Horror Hospital (1973)

Directed by Antony Balch
Starring Robin Askwith, Michael Gough, Vanessa Shaw
Rated R
U.K.

This off-the-wall British production has mostly languished in obscurity for several decades, only recently earning a wider audience thanks to airings on the now-defunct Monsters HD channel, as well as a new DVD release this past summer. It has appeared under various titles -- including the appropriate Doctor Bloodbath and the misleading Computer Killers -- though Horror Hospital is the one by which it is most commonly known.

More a jaw-dropper than a heart-stopper, Horror Hospital is a mostly nonstop riot throughout the 85 minutes it takes to move through its absurd plot, some elements of which recall various Hammer horror tropes, here crazily exaggerated. The story is secondary, though, existing mainly to support the cast of outlandish characters, several buckets’ worth of over-the-top gore, a few flashes of flesh, and a catalogue of campy one-liners.

By the time Antony Balch came to direct Horror Hospital, he’d already built a lengthy résumé of exploitative and avant-garde fare, including a few ’60s collaborations with his friend William S. Burroughs. More a distributor than a director, Balch was responsible for bringing British audiences films by folks like Kenneth Anger and Russ Meyer (including Meyer’s Supervixens), as well as a number of other sex and/or horror titles from abroad.

In 1970, Balch teamed with producer Richard Gordon to direct the wild, weird anthology film Secrets of Sex. The pair would then reunite once more to make Horror Hospital, allegedly beginning with only the title, from which Balch and co-scripter Alan Watson built their wacky story.

The film opens upon a grim-looking dude with black gloves whom we’ll come to learn is the crazed, wheelchair-bound Dr. Christian Storm. Dr. Storm is played by the character actor Michael Gough, veteran of a few Hammer titles who’d later become known as Alfred the butler in the Batman films of the late ’80s and ’90s. With Dr. Storm in the back of a car is a diminutive sidekick in a cap, his dwarf assistant Frederick, played by Skip Martin (The Masque of the Red Death, Vampire Circus).



We soon see a man and woman, both covered in blood and bandages, seemingly running for their lives as the vehicle in which the pair rides follows them.



As they approach the couple, Frederick pulls a lever and a long blade emerges from the car’s side panel. In a flash, the blade swiftly removes the heads from the runners as they pass, conveniently catching them in an attached bag.

“That’ll teach them to try to run away from us!” says Frederick with wide eyes and a toothy grin.

The credits roll, giving the audience a moment to consider just what the hell they’ve wandered into.

Next we see a dude in drag laying in front of a rock band playing to a night club while enveloped in dry ice. “The mark of death is painted everywhere I go,” they sing.

Just off stage broods a pissed off Jason Jones, upset because the band has stolen his song and kicked him out. Jason is played by Robin Askwith, whose long ginger hair and sideburns make him look like a cross between Shaggy, Mick Jagger, and a Planet of the Apes extra.



Askwith would later become better known in the U.K. for starring in the wildly popular Confessions series of sex comedies during the 1970s, appearing in four altogether, including Confessions of a Pop Performer (1975). Askwith's goofy mug also pops up in 1970's Rated X romp Cool It, Carol!

After coming out the loser in a physical confrontation with the band, Jason is nursing his wounds when he is handed a flyer from a travel agency advertising some sort of health-farm-type getaway called “Hairy Holiday.”



Realizing he needs to relax, he decides to check it out, and following a weird exchange with the travel agent, Pollack, he ends up buying a package at a reduced rate. “Might be some nice birds down there,” Jason reasons. Indeed, he soon meets one right away on the train, the fetchingly short-skirted Judy Peters (Vanessa Shaw).



Judy tells Jason that she’s going to visit her Aunt Harris -- whom she’s never met -- to help settle the estate of Judy’s recently deceased mother. Aunt Harris has married this strange Dr. Storm, it seems, who is at the same facility to which Jason is traveling. Judy offers Jason a lift, but her ride fails to materialize and the pair is forced to hoof it.

It begins to rain, then two ominous-looking bikers arrive with signs on their rides -- “Storm 1” and “Storm 2” -- to take them to the health farm or hospital or castle or whatever it is where Dr. Storm has set up shop.

Weird little Frederick greets them and takes them to the receptionist, who it turns out is Judy’s Aunt Harris. She tells her niece she had written her to warn her not to come, but nothing can be done now. Further hassle -- there’s only one available room, which both Jason and Judy are going to have to share.

Frederick takes them to their room, joking that they look like a pair of runaways. Then he says something about how they’d had a couple of runaways that morning and laughs. Then they pass by an open door...



