"100 Years of Horror" Scream Queens (TV Episode 1996) Poster

(TV Series)

(1996)

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5/10
Mediocre, sometimes interesting, documentary on horror actresses.
capkronos8 May 2003
Christopher Lee hosts this pretty good overview of horror movie actresses, defined here as "full bodied women with full bodied screams!" The women, all of whom have interesting things to say and possess a great sense of humor about their careers, are a lot of fun to watch.

Interviews include Beverly ("I gotta support myself!") Garland, the eccentric Gloria Talbott, Carol Borland (talking about Lugosi and being typecast after MARK OF THE VAMPIRE), Lori Nelson, Peggy Moran, Linnea Quigley (who seems to really enjoy her reputation as a bad girl), Pamela Franklin, Brinke Stevens, Caroline Munro, Hazel Court and Nina Foch. Discussed, but not interviewed are Evelyn Ankers (who died in 1985. Her husband Richard Denning shows up to talk about her), Fay Wray, Barbara Steele, Barbara Shelley, Jamie Lee Curtis and Sigourney Weaver. Robert Cornthwaite talks about Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in BABY JANE, David De Coteau talks about Quigley, Stevens and Michelle Bauer being able to pull off 38 pages (!) of a script in a day and Fred Olen Ray, Roger Corman, Hugh Hefner and other men offer insights.

There's also a discussion on sexism and stereotyping, illustrated with movie clips and trailers (CARRIE, ALIENS, BLACK Sunday, THE HUNGER, METROPOLIS, HALLOWEEN and much more). A lot of footage seems to be taken from the British documentary FLESH AND BLOOD: THE HAMMER HERITAGE OF HORROR (1994).

This is available on a double tape with "The Gruesome Twosome" (Karloff and Lugosi), which is unfortunately in the dreaded EP mode, but for the price they're asking (as low as $1.99) it's still worth purchasing.
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8/10
Scream Queens
Leofwine_draca11 April 2017
Warning: Spoilers
100 YEARS OF HORROR is a 26-episode TV series made in 1996 and featuring the delightful Christopher Lee as host, his sonorous narration exploring the history of horror cinema in the 20th century. Each themed episode contains plentiful clips from the films mentioned along with brief interview footage seemingly culled from other documentaries as well as TV shows and the like.

SCREAM QUEENS is, as expected, an episode exploring the role of scream queens in horror cinema, beginning with the great Fay Wray whose role in KING KONG made screaming such a big thing. Various other starlets are included from Evelyn Ankers in THE WOLFMAN to Hazel Court in THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN and others, right up until the then-modern day with Brinke Stevens and Linnea Quigley. The only source of amusement comes from Fred Olen Ray's B-movies being cast in the same light as the Universal and Hammer classics, whereas in reality most B-movie horror of the 1980s and 1990s tends to be long forgotten these days, even by the fans.
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Scream Queens
Michael_Elliott13 October 2010
100 Years of Horror: Scream Queens (1996)

*** 1/2 (out of 4)

Another winning entry in the series with this one taking a look at Scream Queens and why they are so popular in the genre. The documentary goes back to the silent era and works its way to include stars such as Fay Wray, Evelyn Ankers, Hazel Court, Beverly Garland, Lori Nelson, Caroline Munro, Brinke Stevens, Jamie Lee Curtis and Linnea Quigley. As usual we get clips from countless movies including METROPOLIS, THE WOLF MAN, THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, Hollywood CHAINSAW HOOKERS, NOT OF THIS EARTH, HALLOWEEN and countless others.

Fans of the genre are certainly going to be entertained by this episode. Again, at just 23-minutes you really can't go into great detail so don't come in expecting a full history of Scream Queens in the genre. What you do get are some nice clips, great interviews and of course if you're new to the genre then you're going to get several great recommendations. We get several of the Scream Queens interviewed here and those include Carroll Borland, Court, Garland, Munro, Nelson, Stevens and Talbot. Also interviewed are Hugh Hefner, Fred Olen Ray and Roger Corman.
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