THE GHOUL (1975)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *uncanny*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *sociological*

THE GHOUL, the third and last production of the British studio Tyburn, is one of those films whose behind-the-scenes complications are probably more interesting than the actual movie.

GHOUL's primary creators were both Hammer stalwarts-- writer Anthony Hinds and director Freddie Francis-- and its main star was the redoubtable Peter Cushing. I assume that none of them considered themselves "married" to Hammer at the time of GHOUL'S creation. At the same time, though Cushing does his utmost even with a horribly underwritten part, Francis and Hinds aren't bringing their A-game in the least. This is surprising since Tyburn was founded by Kevin Francis, son of Freddie.

For almost thirty minutes, the audience follows the antics of a group of young idle aristocrats (usually the type Hinds would have shown as deserving of doom). Two of the men stage an automobile race, with pretty Daphne (Veronica Carlson) as a passenger. One car crashes and Daphne gets pissed at the inconvenience, taking off on foot to find her way home. She ends up on the estate of Doctor Lawrence (Cushing), who has but two servants: a nasty groundskeeper named Tom (John Hurt) and a sinister Hindu maid named Aya (Gwen Watford). When Daphne encounters Tom out in the woods, Tom tries to get rid of the girl by roughing her up. When she meets Lawrence and reports Tom's behavior, Lawrence blows her off and invites her to stick around and take tea with him. However, Daphne overstays her welcome, for Aya releases a mysterious, savage man-- not seen on full-camera-- who kills the girl. Later Aya cooks the girl's flesh for the "ghoul," with no indication of whether Lawrence is aware of these proceedings. The groundskeeper also comes across one of the male racers and kills him, though Tom's motives for going along with all this is never clear.

Eventually the other two race-participants go looking for their friends, and they too meet the creepy residents of Lawrence's estate. In a blatant example of Hinds stealing from one of his previous scripts, the 1966 REPTILE, it's vaguely intimated that Lawrence went to India and somehow trespassed against Hindu customs, so that his son was cursed to become "The Ghoul." This is pretty much a reprise of the situation in REPTILE, right down to the Hindu servant, but the reasons for the monster were much clearer in the 1966 film.

The film's biggest problem is that its monster is largely confined to the rooms of the mansion, and the monster's "creator" is largely tragic and sympathetic. Tom the Groundskeeper is the only mobile agent, but I don't think anyone would have sought out a horror-film called THE NASTY SERVANT.