Win copies of Armchair Thriller on DVD!

Hopefully you read our reviews of the first two volumes of Armchair Thriller - Rachel In Danger and A Dog's Ransom. If you didn't, let's just say we very impressed.

Both are available to buy now for £12.99, but if money is still tight after Christmas, here's some good news - both are available to win in our latest competition, with three lucky people each receiving a copy of the first two Armchair Thriller DVDs.

To be in with a chance, all you have to do is enter your details on the competition page (hosted on our Modculture site). Good luck!

Enter the Armchair Thriller DVD competition

Coming soon: Doctor Who - The Time Meddler

The modern incarnation of Doctor Who might be playing to rave reviews, but it doesn't have the same charm as vintage Doctor Who. And Doctor Who doesn't get more vintage than William Hartnell - available once more in The Time Meddler.

It's the latest BBC DVD reissue, with the Doctor, Vicki and a stowaway arriving on an English coastline in 1066. But all is not what it seems - whilst investigating a ruined monastery The Doctor encounters an electric toaster, a gramophone playing ecclesiastic chants and a mysterious Monk. The Monk is conspiring to wipe out the Viking fleet and thus allow King Harold to face the forces of William of Normandy with a full strength army at the Battle of Hastings. Can The Doctor succeed in thwarting the Monk's plans or will English history be re-written?

Plenty of extras too, including a commentary with actor Peter Purves, producer Verity Lambert, script editor Donald Tosh and designer Barry Newbery, a feature on the first Doctor, the 'lost 12 seconds', a feature on the restoration of the story, along with photo galleries and trailers.

It's released on February 4th, priced £12.99.

DVD Review: Venus in Furs (1970)

"A woman nude in furs is somehow more erotic...inducing pleasure so great it becomes painful."  Quite.  Not to be confused with the Jess Franco movie lensed the same year, Venus in Furs is a more faithful adaptation of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's infamous novel.  It benefits from the seductive presence of the awesome Laura Antonelli, a sexploitation starlet who went on to a respectable art-house career.  Severin (Regis Valee), an obsessive voyeur, craves to be whipped and humiliated following a childhood trauma.  He spies on his beautiful neighbour Wander (Antonelli) masturbating nude in furs and discovers she's happily aware of being watched.  What follows is a twisted love story between voyeur and provocative exhibitionist.  After marriage, Severin moulds Wanda into the perfect vessel for his fantasies, goading her into sex with strangers while he watches.  Happy at first, Wanda comes to resent his games and rebels.  Reborn as an unstoppable love monster she beds a succession of mustachioed hunks and drives Severin away.  The peculiar conclusion has Severin discover his wife's identical double: a gum-chewing prostitute more compliant to his desires.  As music swells, she whips him silly - a happy ending, of sorts...

Cinematographer-turned director Massimo Dallamano is best known for his excellent, "schoolgirls in peril" gialli (including What Have You Done to Solange?  (1971)).  His languid camera glides across Antonelli's silky flesh, fetishising every inch of her body, yet somehow avoids outright misogyny.  The dreamy, romantic tone softens the sleazy subject matter, coming across like a skin flick antidote to Love Story (1970). 

DVD Review: What's Up, Tiger Lily? (1966)

In the mid-sixties Woody Allen became a hot property after scripting the hit comedy What's New, Pussycat? (1965).  Exploitation legends James Nicholson and Sam Arkoff at American International Pictures promptly purchased a Japanese spy movie called Kokusai himitsu keisatsu: Kagi no kagi ("International Secret Police: Key of Keys") and roped Allen in to re-dub and re-script the picture, transforming it into a zany comedy.  The result was What's Up, Tiger Lily? 

Allen's version recasts star Tatsuya Mihashi as Phil Moskowitz (!), the ace superspy recruited to track down a top secret egg salad recipe.  His employer, the High Macha, ruler of "an exotic country that isn't real but sounds believable", warns him villains are also on its trail.  "They kill, they maim and they call information for numbers they could easily look up in the book."  Aided by sexy sidekicks: Suki Yaki (Akiko Wakabayashi) and Teri Yaki (Mie Hama), Phil tangles with no-goods Shepherd Wong (Tadao Nakamura) and Wing Fat (Susumu Kurobe) in a wild and crazy caper, interspersed with interviews with "creator" Woody Allen ("Danger is my bread and butter") and musical numbers by The Lovin' Spoonful. 

