Children of the Damned *** (1964, Ian Hendry, Alan Badel, Barbara Ferris, Alfred Burke, Sheila Allen, Patrick Wymark, Ralph Michael) – Classic Movie Review 3195

Director Anton M Leader’s 1964 further Sixties adaptation of John Wyndham’s classic sci-fi novel The Midwich Cuckoos is a less successful, but still intriguing and thoughtful, thematic sequel follow-up to Village of the Damned (1960). It features a group of children with similar psychic powers to those in the first film.

In the British black-and-white science fiction horror film Children of the Damned, UNESCO conducts six alien child geniuses from various countries to London, where they escape and hide out in a church. Ian Hendry and Alan Badel head a top cast of serious proper actors, as the UNESCO colonel and geneticist doctor Tom Lewellin and David Neville, who try to figure out who or what the kids are, what they are up to, and to flush them out.

An intelligent horror/sci-fi movie with more ideas than action, this is good stuff, with an interesting screenplay by John Briley. But you feel that there is an even better film in this material, ready surely for a remake, though the box-office flop of John Carpenter’s 1995 Village of the Damned remake will probably prevent that.

It also stars Barbara Ferris as Susan Eliot, Alfred Burke as Colin Webster, Sheila Allen as Diana Looran, Patrick Wymark as Commander and Ralph Michael as Defence Minister.

Also in the cast are Bessie Love, Martin Miller, Clive Powell, Tom Bowman, Harold Goldblatt, Roberta Rex, Frank Summerscales, Mahdu Mathen, Gerald Delsol, Francesca Lee, Patrick White, André Mikhelson and Lee Yoke Moon [Yoke-Moon Lee].

Children of the Damned is directed by Anton M Leader, runs 88 minutes, is made and released by MGM, is written by John Briley, is shot in black-and-white by David Boulton, is produced by Lawrence P Bachmann and Ben Arbeid and is scored by Ron Goodwin.

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 3195

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