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| Images courtesy of Columbia Pictures |
Decades before Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom dealt
in notions of murderous and sadistically cruel Kali-worshipping Thuggee cults
in India in the early 1900s followed by British military intervention, Hammer Horror
of Dracula director Terence Fisher served up this black-and-white MegaScope
widescreen horror yarn The Stranglers of Bombay in 1959. From Wings of Danger producer Anthony
Hinds and released by Columbia Pictures, the notion of Thuggee cult torture
while initially touched upon by George Stevens with Gunga Din reached
shocking new heights here with trademark gore and grisly scenes of violence
including but not limited to a mongoose fighting a snake which were met with
censorship upon release in the United States.
Though critics were initially unkind to the ‘Hammer Horror’ cycle, years
later it stands out as a progenitor to what would or wouldn’t become the
Lucas/Spielberg swashbuckler and ratings board engager.
In the 1830s, Captain Harry Lewis (Guy Rolfe) of the British
East India Company begins conducting an investigation of the mysterious
disappearances of over 2,000 natives including but not limited to merchant
caravans only to be rebuffed by his negligent and cavalier superiors. Believing it to be a labyrinthine organized
crime-operation that kills all animal and human life, his findings lead him to
a cult of Thuggee stranglers who threaten to murder him. Narrowly escaping death at the fangs of a
cobra, Lewis still cannot engender support from his superiors, particularly not
the newly appointed Captain Connaught-Smith (Allan Cuthbertson) who balks at
every report of criminality. After the
Thuggees turn up the head by trying to assassinate Lewis and his family in a
home invasion attack, Lewis takes matters into his own hands trying to thwart
an impending Thuggee strangling massacre of a giant merchant caravan.
Grisly and gruesome, violent and foreboding with a hint of
the macabre and occult permeating every pore drop of sweat or blood stinking up
this hell hole, The Stranglers of Bombay has a mean streak and air of
nastiness that would invariably infect a good portion of Steven Spielberg’s
secondary installment in what became the Indiana Jones trilogy. Replete with eye gouging, burning at the
stake, dismemberment, a mongoose vs. snake fight and branding which wrangled
with the BBFC censors, it was called ‘bestial’ by one critic upon initial
release and further cuts were demanded upon the North American release. Scripted by David Zelag Goodman and loosely
based on William Henry Sleeman’s declaration of war on the Thuggees in 1835
which was eventually fully eradicated in the 1870s, this Earthy period
historical adventure thriller is at once horrific and exhilarating featuring a
standout performance from Guy Rolfe.
Special attention goes to Allan Cuthbertson as the nebbish ineffectual
Captain and to George Pastell as the murderous nefarious High Priest of Kali
who clearly paved the way for Amrish Puri.
Released theatrically in the United Kingdom in 1959 and in
1960 in the US, the MegaScope widescreen black-and-white feature shot by Quatermass
and the Pit cinematographer Arthur Grant with a rousing score by Horror
of Dracula composer James Bernard (himself Indian) was met with mixed
critical reception. Some feeling it to
be one of the meaner spirited Hammer Horror offerings, the film nevertheless
proved to be an early inspiration for the latter Harrison Ford action-adventure
vehicle and still stands today as a tense dose of horrific history. The ensemble cast is solid, the vicious
brutality is still savage even decades later, the technical merits are astute
and while somewhat exploitative as thrillers like this were it still provided a
startlingly acute amount of attention to period detail. While debatable which film will outlast the
other with more people having seen the film it inspired than anything, The
Stranglers of Bombay still has the capacity to elicit a jolt from the
viewer, a realistic historical adventure thriller whose central antagonist
remains scarier than a majority of cinema’s worst adversaries.
--Andrew Kotwicki
