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Post by berkley on Oct 15, 2016 1:55:05 GMT -5
I'm tempted to say Max Schreck: I've only seen Nosferatu, and that might have been his only horror role, for all I know, but it also might be the greatest single horror performance in film history.
In addition to his commanding physical presence, Christopher Lee had one of the all-time great voices, up there with Richard Burton, James Earl Jones, people like that. What resonance, what power! I have a feeling that his gifts should have been put to more use. The Dracula movies are great and he was in other first-rate films (e.g. The Wicker Man), but why wasn't he doing Shakespeare?
But of the Hammer guys I have to go with Peter Cushing. There's something about his screen presence that's always impressed me deeply, though I find it hard to put my finger on what it is exactly. There's a quiet intelligence at work, a refinement, and yet also a hint of strangeness. His face is iconic to me, that bone structure.
Vincent Price I never took to. Did he ever play anything seriously? My view is probably skewed because by the time I became saw him on tv in the late 60s or early 70s he was already making fun of his image as a spooky guy, and perhaps for that reason even when I see his earlier movies he doesn't seem to be into it that much. My favourite performance is his bit on Alice Cooper's Welcome to My Nightmare album.
Lon Chaney, Sr was a genius, but I haven't seen enough of his work to have a full appreciation of his talent. His ability to transform himself is so extreme that it almost works against him in polls like this - which might possibly mean he really was the best of them all, regardless of genre.
Anyway, enough of this meandering, I voted Peter Cushing and "Other"= Max Schreck.
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Post by Hoosier X on Oct 15, 2016 12:10:05 GMT -5
As much as I like The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Phantom of the Opera, my two favorite films by Lon Chaney are The Unknown and He Who Gets Slapped. Slapped isn't really a horror film, but horror doesn't get much more horrible that The Unknown. It was an early role for Joan Crawford, who allegedly said she learned more about acting by watching Lon Chaney for a few hours than from anything else she ever did.
And then there's West of Zanzibar! I watched it really late one night and it was like having a nightmare before going to bed!
I voted for Lugosi because I love Dracula (directed by Tod Browning, who directed a lot of Chaney's best horror films) and all those low-budget movies he made, like Bowery at Midnight. I didn't vote for a second choice because I couldn't choose between Chaney and Karloff.
Lon Chaney Jr. is very much under-appreciated. I think he sometimes didn't really have a good grasp on how to handle some of his horror roles, so he sometimes seems a bit awkward or out-of-place. (Son of Dracula pops to mind.) But that doesn't mean he isn't fun to watch! He was a great performer even when he wasn't such a great actor. I saw Ghost of Frankenstein last night. He's really good in that! His version of the monster is confused and sullen and sulky - and his whole world changes when he meets the little girl! Oh, if only he could be the little girl! If only he could have the little girl's brain, wouldn't it be wonderful! (I love Ghost of Frankenstein, from Lugosi's Ygor to the scene where they wander into Vasaria and scare the geese to the monster climbing the building and getting the little girl's ball to Cedric Harwicke as the other son of Frankenstein to lovely Evelyn Ankers to Lionel Atwill to Ralph Bellamy to the end where the monster is speaking with Bela's voice and it's super-creepy!)
And then there's Lionel Atwill! He's in quite a few movies but he doesn't usually get a chance to be the main villain. He's probably most famous for playing Inspector Kemp, the policeman with the wooden arm, in The Son of Frankenstein. But have you see The Murders in the Zoo?! Geez Louise! He's so gleefully evil! Highly recommended.
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Post by Farrar on Oct 15, 2016 13:16:17 GMT -5
Claude Rains was great as the villain in any picture he was in, though my favorite role was as Prince John in the Adventures of Robinhood. He had the cultured bad guy down to a science. Agreed! Perfect description of Rains. And in keeping with this thread's topic: I should have mentioned his Phantom of the Opera role.  |
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Post by Pharozonk on Oct 15, 2016 19:09:21 GMT -5
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Post by codystarbuck on Oct 15, 2016 19:14:43 GMT -5
Well, the Olsen twins used to scare the heck out of me; does that count?
