The Hellfire Club (1961)
Directed by Robert S. Baker, Monty Berman

Film Review

Far less racy than its title would suggest, The Hellfire Club is a fairly respectable swashbuckler from the stable of Robert S. Baker and Monty Berman, one of Britain's most successful filmmaking partnerships in the 1950s and 60s.  Colourful (to the point of retina-scarringly garish) and well-paced, with a liberal smattering of humour, this is one of the more enjoyable offerings in a once hugely popular genre, its low-key story enlivened by a charismatic cast and some marvellously staged fight sequences.  Keith Michell revels in the role of the hyperactive hero, looking frighteningly like a slightly camp version of Jean Marais as he leaps from one set-piece brawl to another, taking time out to amuse himself with the occasional redheaded lovely (fancy being torn between Adrienne Corri and Kai Fischer...)  Peter Cushing makes a brief appearance as a kindly lawyer who may not be what he seems (ending the film with a line that 99.9 per cent of the audience will fail to comprehend), but the central baddy is Peter Arne, superbly villainous as a woman-beating fiend who practices debauchery, depravity and devil worship (but not, alas, in a way that would ever upset the British film censor).  The Hellfire Club may not live up to its name, but it is still rollicking good fun, worth seeing for Michell's outrageously camp impersonation of a French nobleman.

Film Synopsis

England, 1752.  Lord Netherden is a member of the infamous Hellfire Club, an exclusive gentleman's club which is notorious for its depravity, debauchery and devil worship.  One day, Netherden's satanic exploits are witnessed by his young son Jason, who flees in terror at what he sees.  Unable to bear her husband's tyranny any more, Netherden's wife leaves the family home with her son, but soon runs into Netherden and his men.  Although Jason escapes with his life, his mother perishes.  15 years later, Jason is happy earning a living as an acrobat with a troupe in Holland.  When he learns that his cousin Thomas as inherited his father's estate, Jason makes up his mind to go to England and prove that he is the rightful heir.  In London, he finds a lawyer, Merryweather, who is willing to support his claim, but first he must recover a stolen document which leaves no doubt that he is the rightful heir to the Netherden estate.  Jason deduces that Thomas has stolen the document, and to recover it he must find a way to inveigle his way into his cousin's household.  Unfortunately, Jason is up against a formidable opponent, as the Hellfire Club is the power behind the throne of King George II...