Nothing But the Night (1973)

**_Lee & Cushing investigate sinister happenings on an isle off the coast of Britain_** Based on John Blackburn’s 1968 novel and shot in the spring of 1972, this obscure flick was released eleven months before the similar “The Wicker Man.” They’re different enough to make both worth checking out, but the latter is clearly the more memorable production. Raven haired Georgia Brown is interesting as the female protagonist while Diana Dors’ character comes across irritatingly rampaging, not to mention one-dimensional. The precocious 12 years-old girl is played by Gwyneth Strong in her first film. It runs 1 hour, 27 minutes, and was shot in the South West Peninsula of England, specifically in Dartmouth (due to architectural similarities of Scotland) and, just to the west, Dartmoor National Park (for the chase sequences). Additional stuff was done in the London area. GRADE: B-

Christopher Lee ("Col. Bingham") is the retired policeman who recruits the help of renowned pathologist "Sir Mark Ashton" (Peter Cushing) to help out when the trustees of a children's charity start to dying in what, he thinks, are mysterious circumstances. It all starts with a bus crash that left charred remains when there was no fire, and ends up on a remote Scottish island where perhaps even the children at at risk. There's a great deal of over-acting here - especially from Diana Dors as the mother of one of the children "Mary"; and from a young Gwyneth Strong as that very child. Fulton Mackay is really miscast as the chief constable - a man who seems to hold that rank whilst having only about twenty officers and a few dogs; and Georgia Brown's "Miss Foster" investigative journalist role seemed uncertain as to quite what her point in the story was. It is great to see Cushing and Lee together, but neither are on much form here and the whole thing really does lurch, quite absurdly at times, along for 90 minutes. Pretty mediocre television fayre, this.