Part of American pop's response to the British invasion, The Lovin' Spoonful were spliced into the movie against the wishes of rock music hater Woody Allen.  Indeed, Allen was scathing about the whole enterprise, calling it: "stupid and juvenile" and tried to sue the producers (including Henry G. Saperstein, who co-produced many a Japanese monster movie with Toho) to prevent the film being released.  He recanted after the film drew good reviews and proved a box office success.  Forty years on, What's Up, Tiger Lily? remains frothy fun with some choice Allen witticisms ("I'd call him a sadistic, hippophilic necrophile, but that's flogging a dead horse"). 

Coming soon: Alfred Hitchcock: The British Years

You might be an expert on Alfred Hitchcock's later work, but are you familiar with the great man's earlier output? If not, you can soon get hold of it all in one convenient package - Alfred Hitchcock: The British Years.

Commercial successes at the time of release, Hitchcock's British output of the 1920s and 30s has been largely forgotten by all but hardened fans. But now the pick of that work is back, specifically The Pleasure Garden The Lodger, Downhill, The Man who Knew Too Much; The Thirty-Nine Steps; Secret Agent, Sabotage, Young & Innocent, The Lady Vanishes and Jamaica Inn.

Special features include digitally restored versions of The Lodger, Sabotage, Young and Innocent and Jamaica Inn, Cinema: Alfred Hitchcock (Mike Scott interviewing Hitchcock about his life and career, Aquarius (featuring Hitchcock on the set of Frenzy), analysis of the movies, location reports, trailers and booklets.

The box is available from 25th February 2008, with a recommended retail price of £59.99.

DVD Review: Starcrash (1978)

Beautiful Caroline Munro as space-bikini babe, Stella Star!  Gold-clad Christopher Plummer using mystical powers to "halt the flow of time"!  Kung fu fighting Amazons, acrobatic Troglodytes, and lightsaber battles with stop-motion robots!  The Hoff firing frickin' laser beams from his eyes!  Is Starcrash the greatest movie ever made?  Probably not, but it's awfully good fun.  Second best of the late seventies Star Wars rip-offs, behind Kinji Fukasaku's mind-blowing Message from Space (1978). 

Italian writer-director and sci-fi buff Luigi Cozzi weaves a wild yarn full of in-jokes and genre references.  The magnificent super-spaceship "Murray Leinster" (named after the s-f writer/magazine editor) goes missing and is sought by the Emperor of the Stars (Christopher Plummer) and his cape-swishing arch-enemy, Count Zarth Arn (erstwhile Maniac (1980) Joe Spinell).  Fleeing the Galactic Police, interstellar rogue Stella Star and her bubble-permed, mystical sidekick Akton (faith healer-turned-trash film star (yes, really) Marjoe Gortner) stumble on some survivors who babble about "red monsters."

DVD Review: The Black Cat (1981)

Probably the least heralded movie from Lucio Fulci's "gothic period", The Black Cat isn't a classic but will interest fans of Italian horror.  Edgar Allan Poe's much-adapted short story inspires only the climax, but the bulk of the film is impressively claustrophobic, played in twitchy close-ups between the frightful feline and its master, Professor Robert Miles (Patrick Magee).  Miles is a paranormal researcher, who uses his demonic familiar to gorily slaughter those he feels have wronged him.  Nosy American photographer, Jill Travers (Mimsy Farmer) stumbles onto these mysterious deaths in a quaint English village and teams up with Scotland Yard's Inspector Gorley (genre icon David Warbeck) to bring the culprit to justice.  But is Miles in control, or the cat? 

The film strives for ambiguity, but winds up just confusing.  After the cat lures Gorley into a horrific accident, Miles screams: "No!  I didn't want that!"  Then he looks disappointed when Gorley turns up alive.  Fulci allegedly cranked this one out with little passion involved.  It's a less inspired reworking of Poe than Dario Argento managed with Two Evil Eyes (1989), but there is plenty to savour.  Mimsy Farmer attacked by rubber bats; a foggy village with superstitious locals straight out of Hammer films; a mix of occult lore, super-science and metaphysical chatter; and a victim who cowers while the cat opens a locked door. 

The Amazing Mr. Blunden (1972)

Remember The Railway Children? Of course you do - it's a classic family movie that's on TV every other month. In fact, check your TV guide - it's probably on this weekend.

