Two movies from one source: 'Lisa and the Devil' and 'House of Exorcism'

One of the DVDs included in the "Mario Bava Collection, Vol. 2" contains two different versions of the same movie. (It can also be had as a stand-alone from Amazon.com).

The first version is "Lisa and the Devil", which was a film that director Bava was given a completely free hand on after the commerical success of "Baron Blood." According to a number of sources, it was the film the he always wanted to make, the perfect expression of his vision through the craft he had spent decades honing.

And it was a tremendous flop.

"Lisa and the Devil" was such a such dud that it was only ever released theatrically in Spain, the country in which it was filmed--and then only in a single theater. No distributor was interested in picking it up, despite everyone who saw it at the 1973 Cannes Film Festival thinking it was an artistic masterpiece.

Two years after the failure of "Lisa and the Devil," producer Alfredo Leone set about to salvage his investment by re-editing it and adding scenes that gave the film an all-new exorcism plot in the hopes of riding the success of the "The Exorcist" (which was the first official blockbuster, ever). The revised film was released under the title "The House of Exorcism."

And it became an international box office hit.

"The House of Exorcism" has been described by some critics as a butchered version of as masterpiece. However, these same critics have a tendency to discuss Mario Bava with lots of hyperbole and using the word "genius" almost as frequently as "the" when writing about him. I am hesitant to trust any critic who describes Bava as a genius, so I am hesitant to take their word for the craptacular nature of Leone's re-cut. The more films from Bava I watch, the more I admire his command of cinematography and the visual language of film, but the overall packages that make up his movies are lacking. Most Bava films I've seen have tended toward the slap-dash and incoherent story-wise, as if he was putting together the films primarily to show off imagery. And, frankly, his movies too often call attention to the fact that he's doing something cool with the camera... he's too often doing things to just show off technique instead of doing things that serve the story for me to consider him a genius.

Here are review both "Lisa and the Devil" and "The House of Exorcism". The rating assigned at the top of this post is an average of the rating of the two films with some consideration for highly interesting commentary tracks.

As always, I encourage you to leave your thoughts in the Comments section. I'm interested in what others think about Bava's films in general, or these two films specifically.



Lisa and the Devil (1972)
Starring: Elke Sommer, Telly Savalas, Sylvia Koscina, Alessio Orano, and Alida Valli
Director: Mario Bava
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

When Lisa (Sommer) is separated from her tour group and lost in the old section of Toledo, she is invited to spend the night on the large, walled estate of a reclusive noble woman (Valli). But who is the mustachioed stranger who is oddly familiar to Lisa, but who keeps calling her by the wrong name? Is it more than coincidence that Lisa crossed paths the household's only servant, Leandro (Savalas), just when she lost her way? And why do people start dying in the house? And why don't they stay dead?

So many questions will come to mind while you're watching "Lisa and the Devil." The answers to some of them seem to come into focus as the film progresses--Lisa has clearly been drawn into some bizarre haunting or the supernatural climax of some greater evil--but whatever starts to make sense is thrown into question by a "shock ending", which, like most shock endings doesn't really work because it's not quite supported by everything that led up to it. (It's a little better than most of them, but I think the film could have done without it, even if I can see how it harkens back to the beginning of the film and the image of the devil carrying off the sinful dead.)


This is a gorgeous-looking film that's well-acted and, although a bit slowly paced, is one that will engage your imagination and curiosity as it unfolds. It's also a movie that's surprisingly classical and literate in nature--it reminds me of the Edgar Ulmer's Karloff/Lugosi film "The Black Cat" from the 1930s, and it's full of references to classical art--and full of visual hints and clues that are never spelled out through any form of exposition. Watch the introduction of the Lehars and their driver... you know EXACTLY what's going on in that relationship even though nothing is said. It's a scene that's perfectly staged and acted. The same is true of the scene where Max (Alessio Orano) prepares to rape the unconscious Lisa. I think that's probably one of the creepiest bits of film I've ever seen.)

