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Peter Cushing in 'The Brides of Dracula'.
TCM Celebrates Halloween with a Monster-Themed Film Cycle

TCM Celebrates Halloween with a Monster-Themed Film Cycle

'Dracula', 'The Incredible Shrinking Man', and 'The Curse of the Werewolf' are some of the films that the classic cinema channel will broadcast.

I. C. R.

Sábado, 26 de octubre 2024, 00:09

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Vampires, werewolves, living dead... The Halloween holiday is approaching, and TCM has prepared a film cycle titled 'Here Come the Monsters!' From Monday, October 28 to Thursday, October 31, some of the most brilliant and terrifying characters from literature and genre cinema will parade. Horror stories help viewers release all the hidden fears in our subconscious, and to provoke this catharsis, literature and later cinema have used an army of strange creatures born from the deepest nightmares.

This is how, as recalled by the press release sent by TCM, Frankenstein's monster was born. "It was in Switzerland, on a stormy night in the summer of 1816. A group of friends had gathered to read ghost stories at Lord Byron's house. One of the attendees, Mary Shelley, had a strange dream that night: she saw a horrible being showing signs of life and moving with clumsy movements." Almost two years after that summer nightmare, on March 11, 1818, the writer published 'Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus', considered the first science fiction novel in history. In it, Victor Frankenstein, a medical student, managed to bring to life a body made up of fragments from different corpses.

The character can be seen in titles such as 'Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed' (1969), a film directed by Terence Fisher and starring Peter Cushing, which will open the cycle on Monday at 8:15 PM; but also in 'House of Frankenstein' (1944), which will air on Wednesday at 10:00 PM, where Boris Karloff plays the misunderstood creature, and in 'Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein' (1948), one of the most famous and perhaps the best of the cinematic appearances of the popular American comedy duo Abbott and Costello, who on this occasion are accompanied by legendary monsters and actors such as Dracula (Bela Lugosi), the Wolf Man (Lon Chaney Jr.), or Frankenstein (Glenn Strange). This entertaining horror film will air on Thursday at 5:45 PM.

Fortunately, 'Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein' will not be the only opportunity to see Count Dracula in his full glory. The famous vampire, born from the imagination of writer Bram Stoker, is a terrifying being but with a refined elegance that always exudes enormous eroticism and sensuality. Something that viewers will witness by watching the 1958 film version, with Christopher Lee portraying the Prince of Darkness (Monday, 10:00 PM); with 'The Brides of Dracula' (Thursday, 7:10 PM), the Hammer classic with Peter Cushing playing the vampire this time, and the 'Dracula' directed by John Badham in 1979 (Wednesday, 8:10 PM).

There are many tales, legends, and myths that include werewolves. Already in Greek mythology, there is talk of Lycaon, king of Arcadia, whom Zeus turned into a wolf. And from the Greek word 'Lykos' comes the term lycanthropy. Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were suckled by a she-wolf. And who, as a child, has not heard a story with the wolf as the protagonist? In 1961, Terence Fisher directed 'The Curse of the Werewolf', a feature film starring Oliver Reed, which will close the cycle on Thursday at 10:00 PM.

But the public found other more real reasons to be afraid. The atomic age brought its own monsters: horror cinema allied with science fiction, and prehistoric animals, giant spiders, and ants were reborn... And so, TCM's programming will be completed with titles such as 'Tarantula' (Tuesday, 8:35 PM), 'The Incredible Shrinking Man' (Tuesday, 10:00 PM), and 'Creature from the Black Lagoon' (Thursday, 8:35 PM), all three directed by Jack Arnold, a director who showed that horror cinema has never needed big budgets to be popular and successful with the public.

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todoalicante TCM Celebrates Halloween with a Monster-Themed Film Cycle