That movie was the first to be written and directed by evergreen British actor Lionel Jeffries. His second one is very similar, yet The Amazing Mr. Blunden rarely gets an airing on the small screen. Shame really, because in my opinion, it's actually a superior movie. Superior  and also darker - in the sensitive noughties, maybe a tale of ghosts and time travel just isn't parent-friendly enough for Sunday afternoon viewing.

DVD Review: Yield To The Night (1956)

Diana Dors - it you remember her at all, it's probably from 70s panel shows or the occasional guest slot in minor movies or TV sitcoms. But back in the 1950s, she was the British equivalent of Marilyn Monroe and a decent actress too, as Yield To The Night will testify.

Yield To The Night should be a better-known movie, but just as capital punishment has faded out of our memories, so has this argument against the evils of it. In one of the finest Brit movie openings ever, Diana Dors' character Mary Hilton strides purposely towards a well-heeled woman coming out of an expensive car, before firing several shots into her. Fast forward to Hilton locked up in a cell, awaiting the inevitable death penalty. What drove her to murder? A series of flashbacks cut into the prison scenes tell the tale.

And Now The Screaming Starts (1973)

I'm not one for period dramas, but Amicus and Roy Ward Baker combined to make one that every fan of British horror should see - And Now The Screaming Starts.

With more than a hint of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, this tale of revenge, screaming, wandering hands and haunting is like Hammer extreme - the plot, the blood, the screaming, the colour and the performances all go over and above the call of duty. It certainly wasn't an Oscar contender, but it is 91 minutes of good, old-fashioned comic book horror.

Top of the screaming league is Stephanie Beacham as Catherine Fengriffen, newly married to Charles Fengriffen (Ian Ogilvy) and off to Fengriffen Manor for an idyllic life. Except this is a horror movie and strange things are happening - faces jumping out of pictures, wandering severed hands and mysterious deaths as soon as anyone mentions what could be bringing it all on.

DVD Review: Armchair Thriller - A Dog's Ransom (1978)

Rather like the wait for buses, you wait 30 years for an Armchair Thriller - then two come along at once. However, A Dog's Ransom is a very different and much more complex tale than Rachel In Danger.

Based around a novel by Patricia Highsmith, A Dog's Ransom starts off as a fairly unassuming story about Edward and GIna Reynolds' kidnapped poodle. The dog is presumed lost, but letters start to arrive demanding money for its safe return. After a pay-off (but no dog return), the couple go to the police, who subsequently laugh it off as a minor crime. But one young, Cambridge-educated policeman (Clarence Duhamel, played by Brian Stirner) decides to get involved, visiting the couple (who he sees as 'his kind of people') to find out some details of the 'dognap', before using his girlfriend Marion (Susie Blake) to access social services information to track the culprit down.

All evidence points to a disabled Polish man called Kowajinski. Duhamel tackles him before reporting the crime to his superiors. But there's a sting in the tale - Kowajinski has framed Duhamel for bribery and as Kowajinski regains his freedom on bail, Duhamel finds himself under close investigation by the police force.

DVD Review: Armchair Thriller - Rachel In Danger (1978)

Armchair Thriller was a little before my time (or rather, before my bedtime), but this series of mini-dramas from ITV pulled in big ratings for ITV in the late 70s - and watching the first of the DVD reissues now, you can see why.

Rather than the one-off suspense/horror shows of the time (Thriller, Tales of the Unexpected and Hammer House of Horror to name just three), Armchair Thriller was broken down into half-hour episodes, each with a cliffhanger ending to keep you coming back for more. And aided by a solid cast, impressive writing teams, some very clever plots, a spooky intro and a catchy theme by Roxy Music's Andy Mackay, it still has much to offer the viewer today.

The first Armchair Thriller to get the reissue treatment is the first one to hit the screen back in 1978, Rachel In Danger. Very much of its time, Rachel In Danger centres around a young girl (Rachel, played by Della Low) who travels London to meet up with the father (Peter Warmington) she hardly knows. He's split up from Rachel's mother and has been working in South America as a university lecturer - this is the first meeting since the girl was aged just two.

Inglorious Bastards (1978) heads to DVD

If you didn't know, Quentin Tarantino is currently working on his next film - a remake of Inglorious Bastards, starring Tim Roth and planned for 2009. If you can't wait that long, you can soon pick up the original via Optimum.