The film's imagery and pacing gives it a dreamlike quality that is highly effective here. From the moment Lisa "crosses the threshhold", every event, every image we see seems possessed with a deeper, hidden meaning and that a secret story is unfolding below and behind the surface. The broken watches, the odd clocks, the white rose, the blind mistress of the house, the servant who seems to be the one truly in control, Lisa herself... all of these things seem to be images that stand for something other than what is obvious. It's a very cool sensation, and it's one that Bava successfully maintains for most of the film. He doesn't even ruin the mood anywhere with the expected garish color gels or painfully overdone camera flourishes... part of this might be because he didn't serve as his own cinematographer on most of the film but it might also be that those critics who have described this film as Bava's masterpiece are not being hyperbolic. I'm still not convinced he was the genius some like to make him out to be, but I do think there is greatness present in this film. I also think that it was ahead of its time. If this film had been made and released twenty years later. in the 1990s when the direct-to-video market was flourishing, I think it would have been a huge hit. It is a movie that had no place in the 1970s film market, despite its excellence. (The "shock ending" after the film's main action has concluded is also a sign that the world was not ready for this movie. I can't say for sure that this was the first movie that was structured liked this, but it's definitely one of the earliest.)

By the way, the film also contains some of the sexiest non-nudity you're ever going to see in a slasher-film style death scene. Sylvia Koscina, who is remarkable for her habit of getting nude in movies, actually stays covered up here, but watch for scene where she gets bludgeoned to death by the red-robed killer. I'm sure you'll agree that she's ten times more gorgeous there than if she'd actually been flashing her boobs... and it's another instance of Bava getting something exactly right.


It's not just Mario Bava who is perhaps as good as he ever was in this film. Elke Sommer gives a great performance as Lisa, who may or may not be the ghost or reincarnation of Elena, a woman who brought doom upon a household some 100 years prior to the beginning of the film. I don't think I've never seen Sommer look so beautiful or be so convincing in a role. Telly Savalas is even better as the enigmatic Lehandro who is both servant and puppetmaster in the dreamworld that this film's characters exist in. I think Savalas probably gave the best performance of his career in this film; particularly impressive is the way he delivers some very lyrical stretches of dialogue that sound completely natural as he speaks them.

"Lisa and the Devil" is every bit the masterpiece it has been cracked up to be. The DVD release included as part of the "Mario Bava Collection Vol. 2" is the first release of the film that's been fully restored to the state that Bava intended it to be seen.


The House of Exorcism (1975)
Starring: Elke Sommer, Telly Savalas, Robert Alda, and Carmen Silva
Directors: Mickey Lion (aka Mario Bava and Alfredo Leone)
Rating: Four of Ten Stars

After a young tourist (Sommer) is possessed and forced to live out horrors with her inner demons, a priest (Alda) undertakes the dangerous task to driving the evil from her soul.

If one doesn't try to apply story logic to this film, one can admire the relative seamlessness with which Leone's new sequences blend with Bava's original film. (Except for the bit in the antique shop. The owner changes completely in appearance from one shot to the next, and then changes back again at the end of the film; the original actor was plainly not available, and I guess Leone thought no one would notice.)

However, one cannot admire the way he gutted the artistry from "Lisa and the Devil". I understand what he did and why he did it. I understand that he is in the film industry and that he was in the business of making product that people wanted, but I still think it was a shame that the 1970s film audiences weren't ready for something as good as "Lisa and the Devil".

One also cannot describe "The House of Exorcism" as a good movie, no matter how generous one wants to be. It is completely incoherent storywise, and it wanders fairly aimlessly through its 94 minutes of running time. Although the acting is good--Sommer and Robert Alda both do fabulous jobs in the cheesy, overblown priest vs. possessing spirit scenes--it is being squandered on empty nonsense.


As I said earlier, the action in the mansion has been transferred to Lisa's soul eventhough it doesn't make sense as being treated as such. To make matters worse, while "Lisa and the Devil" ended in a strange and inscrutible way, this version just sort of stumbles and falls on its face at the end with no real resolution to Lisa's possession, nor any clear explation to why the priest things that exorcising demons in the house will cure her. (Yes, at the very end, Leone decides not to give us blow-by-blows on everything that's happening.)

Watching this film and "Lisa and the Devil" in close proximity to one another will give you some insight in how just a few cuts, rearranged scenes, and a few additional scenes can change one movie into something completely different. The transformation of a beautiful, mysterious ghost story into a sloppy, third-rate horror flick with a completely different storyline is an astonishing sight to behold, whether you're interested in the craft of filmmaking or just a lover of movies.


