I DON'T WANT TO BE BORN aka THE DEVIL WITHIN HER 1975

 

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"Conceived by the Devil, only she knows what her baby really is!"

"Pray for the Devil Within Her...before it preys on you!"

"You will have a baby - a monster, an evil monster conceived

 in your womb as big as I am small and possessed by the devil himself"

Part of the wave of possessed baby pictures spawned by ROSEMARY'S BABY that even 7 years after that film's 1968 premiere was a genre that was still going strong and would gain even more momentum with the release of THE OMEN in 1976. With also a bit of homage to IT'S ALIVE, this was released in the UK under I DON'T WANT TO BE BORN in 1975, it was retitled by A.I.P for its 1976 American release as THE DEVIL WITHIN HER (where it was often time double-billed with SQUIRM or SHIVERS). It subsequently would surface on home video under a myriad of titles including THE MONSTER, IT LIVES WITHIN HER, and most bizarrely SHARON'S BABY (even though there is nary a character named Sharon to be found here). 

Although trashy and lurid, it is not quite as exploitative as you might initially think (or hope for) and never reaches the insane giddiness of a BEYOND THE DOOR 1974 and one thinks that the producers might have been hoping to reach for something a bit more serious. Sadly, by this time, the British film industry (in particular the horror genre) had begun to have troubles with American co-producers fleeing for the more economic thriftiness of Italy & Europe which along with the decline of Gothic horror made for some grasping at straws type productions (such as this) which tried to latch on the new trends in horror. With a game cast giving it their all with for the most part serious performances (despite the sometimes unintentionally funny dialogue) along with some gloriously insane moments help make this maybe not a great film (or perhaps even "good") but there is something to be said for Joan Collins with a possessed baby, Donald Pleasence as a pediatrician, some iffy attempts at Italian accents and of course Caroline Munro.

The film starts off with a hysterical & screaming Lucy Carlesi (Joan Collins) going through a difficult birth which results in a 12 lb. boy (with a full head of black hair) who promptly attacks Lucy. Dr. Finch (a remarkably restrained performance by Donald Pleasence) remarks "This one doesn't want to be born" and after the newborn's aggressive behavior intones "Even at this age, babies have an extraordinary instinct for survival” (!!). She brings the baby home to her husband Gino (Ralph Bates TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA 1970 and here bizarrely cast as an Italian businessman) and their immediately suspicious housekeeper Mrs. Hyde (Hilary Mason DON'T LOOK NOW 1973).

In a flashback, Lucy recounts her previous profession as a "nightclub showgirl" (i.e., stripper) who worked in a club run by a creepy and lecherous John Steiner (CALIGULA 1979 and bunches of Italian productions) and the MC was pudgy small person Hercules (George Claydon TWINS OF EVIL 1971 and here looking like he's auditioning for the lead role in Edgar Allan Poe's Hop-Frog). At one point Hercules had started making sexual advances on Lucy and upon rebuffing him he put a curse upon her future baby. Now concerned by this (along with the fact that Steiner's sleazy club owner may be the father of her baby) she reaches out to her friend and fellow stripper Mandy (Caroline Munro DRACULA A.D. 1972). Some reviews have Munro's character referred to as Collin's sister, but I did not pick up on that and for some strange reason Munro is dubbed here with a cockney accent. 

Also showing up to help is Sister Albana (BBC & Shakespearean actor Eileen Atkins) who is also a research scientist with small animals (I am not sure why this is brought up as a character point in the film) and the actual sister of Gino. It is strange that the scriptwriters choose to have Gino of Italian descent and to make a point of his sister being a nun based in Italy. Bates struggles sometimes with a fading in and out Italian accent while Atkins (a wonderful actress) pronounces devil as "dee-vul" and often time looks like she is wondering what she's doing in this film. A nun from England could not handle an evil baby that needs an exorcism?

The Carlesi's new baby shows increasingly disturbing behavior as he screams and throws a fit during his baptism and shrieks when Gino and Sister Albana attempt to pray in the house one night. Along with tearing his room apart at various times and the appearance of a dead mouse in a cup of tea all of which lead the ever-dwindling cast to the fact that something is satanically up with the child. When the baby starts its murderous rampage things really get crazy as we see a little hand reach out and push the destined-to-be-killed young nanny into a river. The problem with evil baby movies is that you either go with a full-on monster baby (IT'S ALIVE) or you go with suggestion and the unseen (ROSEMARY'S BABY), however when you just show a baby in a crib (as in this film) you simply have a baby making baby-faces in a crib. 