Inglorious Bastards is to the war film what The Good, The Bad and The Ugly is to the western - entertaining and with an incalculable body count. Directed by Enzo Castellari and starring Bo Svensson, Peter Hooten, Fred Williamson and Michael Pergolani, Inglorious Bastards is set in the Ardenne Mountains during World War II, with five American soldiers on the run, mistakenly killing a group of American agents disguised as a German patrol - then being forced to redeem themselves by the French resistance by carrying out the agents' mission themselves.

If an old school war movie sounds like your thing, you can pick this up from 18th February. Watch out for a review before then. And check out the trailer below...

DVD Review: Fear In The Night (1972)

Hammer went down numerous alleys to find a winning formula in the 70s, few of them massively successful from a commercial point of view, but many of them well worth watching if you're a fan of British cinema. And that includes Fear In The Night.

With a minimal cast of Peter Cushing, Joan Collins, Judy Geeson and Ralph Bates, Fear In The Night is more psychological thriller than horror, with Geeson starring as the newly-married Peggy Heller, making a fresh start after a breakdown with new husband Robert Heller (Bates).

The Flipside presents... Dirty Mary Crazy Larry (1974) with Susan George Q&A

A new year and a new presentation from the Flipside team at the BFI, this time Dirty Mary Crazy Larry from 1974, with the added bonus of a Q&A with star Susan George and director John Hough.

Peter Fonda is Crazy Larry, a racer on the run in his 1969 Dodge Charger after a ruthless robbery; Susan George is Dirty Mary, the sexy groupie who joins him for the ride. Before long the entire police force is on their tail in what the New York Daily News described as “the longest high-speed car chase in history” before a jaw-dropping finale.

It's showing on Thursday 24th January at  NFT1, with the screening starting at 8:20pm.

Book tickets online for the BFI website

New Isssue of Cinema Retro Available

The new issue of Cinema Retro Magazine is now available and if you're a fan of '60s & '70s era films you won't want to miss it.

The latest issue features a 10-page article on the 1967 spy thriller Deadlier Than the Male and includes many terrific color photos from the movie as well as an interview with the film's beautiful star Elke Sommer.

Some other highlights in issue #10 include an insightful look at the great Oliver Reed film I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname (1967), a first hand account of Hammer Studios 50th Anniversary celebration, more in-depth coverage of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. films and a nice piece on the popular American actress Doris Day.

To find out more about the new issue of Cinema Retro and learn how you can purchase a copy of the magazine or subscribe, please visit their official site: Cinema Retro

- Kimberly Lindbergs

DVD Review: In the Realms of the Unreal (2004)

Jessica Yu's award-winning documentary, In the Realms of the Unreal offers a portrait of one man's astonishing inner life.  Henry Darger was an elderly recluse.  He spent his childhood in an Illinois asylum for 'feeble-minded' children and his adulthood working as a janitor in Chicago.  He lived a quiet life alone in his apartment, while regarded him as a harmless eccentric.  But when Darger died in 1973, his landlady discovered three hundred paintings in his room, some over ten feet long, and a 15,000-page illustrated novel called The Realms of the Unreal.  Darger's magnum opus told the epic story of the virtuous Vivian Girls, seven angelic sisters who lead a rebellion against the cruel, child-enslaving kingdom of Glendillinia.  Bursting with colour and imagination, the artwork was exhibited in major galleries and went on to inspire poetry, music and plays. 

Storybook narration from child star Dakota Fanning sets the tone for Yu's engaging fable.  She weaves portions of Darger's autiobiography read by Larry Pine, interviews with his surviving neighbours, still photographs (only three pictures of Darger exist) and animated excerpts from The Realms of the Unreal, and creates a moving picture book.  As a human being, Darger remains a mystery even to those who knew him.  Many of those interviewed here can't even agree how to pronounce his name, or on small details like where he sat in church.  Darger himself sometimes claimed his real name was Henry Dargarus and he was born in Brazil. 

DVD Review: Spirits Of The Dead (1968)

Go on! Stick Edgar Allan Poe into the IMDB search and you’ll notice it straight away - the numerous cinematic treatments of his work have distinctly non English titles -Portuguese, Danish, Spanish even an early Czech film giving a big clue as to where his main fan base was and is located.

