And The Wall Came Tumbling Down

Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense was a joint mid 80s production between the erstwhile studio of the title and 20th Century Fox in the US a collaboration which explains budget, the slightly longer than normal run time and the plethora of relatively big name US stars of the era like David Carradine, Dean Stockwell, David McCallum and Dirk Benedict who show up through the various episodes as well as the various stalwarts of British TV of the time like Gareth Hunt and Peter Wyngarde both of whom feature in this episode alongside playboy model Barbi Benton.

This, the penultimate, episode of the series was written by the great Dennis Spooner the writer behind numerous Gerry Anderson serials such as Stingray and Thunderbirds, script editor for the 1st Doctor era and the co-creator of Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased), The Champions, Department S and Jason King for ITC and then later The New Avengers.  His story here reunites him with two of the stars of those series in the forms of Wyngarde and Hunt and tells a story of a church, scheduled for demolition but the scene of several unexplained deaths.

Mixing your typically Hammer satanic, gothic trappings of a spooky old desecrated church with a more modern vision of the apocalypse Spooner has produced a fun, schlocky romp.  The whole thing looks quite nice and races along but few of the actors involved are exerting themselves; Benton is way out of her light comedy comfort zone and Hunt was always more convincing shaking a fistful of coffee beans than as a leading man and Wyngarde has little to do except look spooky and malevolent (and always effortlessly cool) but it is an undeniably fun watch

Buy it here - Hammer House Of Mystery And Suspense - Vol. 2 [DVD] - or watch it below.

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