The iconic Christopher Lee, who was arguably one of the great screen vampires of all time, a Bond villain, a Star Wars villain and Saruman in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, was way more than just these high-profile performances.
Through his upbringing, he spoke Italian, German and French fluently … he served throughout World War II and then abandoned everything he knew, career, position, etc., to follow a career in acting beginning in the immediate post-war period (and even then, most who knew him said he was too tall at six-foot, five-inches to be more than a footnote).
Severin Films, with sales and distribution support provided by MVD Entertainment Group, announced this past week that another collection of his “foreign” film productions (remember, German, Italian, French … even Latin) will be heading home on July 26 as the Blu-ray collection titled The Eurocrypt of Christopher Lee Collection 2.
This five-film collection (six, if you count the bonus feature) kicks off with his 1959 Italian-take on being a vampire (he had just starred as Dracula in director Terence Fischer’s 1958 film release of Horror of Dracula), director Steno’s (aka: Stefano Vanzina) Uncle was a Vampire.
Bonus features included with Uncle was a Vampire (Italian, with English subtitles) is the featurette titled “Commedia Dracula All'Italiana,” an alternate cut of the film and commentary from Christopher Lee biographer Jonathan Rigby (“Christopher Lee: The Authorised Screen History,” “English Gothic: A Century of Horror Cinema,” “Euro Gothic: Classics of Continental Horror Cinema” … and more), who is joined by Hammer Films historian Kevin Lyons.
Next in this Christopher Lee film collection from Severin Films on July 26 is German filmmaker Helmut Ashley’s 1962 film release of The Secret of the Red Orchid (aka: The Puzzle of the Red Orchid), which was a film adaptation of writer Edgar Wallace’s 1932 crime novel, “When the Gangs Came to London.”
Christopher Lee does all of his own lines in German, as does another screen icon, Klaus Kinski (for those who have seen the English-dubbed version, it is absolutely hysterical to hear Lee and Kinski dubbed by other actors … think: Sean Connery dubbed by Pee Wee Herman).
Bonus features include two commentary options — the first with Nathaniel Thompson (author of the “DVD Delirium” series) and Troy Howarth (author of three volumes of “So Deadly, So Perverse”) and the second teams film scholars Kim Newman (“Anno Dracula”) and Barry Forshaw (”Euro Noir”).
We skip ahead to 1973 (domestic, 1974) and the decidedly British entry, Dark Places, teaming Christopher Lee with long-time Hammer Films director Don Sharp in what amounts to a runaway film production.
A deranged killer, suitcases full of cash, dead bodies hidden in the walls and Christopher Lee and his “sister,” played by Joan Collins, trying to find the loot before Robert Hardy (All Creatures Great and Small, War and Remembrance, Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years) can murder them.
The film arrived in the U.S. in 1974 theatrically with distribution by Cinerama Releasing Corporation (Willard, Candy, Tales from the Crypt, etc.) and then surfaced on VHS in 1984 via Embassy Home Video.
This is certainly the Blu-ray debut for Dark Places, with the DVD releases that are currently in circulation being from various “entrepreneurial” suppliers … run by salty sea dogs and buccaneers since at least 2018 (likely rips from the earlier Embassy VHS release).
Bonus treasures here include a video session with Jonathan Rigby and commentary by the Thompson/Howarth team.
Rounding out this Blu-ray collection are two versions of director Edouard Molinaro’s Dracula and Son (original 1976 French-language presentation and the 1979 English-dubbed theatrical version, with commentary by Rigby/Lyons, a second commentary by Kat Ellinger … and more) and the 1989 Dutch film, Murder Story (which includes, as a bonus, the 1985 (1988) “Canadian” slasher film — actually filmed in Sweden — Mask of Murder) … commentary is supplied by co-writers/co-directors Eddie Arno and Markus Innocenti, plus the featurette titled “A British Producer In Holland.”
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