Of course Roger Corman had, through the early 60s, rekindled a keen interest for Poe in his homeland and quite successfully too with 1964’s The Masque Of the Red Death marking the high point. Four years later and falling in with the very ‘now’ trend of compendium films and featuring some very ‘now’ film stars came the Franco- Italian Histoires Extraordinaires (Spirits Of The Dead).

Jean-Pierre Léaud: The New Wave and After

San Francisco Bay Area residents won't want to miss the upcoming Jean-Pierre Léaud: The New Wave and After film program taking place at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive Jan. 18 - Feb 29th.

The French New Wave (Nouvelle Vague) produced many great stars, but Jean-Pierre Léaud is undoubtedly one of the brightest and most talented. He was only 15 years old when he first appeared in François Truffaut's classic The 400 Blows and the actor would go on to star in many other important French films for the next two decades. Jean-Pierre Léaud is still working and making great films and this impressive six week event brings together many of the iconic French actor's best work spanning a period of over 35 years. Some of the films being presented during the program include The 400 Blows (1959), Masculin Feminine (1966), La Chinoise (1967), Weekend (1967), Stolen Kisses (1968), Two English Girls (1971), Day for Night (1973), The Mother and the Whore (1973), Love on the Run (1979) and Irma Vep (1996).

Ticket prices and showtimes can be found at the official program site: Jean-Pierre Léaud: The New Wave and After.

- Kimberly Lindbergs

Absolute Beginners (1986)

Absolute Beginners - it was the film franchise that couldn't fail. A cult novel that reads like a film screenplay, a 'hip' director and a bag load of goodwill. But it did fail - and unlike most movies that get ripped apart by the critics, this one didn't even get belated cult status. But is it really so bad? Well...

I was one of the people willing this to work. As a schoolkid, I was obsessed with this book, I can still quote chunks of it now. And I really hated this movie version when it came out. Director Julien Temple wasn't a movie man, he was from a music background - and took the brave/foolish decision to turn Absolute Beginners into a musical. In fact, watching it now it seems more like a traditional West End show. There's was another problem too - it was the 1980s. Ok, that's not necessarily a bad thing, but this film has 80s stamped all over it - the hair, the music, the clothing - it was all supposed to be set in the late 50s, but Temple just couldn't pull off that vintage/period feel. A more skilled director probably could. And a more skilled director probably would have ditched most of the music, as well as the wooden leads (Patsy Kensit and Eddie O'Connell).

DVD Review: Payroll (1961)

It's rare to find a vintage British crime flick set outside of London, but Payroll is in that minority, using the streets of early 60s Newcastle as the backdrop to a vicious robbery - and the fallout that follows it.

Michael Craig stars as Johnny Mellors, leading a gang (which also features a young Tom Bell as Blackie), planning an assault on a wages run, acting on information from one of the firm's employees (Dennis Pearson, played by William Lucas). But there's a problem - the old system is about to be changed, no longer a car run from the bank, the firm has brought in an armoured vehicle, complete with police radio and emergency siren. The complete anti-theft machine it seems.

DVD Review: The Frightened City (1961)

You would be forgiven for thinking that the gritty British crime thriller started at Get Carter and ended with Guy Ritchie, but the crime flick has been around as long as the moving picture in the UK - with The Frightened City typical of the early 60s output.

Available now for the first time on DVD (as part of Optimum's British Thrillers series), The Frightened City is British noir, set in London's gangland and starring Sean Connery as a petty criminal caught between two warring factions. Connery isn't the main character here though - that's Herbert Lom as money man Waldo Zhernikov. He has a plan - to bring together all the London crime gangs into a large syndicate, making it easier to extract protect money from the club and restaurant owners.

Battle Royale T-shirts

The London based design company Airside created these rather gory and terrific looking t-shirt designs inspired by Kinji Fukasaku's great Japanese film Battle Royale (Batoru Rowaiaru, 2000).

Each shirt cost around £24.99 and they come in many different sizes for males and females. Airside also offers shipping to to anywhere in the world.

For more information please see the official online Airside Shop

Beat Girl showing on BBC4 as part of Pop Britannia season

The BBC's latest themed season, Pop Britannia, got off to a decent start last night, with a look at the early Brit pop scene of the 1950s, as well as a couple of cheesy Cliff pop movies - Espresso Bongo and the Young Ones.

