The Greed of William Hart [Horror Maniacs] ** (1948, Tod Slaughter, Henry Oscar, Aubrey Woods, Patrick Addison, Jenny Lynn, Winifred Melville, Arnold Bell) – Classic Movie Review 10,871

Director Oswald Mitchell’s 1948 black and white horror movie The Greed of William Hart [Horror Maniacs] is a lip-smacking, body-snatching British low-budget feature that stars the appropriately named Tod Slaughter as corpse-pincher William Hart, though it is based on the sensational real-life story of resurrectionists Burke and Hare.

In ye olde-worlde Edinburgh, in 1828, Irish immigrants Hart (Slaughter) and Moore (Henry Oscar) go about their evil business as grave-robbers and then take up murdering the locals and selling their bodies to the medical school so that surgeons can have fresh corpses to investigate for anatomy lectures and demonstrations.

Medical student Hugh Alston (Patrick Addison) suspects the two but the main buyer of the bodies, Dr Cox (Arnold Bell), tries to hinder his investigation.

The Greed of William Hart is no different from any other grave-robbing film and the writer John Gilling obviously thought so too, for when he came to write another screenplay 12 years later, he went back to the corpse of this one and created The Flesh and the Fiends (1960), using the actual names of the killers.

It was filmed as a historical adaptation of the Burke and Hare murders but the British Board of Film Censors demanded all references to the real-life murderers were removed. It was re-titled and re-dubbed with different character names, substituting Hart and Moore for Hare and Burke, and Dr Cox for Dr Knox. All other names, including victims Mary Patterson (Mary Love), Mrs Docherty and Daft Jamie Wilson (Aubrey Woods), are unchanged. The producers had to re-record the soundtrack, with the new names meticulously cut into the original soundtrack, though it is easy to lip-read Burke, Hare and Knox. Because of the cost of re-dubbing, there was no money left for a music track

Also in the cast are Aubrey Woods, Patrick Addison, Jenny Lynn, Winifred Melville, Arnold Bell, Mary Love, Anne Trego, Edward Malin, Hubert Woodward and Dennis Wyndham.

It is shot at Bushey Studios, Bushey, Hertfordshire, England.

The Greed of William Hart was slightly edited and retitled Horror Maniacs in the US and was belatedly released by J H Hoffberg Company in 1953 in a double bill with Slaughter’s The Curse of the Wraydons retitled Strangler’s Morgue.

Jenny Lynn was married to Tod Slaughter, though she plays Henry Oscar’s character’s wife in the film, Helen Moore.

The Greed of William Hart [Horror Maniacs] is directed by Oswald Mitchell, runs 80 minutes, is made by Bushey Productions and Gilbert Church Productions, is released by Ambassador Film Productions (1948) (UK) and J H Hoffberg Company (1953) (US) (as Horror Maniacs), is written by John Gilling, is shot in black and white by S D Onions and D P Cooper, produced by Gilbert Church.

See also The Body Snatcher (1945) Burke and Hare (1972).

William Burke was hanged in 1829 but William Hare avoided this fate by testifying against him.

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 10,871

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