Benedito Dias Rodrigues
Creative plot easily inspired in old Greek's myth, Medusa here supplanted to another name Gorgon as movie's title and Megeara in the picture,the astonishing atmosphere allowed by Fisher in a colorful sets haunting by a moonlight,Cushing is fabulous in his role,also Barbara Shelley,but Christopher Lee was totally disagreement wiith the real character very older to him,also another plot's fail the main actor appears almost in last part of the picture,despite that the whole thing is delightful to every fan who loves Hammer!!Resume:First watch: 2018 / How many: 1/ Source: DVD / Rating: 7.25
Leofwine_draca
THE GORGON is one of the second-tier Hammer Horror offerings made during the 1960s. It's not one of their classic films but fans of the studio will probably be pleased regardless by the heady Gothic atmosphere which pervades the whole production. It's also the last time that the studio's most famous stars Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing teamed up with arguably the studio's best director, Terence Fisher, who of course was responsible for their 1950s classics like THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN. This one's again set in an unspecified European country, where mysterious deaths have been plaguing the local countryside leaving the victims literally petrified.There's not much mystery served up in the story here, because what's going on is pretty obvious at the outset. In addition, the pacing is quite slow so there's some twiddling of the thumbs involved. However, watching a good cast going through the motions is always a pleasure, so you can overlook these shortcomings and the dodginess of the heavily dated special effects to boot. Cushing relishes his subdued, almost sad, part, Lee is always great fun as the hero for a change (possibly a warm up for THE DEVIL RIDES OUT), and others like Michael Goodliffe, Richard Pasco, and Patrick Troughton shine.
Jon Corelis
British film studio Hammer made its reputation in the 1960s as a producer of better than average horror films. The Gorgon, directed by Terence Fisher and starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, all three veteran horror film stalwarts, retells the story from Greek myth of the snake-haired woman so ugly that anyone who looks directly at her is turned to stone. The most interesting thing about the film is the mise-en-scene: the story is reset in a supposedly Eastern European village but the environment seems like a cross between Transylvania and Sussex; the interiors and costumes are richly detailed and credible. The acting is as good as you would expect from Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, with the latter rather atypically playing the good guy rather than a villain.The film is good enough that it might have been a minor classic of the horror genre, except for one huge flaw. (Possible spoiler ahead, but if you know the myth at all you will know what happens anyway.) At the end of the film, in what is supposed to be the peak of the horror, when we finally get a closeup of the Gorgon's decapitated head, it is ridiculously obvious that it is the head of a mannequin. It is about as convincing a special effect as you would expect in a movie made by high school students in their garage.That aside, the rest of the film is good enough to be watchable and will be of interest especially to fans of the horror genre. It's available in various DVDs; I saw it on the Icons of Horror Hammer DVD set, which is of acceptable quality.
ferbs54
Just one of the pictures that Hammer turned out in 1964, out of an eventual eight, "The Gorgon" finds the famed studio dipping into the well of Greek mythology for the first time, to come up with still another solid horror entertainment. The film, besides reuniting Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee (the two would ultimately appear in a whopping 22 pictures together!), also showcased the talents of director Terence Fisher, who would helm 27 films for the House of Hammer by the end of his career (including such beloved pictures as "Four-Sided Triangle," which was Hammer's first sci-fi outing, "The Man Who Could Cheat Death," "The Mummy," "The Curse of the Werewolf," "The Devil Rides Out," five of the studio's Frankenstein titles and three Draculas), as well as Barbara Shelley, who would soon be regarded as one of THE queens of British horror by dint of her appearances in such films as "Dracula, Prince of Darkness" and "Quatermass and the Pit" (for this viewer, however, she will always be Venus, from the classic "Avengers" episode "From Venus, With Love"). And as if that weren't enough talent both in front of and behind the camera, the film was scripted by John Gilling, who would ultimately direct six pictures for Hammer himself, including such beloved miniclassics as "The Plague of the Zombies" and "The Reptile." In "The Gorgon," a university student named Paul Heitz (played by Richard Pasco) comes to the German village of Vandorf, in the year 1910, to investigate the recent deaths of his brother and father, both of whom had mysteriously been turned to stone by an unknown agency. Local doctor Namaroff (Cushing) is secretive and unhelpful, while his assistant, Carla (Shelley), seems a bit more sympathetic. The legend of the Gorgon Megaera (still-living sister of the Tisiphone and Medusa Gorgons of Greek antiquity) is one that no villager wants to speak of, but after being hospitalized due to just catching a glimpse of Megaera in the reflecting water of a fountain, Heitz has little doubts as to her existence. But if the Gorgon takes human form by day, who on Earth can she be? Fortunately for Heitz, his professor from Leipzig University, Meister (Lee...Mr. Tall, Dark and Gruesome himself, here playing a "good guy" in a Hammer film four years before his Duc de Richleau in "The Devil Rides Out"), soon arrives on the scene to proffer some much-needed assistance....In truth, it really is remarkable how Hammer was able to fashion a perfectly acceptable horror outing with little in the way of special FX. This is a film that surely might have benefited from some Ray Harryhausen-type of stop-motion animation magic in bringing the Gorgon to the screen. As played by Prudence Hyman, the creature looks more like some old biddy with a bad makeup job whom you might encounter on Manhattan's Upper East Side, while her snakelike tresses barely move and, when seen from middle distance, look more than anything like the multicandled headpiece that the geriatric female Satan worshipper sports in the '67 Hammer picture "The Witches." But somehow, the lack of top-grade FX doesn't seem to matter here. The actors are all so good, down to the smallest bit part (Michael Goodliffe is especially fine, playing Paul's doomed father), the sets are so endearing (especially that stylized nighttime cemetery, and the interior of Megaera's lair, the deserted Castle Borski), James Bernard's music is so effectively eerie, that the picture is easily put over the top. Gilling's screenplay is a compact one, with little flab, although it should be fairly easy for anyone but the most dim-witted viewer to deduce the human identity of the Gorgon; so easy, indeed, that it is probable that it was not even intended to be a mystery. And need I even mention how wonderful Cushing and Lee both are in this film, although their screen time together is limited to only a few brief scenes? Also, for this viewer, how nice to see the brutish Jack Watson on screen, here playing hospital attendant Ratoff; Watson, for me, will always be best remembered as Juggins, who went after Emma Peel with a whip in another classic "Avengers" episode, "Silent Dust." Grand yet modest fun for all ages, from its opening shot of the Castle Borski to its deliciously (and surprisingly) downbeat ending, "The Gorgon" is yet another winner from the legendary House of Hammer.
