This striking lobby card, with its garish graphics and perfect inset scene, is more effective than the movie. Instead of a blazing hell-fire hound, this movie’s dog is rather docile when attacking anyone. Add the ludicrous head-piece to the scrawny four-legged fiend and any potential excitement is sucked away pretty quickly. With Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing (both men played Sherlock Holmes at various times), you would expect more Hammer terror. The travails of getting a “suitably ferocious Hound on film” are detailed in Brian Patrick Duggan’s excellently researched Horror Dogs: Man’s Best Friend as Movie Monster if you would like to know more.
