Amicus Productions
Amicus Productions was a British film production company, based at Shepperton Studios, England,[1] active between 1962 and 1977. It was founded by American producers and screenwriters Milton Subotsky and Max Rosenberg.[2]
Films
Prior to establishing Amicus, its two producers collaborated on the successful horror film
Amicus's horror and thriller films are sometimes mistaken for the output of the better-known
Although not an Amicus Productions film, a film version of
Portmanteau horror films
Amicus released seven
The casts of these films are invariably composed of name actors, each of whom play a main part in one of the stories—-a small proportion of the film as a whole. Along with genre stars like Cushing, Lee and Herbert Lom, Amicus also drew its actors from the classical British stage (Patrick Magee, Margaret Leighton and Ralph Richardson), rising younger actors (Donald Sutherland, Robert Powell and Tom Baker), or former stars in decline (Richard Greene, Robert Hutton, and Terry-Thomas). Some, such as Joan Collins, were in their mid-career doldrums when they worked with Amicus, while others such as Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker (later the third and fourth incarnations of the Doctor in the science-fiction series, Doctor Who) were at the height of their careers.[7]
Torture Garden, The House That Dripped Blood and Asylum were written by
Other horror films
Amicus also produced some conventional chillers, such as The Skull (1965), The Psychopath (1966), Scream and Scream Again (1970), I, Monster (1971), And Now the Screaming Starts! (1973), and The Beast Must Die (1974). The Skull was also based on a Bloch story (though scripted by Milton Subotsky). Bloch was also the screenwriter of The Psychopath (1966), and wrote the original adaptation of The Deadly Bees (based upon H. F. Heard's A Taste for Honey).[1][9][10]
Science fiction, espionage, drama
In the mid-1960s, Amicus also produced two films based on Doctor Who which had debuted on television in 1963. The films, Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965) and Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. (1966), are the only theatrical film adaptations of the series. In these films, Peter Cushing played "Dr. Who", a human scientist rather than an alien, with Who as his actual surname, disregarding the backstory of the TV series.[11][12]
Amicus also funded and produced films of other genres. Danger Route (1967) was a film version of Christopher Nicole's (writing as Andrew York) 1966 spy novel The Eliminator, directed by Seth Holt, the only film of the Jonas Wilde series of novels to have been filmed.
Margaret Drabble's adaptation of her novel The Millstone (1965) was filmed as A Touch of Love (1969), and Laurence Moody's novel The Ruthless Ones (1969) was filmed as What Became of Jack and Jill? (1972)[2][7][13]
Amicus Productions produced a few
Amicus later produced a trilogy of adaptations of several of the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs, including The Land That Time Forgot (1974), At the Earth's Core (1976), and The People That Time Forgot (1977).[15]
2000's
In 2003, Anchor Bay Entertainment released a five disc DVD box-set of Amicus films in a coffin-shaped container in the UK.[16] In 2005, Amicus was revived to produce homages to the old titles as well as original horror fare. Their first production was Stuart Gordon's Stuck (2007).[7]
Resurrection of Amicus
In 2023 it was announced that Amicus would recommence film production, led by Lawrie Brewster, Sarah Daly and Megan Tremethick, with support from the Subotsky family. Amicus would produce the upcoming film In the Grip of Terror[17] Variety reported "The filmmaker (Brewster) and his team are also starting a crowdfunding campaign to facilitate the initial stages of the project. Their goal is far more ambitious than just one film. 'Our aim is to re-establish Amicus Productions as a beacon of independent British horror', Brewster said."[18]
Filmography
- It's Trad, Dad! (1962)
- Just for Fun (1963)
- Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1965)
- Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965)
- The Skull(1965)
- The Psychopath (1966)
- Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. (1966)
- The Deadly Bees (1967)
- The Terrornauts (1967)
- They Came from Beyond Space (1967)
- Torture Garden (1967)
- Danger Route (1967)
- A Touch of Love (1969)
- Scream and Scream Again (1970)
- The Mind of Mr. Soames (1970)
- The House That Dripped Blood (1971)
- I, Monster (1971)
- Tales from the Crypt (1972)
- What Became of Jack and Jill? (1972)
- Asylum (1972)
- The Vault of Horror (1973)
- And Now the Screaming Starts! (1973)
- From Beyond the Grave (1974)
- Madhouse (1974)
- The Beast Must Die (1974)
- The Land That Time Forgot (1974)
- At the Earth's Core (1976)
- The People That Time Forgot (1977)
References
- ^ a b "Amicus Productions". BFI. Archived from the original on 16 July 2012.
- ^ a b "BFI Screenonline: Film Studios and Industry Bodies > Amicus Productions". screenonline.org.uk.
- ^ Pirie 2008, p. 133.
- ^ "Amicus Productions – film production company - HORRORPEDIA". HORRORPEDIA. 23 September 2013.
- ^ "Amicus Films". classichorrorfilmsguide.co.uk.
- ISBN 9780415230032.
- ^ a b c d Hodgkinson, Will (13 February 2009). "Blood and gutsiness". The Guardian.
- ^ "The House That Dripped Blood - 1970". britishhorrorfilms.co.uk.
- ^ "The Skull". BFI. Archived from the original on 4 August 2012.
- ^ "H.F. Heard". BFI. Archived from the original on 6 August 2012.
- ^ "BFI Screenonline: Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965)". screenonline.org.uk.
- ^ "THE HISTORY OF THE DR". petercushing.co.uk.
- ^ "What Became of Jack and Jill - Britmovie - Home of British Films". britmovie.co.uk. Archived from the original on 17 February 2015. Retrieved 17 February 2015.
- ^ p. 292 Senn, Bryan “Twice the Thrills! Twice the Chills!”: Horror and Science Fiction Double Features, 1955–1974 McFarland; Illustrated edition (30 April 2019)
- ^ "Amicus and the art of the film poster". British Film Institute.
- ^ "The Amicus Collection". Film @ The Digital Fix.
- ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 18 October 2023.
- ^ Ramachandran, Naman (15 August 2023). "British Horror Label Amicus Resurrects With Anthology Film 'In the Grip of Terror'". Variety. Retrieved 18 October 2023.
Notes
- Pirie, David (2008). A New Heritage of Horror: The English Gothic Cinema. London: I. B. Tauris.
Further reading
- Allan Bryce (ed.). Amicus: the Studio that Dripped Blood. Liskeard: Stray Cat, 2000 ISBN 0953326136163 pp.
- Bruce G. Hallenbeck. British Cult Cinema: The Amicus Anthology. Bristol: Hemlock Books, 2014 ISBN 978-0-9576762-8-2239 pp.
- David Harkin. British Cult Cinema:Amicus to Zardoz. Matador, 2022 ISBN 978-1803135366