Filmed in a "Real" Haunted Mansion...
Boris Karloff Exiting Career with Grace...
Christopher Lee Adding Gravitas...
Barbara Steele Doing a Bizarre,Colorful Barbara Steele, but Given Little Screen-Time...
Michael Gough as a Dumb-Waiter...
and a Story Cribbed Unaccredited from Lovecraft.
The Film also Employees a Lead Actor that has No On-Screen Chemistry, Dull as Dirt and is at Best, Mis-Cast.
This Bit of Late-Sixties Horror, Including Witchcraft, Sacrificial Virgins, "Instruments of Torture", is Inexplicably Lack-Luster and Unengaging.
A Typical Cornball and Cringe Inducing Miss-Step, Common in the Era, was to Emphasize the "Hip-New" Counter Culture "Freaking Out" in Orgiastic Ecstasy with Sex, Drugs, and...
Speaking of Drugs...the "Dream-Hallucinations" are another Mis-Handling of LSD, Hypnosis, using Weak and Cheap Kaleidoscopic Effects with No Explanations or Exposition.
It's Not Awful (How could it be?) but it Lacks Imagination and Energy.
Tigon Studios, Hammer's British Rival, Never had the Class, Subtlety, and Charm that made Hammer the "Talk of the Town" in the B-Movie Domain for 2 Decades.
This Made it to the Screen Towing some Marquee Attractions but Disappointed Almost Everybody, Fans and Critics Alike.
Worth a Watch with Low Expectations.
Boris Karloff Exiting Career with Grace...
Christopher Lee Adding Gravitas...
Barbara Steele Doing a Bizarre,Colorful Barbara Steele, but Given Little Screen-Time...
Michael Gough as a Dumb-Waiter...
and a Story Cribbed Unaccredited from Lovecraft.
The Film also Employees a Lead Actor that has No On-Screen Chemistry, Dull as Dirt and is at Best, Mis-Cast.
This Bit of Late-Sixties Horror, Including Witchcraft, Sacrificial Virgins, "Instruments of Torture", is Inexplicably Lack-Luster and Unengaging.
A Typical Cornball and Cringe Inducing Miss-Step, Common in the Era, was to Emphasize the "Hip-New" Counter Culture "Freaking Out" in Orgiastic Ecstasy with Sex, Drugs, and...
Speaking of Drugs...the "Dream-Hallucinations" are another Mis-Handling of LSD, Hypnosis, using Weak and Cheap Kaleidoscopic Effects with No Explanations or Exposition.
It's Not Awful (How could it be?) but it Lacks Imagination and Energy.
Tigon Studios, Hammer's British Rival, Never had the Class, Subtlety, and Charm that made Hammer the "Talk of the Town" in the B-Movie Domain for 2 Decades.
This Made it to the Screen Towing some Marquee Attractions but Disappointed Almost Everybody, Fans and Critics Alike.
Worth a Watch with Low Expectations.