Mania (The Flesh and the Fiends) (1960)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Mania (The Flesh and the Fiends) (1960) – J. Gilling

Not produced by Hammer Studios but featuring their star, Peter Cushing, as the rather diabolical (or at least unethical) Dr Knox, who pays “resurrectionists” for corpses to use in anatomy and surgery classes in Edinburgh in 1828.  He pays more for fresher corpses and soon an enterprising pair of louts, Burke (George Rose) and Hare (Donald Pleasance), go into business, the murder business, to keep Dr Knox and his students fully stocked.  Of course, this is a true story (which also inspired a short story by Robert Louis Stephenson and the corresponding Boris Karloff film, The Body Snatcher, 1945).  Cushing plays Knox with one eye shut, signifying the blind eye he turns to the source of his cadavers.  Pleasance is especially good in this early role.  The DVD I watched seemed to be made from an umpteenth generation copy but I could still enjoy the creepy mise-en-scene and eccentric supporting characters that inhabit it (although my US version of the film excludes all the naughty bits that made this film a scandal in its day). Worth a look if you can find a decent copy.