Doc Rotten's 666 Revelations: Scream Queens of 1972

Few female roles in 1972 would rise above the supporting role, the damsel-in-distress. One of those roles would go to Sandra Cassel in Last House on the Left where she is the primary focus of much of the picture, struggling to survive unimaginable horrors. Joan Collins would face a maniacal Santa in Tales from the Crypt in a role where she would be protagonist and antagonist simultaneously. Stephanie Beacham shines in Dracula AD, 1972, but ends up being little more than the victim. She fares a little better than Caroline Munro in the same picture, who manages to overcome the script and turns in a memorable performance. Elke Sommer faces off Baron Blood for Mario Bava and Fiona Lewis has to square off against both Dr. Phibes (Vincent Price) and Darrus Biederbeck (Robert Quarry) in Dr. Phibes Rises Again. Adrienne Corri is a human leader of a band of undead gypsies in Vampire Circus and Joan Van Ark faces a swamp full of deadly reptiles in Frogs. Here are six of the Scream Queens who left an impression in 1972.

STEPHANIE BEACHAM as JESSICA VAN HELSING in DRACULA AD, 1972

As Jessica Van Helsing, the Granddaughter of Lorrimer Van Helsing, Stephenie Beacham portrays the modern gothic scream queen in Dracula AD,1972, Hammer film’s attempt to modernize the Dracula legend. Both captivating and charismatic, Beacham manages to bring more to the role of Jessica than the script demands. In the story, Jessica is no more than a pawn, a way for the resurrected Dracula to get revenge on the Van Helsing family name. To her credit, she does manage to glue together the Victorian elements to the present 1972 day settings. Regrettably, however, she is never allowed to inherit her family namesake and all the vampire vanquishing is left to her grandfather, played by Peter Cushing. It seems audiences in 1972 were not ready for a Buffy-like character just yet. Stephanie Beacham is also cast in And Now the Screaming Starts costarring again with Peter Cushing.

CAROLINE MUNRO as LAURA BELLOWS in DRACULA AD, 1972 

Dracula AD, 1972 is a significant movie in Caroline Munro’s career. Up until this point she was a model that had appeared in a number of films, such as The Abominable Dr. Phibes and Dr. Phibes Rises Again. With this film, it all changes as Hammer films signs her to a long-term contract. While, the role is a supporting role, it ignites the acting bug for Munro and she becomes a full time actress that happens to model. Even with minimal screen times and fewer lines, Caroline Munro is able to steal the movie from lead actress Stephanie Beacham when they share scenes. She is also given more memorable interaction with the villains, Johnny Alucard and Count Dracula, and is featured heavily in the press materials alongside Christopher Lee. And so a Scream Queen is born; she follows this movie up with films like The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1974), Captain Kronos Vampire Hunter (1974), At The Earth’s Core (1976), Maniac (1980) and The Last Horror Film (1982). She also makes quite the fetching Bond girl in The Spy Who Loved Me (1977).

ELKE SOMMER as EVA ARNOLD in BARON BLOOD

For his next horror feature, Baron Blood, Mario Bava casts Elke Sommer as Eva Arnold. Baron Blood is a return for Bava to more gothic pictures full of witchcraft, iron maidens, zombies, and atmosphere and Sommer is his modern replacement for Barbara Steele and Jacqueline Pierreux in his earlier pictures, Black Sunday (1960) and Black Sabbath (1963). In Baron Blood, Sommer’s Eva Arnold is Herr Dortmund’s beautiful assistant who finds herself attracted to the hero, Peter. Together they read an incantation on the bell tower and unleash the evil of Baron Blood. Her character is very much in vein of damsel-in-distress; however, she is allowed to be a larger part in vanquishing the monster. While, for much of the film, she is running and screaming or lying unconscious; in the end, she does manage to untie both Peter and Karl allowing all three to escape. Elke Sommer returns in Mario Bava’s next film as well, Lisa and the Devil a.k.a. House of Exorcism (1973).

SANDRA CASSEL as MARI COLLINGWOOD in LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT 

Last House on the Left is Wes (A Nightmare on Elm Street, 1984) Craven’s directorial debut and is produced by Sean (Friday the Thirteenth, 1980) Cunningham. It is a disturbing tale of rape and revenge, violent and graphic for its time, foreshadowing brutal films of the late Seventies and early Eighties. In the UK it became famously known as one of the “video nasty” videos banned in that country. For his lead, Craven cast Sandra Cassel as Mari Collingwood one of two women (the other being her friend Phyllis) brutalized by a gang of misfits, lead by David Hess as Krug Stillo. Barely surviving the ordeal she escapes and returns to her parent’s home, followed by Stillo and his thugs. In the finale, her parents confront the foursome and get revenge for horrors they’ve inflicted on Mari and Phyllis. Sandra Cassel, sometimes credited as Lydia Cassel or Sandra Peabody, only made less than a dozen films from 1970 through 1976.

JOAN COLLINS as JOANNE CLAYTON in TALES FROM THE CRYPT

Amicus films are the king of anthology horror pictures with films like Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors (1965), Torture Garden (1967), Vault of Horror (1973) and Asylum (1972). Fashioned after the EC comics from the Fifties, Amicus finally makes the connection official with Tales from the Crypt in 1972 basing the five stories on strips printed within comics. For the “All Through the House” episode, Amicus and director Freddie Francis cast Joan Collins to play Joanne Clayton. As one of the five travelers who encounter the mysterious man in the Crypt, Collins plays a disenchanted wife who executes her plans to kill her husband on Christmas Eve. In typical EC ironic fashion, she soon finds herself fleeing the threats of an escaped lunatic dressed as Santa Claus. Unable to call the police for fear of exposing her dastardly deed, she finds herself trapped inside her own home, until her daughter mistakenly allows Santa in through the front door. Throughout the Seventies, Joan Collins makes a number of appearances in genre films, such as Fear in the Night (1972), Tales the Witness Madness (1973) and Empire of the Ants (1977), before rising to world-wide fame as Alexis Colby on TV’s Dynasty.

ADRIENNE CORRI as GYPSY WOMAN in VAMPIRE CIRCUS

Seen previously in A Clockwork Orange opposite Malcolm McDowell, Adrienne Corri stars as the gypsy human leader of a band of vampires posing as a traveling circus in Hammer Film’s Vampire Circus, directed by Robert Young. Obsessed and maniacal, she commands her undead clan to carry out the curse of her lover, Count Mitterhaus, in effort to revive his dead corpse. Adrienne Corri brings the gypsy queen a stoic and commanding presence that serves the character well. She is quite believable as a mortal that could band and lead a group of misfit undead monsters and creatures of the night. The accomplished stage actress also stars in Madhouse (1974) alongside Vincent Price, Peter Cushing and Robert Quarry.