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Dead Of Night [1945]


RRP: £12.99
Our Price: £4.15 (subject to change)

Editorial
Amazon.co.uk Review

While horror conventions may change from generation to generation, there are ideas that will scare us no matter what time period we inhabit. Dead of Night is a classic horror anthology that effectively plays on those timeless fears. Mervyn Johns stars as a man who has been summoned to a house with a group of strangers he has never met but has seen in his dreams. As they convene, he predicts certain events will happen as they do in his dreams and when they do, the other guests relate their own experiences with the supernatural, including tales of a possessed mirror, a sinister ventriloquist's dummy and an eerie premonition of death. Throughout the group meeting, the protagonist fears something horrible will happen to him and we are left to wonder what it might be. The film's final, revelatory sequence offers an unexpectedly horrific surprise. It may have been made in 1945 but Dead of Night is still spooky. --Bryan Reesman

Editorial
Amazon.co.uk Review

The Ealing Classics Collection presents four films from the great British studio, which, unlike the two sets devoted to Ealing Comedy, have at first glance little in common. Apart from many of the same names before and behind the cameras, what really connects Went the Day Well? (1942), Dead of Night (1945), Nicholas Nickleby (1947) and Scott of the Antarctic (1948) is Ealing's commitment to well-written, high-quality drama realised with the best possible production values.

British patriotism at its best links Went the Day Well? with Scott of the Antarctic. The former is a wartime propaganda morale-booster that doesn't shirk from showing the cost of the conflict, but provides genuine excitement as a small German advance force take over a Midlands village--a plot later reworked in The Eagle Has Landed (1977). Director Alberto Cavalcanti handles events with neo-documentary efficiency and William Walton's score cannot fail to stir. No less a composer than Vaughan Williams scored Scott, delivering one of the finest in film history, while Ealing spared no expense on Technicolor location filming. The result is occasionally too tableau-like and historically inaccurate--the mini-series Shackleton (2002) is more commendable in this respect-–but remains a gripping and ultimately very moving drama.

The darker side of life is explored by Cavalcanti in a suitably stark version of Charles Dickens' Nicholas Nickleby, a film unfortunately overshadowed by David Lean's double whammy of Great Expectations (1946) and Oliver Twist (1948). Here Derek Bond is fine as Nicholas and a superb supporting cast, including Cedric Hardwicke and Stanley Holloway, ensure this is a first-rate production. Dead of Night offers one of the earliest examples of the anthology horror film, all wrapped in a decades-ahead-of-its-time framing narrative that nightmarishly twists reality inside-out. Most famous is the sequence with Michael Redgrave as a ventriloquist possessed by his own dummy, an idea later expanded to feature length with Anthony Hopkins in Magic (1978). Still unsettling six decades on, this all-time horror classic is only marred by a terrible comedy golf skit.

On the DVD Ealing Classics presents each film on its own DVD without extras. All four are in the original 4:3 ratio, in black and white, apart from Scott of the Antarctic. The audio is functional mono, and, while dialogue and sound effects are very clear, the music tracks are often distorted.

Picture quality is very variable, with Went the Day Well? being taken from an excellent print. Dead of Night, though, is constantly beset by small sparkles, with much more serious print damage being in evidence, making this a very below-par presentation for such a classic film. Nicholas Nickleby ranks somewhere in between, with a print showing various forms of constant but minor damage and offering a rather indistinct image in the darker scenes. The big budget Technicolor of Scott of the Antarctic is a little muted and the many snow scenes show a considerable amount of grain, but otherwise the print is in very good condition. --Gary S Dalkin


classic
Review date: 2008-04-13 Rating: 10 out of 10

i think this is a fantastic film. The quality is pretty bad which is an awful shame but the story itself still scares me each time i watch it. I decided to take myself off to my room last night with a cup of tea and this film and for the entirety of the film i was scared witless. I do admit i am scared by a lot of films but there is something so completely compelling and unlike anything else about black and white suspense and horror. I am an avid movie fan full stop although b&w still comes up tops in my favourite style or genre and this film simply regaled all my feelings of admiration for a good old classic film. Brilliant!

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Reviews


A True Classic
Review date: 2008-03-25 Rating: 10 out of 10

I first saw this incredible film as a child in the seventies and it scared me witless. As a teenager I imagined that a British black and white movie from the 1940s would be very unimpressive. How wrong I was! In fact this powerful work of art only increases in potency with age. It is a remarkable film of real psychological intensity.

