Hammer made a variety of film set in differnt periods and places and so creating a range of landscapes for the films characters to inhabit. One Million Years BC was the first of Hammer's prehistoric films that is notable for Raquel Welch being scantily clad and Ray Harryhausen's special effect monsters. Don Chaffey then directed Creatures The World Forgot which was not a good pregistoric film. Hammer made several ancient Egypt themed films featuring mummies. The Viking Queen again from Don Chaffey was set in Roman Britian and vey loosely based on the Iceni rebellion. Slave Girls uses the theme of a modern person transported to a different reality, this time a world run by women. In The Lost Continent there is a strange misty sea world the characters have to navigate through. She was one of the more successful films of this style that Hammer produced.
Hammer had a whole series of female vampires. The Brides Of Dracula was the first of their films with the female vampire as the main character.
Pre-credit scenes were a feature of Hammer films.
Hammer made three films based on the Marcilla character though only the first film (Vampire Lovers) was based on the source novel Carmilla.
Wicked Women - Ingrid Pitt as the depraved Countess Dracula taking the blood of virgins to stay young. Martine Beswick is the female alter ego of Dr Jekyl and Sister Hyde. Lizabeth Scott is the prisoner in Stolen Face who has her face changed by a surgeon to copy his lost love. Bette Davis is the deranged nanny in The Nanny. The Anniversary is another dominant performance from Bette Davis. Fanatic (Die Die My Darling) has Tallulah Bankhead in her final film terrorising Stephanie Powers.
Hammer made various films that revolved around the events of WW2. Their version of The Lady Vanishes is set on the eve of war. Yesterday's Enemy was a more controversial film of the British treatment of prisoners. The Camp on Blood Island was another controversial film again from Val Guest this time showing the brutality of the Japanese. Ten Seconds To Hell from Robert Aldrich brings realism to a bomb disposal unit in post was Germany. Up The Creek was a comic look at life in the navy. The Steel Bayonet was a more realistic view and alomost documentary style of the horrors of war.
Science fiction - Hammer made a series of science fiction films generally on small budgets. Quatermass and The Pit was one of their most successful as it had effects and an intelligent and thought provoking story line. Spaceways follows the development of the first manned rocket in to space. In The Quatermas Xperiment a returning astronaught has turned into an alien. In the 1962 film The Damned children are experimented on with radiation to see if they could survive a nuclear war. In Dick Barton Strikes Back enemy agents use a sonic ray against people from the top of Blackpool tower. X The unknown has a sludge of mud and energy released by the army. In Quatermas 2 aliens are invading the earth by stealth in this another Val Guest directed film.