If you decide to check out "Lisa and the Devil"/"The House of Exorcism", make sure you take the time to watch "The House of Exorcism" a second time while listening to the commentary track by Alfred Leone and Elke Sommer. Leone's discussion of how and why the recut version of the film came to be is absolutely fascinating. (Actually, you might just want to skip straight to watching it with the commentary. You won't be missing much, because everything good you've already witnessed in "Lisa and the Devil".)

Bava delivers badly done proto-slasher

5 Dolls for an August Moon (aka "Island of Terror") (1970)
Starring: Ira von Furstenberg, Ely Galleani, Maurice Poli, Teodoro Corra, William Berger, Edwige Fenech, Helena Ronee, Howard Ross and Edith Meloni
Director: Mario Bava
Rating: Three of Ten Stars

A business magnate (Corra) invites four couples to spend the weekend at his isolated island retreat as part ofa strategy to convince a maverick scientist (Berger) to sell him the formula for a new industrial plastic. It's all fun, games, and fornication until someone starts murdering the guests.


"5 Dolls for an August Moon" is a mostly thrill-free thriller that is a jumbled, inept attempt at presenting a "Ten Little Indians"-style tale of murder and mayhem which features characters so generic most of them are impossible to tell apart, the most inexplicable recurring example of Stupid Character Syndrome I've ever seen on film and what is almost certainly the most inappropriate musical score since the invention of the talkie.

For those who don't know, Stupid Character Syndrome is where the characters in the film behave in a braindead fashion or fail to act on facts they know because it would cause a badly constructed story to fall apart. In the case of this movie, it's the way everyone seems to forget about Isabela, a cute young woman (played by Ely Galleani) who is also present on the island, except when they run into her or ask her whether she's seen this missing person or that missing person pass by.

Isabel doesn't seem to be living at the house, nor anywhere else on the island for that matter, but no one seems surprised or disturbed to meet her wandering about. In fact, no one is even disturbed when she engages in obvious suspicious behavior while bodies are piling up, nor does anyone attempt to make her account for her whereabouts. The mental blind-spot the characters have toward Isabel is so severe that late in the film a character states, "The murderer has got to be one of the four of us!", referring to himself and the other three characters in the room. BUT WHAT ABOUT ISABEL?! There were FIVE people still alive on the island when that phrase was uttered, but everyone had, once again, forgotten about Isabel.

(Now, it's possible I may have missed a throw-away line where they came to conclusion that Isabel was dead, but I doubt it. Either this character was added late in the process for some reason and no-one bothered to intergrate it more fully into already filmed scenes, or this script simply was worse than the average Bava film.)

In addition to a bad script with cookie-cutter characters and massive holes, the film suffers from some truly awful soundtrack music. It starts with the fact that it's mostly performed what sounds like a Hammond Electric Organ, and it gets worse because apparently the filmmakers thought that something that sounds like circus music was appropriate to play whenever a dead body is shown hanging in the freezer. This, of course, might indicate that the film was supposed to be a dark comedy instead of a thriller; if this is the case, it's as much a failure as a comedy as it is a thriller.


Even the direction and photography is weak and unispired in the film. If I didn't know Mario Bava helmed this picture, I might have said that the film was made by someone who wanted to be Mario Bava but who didn't have enough talent. A number of Bava signatures--filming images reflected in pools of liquid, shots of characters far away down a passageway, or shooting through lattices--are featured in the film, but while I sometimes feel like he's trying to show off how clever he can be as far as how he films a scene, I feel in this movie like he's doing a bad imitation of himself. (That said, the film does feature one of the neatest, most creative track-shots/revelation of a dead body that I've ever seen--when a tray of glass balls is overturned, causing them to spill down a spiral staircase and come to rest next to the latest murder victim.)

A single flash of genius, however, goes not make this film worth seeing.

I read somewhere (DVD Verdict, maybe?) that Bava hated this movie. I can clearly see why, as there are many reasons to not like "5 Dolls for an August Moon". They all add up to a recommendation that you skip this movie, unless you've set yourself the goal of watching all Mario Bava pictures, or you're doing a study on the creation of the slasher film genre. Like Bava's "A Bay of Blood," this film is an evolutionary ancestor of "Halloween" and "Friday the Thirteenth"

Baron Blood:Stupid Character Syndrome runs rampant

Baron Blood (aka "Chamber of Tortures" and "The Torture Chamber of Baron Blood") (1972)
Starring: Elke Sommer, Antonio Cantafora, Massimo Girotti, Joseph Cotton, and Rada Rassimov
Director: Mario Bava
Rating: Five of Ten Stars

While visiting his ancestral home in Austria, a not-very-bright American grad student (Cantafora) restores his sadistic, blood-thirsty 16th century ancestor to life by reading a incantation that promises to do just that. The ressurected "Baron Blood" is now roaming the countryside, claiming victims, and moron-boy must find a way to undo what he did.