This next week looks even better, with a rare showing on the once controversial Beat Girl movie (with killer John Barry soundtrack), a documentary on 60s and 70s pop and a couple of Bowie gems - Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars and the BBC's own Cracked Actor film (where Bowie goes from goth to white soul boy).

Want a taster of Beat Girl? See the intro below. The full film is on at 7:40pm on Friday 11th January on BBC4.

DVD Review: And Soon The Darkness (1970)

This is something of a first for Cinedelica - I'm reviewing the same movie for the second time. But as And Soon The Darkness has finally been released in its home country of the UK on DVD and as a copy has just popped through the letterbox, I feel it's justified this time.

Loosely classed as a horror, it's actually more of a thriller - and a very good one too as director Robert Fuest uses a minimal cast and the expanse of the French countryside to create a genuinely tense movie that leaves you second guessing right to the final scenes. In some ways, it's an Avengers spin-off, made soon after that show had finished, with writing duties shared by Brian Clemens and Terry 'Daleks' Nation, production by Clemens and Albert Fennell and with a jaunty (and slightly inappropriate) theme by Laurie Johnson.

Network releases cult classic Armchair Thriller on DVD

Another TV cult classic is heading to DVD for the first time courtesy of Network - Armchair Thriller.

Originally broadcast between 1978 and 1980 by Thames Television (with a theme tune by Roxy Music’s Andy Mackay), it was a weekly prime-time drama, with the usual cliffhanger at the end of each episode. The first two episodes of the series are first to disc, those being Rachel In Danger, about a girl meeting her father for the first time - but in fact meeting an international terrorist posing as her father and A Dog's Ransom about an affluent Chelsea couple whose dog is kidnapped - threatening their entire lifestyle.

We're hoping to have some reviews online soon, in the meantime, you can order the shows now in time for their 21st January release, priced just under £10.

Find out more about the DVDs at Amazon.co.uk

Cult Clip: The Innocents (1961)

The word 'spooky' just about sums up the extremely strange British cult horror The Innocents.

It's the story of a governess (played by Deborah Kerr), hired to care for two children in a gothic-style stately home. While caring for the children, the governess discovers that her predecessor was having an affair with a man called Quint, who was also employed in the house, with both of them dying in bizarre circumstances.

Not only that, but she believes the two are attempting to possess the bodies of the two children. Strange and slightly disturbing even by today's standards, but well worth seeking out. See the trailer below...

And Soon The Darkness finally gets a UK DVD release

It's been some time coming, but finally, years after it got a release everywhere else, And Soon The Darkness is finally getting a DVD release in the UK. And as it's a lost Brit classic, it's not a day too soon.

We've reviewed the US version previously and recently dug up the trailer via YouTube. It's directed by Robert Fuest, using the team behind The Avengers (soon after that series ended), coming together to produce a tense/moody thriller about two young female cyclists who are on holiday in the French countryside. But one goes missing, leaving the other alone and unsure who to trust - because any of the people around could be a murderer.

I've managed to secure an advanced copy of the UK disc, so here will be a review of it online soon, along with details of any extras. If you can't wait for it, you can pre-order on Amazon for a bargain £7.98.

Find out more about the DVD at Amazon.co.uk

Coming soon: The Bank Job (2008)

Not long into 2008 and we're already being greeted by another British gangster flick - although The Bank Job has more to do with 1971 than the modern era.

It's actually based around true events, specifically an unsolved robbery 37 years ago, when thieves broke into a London bank vault, looting boxes worth millions. No-one was caught for it and the government issued a press gag on it. The movie second guesses what was hidden in those boxes, throwing in a tale of murder, corruption and a sex scandal with links to the Royal Family, not to mention lots of early 70s style.

Tales From The Crypt (1972)

I love a good early 70s British horror film. Ok, it's not likely to be the scariest thing you see, but a movie like Tales From The Crypt is guaranteed to entertain you for the best part of 90 minutes.

Based on the Al Feldstein and Johnny Criag comic book stories, this Amicus anthology of stories gives the tales a distinctly British spin - and it's about as 70s as it comes. In fact, if you want a pictorial history of British interior design of the period, just buy this and take note of Joan Collins' pad in the 'All Through The House' Segment. But before we get to that, let's start at the beginning.