Nick Riddle
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- February 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781911325529
- eISBN:
- 9781800342330
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3828/liverpool/9781911325529.003.0003
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter examines Hammer and its history with science fiction. Hammer had become, by 1963, an easy studio to pin down: the broader production slate of the 1950s had been narrowed to mainly ...
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This chapter examines Hammer and its history with science fiction. Hammer had become, by 1963, an easy studio to pin down: the broader production slate of the 1950s had been narrowed to mainly produce Gothic horror and modern thriller/slasher films, with little interest in cultural 'respectability'. Since Hammer's first feature-length film, however, its slate of releases covered a multitude of subjects and genres such as mysteries, comedies, crime dramas and noirs, and science fiction. A certain amount of commentary on Joseph Losey's The Damned (1963) has identified it as an anomaly in the Hammer catalogue. There is its frequent description as a kind of hybrid, mixing the biker/delinquent movie with the science fiction genre; but Hammer had previous form in this department. The genre mix in The Damned is more ungainly than most because, rather than running concurrently throughout the film, the genres tend to interrupt each other.Less
This chapter examines Hammer and its history with science fiction. Hammer had become, by 1963, an easy studio to pin down: the broader production slate of the 1950s had been narrowed to mainly produce Gothic horror and modern thriller/slasher films, with little interest in cultural 'respectability'. Since Hammer's first feature-length film, however, its slate of releases covered a multitude of subjects and genres such as mysteries, comedies, crime dramas and noirs, and science fiction. A certain amount of commentary on Joseph Losey's The Damned (1963) has identified it as an anomaly in the Hammer catalogue. There is its frequent description as a kind of hybrid, mixing the biker/delinquent movie with the science fiction genre; but Hammer had previous form in this department. The genre mix in The Damned is more ungainly than most because, rather than running concurrently throughout the film, the genres tend to interrupt each other.
