'NOTHING BUT THE NIGHT'.....MORE BRIT KIDDIES OF THE DAMNED............

Nothing But The Night (1973).....was derived from a book by one of BQ's favorite long-lost authors.......the unsung, long out of print (until recently) John Blackburn.

                 How do we describe a Blackburn novel.......sci-fi mystery? Suspenseful horror?  A mad, mad mixture of Agatha Christie, Stephen King and Michael Crichton?

                 All of the above.

                 "Nothing But The Night" is the one and only film adapted from a Blackburn novel, his first written in 1958.  To its credit, it gamely attempts to combine all the Blackburnian elements and genres we listed.....

                Sadly, it's directed flatly with no imagination, no style and no sense of dread from the fantastically perverse, gruesome yarn it spins......the footage lays there like the director was checking his watch for quittin' time.

                 Doubly tragic when you consider the powerhouse cast assembled for this.....including horror titans Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee.......and Diana Dors, who started her career as the British Marilyn Monroe and finished it as the British Shelly Winters......

                  Dors is in full Shelly Winters mode here, playing the wayward, outraged mother of a strange, possibly evil little girl.......who's being raised in an equally strange 'orphans' academy' run by a group of elderly, wealthy trustees.

                   Some of the trustees are mysteriously committing suicide and Dors, already a convicted murderess, is on the lam for trying to throttle her creepy kid, .....and Creepy Kid herself herself may or may not have killed a bus driver while transporting her and her fellow orphans on a field trip.

                  Enough weirdness and mystery for you so far?

                 It's certainly enough for a Police Colonel (Lee) and a doctor (Cushing) to investigate all this bizarre stuff.........and even they can hardly comprehend how bizarre it all turns out......

                  We don't want to blow the whole story for you, but the startling, horrifying truth of what's going on in "Nothing But The Night" is almost identical, 44 years later, to the primary idea of 2017's most popular horror movie.......

                   If you should come across 'Nothing But The Night',along with its over-the-top climax, you'll know exactly which movie we're speaking of........

                    We strongly recommend, however, seeking out John Blackburn's book first......(yes, it's in print......and unless you're a hardcore British horror/Chris Lee/Peter Cushing fan, you can pass on the movie...….it's not even a fraction horrific as the book...….

                     Therefore, 1 & 1/2 stars for the film (*1/2) 4 stars for the book (****) (And if you get you jollies from the book like we did, check out other Blackburn goodies like "A Scent Of New Mown Hay" and "Children Of The Night".....chills guaranteed indeed.)