Two of the Greats In An OK Movie

Nothing But The Night (1973) – The trustees of an orphanage are dying in suspicious circumstances. The surviving leadership refuses to read anything mysterious into those deaths. Then all the remaining trustees and 30 orphans die in a bus accident. A retired police detective, a pathologist, and a journalist begin an investigation of what was happening on the island.

Directed by Peter Sasdy

Starring – Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing

Why I Liked It – A surprisingly decent horror/mystery that overcomes a weak script.

I am not a huge horror fan. Modern horror is way too much slasher/gore for my taste, but if given a choice, I’ll take older “raise the hair on the back of your neck” kinds of stuff. But I chose this one for a simple reason. The two actors at the top of the billing! Lee and Cushing made their careers playing these kinds of roles. Old-school upper-class Englishman, and/or creepy villains. Here, it is the first category as they are recruited to investigate the orphanage deaths. All the adults are wealthy and the orphanage foundation stands to profit from their deaths. When the next accident kills dozens of the orphans, there is one girl who survives. She presents a variety of strange symptoms, which puzzles a psychiatrist interested in the case. He tries to get one of the senior doctors at the hospital (Cushing) interested. After the younger doctor’s murder, they bring in a senior police officer friend (Lee) as well. Everything leads back to the island home of the orphanage, where some terrifying discoveries await.

Despite a very good concept, the script is probably the weakest part of the equation. That leaves the cast reaching at moments. Happily, most of the best moments are in the final twenty minutes, with a nice kinda twist at the end. It probably saves the overall experience of the movie.

Fun note: keep your eyes open for a very young Michael Gambon as a police officer! Both Grand Moff Tarkin AND Dumbledore in the same movie!

In the end, I enjoyed the movie.

You can stream “Nothing But The Night” on Tubi, Plex, Amazon Prime, Roku, YouTube TV

Rating – *** Worth A Look