“I hope you’ll be tidier than the people who had that room!” says Frederick.

A phone call between Aunt Harris and the travel agent, Pollack, helps clarify what we already know to some extent -- the “Hairy Holiday” is a ruse, designed to draw unsuspecting young adults into some sort of ultimate tourist trap.

Judy and Jason are a little worried, but that doesn’t stop Judy from taking a shower...



...and Jason from inviting himself to join her. He’s ready to pursue their budding relationship even further, but the dinner bell rings and Judy suggests they get something to eat first.

Turns out the company at dinner is less than jovial. In fact, they’re positively anti-social.



All are ashen-faced with scars on their foreheads and utterly non-responsive. One girl then begins screaming and gets carried away, prompting Jason to ask “What the fuck’s going on here?!” Getting no satisfactory response, he and Judy race back to their room.

More weirdness ensues, including blood running from a faucet and an unsettling visit from Dr. Storm, Frederick, and Aunt Harris. The couple are pretty shaken up, but not so rattled that they can’t enjoy themselves a little.



Later they talk of escaping, and some late-night exploration uncovers more zombie-like patients.

The next day the travel agent Pollack arrives. It appears he wants money -- he’s blackmailing Dr. Storm. He’s given the money and sent on his way, but he doesn’t get very far...



Bad move, Pollack. Really should’ve kept quiet. And kept his head.

Having seen Pollack’s murder from his window, Jason goes to Dr. Storm demanding an explanation. The doctor gives him one, taking him on a tour of the gymnasium where he trains his post-surgical patients. “Just like puppets,” says Dr. Storm. “And I’m the puppet master!”



Why is Dr. Storm telling Jason all of this? Because he has similar plans to operate on him! And Judy, too! He shows Jason how he has Judy locked up, and Jason responds by fighting his way through Dr. Storm’s henchmen to flee outdoors. His escape doesn’t last long, brought to an end via a protracted, Easy Rider-ish hippie beat-down.



Doesn’t look good for our pair in peril. Nor for Abraham (Kurt Christian), yet another hairy hippie who comes to the hospital looking for his girlfriend whom he thinks might have come in response to the Hairy Holiday ad.



Looks so content does, Abraham. He has no idea.

Meanwhile, Aunt Harris is starting to become increasingly uncomfortable about the arrangment, and tells Dr. Storm she’s leaving him. “Very well,” he says. “If that’s what you want.” We know, of course, that leaving Horror Hospital is much easier said than done.

More complications follow as we watch to learn the fates of Jason, Judy, Abraham, Aunt Harris, and little Frederick (who also seems ready to escape the evil doctor’s clutches). Along the way, Dr. Storm tells the story of his medical background and former experiments “in human desire,” shown in flashback.



There are some unexpected twists, including a truly gruesome one involving Dr. Storm’s physical appearance. More than enough to keep the audience fairly riveted. And laughing, too, with a host of bizarre non sequiturs. Such as when Jason interrupts a deadly chase to have a bite in the kitchen...



Hey, what could he do? He was feeling peckish, and the food was right there!

All of which is to say, if you are feeling at all peckish for an utterly manic British horror-comedy from the swinging ’70s, Horror Hospital should satisfy.

- Triple S

Cool It Carol! (1970)

AKA The Dirtiest Girl I Ever Met
Directed by Pete Walker
Starring Janet Lynn, Robin Askwith
Rated X
UK

"C'mon, Carol...just what kind of party did you think this was?"

Director Pete Walker is best known for his pitch-black, gut-bucket, 70's sex/horror flicks: Die Screaming Marianne (1971), The Flesh and Blood Show (1972), House of Whipcord (1974), and Frightmare (1974). All four films are raw, mean-spirited stabs of unhappiness, color-soaked nightmares of beautiful people doing ugly things and ugly people doing...well, even uglier things. Peter Walker was/is a pisser, that's for sure.

Significantly, Walker also made his share of sexploitation flicks, including the 3D Four Dimensions of Greta and spy spoof Tiffany Jones (both 1973), but even those were surprisingly mirthless. Cool It Carol! is also, theoretically, a softcore film, possibly even a sex comedy. It does, after all, contain all the necessary elements - kicky dollybird, fumbling boyfriend, greasy pervs with weird mustaches - but much like the horror flicks Walker would soon direct, Cool It Carol! is glum, gray, and depressive. You won't know whether to pop a boner or gulp down some hemlock.