Collin's 70's pre-DYNASTY acting career has passed over at times (sometimes by Joan herself) but there are some real sometimes sleazy/sometimes WTF crazy (but always entertaining) gems in here including the late-night cable favorites THE STUD 1978 and THE BITCH 1979 along with REVENGE 1971 and EMPIRE OF THE ANTS 1977. She also appeared in the Italian poliziotteschi MAGNUM COP 1978, the Hammer thriller FEAR IN THE NIGHT 1972, and was the unfortunate recipient of a Christmas-gone-bad in the TALES FROM THE CRYPT segment "All Through The House" in 1978. 

Always giving her all (Collin's was RADA trained) she throws herself fully into her role even giving a flash of nudity during a roll in the bed with Bates although she keeps dressed during "dance routines". There is some full-frontal nudity supplied by others (which I suspect are played by "Suzie Lightning" and "Lopez" going by the end credits) which help nudge the film into "R" rated territory. Bates who a bit earlier in the decade had been groomed as a new younger-type leading man for Hammer (appearing in THE HORROR OF FRANKENSTEIN 1970, LUST FOR A VAMPIRE 1971 and DR. JEKYLL AND SISTER HYDE 1971) but with the studios declining fortunes his roles there dried up and he would tragically die at the young age of 51 in 1991. 

 Pleasence who by this time was a staple in these types of films gets lines that bring the most unintentional laugh-out-loud lines ("I thought today would be a bit of a bore, but here I am talking about mysticism with an Italian nun"), and although he could go over the top in some roles his dead serious reading of these lines here all add to the lunacy of the plot. One of my favorite actresses of the period, Caroline Munro has what is basically a glorified cameo here but brings her undeniable presence to her scenes and gets to appear in some pretty groovy outfits. 

Directed by Peter Sasdy (who did some great work for Hammer including TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA 1970, HANDS OF THE RIPPER 1971, COUNTESS DRACULA 1971, and the interesting Tigon produced eco-thriller DOOMWATCH 1972) brings a few interesting flourishes to the proceedings including a nifty decapitation. The score by Ron Grainer is a mish-mash of world music, 70's Italian scores, and prog rock all of which mix together in a crazy stew that screams "1970's!!" In addition, there are some great views of mid 70's London. 

AND SOON THE DARKNESS 1970

"Two beautiful girls...a bright summer day... trapped 

in a terrifying web of shock and suspense"

    One of the more underappreciated and underseen thrillers of the '70s and taking the unusual tact of unfolding almost entirely in the bright sunshine of the French countryside, AND SOON THE DARKNESS, takes a simple economical plot concerning two women alone on a biking holiday who slowly come to the realization that they're being stalked by an unseen perpetrator with the universal fear of being isolated in a foreign country where you don't speak the language. 

    Two young English nurses Jane ( Pamela Franklin THE INNOCENTS)  and Cathy (Michele Dotrice THE BLOOD ON SATAN'S CLAW) are on a holiday bicycling through the French countryside of the Lorie Valley. Although obviously "work friends" it's apparent straight away that the two women are opposites in what they expect out of their vacation. The dark-haired Jane is the more practical one wanting to stick to a schedule while Cathy just wants to spend time relaxing and meeting men. The film neatly sets up the premise that neither girl is at fault for their strained relationship or is a bad person, they are simply two people who probably shouldn't be traveling together. 

    Stopping at a roadside cafe they catch the eye of a young man astride a moped (Sandor Elès COUNTESS DRACULA) who seems to be following them in a roundabout fashion as they continue their journey. Cathy and Jane begin to squabble with Jane wanting to press on to the next village while Kathy would lay about in sun and (hopefully) meet up with the stranger on the moped. The pair decide to split with Jane pedaling onward while Jane stays behind for a nap and some sun. Laying about in the woods Jane put her laundry out to dry and soon ominously finds a pair of her panties missing, her bike disabled and in a wonderful shot, we see a shadow quickly pass over her face.              Becoming concerned Jane returns and not finding Cathy she makes inquires at a small hotel run by an elderly woman (Hana Maria Pravda) who while not speaking English does project a sense of dread as Jane (and us the viewer) are only able to catch the words "bad road". The film cleverly does not use subtitles so we immediately can empathize with Jane and only are able to gleam the same small snatches of information that she does. She eventually finds an ally in the form of a visiting English schoolmistress (Clare Kelly GEORGY GIRL) who informs Jane that a local young woman was murdered along the same stretch of the road the previous year (and who bears a striking resemblance to Cathy).

