The Horrible Dr. Hichcock (1962)

Ah, few things were better than those old Italian film posters for films like this; fairly sure that some of the posters were better than the films they were promoting… though I hesitate to say that about this film, which I do think is well made, and the recent blu-ray restoration shows it off to good effect. Director Riccardo Freda had basically invented Italian gothic cinema in the late 50s with I vampiri; by this time, the genre was well established but, as Tim Lucas’ commentary notes, Italian audiences only really went to see Italian films that pretended they weren’t homegrown… hence why almost everyone here is given an Anglo pseudonym of varying degrees of ludicrousness (“Frank Smokecocks“? And I thought “Anthony Daisies” was an unfortunate attempt to translate a name literally…). Also, scriptwriter Ernesto Gastaldi was give the instruction to come up with something in the vein of Roger Corman’s Poe films, and I daresay he gave the producers that… with an additional twist, that being the titular doctor’s necrophilia kink. AIP wouldn’t go that far, hence why they refused to distribute it, and also why star Robert Flemyng tried to get out of it; the first script he read didn’t have the necrophilia angle, and it was too late to back out once he got the later version that did have it… Anyway, while Flemyng’s lack of enthusiasm doesn’t exactly help things, Hichcock is nonetheless worth watching for its visuals if nothing else; the narrative is maybe a bit thin and prone to moments of making no sense that Lucio Fulci might’ve considered bold, but the visual telling of events is often extraordinary. I offer some examples that you can click to enlarge:

Nothing if not great to look at throughout; I love how a lot of 60s cinema looks, but Freda and cinematographer Raffaele Masciocchi conjure up some quite marvellous stuff with colour (Tim Lucas wonders if Freda’s old cameraman Mario Bava offered some uncredited assistance), and the visuals are solidly accompanied by Roman Vlad’s music (for some reason, the only crew member credited under his own name). Hichcock might be more style than substance in the end, but the style is impressive enough that I’ll take that…