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Post by Rob Allen on Oct 15, 2016 20:02:04 GMT -5
Vincent Price I never took to. Did he ever play anything seriously? He did, mostly early in his career. Check out Laura from 1944. Directed by Otto Preminger, I'd describe it as a "drawing room noir" crime drama with a memorable, haunting score. |
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Post by Hoosier X on Oct 15, 2016 20:35:02 GMT -5
Vincent Price has a small but significant role in Tower of London (1939). He's the Duke of Clarence, the treasonous brother of Edward IV and Richard, Duke of York (later Richard III). He gets into a drinking contest with Richard (Basil Rathbone), who soon drowns him in a barrel of malmsey! (Malmsey is, I think, a sweet wine supposedly favored by Clarence.)
It's great! It also has Boris Karloff!
Twenty-five years later, there was another version of the same historical material, also called Tower of London, with Vincent Price as Richard III. I don't think I've ever seen it. That seems like an egregious oversight.
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Post by crazyoldhermit on Oct 16, 2016 2:14:09 GMT -5
Of the list, tough call between Lee and Cushing. Went with Cushing because I find the Cushing-led Frankenstein series to be much more enjoyable than the Lee-led Dracula series.
Off the list my pick is Klaus Kinski. It all comes down to one role, his performance as Count Dracula in Nosferatu. Chilling.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 16, 2016 12:04:33 GMT -5
Off the list my pick is Klaus Kinski. It all comes down to one role, his performance as Count Dracula in Nosferatu. Chilling. I totally forgot about Klaus ... your description of the word "chilling" is well put! |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Oct 16, 2016 12:33:36 GMT -5
I'm tempted to say Max Schreck: I've only seen Nosferatu, and that might have been his only horror role, for all I know, but it also might be the greatest single horror performance in film history. I assume you've seen Shadow of the Vampire, which is an interesting alt-histoy look at Max Schreck and Nosferatu. If not, I recommend it. |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Oct 16, 2016 12:37:34 GMT -5
I voted Karloff, btw. I'm really not a horror fan at all. But I have traditionally liked Karloff in anything.
Though maybe I should say Rod Serling. His narration of Twilight Zone was frequently as chilling as anything in actual horror films.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 16, 2016 16:00:50 GMT -5
If we're counting scream queens, where's the love for Linnea Quigley?!    oh, I LOVE Linnea (and Brinke Stevens).. and both of them are in my top 5 Scream Queens. . but JLC and AB are #'s 1 & 2  (and who is the other in my top 5?. . . .why Debbie Rochon, of course ) |
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Post by chadwilliam on Oct 16, 2016 17:43:25 GMT -5
Lon Chaney Jr has my vote as well. Perhaps unusually, I don't think of him so much as The Wolf Man, but as Lawrence Talbot. No one embodies eternal torment as precisely as Lon Chaney Jr does in this role - every fibre of his being screams "ANGUIGH!" and yet it's never overplayed. As Cei U also remarked - it's Chaney Jr whose staggering, limp legged walk I envision when I think of The Mummy (as an aside, David Emge's highly regarded turn as a zombie in Dawn of the Dead was inspired by Chaney Jr in this role).
I recently watched The Black Sleep for the first time and while I enjoyed the film, it will always bother me that in spite of boasting the second greatest line up of talented actors in the entire horror genre (I'd rate The House of Frankenstein from 1944 as having the greatest) both Bela Lugosi and Lon Chaney Jr played mutes. That's a problem that I have with a lot of Chaney Jr's work throughout the late 1950's - in so many of them he doesn't speak a word. It's strange then that out of all of the horror icons, he did get a taste of mainstream success with his small but significant roles in High Noon and The Defiant Ones (one of his favorite performances was as a struggling father who saved every cent he made as a junkman so to put his kids through college in The Golden Junkman from the TV series Telephone Time. In succeeding at this task, he is forced to realize that his kids now look down upon him due to their achieving this higher station in life).
I also love the episode of The Monkees in which he appeared. I think it took a few viewings before I recognized that he was teamed up with Len Lesser in that appearance. For those who don't know, Len Lesser was Jerry's Uncle Leo in Seinfeld. Micky Dolenz also once pointed out that he lived next to Chaney Jr as a kid and remarked that he was "the sweetest guy". |
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Post by Hoosier X on Oct 16, 2016 19:32:44 GMT -5
And don't forget Lon Chaney Jr's great performance as Bruno in Spider Baby!
Bruno: Just because something isn't good doesn't mean it's bad.
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Post by Pharozonk on Oct 16, 2016 20:35:37 GMT -5
On the Italian side of things, I would throw in Daria Nicolodi for all the great movies she did with Dario Argento.
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