VHS : These Are The Damned aka The Damned [1963 Hammer Production]

Rating: - Has not worn well but should be on DVD
Like one of the other reviewers I have strong memories of seeing this years ago. The film begins with a gang of terrorising bikers (not too terrorising) in Weymouth, led by Oliver Reed and evolves into a sinister plot involving Government experiments on children.

The storyline is more or less as I remember but unfortunately, having seen it on television recently, the acting isn't, the performances being for the most part wooden. The script is just a bit too portentious for the creaky storline to handle.

Having said that there is much to admire about the ambition of this movie and it's a real shame that you can't get it on DVD. However, anyone keen to get hold of a copy should search for a DVDR version on google and they should find something.

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Rating: - Losey's greatest
These Are The Damned aka The Damned [1963 Hammer Production]
This is the Losey film that has reverberated most strongly in my mind since I saw it twice on German TV a couple of decades ago - despite *Eve*, *The Servant* or *The Go-Between*. It is a thriller with a horrific SF dimension that has become more realistic with passing time: a journalist discovers in 60s London, very strikingly portrayed with Oliver Reed type-cast as a vicious rocker, that the child survivors of a nuclear catastrophe, all mutants and highly radio-active, are being kept by a British government anxious to plan for the aftermath of a possible nuclear war. The most powerful scenes concern a sculptress, the mistress of the politician responsible for the children, and what happens when she finds out. This is one of those films that deserve a superior DVD edition; its non-appearance makes one wonder - after all, a film with the unnecessarily pessimistic thesis that a British government could be responsible for deceiving the public on a vast scale and commit murder to keep it quiet is prima facie so absurd, surely, that nobody could feel it necessary to prevent it being as widely disseminated as possible...?

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Rating: - Unusual SF
Info taken from book 'Biker' by Bill Osgerby. I have not seen it, would like to do so, but not for its currently going price!
Alternatively entitled 'The Damned', it was produced in 1961 but not released until 1963 for some reason. Probably the first movie to feature British bikers, it was an unusual science fiction tale and features Oliver Reed in his first major role, this time as 'King', the cold blooded leader of a pack of motorcycle thugs - but Reed appears as the only one of his gang not wearing leathers.
Who knows how good the film really was? It's clearly not currently released, but we can only hope......