The Beast Must Die (aka You Deserve A Break Today)

The Beast Must Die, Paul Annett's 1974 addition to the well-stocked horror canon of the Shepperton-based Amicus Productions, opens with a truly idiosyncratic prologue. We are greeted by the voice of Valentine Dyall, who informs us that, "This film is a detective story in which YOU are the detective. The question is not "Who is the murderer?" but "Who is the werewolf?" The distinction is, perhaps, a redundant one, given that, for the purposes of this story, "murderer" and "werewolf" amount to much the same thing. A body count is piling up, one of our established cast is responsible, but they're adept enough to keep their identity just out of view. "After all the clues have been shown--you will get a chance to give your answer," continues Dyall, before urging us to "Watch for the Werewolf Break!", and that's where the fun really begins.

The prologue, promising lurid spookhouse thrills within the parameters of a whodunnit, sets the tone for the film's unusual genre mash-up - part kooky monster B movie, part country house mystery, part pulpy action thriller. The one thing The Beast Must Die is not, in truth, is much of a horror flick. There are stretches of darkness and smatterings of gore, but Douglas Gamley's funky, upbeat score suggests something more in line with such contemporary UK adventure series as The Avengers and Strange Report, and there is great emphasis throughout on extended action-orientated set-pieces, including an opening aerial pursuit and one or two motor chases thrown in for good measure (although this occur between long stretches of slower-moving action in which the characters are permitted to marinate in their own paranoia). What The Beast Must Die unabashedly is is a pure, unadulterated slice of 1970s kitsch, buoyed along by a silly, if undeniably charming gimmick, and it will be best appreciated among those who understand that suspense is at its most delectable when washed down with copious amounts of gimcrack.

The Beast Must Die was adapted from a short story by James Blish, "There Shall Be No Darkness" (incidentally, it has no connection to the Cecil Day-Lewis novel of the same name, recently adapted into a five-part mini series for Britbox), and has shades both Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None and Richard Connell's The Most Dangerous Game, two literary staples that have been plundered exhaustively for their potential as perfectly recyclable thrillers. The variations Annett brings to the table involve millionaire hunter Tom Newcliffe (Calvin Lockhart), who, bored with bagging more conventional game, invites an assortment of eccentrics for a three-day excursion at his isolated country home, with the intention that one of the party will become his next prey - although which, from the outset, is a complete mystery to him. Newcliffe has carefully selected his guests on the basis of their possible connection to lycanthropy; he is aware that he is housing at least one werewolf in his midst and, with a brilliant full moon on the horizon, intends to expose the clandestine beast so that he can go up against the actual most dangerous game. The candidates include Professor Lundgren (Peter Cushing), a leading expert on the alleged science behind the werewolf transformation, disgraced diplomat Arthur Bennington (Charles Gray), unassuming concert pianist Jan Gilmore (Michael Gambon), his lady companion Davina (Ciaran Madden), and Paul Foote (Tom Chadbon), an artistic hipster with little shame over his history of experimentally dabbling in cannibalism. The guests swiftly discover that they are trapped on Newcliffe's estate, with surveillance cameras and patrol helicopters tracking their every move, and as the days pass by and the nocturnal shape-shifting inevitably occurs, Newcliffe struggles to match his wits against those of the shut-in beast, an obsession that proves unsettling to his wife Caroline (Marlene Clark, dubbed with the voice of Annie Ross). The beast, seemingly fully capable of staying at least one step ahead of its pursuer, obligingly claims a few casualties along the way, narrowing down our list of possible suspects, until at last we reach our climax, a good old-fashioned drawing room denouement in which the survivors all gather together for a final round of finger-pointing. First, though, we get the promised Werewolf Break, and what a beguiling oddity it is.