     Directed by Robert Fuest (THE ABOMINABLE DR. PHIBES) and written by Brian Clemens (DR. JEKYLL AND SISTER HYDE) both of whom had worked on THE AVENGERS TV show, this couldn't have been farther from Fuest's Art Deco horror of the Phibes films or the futuristic sci-fi spy-vibe of THE AVENGERS. Set almost enterally along a long stretch of lonely road and making wonderful use of the sunny countryside it makes use of a deceptively simple premise which unfolds in realtime after Cathy's disappearance. Without his art-deco flourishes, Fuest instead relies on lighting and composition along with the sights and sounds of the French countryside all of which in spite of the bright sunshine hint at something forbidding lurking just offscreen. The film also conjures up a suspenseful feeling of isolation and dread as the wide-open countryside although green and sunny provides no sanctuary for Jane. The film's advertising really played up the Hitchcock angle, name-dropping him in some of the taglines, and his name was featured prominently on the poster artwork.   

     Throwing up red herrings with every character introduced the film has a distinct Giallo-like feel to it with Sandor Elès's mysterious sort-of "detective" character astride a Vespa and always lurking in the background could have come right out of a  classic Italian Giallo along with the unknown sense of dread and ambiguity. Fuest doesn't throw out bunches of jump scares but instead relies on a slowly amping of dread to fuel the viewer's unease. The scene with Cathy alone in the woods and being slowly stalked is a textbook example of how to unfold a suspenseful sequence by resorting to screaming and bloodshed. Even though unfolding almost entirely in bright sunlight the sense of desolation and isolation is quite palpable with the longs miles of empty country roadway with no other person in sight. The location filming helps immensely with the lone process shot of Jane and the schoolmistress driving in a car sticking out. 

    The cinematography by Ian Wilson (CAPTAIN KRONOS VAMPIRE HUNTER) is also very evocative with subtle uses of changing lighting and framing that gives a sense of something or somebody lurking just off-screen. The trick here is that it would be easy for the film to fall into repetition with its basic story and shots of an empty road, but director Fuest & co-writer Clemmens (along with cinematographer Wilson) do keep the film moving along with their inventive use of the space and locations. But there does feel like about 15 min. or so could have easily been cut as Jane's many meetings with the kind-of-crazy locals/red-herrings do drag a bit with one in particular with a fidget inducing drawn-out encounter.

     As the two leads both Pamela Franklin and Michele Dotrice are excellent with Franklin especially fine in the latter half of the movie where she literally carries the entire narrative alone often time with long stretches of no dialogue using just her body language and facial expressions to carry the narrative. A very gifted actress Franklin had first come to notice in Jack Clayton's superb THE INNOCENTS in 1961 and would later appear in THE LEGEND OF HELL HOUSE in 1974 with her career winding down with TV work later in the decade before retiring in the early '80s. In 1967 she appeared in the sadly underseen OUR MOTHER"S HOUSE which is a film ripe for rediscovery.

     Dotrice appeared in two of the better British folk-horror entries with BLOOD ON SATAN"S CLAW from 1971 and Hammer's THE WITCHES in 1966. She continues to work on the BBC quite regularly. 

     In 2010 in a version best avoided, AND SOON THE DARKNESS was remade transporting the plot to South American with two American women is the object of peril. 

All screencaps above are from the Kino Blu-ray

BEWARE MY BRETHREN (aka THE FIEND) 1972

"In the name of the Brethren he washed away 

the sins of women ...and led them to the Gates of Hell!"

"Sinner... meet your maker!"

"It's a Sickness of the Soul!"

     In the early 1970's the British horror industry began to move away from the Gothic style horror of Hammer with companies such as Tigon producing films like WITCHFINDER GENERAL(1968) and THE BLOOD ON SATAN'S CLAW (1971) while still being period horror pieces also injected a healthy dose of sadism and sex into the proceedings which were far different then Hammer's splatters of bright red blood and "wink-wink" flashes of female skin. There was also a move toward more contemporary based films that featured sex and/or psychotic driven killers along with none-too-subtle plots concerning religious & conservative hypocrisy such as what Pete Walker was directing with such films as HOUSE OF WHIPCORD (1974) and THE CONFESSIONAL (1976), along with the sex, sadism & gore work of Norman J. Warren in SATAN'S SLAVE and the sci-fi based INSEMINOID.
     Director Robert Hartford-Davis' career has sadly become a small footnote in the history of British horror. Partly due to his tragic early death at the age of 53 in 1977 he none-the-less directed a sizable chunk of interesting films including the early sexploitation GUTTER GIRLS (1974), the really bizarre GONKS GO BEAT (1964), the underrated Gothic THE BLACK TORMENT, and the sleazy & sordid CORRUPTION (1968) with Peter Cushing in his most jaw-dropping role and the blaxploitation BLACK GUNN (1972) with Jim Brown and Martin Landau.
    Re-tilted in the U.S. BEWARE MY BRETHREN from its more straightforward British title THE FIEND it opens with juxtaposed scenes of fanatical minister figure giving a fire & brimstone sermon over a baptism which is intercut with a young woman being stalked and brutally stripped and killed before being tossed in a river all of which is set wailing gospel number by Shirley Bassey impersonator Maxine Barrie.

