Showing posts with label Rasputin: The Mad Monk. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rasputin: The Mad Monk. Show all posts

Wednesday, 22 June 2016

(1966) Rasputin: The Mad Monk

Rasputin, the Mad Monk is a 1966 Hammer film directed by Don Sharp. It stars Christopher Lee as Grigori Rasputin, the Russian peasant-mystic who gained great influence with the Tsars prior to the Russian Revolution. It also features Barbara Shelley, Francis Matthews, Suzan Farmer, Richard Pasco, Dinsdale Landen and Renée Asherson. The story is largely fictionalized, although some of the events leading up to Rasputin's assassination are very loosely based on Prince Yusupov's account of the story. For legal reasons, the character of Yusupov was replaced by Ivan (Matthews). Yusupov was still alive when the film was released, dying on 27 September 1967.

The emphasis is on Rasputin's terrifying powers both to work magic and to seduce women.