The story behind the inclusion of the Werewolf Break goes something like this: the original cut submitted by Annett contained no such device, and producer Milton Subotsky was so unimpressed with what he saw that he felt compelled to add in a little flavour of his own, hitting upon the idea of an interactive element in which the viewer was challenged to come to a conclusion over the identity of the werewolf just before it was revealed to them. It was a technique he borrowed directly from the book of William Castle, who had similarly paused the action with the visual of a ticking clock for his 1961 film Homicidal. Known as the "Fright Break", the conceit was that Castle was putting the film on the hold for the benefit of those who might not want to stick around for the horrifying climax, with the promise of a full refund waiting for them outside in the theatre lobby - the catch being that if you took Castle up on his offer, you were forced to suffer the indignity of exiting through "Coward's Corner" and signing a document formalising your status as a bona fide coward (if you were willing to endure all of that then I'd say you had guts). In the case of The Beast Must Die, the film is halted for a full minute while images of the possible candidates are flashed upon the screen; the latter 30 seconds are accompanied by a visual countdown which leads us back into the action. Subotsky was reportedly satisfied with the result, insisting that he'd salvaged the picture, but Annett has gone on record as saying that he was deeply opposed to it, believing it completely took all the wind from the tension he'd been artfully building for the climax. I think it's fair to say that history has vindicated Subotsky, however, the Werewolf Break being the one aspect of The Beast Must Die that everybody remembers, something Annett himself openly admits on the film's Blu-ray commentary. He also acknowledges that at least one big-name critic (Leonard Maltin) was won over by the gimmick (alas, Maltin looks to have been in the minority; other critics were intrigued by the Werewolf Break but felt that the rest of the film fell short of it).

The central mystery is not a massively robust one, but it's not a total cheat either - so long as you've an eye for keeping track of which characters were in which vicinity and when, you should be able to have a reasonable stab at it. For those interested in experiencing the mystery fresh, I would advise the following:

• I will not be revealing the answer here, so you may read on without fear of spoilers. I will, however, exert my bragging rights in proclaiming, with no false modesty, that I gave the correct answer during my first viewing (again, it's not an exceedingly complicated mystery, provided you pay close enough attention to the characters).
  
• Do NOT, under any circumstances, be tempted to watch the theatrical trailer before you begin. It emphasises the mystery, and the presence of the Werewolf Break; unfortunately, whoever edited it made the self-defeating blunder of including - and lingering on - at least one visual that makes it painfully obvious who the werewolf is. The faces of all possible candidates are shown, and juxtaposed with footage of the werewolf gradually transforming back into human form, and all but the most inattentive of viewers could very easily match the correct mugshot with the face lurking behind the ever-decreasing layer of fur.
  

 

Still, the curiosity at the heart of The Beast Must Die has less to do with the identity of the werewolf than with the presence of that Werewolf Break; why should such a simple gimmick, visibly crowbarred in after the fact, add so immeasurably to our enjoyment of the picture? After all, it's not as though Subotsky's trick comprises anything other than a rundown of information the viewer already knows - that the werewolf has to be one of the listed individuals. One can understand Annett's reservations; the appearance of the break removes the viewer from the immediacy of the story, getting them to contemplate the narrative action from a wholly artificial vantage point. Unlike Castle's Fright Break, which was designed to prompt some kind of visible action (or, more likely, inaction) from its audience, werewolf watchers would, so far as I can tell, have received no real opportunity to "give" their answer, unless they were bold enough to yell it at the screen. The idea behind the break appears to be more to goad the viewer into committing to an answer, if only within the privacy of their own heads, enhancing their investment in the mystery and having the stakes feel a whisker more personal.

Perhaps emphasising the mystery element of the film was necessary in order to divert the viewer from its deficiencies as a horror picture - more specifically, its deficiencies regarding the beast itself, quite possibly the least terrifying werewolf you'll ever set eyes on. To divulge the nature of the titular beast would not be much of a spoiler, as a still of the creature is featured in Dyall's opening announcement. We can see even there that our monstrous wolf is quite blatantly a dog wrapped up in layers of fabric, and looking like it's on its way to some downmarket cosplaying convention, a point that numerous contemporary critics were unable to see past - among them, Gene Siskel, who wittily described the monster as a "spray-painted collie" (he gets the breed wrong - the dog in question looks more like a German Shepherd - but his interpretation is nevertheless hilariously astute). On top of everything else, the "werewolf" is portrayed by such a happy, friendly, loving-looking dog, the kind you wouldn't be adverse to keeping as a family pet - there's a scene where it pounces on one unfortunate victim, supposedly to tear their throat out, and looks more as though it's trying to engage them in some kind of doggy ballet. You will not feel much menace in the presence of this mutt, but its technical shoddiness no doubt contributes enormously to the film's kitschy appeal. And besides, there are other reasons why the dog's generally buoyant spirits are of great reassurance to me. There is only sequence in which the "wolf" displays anything resembling genuine aggression - when it is confronted by the Newcliffes' own dog - and, on the Blu-ray commentary, Annett confirmed my worst suspicions in indicating that their skirmish was not simulated; Annett insists that neither animal was harmed (although we do see them make physical contact), but admits that the dogs were provoked into snapping at one another, which is obviously not cool.