Things start out cheery enough, at least. Carol (heartbreaking Janet Lynn, one of the most adorable 70's Brit actors you'll ever lay eyes on) and her slacker sometimes-boyfriend Joe (Robin Askwith, the chimp-faced denim-demon from the Confessions of... series) leave their tiny Midlands town to try and make something of themselves in swinging London. Carol wants to be a model; Joe just doesn't want to work very hard. On the train ride into the city, the two old friends have sex together for the first time. Carol's not thrilled with Joe's performance, but realizes she may have an exhibitionist streak.

This comes in handy when she gets to town and starts auditioning for modeling gigs. Since she has no photographs to give away, she merely strips down in front of agents.

When this fails to snag her any work, she does a nude shoot with a pin-up photographer. He promises to try and sell the pictures to Playboy. In the meantime, Carol and Joe are starving, and Joe' s attempts to find work have come up empty. Joe contemplates robbing a bank; to keep her idiot friend out of jail, Carol offers to try our prostitution instead.

This goes surprisingly smooth, at first. Carol racks up some regulars, and Joe acts as her ineffectual but loyal pimp. One night, in desperation, Carol and Joe agree to shoot a porn flick together, while a bunch of sweaty old weirdos in bowler hats watch.

That scene is meant to be funny, by the way, but it's mostly just depressing.

Anyway, once the film gets around, Carol becomes an in-demand nude model, porn star, and big-ticket escort.

So, a happy ending, then?

Sort of. Not really. Nobody's ever really happy in a Pete Walker movie.

Slow and deliberate - a Walker trademark - but still compulsively watchable, Cool It Carol! turns the way-out 60's London mod scene squarely on its perfectly coiffed head. Leave it to mean ol' Pete to turn the grooviest era of the world's grooviest city into a drab and heartless hive of casual villainy.

PS: Sadly, besides a couple of blink-and-you'll-miss-her cameos in the incredible Twins of Evil and not quite as incredible Satan's Playthings (both 1971), this is Janet Lynn's only substantial role. A shame, because not only was she a convincing actress, she was an absolute doll.

- Ken McIntyre

Confessions of a Pop Performer (1975)

Directed by Norman Cohen
Starring Robin Askwith, Antony Booth, Kipper
Rated R
UK
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"Have you seen my Fanny?"
"I've seen Curse of Frankenstein, and I think that's bloody well enough."

Tim Lea is an accident-prone stooge who looks like Brian Jones, sounds like Dudley Moore, and somehow blunders his way into bed with a seemingly endless stream of horny/lonely/married women. A window washer by trade, he rarely gets any actual work done, since he's always getting suckered into some crazy scheme by his brother in law Sid or being stripped naked and mounted by a randy housewife. If this sounds at all familiar, it's because the Confessions of series played relentlessly on late night cable in the 1980's. Dated even then, these curious time-wasters were hugely popular in the UK, but were almost universally despised in the states. I have never heard anyone discuss these films fondly, despite the fact that any teenage American skin-seeker with a premium cable plan in the '80's has seen every one of these films, and can quote groan-worthy Tim Lea dialogue verbatim. In fact, the Confessions series may be where most Americans learned how to do a British accent, because Robin Askwith's Tim sounds exactly like a yank goofing his way through a cockney bit: "Oh, 'ello guvnor!"

So yeah, we endured 'em. After all, on many long and lonely nights in 1985, it was either this or an even dumber Shannon Tweed movie. Confessions' reign on the 3AM timeslot ended two decades ago, and now they mostly sit quietly on dusty UK DVD racks, waiting for some sort of Askwith revival to be rediscovered as long-lost cult comedy classics. And while they do have their charms, my guess is, they'll be waiting a while longer.

Confessions of a Pop Performer was the second film in the Confessions series, rushed out a year after the smashing success of Confessions of a Window Cleaner (1974), the (ahem) towering comic monolith that started it all. Pop Performer starts exactly where the last one ended, with Tim banging away on some meaty-hipped cheating wife while a rather awesome theme song, a gooey Britop confection called Confessions of Timmy Lea by Dominic Bugatti, plays over the credits. Not surprisingly, the old bird's husband walks in on them. They speed the film up, Benny Hill style, as he gets chased around the room. Timmy makes his escape through the window. That scene was essentially the entire plot of the first movie, so they at least got it over with quickly this time and actually threw a little storyline into the mix.