   Straight away we're introduced to Kenny (Tony Beckley WHEN A STRANGER CALLS and THE LOST CONTINENT) whose a kind of roving security guard dressed in full uniform and riot helmet and whose in the midst of a violent knock-down fight with a pair of crooks before being rescued by a police inspector (David Lodge INCENSE FOR THE DAMNED) who informs Kenny about the finding of the woman's body from the opening scene which was one more in a string of recent brutal murders. Kenny lives with his mother Birdy (Ann Todd SCREAM OF FEAR) and they both have fanatical religious beliefs that are prodded along by the above-mentioned zealot minister (played in wonderful scene-stealing glory by the great Patrick Magee (A CLOCKWORK ORANGE).
    The film quickly sets up a spoiler-free reveal of the killer being Kenny with his other part-time being a pool attendant which along with his nighttime guard job allows him a full range of victims including prostitutes and other women who he feels are of "loose morals". In homage to Michael Powell's PEEPING TOM Kenny also records his victim's words before killing them ("Two punds for a play about in the back of yer truck") and spends his off time gleefully listening to them in his basement (decorated with Goya prints of dismembering) while the film cuts to McGee delivering a fire & brimstone in the church.
    There are several startling (and sometimes darkly humorous) juxtapositions in the film including a newspaper headline screaming "Third Nude Found!" before cutting to Kenny slowly polishing his nightstick and a women's naked body falls out of a cement mixer while Kenny scrapes cement residue carefully off his boots.

    Birdy has a large home and allows Magee's flock (named The Brethren) to worship there while she plays the organ. There're references to Birdy's husband leaving her and Kenny in the distant past which brings up some Oedipus atmosphere along with vague hints of incest. In addition, Birdy suffers from diabetes which is treated by visiting nurse Brigitte (Madeleine Hinde SCHOOL FOR UNCLAIMED GIRLS) and her treatment must be kept secret from minister Mcgee whose fanatical beliefs forbid the use of traditional care. Birdy's nurse Brigitte tells her concerns about Birdy to her sister/roommate Paddy (a wonderful chain-smoking & wise-cracking Suzanna Leigh from LUST FOR A VAMPIRE) whose an investigative reporter and immediately begins poking into the Brethern. The film ends with a startling (and slightly bonkers) climax as we see Kenny slowly unravel even more mentality along with the pity we feel for Birdy and the emergence of Mcgee's minster as an example of evil almost on par with serial killer Kenny.
    The main cast is excellent with Anne Todd a standout as the mother who slowly begins to realize what her son is while desperately clinging to her religious beliefs. Considered one of the most beautiful English actresses she was married to David Lean for 8 years during the '50s. Tony Beckley is quite good at playing a mentally unbalanced killer who we do feel some pity for and there's a wonderful scene where he desperately tries to hand out flyers for the Brethren to uncaring pedestrians as seems to the task as a penance. Suzanne Leigh has great fun in the role of Paddy and there's a wonderful scene between her and Todd late in the movie that reveals more about Todd's character and her feelings toward Kenny. The film is also interesting in that it doesn't have a male central hero to save the day (and heroine) as Brigitte's doctor boyfriend washes his hands of the situation and quickly leaves it to Paddy to investigate.
    With its naked female bodies hanging on meat hooks or tumbling out of cement mixes BEWARE MY BRETHREN has a very grim atmosphere about it with a seediness and sordidness that seems to creep into every frame. Borrowing serial killer troupes from PSYCHO and PEEPING TOM it combines these with the new "permissiveness" of 70's horror cinema and looks forward to Pete Walker's work a couple years down the road and makes a nice companion to the major studio 10 RILLINGTON PLACE from 1971. The film's screenplay is by Brian Compton (GIRLY) and was photographed by Desmond Dickinson who also was the DP on TROG, THE HORROR ON SNAPE ISLAND, THE BEAST IN THE CELLAR, BERSERK, and BURKE AND HARE among others. At one point, Kenny enters a cinema that's playing SCARS OF DRACULA.
     Part of the films flying under the radar status for years was that the BBC imposed some serious cuts on it upon release with the full strength version appearing in the U.S. on a murky looking VHS in the '80s (which I remember renting and seemed to have lurked on the shelves of every mom & pop video store). Odeon released the uncut version on DVD in 2011 and Vinegar Syndrome put out a beautiful Blu-ray/DVD  in 2018 with a highly informative commentary by Samm Deighan.

All screen shots above are from the Vinegar Syndrome DVD