The real monster of The Beast Must Die is not our amicable-looking werewolf. It is, as in life, the ticking clock, which obligingly appears for the second half of the Werewolf Break to indicate how much time we have remaining before the story resumes and validates (or invalidates) our detective prowess. The visual of the clock is another beguiling detail that adds a strange degree of menace to the Break - its eerie effectiveness is hinted in Annett's musings, on the Blu-Ray commentary, as he ponders its significance to viewers "when they're eating their takeaway curries half-arsed on a Saturday night, when the film was often on television, [and] probably think this is some sort of clock telling them go to bed." The clock signifies the voice of authority, however implicitly, demanding a response by reminding us of the very finite time we have allocated. With its appearance, not only do we find ourselves plucked out of the narrative setting, but confronted with a queasy amount of cinematic dead space, in which there is nothing to be heard but the tick of the clock, as the faces of our prospective werewolves continue to fade in and out in succession (only one of them, Foote, produces a smirk that seems to mirror the knowing audacity of the gimmick). Castle's Fright Break, by contrast, used the sound of a beating heart, itself an uncomfortable reminder of the fragility of human existence, but viewers had the additional reassurance of voice-over narration to guide them through the process, finally exalting them as "a brave audience". In the Werewolf Break, Dyall is content to leave the viewer suspended in that uneasy narrative gulf, with only their own contemplation and the unrelenting march of time closing in on them. The real purpose of the Break, we presume, is less about giving the viewer space in which to review the preceding evidence than immersing them in cold uncertainty; brakes are slammed on the narrative momentum purely to give that uncertainty a greater vehemence than would otherwise have been merited.

The Beast Must Die might also be seen as a novel hybrid on the temporal front, swathed in characteristically 1970s dress while (thanks to Subotsky's post-production tinkering) looking back fondly on the B pictures of the previous decade, and with at least one component with which it might be regarded as positively ahead of its time - it boasts the rare distinction, for its era, of being a mainstream-skewing British production led by a black protagonist, albeit a fairly unsympathetic one (how nice a guy is Newcliffe if he's willing to falsely imprison and endanger a bunch of people just to kick-start a few adrenalin rushes?) Apparently, Lockhart's casting represented Amicus' response to the rising popularity of the blaxploitation picture in the US, in particular, the recent box office success of the similarly horror-orientated Blacula (1972), and when The Beast Must Die received a Stateside VHS release in the 1980s, it did so under the alternate moniker Black Werewolf, possibly in an effort to link it more directly to the movement. As Black Werewolf, the picture also jettisoned its pivotal Werewolf Break, giving viewers the opportunity to experience the film as the director originally intended - which is to say, probably a lot less flavoursome. As part of the trade-off, however, Black Werewolf did receive one heck of an electrifying cover (do a Google image search on "Black Werewolf VHS"; you're going to love what you see), one that can only have left newcomers hoping to see something a bit more salaciously-charged feeling sorely disappointed (but then what VHS cover from that era didn't promise more than it could deliver?).

To say a few words about the wider casting, although the characters of The Beast Must Die lack the strong personalities of those of the Agatha Christie story it's loosely replicating, the ensemble are charismatic enough to carry it through; in addition to Lockhart, standouts include established Amicus regular Cushing and Chadbon, who plays the bohemian Foote with an air of transparently defensive smugness.

Still tiptoeing cautiously around the matter of the werewolf mystery and how it ultimately resolves itself, I can disclose that The Beast Must Die ends up reaffirming that man, and not beast, is indeed the most dangerous game. And that, most unfortunately for him, he's also his own worst enemy.