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By Tim Greaves

In the early 1980s, Israeli cousins and co-producers Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus – the men behind then-thriving outfit The Cannon Group – decided that they would like to add an old-fashioned style horror film to their burgeoning library of titles. They approached director Peter Walker, renowned for a slew of successful exploitation pictures throughout the 1970s, suggesting he create something for the likes of Bela Lugosi, Peter Lorre and Boris Karloff, blissfully unaware the three actors were dead. Regardless, Walker took the baton and ran with it, the result being 1983’s rather splendid House of the Long Shadows.

Probably best remembered for assembling icons of horror cinema Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Vincent Price and John Carradine under one roof, House of the Long Shadows didn’t wow critics at the time and with hindsight it’s easy to see why. Times...

Stars: Peter Ustinov, Lee Grant, Angie Dickinson, Richard Hatch, Brian Keith, Roddy McDowall, Michelle Pfeiffer, Rachel Roberts, Paul Ryan, David Hirokane | Written by Jerry Sherlock, Stan Burns, David Axlerod | Directed by Clive Donner

In Hawaii, master sleuth Charlie Chan unmasks the Dragon Queen as a killer. Before she’s arrested, she places a curse on Chan and his family. Years later in San Francisco, Chan is called out of retirement when the city of San Francisco finds itself in chaos over a series of weird murders. Chan is assisted by his blundering grandson, Lee Chan Jr, who is more of a hindrance than help. Yet the shadow of the Dragon Queen still hangs over the Chan family, when she becomes his number one suspect.

If you’ve never heard of (or seen) Charlie Chan & the Curse of the Dragon Queen before, where have you been? Here in the UK the...

Boasting a legendary cast comprising Vincent Price, Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, John Carradine and more, Pete Walker's House of the Long Shadows will be released on Blu-ray by Kino Lorber in time for Halloween. Our latest round-up also includes the trailer and release details for Russell Friedenberg's Everglades-set horror film, Wind Walkers, and news on who will score the sophomore season of Syfy's Dominion.

House of the Long Shadows Blu-ray: According to Blu-ray.com, Kino Lorber will release House of the Long Shadows on Blu-ray this September.

Synopsis: "An American writer goes to a remote Welsh manor on a $20,000 bet: can he write a classic novel like "Wuthering Heights" in twenty-four hours? Upon his arrival, however, the writer discovers that the manor, thought empty, actually has several, rather odd, inhabitants."

Directed by Pete Walker from a screenplay by Michael Armstrong (which, in turn, is based on the novel,...

Reviewed by Kevin Scott, MoreHorror.com

House of the Long Shadows (1983)

Directed by Pete Walker

Written by Michael Armstrong, Earl Derr Biggers (novel), George M. Cohan (play)

Cast: Desi Arnaz Jr. (Kenneth Magee), Vincent Price (Lionel Grisbane), Peter Cushing (Sebastian Grisbane), John Carradine (Lord Elijah Grisbane), Christopher Lee (Corrigan), Sheila Keith (Victoria Grisbane), Julie Peasgood (Mary Norton), Richard Todd (Sam Allyson), Louise English (Diane Caulder), Richard Hunter (Andrew Caulder)

I like to think of “House of the Long Shadows” as kind of the super group of horror films. What I mean is that typically that term is reserved for the music field for example, Damn Yankees, Asia, Velvet Revolver, Audioslave. Hopefully, you get the point. It’s professionals who have already made their own fame and fortune alone or with another group, but band together for a second helping of notoriety. I don’t know if anyone in this film...

As the undisputed king of American gothic, Vincent Price holds a unique position regarding his association with British horror. From the mid sixties, nearly all his films were made in the UK, and while not as distinguished as The House of Usher (1960), Tales of Terror (1962) and The Raven (1963), they are not without interest. As an actor perfectly suited to English gothic, Price’s output includes two career-defining performances. In a nutshell, he had the best of both worlds.

Masque of the Red Death (1964)

The British phase of his career began with a bang. After directing all of Price’s Poe chillers for American International Pictures, Roger Corman wanted to give the formula a fresh approach by making his next film in England. Aip’s Samuel Z Arkoff and James H Nicholson had already produced several European films, so the next step was to establish a London base with Louis M Heyward in charge.

