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Good morning everyone. I hope you're all keeping well. Here's the news from the week just past.

R.I.P. Christopher Lee 1922-2015.

As I'm sure you've all heard, we lost a giant of the genre earlier this week. Christopher Lee passed away at a hospital in London, England. He was 93.

Sir Christopher Lee 1922-2015

Lee appeared in over two hundred films over seven decades. He is perhaps best known for his work in the Hammer horror films of the sixties and seventies, as well as his roles in The Lord of The Rings and Star Wars franchises, as Saruman and Count Dooku, respectively.

Growing up the Roger Moore 007 era, he was first introduced to me as the villain Scaramanga in 1974's Man With The Golden Gun, but I would obviously seem him countless more times as my love of horror grew in the eighties. I count his roles in 1973's The Wicker Man and Horror Express among my favourites. To give you an idea of the scope of his career, check out this wonderful illustration by Andrew Barr.

May you rest in peace, Sir Lee.

Second Wave 2015.

Onto lighter news, the Fantasia Film Festival announced the next group of titles it will be screening next month and there are definitely some standouts.

Charlize Theron and Nicholas Holt reunite in Gilles Paquet-Brenner's adaptation of Gillian Flynn's Dark Places. Chloe Grace Moretz, Christina Hendricks and Tye Sheridan also round out the impressive cast.

About five years ago, David Kelly came onto the horror scene with his Hammer produced Wake Wood. Now he returns with Cherry Tree, a film about good intentions gone awry.

Anyone who saw Kidnapped (Sequestrados) at Fantasia a few years back will no doubt remember Miguel Angel Vivas. This year he returns with his first English language film Extinction, a post-apocalyptic monster movie which is rumoured to have astonishing practical effects. Sign me up.

Fresh off the Cannes film market is Nathan Ambrosioni's Hostile.

Now sure, it might not seem like this is anything new, but I should mention that Ambrosioni is fourteen years old! Dubbing a movie onto another VHS was the extent of my filmmaking skills at that age, so I think this is pretty impressive.

On the science fiction side of things, we have Synchronicity. Jacob Gentry (one of three filmmakers that gave us The Signal in 2007) has returned with this effort about the repercussions of time travel.

Fantasia also a glut of films from previous fests that I am itching to see, including Cop Car, The Hallow and The Invitation. Only just over a month to go!!!

Blue Shining.

Cinephile Richard Vezina made this wonderful tribute to both Stanley Kubrick and David Lynch by posing the question, what if Lynch had directed the 1980 version of The Shining? The results are pretty fucking lovely.

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Vezina had made previous tributes to Kubrick and Lynch individually (which you can watch here and here) but this is definitely his best video yet.

Horror of Dracula (#7)

The next title I watched on Time Out Best 100 List was Hammer Films 1958 staple Dracula aka Horror of Dracula. I know it may seem odd that I'd never seen this movie, but, when it comes to Hammer, I've always gravitated to the more female-centric titles in their catalogue. Shocking, I know...

This adaptation of Bram Stoker's classic story sees Jonathan Harker (John Van Eyssen) and Dr. Van Helsing (Peter Cushing) battling the evil Count Dracula (Christopher Lee). 

Watching Dracula was a pleasurable experience, but I can't help but feel this is one of the more dated entries on the list. Having said that though, there was plenty of stuff to love. Director Terence Fisher puts his workman-like stamp, that served him so well throughout the fifties and sixties, on the proceedings by beautifully transporting us back to the end of the nineteenth century. Not surprisingly, Cushing is the shit in this film. Much like his performance in Fisher's creature feature Island of Terror eight years later, Cushing  takes charge of the situation and does what needs to be done. 

Peter Cushing as Dr. Van Helsing in Horror of Dracula.

If I had one gripe about the film, it was how little Dracula was actually in it. Lee comes in at the beginning and, after dispatching Harker, steels away for a good chunk of the film. Apart from briefly ravishing a few damsels in distress, we don't see Dracula again until his final confrontation with Van Helsing and his compatriot, Arthur (Michael Gough). I know this was the first in a long line of Dracula films featuring Lee, but considering he is the title character, I figured he'd have more screen time. 

John Van Eyssen (left) as Jonathan Harker & Christopher Lee as Count Dracula.

Hammer Films are a huge part of the horror canon and have inspired countless filmmakers, so I cannot contest the inclusion of Horror of Dracula on the Time Out list. Though I may not value Hammer as highly as some, I fully recognize their artistic importance.