Forget other films in the horror/supernatural genre made since. This is the real deal: a truly disturbing masterpiece that you will remember for a very, very long time...
A true classic.

directors .... this is how to make a great ghost film ......if only ......
Review date: 2007-10-12 Rating: 10 out of 10

as the other reviewers have stated , the quality of the actul print is pretty poor on this region 2 version , and from what i have read i may try to get the region 1 copy , but given the choice of this movie with this print or not having this movie in my ghost dvd collection would seem totally wrong . even now for its age you can imagine how scary it must have been when first viewed back in the day [ 1945 ] compared to other movies of that era .i remember as a schoolboy first seeing it on t.v. when the beeb were doing a series of great ealing movie re runs , and they had HALFWAY HOUSE as the first movie { another great little ealing ghost story } and this classic as the second . there are,nt that many movies that have such appeal and can stick in my mind but both those two and especially this classic did and for all these years as well , and now finally being able to get it on dvd and at least to watch it again , so print taken into consideration an excellent addition to any ghost collection , a must in fact , now all i need is the other classic ghost story HALFWAY HOUSE , and ray milland in the other most excellent classic ghost story THE UNIVITED to really make a classic ghost collection .

Terror repeated
Review date: 2007-09-16 Rating: 10 out of 10

When you watch this now, and it seems a little dated, remember what Universal were doing with horror films in the 1940's. Abbott & Costello meet Frankenstein etc etc. They had run out of ideas, and until Hammer came on the scene in 1957 the horror/ghost story genre was virtually dead. Well this film is the exception.

A brilliantly made horror anthology from Ealing which paved the way for the Amicus films of the 60's and 70's (Dr Terrors House of Horrors, Tales from the Crypt etc) and directly influenced the film Magic starring Anthony Hopkins in 1978. This particular section of film centers on a ventriloquist and his dummy. Michael Redgrave is outstanding as Maxwell Frere the ventriloquist and it is this story and the Golfing one that will leave you very spooked.

Another thing that will leave you spooked is the ending, which unlike most Hollywood films made in those days, and even now, is very scary indeed. When you watch this film remember it was made in 1945 and that some of the stories have been used over and over in variations in more modern films. This is the original and its very creepy.

'Room for one more inside...'
Review date: 2007-09-15 Rating: 10 out of 10

I've seen this classic film almost every time it's been shown on TV for the last 30 years, and it's great to be able to have a permanent copy for one's DVD library. Perhaps because the TV prints have always been poor, I'm not so bothered about the print quality as others seem to be (although the sound is rough in places). Sure, this deserves to have the full restoration business done, but that is very expensive, and I've been disappointed in the past with some American issues of classic films (NTSC to PAL conversion?) so I haven't tried that avenue. Yet.

To the film itself. I am concerned that younger viewers coming new to this film may have unreasonable expectations; it has dated certainly, having a very middle-class 30's/40's Englishness about it that may put some viewers off straight away. This of course would be a terrible shame. Ealing Studios themselves did it no favours by having as a poster (reproduced on the DVD box) a depiction of some weird monster- completely misleading as these are human, psychological, tales.

Over the years, I've asked people what their favourite of the five (six?) separate stories is. Although everyone remembers Michael Redgrave's fine performance with the ventriloquist's dummy, it is The Mirror which is remarked on more than you might expect. This is I think the deepest tale in terms of character development, and we really get drawn into the drama gradually unfolding. I've also always had a soft spot for the delightful Naunton/Wayne golf sequence, a gentle comedy in the middle of the film - giving us a breather before we get inexorably dragged towards that astonishing climax; as surreal as anything you will see in British cinema.

At its current preposterously low price I would snap this up. A better U.K. transfer may come along some day, but this will do in the meantime.

So go on, join Mervyn Johns, and visit Pilgrim's Farm.

Again.

Product Details/Specifications


Actor(s):
Googie Withers
Mervyn Johns
Mary Merrall
Roland Culver
Frederick Valk

Creators:
Mervyn Johns (Primary Contributor)
Roland Culver (Primary Contributor)

Director(s):

Recording label: Optimum Home Entertainment
Manufacturer: Optimum Home Entertainment
EAN: 5060034576631
Binding: DVD
Number of items: 1
Format: Black & White, PAL,
Release date: 2006-11-13
Audience rating: Parental Guidance
Region code: 2
Running time: 99 minutes
Theatrical release date: 1945
Language: English (Original Language)

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