General Witchfinders
51 - Captain Kronos – Vampire Hunter
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Episode notes
Captain Kronos – Vampire Hunter is a 1974 British swashbuckling action horror film, written and directed by Brian Clemens in his directorial debut. Clemens was celebrated for his work as a screenwriter, particularly for his contributions to British television series. Prior to Captain Kronos, he wrote and produced Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde for Hammer. Other films he wrote that fall into and circle around our areas of interest include And Soon the Darkness (which he wrote with Dalek creator Terry Nation), See No Evil (the 1971 Mia Farrow film,), The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, The Watcher in the Woods (one of Disney's forays into horror and one of Ross's all-time favorites), and one of the most bizarre sequels of all time—Highlander II: The Quickening. According to his son Samuel, Clemens' last words were, "I did quite a good job," spoken after watching an episode of The Avengers.
In Captain Kronos, the titular character is played by Horst Janson, famous in Germany for his role in Salto Mortale, where he portrayed a trapeze artist. He later became familiar to younger audiences as "Horst" in Sesamstrasse, the German adaptation of Sesame Street, which he hosted from 1980 to 1983. The Captain's voice was dubbed in this film due to Janson's strong German accent, with Julian Holloway taking on the task. Holloway, who featured in eight Carry On films before moving into voice-over work, has recently voiced Prime Minister Almec and Admiral Kilian in Star Wars: The Clone Wars. He also appeared in Doctor Who's last story of the classic era, Survival. In 1976, he had a brief relationship with Tessa Dahl, daughter of Patricia Neal and Roald Dahl, which produced one daughter, the author and former model Sophie Dahl, who was born the following year.
The supporting cast includes John Carson as Dr. Marcus, a physician who enlists Kronos's help to investigate strange deaths in his village. Carson, often noted for his voice that bears a striking resemblance to James Mason’s, was a Hammer regular with appearances in Taste the Blood of Dracula and The Plague of the Zombies.
Caroline Munro appears as Carla, a Romanian girl who becomes Kronos's feisty sidekick. Known for her glamorous looks, Munro rose to fame as the "Lamb's Navy Rum" poster girl, a role she held for ten years. She initially caught Hammer’s attention through her work on The Abominable Dr. Phibes, where she played Vincent Price's silent, deceased wife, and its sequel Dr. Phibes Rises Again (check out episode 10 for our review of the first of those two "classics"). As well as this film, she of course appeared in the subject of our very first podcast episode, Dracula A.D. 1972. Outside Hammer, Munro went on to play the slave girl Margiana in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, the princess in At the Earth's Core, and the deadly Bond girl Naomi in The Spy Who Loved Me, turning down the role of Ursa in Superman to accept it.
The film’s score was composed by Laurie Johnson, who, from the 1960s to the 1980s, composed over fifty themes and scores, including the theme used on This Is Your Life (entitled "Gala Performance"), The Avengers (from 1965), Animal Magic (entitled "Las Vegas"), Jason King, The New Avengers, and The Professionals.
Though Captain Kronos was shot in 1972, it was delayed and eventually released in 1974. The film was intended to kick off a series featuring Kronos and his companions, but no sequels were made—although there have been a number of follow up comic book adventures.
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