Charlie Chan was the literary creation of Earl Derr Biggers, but he also starred in a popular film series. Political correctness be damned as the films, though stilted, are still entertaining. This set nearly completes the series but alas not yet. The short history of Charlie Chan: author Earl Derr Biggers created the Chinese-American sleuth in 1923. It wouldn’t take long till Chan made the jump to the silver screen, but it wouldn’t be until Warner Oland took the role in 1931. His death in 1938 passed the role to Sidney Toler but Fox tired of the series and the bargain basement studio Monogram took the series and Toler. Toler’s death would find Roland Winters taking over the...

Prime time television in the 1950s and 1960s was packed with family situation comedies, including Hanna-Barbera’s takes on The Honeymooners in the form of The Flintstones and The Jetsons. By the dawn of the 1970s, those situation comedy tropes began to permeate Saturday morning cartoons as funny animal and super-heroic fare began to wane. Then there came Scooby-Doo, the first truly original and fresh concept in ages. The four meddlesome teens, their charismatic canine companion and van became the template for many imitators.

I can therefore imagine the brain trust at H-b trying to find new variations on the successful theme. The idea of combining elements a mystery solving family was a natural but how they ever settled on Charlie Chan and his dozen children remains an, ahem,. mystery.

The Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan debuted in 1972 on CBS and was derived from Earl Derr Biggers literary sleuth,...

Mickey Spillane grabbed his position in the pop culture pantheon much like his iconic creation, private eye Mike Hammer, made his way through a case: through a sort of literary brute force, blasting away with heavy doses of graphic violence, steamy sex, and a style which reviewers often considered the prose version of a blunt object.

As a mystery writer, Spillane wasn’t as clever as Evan Hunter, nor as introspective as late career Ross MacDonald, nor did he have the insider’s street savvy of George V. Higgins, or the prose command of Raymond Chandler. Read today, some of his stuff seems so familiar and stale and excessive it borders on camp. But, whatever one’s qualitative judgment on Spillane and his canon, there’s no doubt his impact on the mystery genre – and the private eye tale in particular – was both massive and indelible, reaching beyond the printed...

Warner Bros/courtesy Everett C Sherlock Holmes: A Game Of Shadows, from left: Noomi Rapace, Robert Downey Jr., Jude Law in “Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.”

The next new “Sherlock Holmes” movie is out, and if you loved the first film, it’s more of what you loved — more slam-bang Victorian action, more whimsically anachronistic dialogue, more sly homoerotic innuendo and of course, more Robert Downey Jr. doing what he does best, which is to say, upend every convention...

Charlie Chan definitely has a place among the pantheon of famous fictional detectives. He is certainly one of the more controversial ones. Although Chan is undoubtedly a hero, many Asians resent the character as an ethnic stereotype. Chan is polite and soft spoken, never lacking an appropriate old Chinese proverb to suit the occasion.

The character of Charlie Chan was created by Earl Derr Biggers in 1923 as a rebuttal to the “Yellow Peril” stereotypes so common in literature of the day, such as Fu Manchu. Biggers lived in Hawaii and resented the unflattering Asian clichés so he invented a benign Chinese Investigator working for the Honolulu Police Force. He wrote several Chan novels. The honorable Chinese Detective became so popular that he was soon adapted into film. There were many Chan films, starting in the silent film era. Early films actually starred Chinese actors but the Audience didn’t respond to Asian Leading men.

You never hear the English complaining about Sherlock Holmes, but Charlie Chan is probably not looked at to reboot thanks to political correctness (Fu Manchu neither). It.s more the fact that anyone but a Chinese usually plays him, but there is some touchy racial areas that mostly come from his sidekicks. Come to think of it maybe the English should.ve complained that the latest Sherlock wasn.t English at all it was American Robert Downy Jr. Charlie Chan is based on Earl Derr Biggers. literary creation, a Honolulu based Chinese-American detective whose sleuthing skill rivaled Sherlock. In the 1930s, he was brought to the silver screen by Fox and they cast the Swedish Warner Oland. Success...