After a hard day of fucking other men's women and not washing any windows, Tim and his brother-in-law Sid (Antony Booth, who would later become Tony Blair's father-in-law) head down to the pub for a pint. They hear a catchy pop band playing upstairs, but are too lazy to actually go up there and watch them. Still, Sid decides on the spot that he wants to manage them and take them to the top, so when the goofy looking band trundles downstairs sometime later, Sid writes up a contract and signs them, right then and there. Later on at home, Sid and Tim go about the difficult task of naming the new pop sensations. Apparently they hadn't gotten around to choosing a moniker yet. Tim wants to go with "Bloater", which does sound pretty awesome, but Sid doesn't think it's modern enough, and decides on "Kipper".
"Well, the name smells of success," notes Timmy.
"I bet they play sole music," quips Tim's mum.
And then Tim's dad comes home from work dressed in a gorilla suit.

Sid sets up a showcase gig for the band at a local club, but there's a slight problem. Turns out that Kipper weren't actually playing their instruments at the pub, they were just lip-synching to records, so there's a good chance they can't actually play anything. Then again, maybe they can, so Sid and Tim forge ahead regardless, running around London hyping the gig. Tim meets a pretty young reporter named Jill (Carol Hawkings) who wants to do a story on a modern pop group. She brings him up to her office and he proceeds to accidentally start a fire. Panicking, he grabs a fire extinguisher and sprays it wildly, covering the room in foam but somehow managing to miss the actual fire. Then he stumbles backwards and knocks down an entire wall. Her dad (Robert Downing, RIP) runs in to see what all the commotion is, and of course he gets sprayed in the face and falls on his ass. Eventually, the entire room gets swallowed up by foam. It's the sort of comedic overkill Brit humor is known for, but it's more puzzling than funny.

Tim's mom tells Sid she can get a mob of girls together to chase Kipper when they arrive at the club that afternoon. Always looking for cheap publicity, Sid agrees to the plan.
At the appointed time, the mob shows up. Imagine that, they're all old women. One of the biddies somehow jams her hearing-horn (or whatever you call them; granny had one on the Tweety Bird cartoons as well) onto the drummer's hand, so Tim is forced to drum for Kipper, despite the fact that he does not play the drums. But since there's a good chance that none of them can play instruments, how bad can it be?

Surprisingly, the show starts out well. The band launch into a pretty great Gary Glitter-esque glam-stomper called "The Clapper". The old ladies go nuts. The record label dude, Mr. Barnwell (Benny Hill alumni Bob Todd, RIP) is pleased. Sid's already counting his dough. And then, quite suddenly, it all goes to hell. Tim rips off his shirt and goes on an Iggy Pop style vandalism spree, trashing his drums and knocking over the rest of the band. For some reason, the piano blows up. The song devolves into destructive noise. A bunch of people all start running around screaming and smashing into each other. And then a groupie thinks Tim is Mick Jagger, so she drags him into a prop room and fucks him. And then Tim escapes by dressing up like a horse.
So, overall, good gig.

Next morning, at the breakfast table, Tim's dad says, "What I don't understand is why Black Beauty here came home last night dressed as a horse."
"Well, if you can come home dressed like a gorilla," Tim replies, "Than I can come home dressed like a horse."
Touché!


So a bunch of dumb stuff happens, mostly involving Tim and his penis. He has sex with a record store clerk in a pile of 7" singles and later on hits a guy in the face with a banana cream pie. Etc. It all climaxes with Kipper floundering their way into playing a black-tie charity gig at a large London venue. Tim almost misses the gig, of course, because he was busy fucking a melon-chested contortionist (you really do just wanna castrate this kid after awhile). In a scene reminiscent of Spinal Tap, Tim attempts to find his way backstage, and ends up poking through a hole onstage while the Climax Sisters perform a nutty Shangri-Las-esque song that goes, in part, "I'll never forget the day you drove off in a rage because you thought I loved Bill/You were on a motorcycle, I wish you'd been killed".

Does it all work out? Yes but no but yes. The usual, really.

In Summation: There's a good chance that Confessions of a Pop Performer would be impossible to sit through were it not for the fantastic music. Askwith's aw-shucks mugging really starts to grate like nails-on-chalkboard after awhile. But since its got a fistful of vintage glam, bubblegum, and girl group numbers, ga-roovy fashions, and half a dozen full-frontal scenes, I am quite willing to recommend it for gooey retro kicks. I will probably feel much differently by the time I finish this series - I mean, people hate 'em for a reason - but the bubblegum put me in a charitable mood. The old pop narcotic trick.

Availability: The Confessions series is available in a Region 2 Pal DVD. Also, and perhaps more importantly, a soundtrack LP was released. I've never seen it, but can only assume it's incredible.

Clip: Theme song!

-Ken McIntyre