The Gorgon

The Gorgon

Theatrical release poster
Directed by Terence Fisher
Produced by Anthony Nelson Keys
Written by John Gilling
Starring Peter Cushing
Christopher Lee
Richard Pasco
Barbara Shelley
Michael Goodliffe
Music by James Bernard
Cinematography Michael Reed
Editing by Eric Boyd-Perkins
James Needs
Studio Hammer Film Productions
Distributed by Columbia Pictures
Release date(s) 1964
Running time 83 min.
Country  United Kingdom
Language English

The Gorgon is a 1964 British horror film directed by Terence Fisher for Hammer.

It stars Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Barbara Shelley and Richard Pasco. The film was photographed by Michael Reed, and designed by Bernard Robinson. For the score James Bernard combined a soprano with a little-known electronic instrument called the Novachord. The film marks one of the few occasions when Hammer turned to Greek mythology for inspiration; this time it is the legend of the Gorgon that is respun for the Hammer audiences.

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Plot

The year is 1910. In the rural German village of Vandorf, seven murders have been committed within the past five years, each victim having been petrified into a stone figure. Rather than investigate it, the local authorities dismiss the murders for fear of a local legend having come true. When a local girl becomes the latest victim and her suicidal lover made the scapegoat, the father of the condemned man decides to investigate and discovers that the cause of the petrifying deaths is a phantom. The very last of the snake-haired Gorgon sisters haunts the local castle and turns victims to stone during the full moon.

Cast

Novelization

A novelization of the film was written by John Burke as part of his 1966 book The Hammer Horror Film Omnibus.

External links