazzling visual feast? Just that he 'looked in' and it 'nourished his brains'. Beautiful, baby, just beautiful.

Pictures Of New Towns

We're back in Bracknell new town for a look at some of the locations used in the 1972 film 'The Offence'.

The film is a pretty powerful psychodrama about a veteran police officer (Sean Connery) who has seen too many horrors and broken too many rules and no longer feels a distance between himself and the criminals he pursues. When he interrogates a suspect in a child rape case, his self-loathing boils over into sudden and fatal violence. It's a very dark film, and I'll come back to it when I gather the nerve.

Here's Bracknell by day, specifically the Wild Ridings estate. It looks pretty bleak, but then it's supposed to. Clearly under construction, I doubt it's quite as spacious and under-populated these days as it was in 1972.

 
Here's Bracknell by night, an even grimmer proposition. Apart from the Police, the civic centre seems entirely populated by snitches, drunks and paedophiles. I can't imagine this did anything for Bracknell's public image, although snitches, drunks and paedophiles might have thought it their kind of town.

Roy from 'I Want What I Want' worked in an office up there somewhere, poor devil. No wonder he was so confused.

If you're ever troubled by anyone running on about flares and Aztec bars and how much bloody fun the seventies were I would strongly suggest showing them 'The Offence' and asking them to point out just where the 'fun' elements are in this production. The cold, empty streets? The constant threat of violence and perversion? The lonely cinema showing 'Please Sir'?

Valerie Leon, Film Actress

Valerie Leon makes a movie in 'Countdown', a 1967 episode of the ITC series 'The Baron'.

Mr. Pipes

Ben Benson gets Pat Keysell dancing to his tune in this clip from a 1973 edition of 'Vision On'. I wonder how she would have responded to a Euphonium? At the end, even Tony Hart gets his groove on.

Is He Very Violent? Not If You Are Silent

Ulf Goran is The Music Man, he comes from fairy land, via Sweden. What can he play? Well, more or less everything, but he specialises in folk guitar (he had previously presented an instructional guitar show) and has lots of joyful enthusiasm, which he manages to pass onto his audience without being infantile or patronising or creepy. I think he's great, and have several of his 'how to' records.

Special mentions should go the set designer, who has recreated my Great Aunt Dolly's living room down to the smallest detail, including the constantly lit coal fire, and to whoever made those awful tartan outfits for Genevieve and Ralph Wilson.

Tip For The Top

Finally, a halfway decent record on 'Marc'. Bolan knew Radio Stars lead singer Andy Ellison well, having been in pop art group John's Children with him for all of four months in 1967.

John's Children never had a hit single, but were famous for two things, the violence and aggression of their stage show and their musical ineptitude. When Punk started to make an impact, Ellison thought his time had come. It hadn't, but it was worth a go.

La Regina Dei Vampiri

A subtle Spanish poster for 'Countess Dracula'. Please note the fangs and what can only be the skulls of children or midgets.

Pretty Thirsty

'Countess Dracula' is one of the few Hammer horror films that uses fact as its starting point, i.e. the nasty real life exploits of Countess Bathory, although it departs very quickly from actual events and distorts and twists the source material to its own evil ends (also see 'Rasputin, The Mad Monk') .

Ingrid Pitt stars as the decrepit Countess Elisabeth who discovers that she can radically rejuvenate her appearance by the application of fresh blood from a virgin. Naturally, this isn't the sort of beauty product you can buy in Boots, which leads to murder and mayhem and some truly massive hats. Ingrid is very good as the old Countess, not so good when posing as her own daughter (ironically, she's slightly too old for the role), but, overall, gives probably her best film performance.

Originally released as a double bill with 'Vampire Circus', 'Countess Dracula' is an interesting and atypical Hammer which, despite the title and most of the promotional material, contains absolutely no vampirism whatsoever.

Countess Dracula

The Greatest Blood Show On Earth

I first saw 'Vampire Circus' in the early nineteen eighties and was desperately disappointed, not because it was rubbish (it's rather good) but because the comic strip version seemed so much better. A curious hybrid of mid sixties classic Hammer Gothic and the extra sex and gore expected in the early seventies, 'VC' is not entirely successful, but it is fast moving and brutal and brings a new and interesting dimension to the increasingly weary Hammer vampire cycle. What it does particularly well is conjure a small, frightened world constantly under threat from the forces of darkness: morbidity, perversity, incest, bestiality, sado-masochism, paedophilia, bloody violence and some of the campest vampires of all time.  

Robert Tayman (chief vampire Count Mitterhaus) could have had a long horror career if he'd started ten years earlier but, in the seventies, his vulpine features and gimlet eyes were soon out of fashion. Apart from a memorable appearance in Peter Walker's 'House Of Whipcord' he mainly stuck to supporting roles in TV before disappearing entirely in 1978 after a small role in 'The Stud'.

Vampire Circus

My Life's Blood Is Yours

It's my birthday today, so here is probably my favourite magazine of all time, or at least the one I love the most. 'House Of Hammer' Number 17 came out in February 1978, but I didn't pick one up until Easter when my family and I went to Kessingland in Suffolk (a regular destination) for a very wet weekend in a ridiculously small caravan. I'd read it about a thousand times before we got home.

Aged 9, I found the 'Vampire Circus' adaptation endlessly involving, mainly because it was incredibly violent and I thought the artwork, by Brian Bolland, was brilliant. CHONK!

Story Of A Nympho

'Fun & Games' was the second feature film from stunt co-ordinator turned prolific TV director Ray Austin. Perhaps better known under the sensational title of '1,000 Convicts & A Woman', it disappoints on every level. There are only about six convicts for a start.

Alexandra Hay is the Prison Governor's daughter, a 17 year old who claims to be a nymphomaniac but mainly seems to be looking for the attention Daddy never gives her. She spends her time clomping around the prison (which seems to actually be a second rate Grammar School) in skimpy outfits, sucking her thumb and making suggestive comments and laughing inanely: she's supposed to be incredibly sexy, of course, but she's actually just really annoying.

Not a patch on Ray Austin's debut film 'Virgin Witch', the film effectively sputters out after about half an hour and, after that, no amount of implied threesomes, grotesque neck breaks and escape attempts can take away the sense that some form of fraud has been committed.

Here's a clip where she cycles until she has an orgasm. Dirty bike.

1,000 Convicts and a Woman