"Baron Blood" is an uneven film, both in its photography, pacing and acting. The camera work ranges from amazing to annoyingly bad--how can the same director/cinematographer who made the gorgeous "Diabolik" be the guy who is responsible for overuse of of crash-zooms and focus-pulls that we are subject to here?--the plot moves with a more jerking pace than a car with a failing transmission, and the acting ranges from passable in some scenes, to completely wooden in others, to so over-the-top scene-chewing in yet others that I am sure injuries must have occured from the flying splinters.

Full of stupid characters doing stupid things, being played by actors who aren't giving their best performances, "Baron Blood" is mostly a mediocre attempt at capturing the look and feel of the Hammer gothic horrors from the 1950s and 1960s--something Bava had previously done a better job at in previous films "Black Sunday" and "Kill, Baby... Kill!"--but which is does feature a few dazzling moments of horror and artistry that will make you understand why those who praise Mario Bava are so in love with his work.

There is fantastic sequence where Anna (Elke Sommer), the film's damsel in distress who eventually saves everyone in the end, in a nice little twist to the genre standards, narrowly escapes ambush by the cloaked Baron Blood and is then persued through the eerily deserted streets of the town. The sequence ends with a wimper instead of the bang it could have and should have ended with, but it almmost makes the movie worth wathing by itself. The filming here is as gorgeous as anything Bava ever recorded and the suspense of the chase will have you on the edge of your seat.


The end of the movie, even with the massive plot holes that get opened and let unresolved as we build toward it, is also spectacularly filmed and intense that the viewer will almost forget the mediocrity that went before it. The resolution to the story also has a couple of elements that I never would have imagined, but they are of the "Wow! Cool!" variety rather than of the eye-rolling, out-of-left-field-to-show-how-clever-the-writer-thinks-he-is variety.

"Baron Blood is worth checking out if you've got nothing else that looks interesting, and it would be a perfect headliner for a "Creepy Castle"-themed Bad Movie Night, but you shouldn't go too far out of your way of it under any circumstance.

Bava delivers stylish tale of gothic hauntings

Kill, Baby... Kill!
(aka "Curse of the Dead", "Don't Walk in the Park", and "Operation Fear") (1966)
Starring: Giacomo Rossi-Stuart, Erika Blanc, Fabienne Dalin, and Max Lawrence, Valeria Valeri, and Giana Vivaldi
Director: Mario Bava
Steve's Rating: Six of Ten Stars

Dr. Paul Eswai (Rossi-Stuart) arrives to assist with a murder investigation in a remote village. He finds the place gripped in fear of some evil whose name they don't even dare to mention. Although he at first dismisses it as superstitious nonsense, Paul finds it increasingly difficult to deny that the town is being haunted by the ghost of a vengeful little girl (Valeri)... particularly after he and a young woman with a mysterious past (Blanc) become targets of the spirit's wrath. Will he discover the secret behind the hauntings before it's too late to save himself?


"Kill, Baby... Kill!" is an Italian production that has all the production values and moodiness of some of the best Hammer gothic horror films from the late 1950s and early 1960s. If it wasn't for the bizarre color schemes that director and cinematographer Mario Bava likes to use to light his sets--lots of reds and greens, even in outdoor night shots-- and a somewhat more ponderous pace throughout, one might mistake this film as coming from the hands of the likes of Terence Fisher.

The film has a decent cast, an engaging, convoluted story that keeps twisting and turning up to nearly the very last moment of the film, and a very creepy little girl ghost. (Yes, the stringy-haired Japanese ghost chicks weren't the first underage phantoms in skirts to massacre the fearful.)

On the downside, the film suffers from a pace that never quite gets to where it should be. Bava treats us to some great visuals but he goes overboard with them and they become drags on the film at several different times than mood setters... there's just a little too much calling attention to the tricks of the trade than simply applying them. (And here's where Fisher leaves Bava in the dust... he made gorgeous, moody pictures, but he never felt the need to call the audience's attention to his work... instead, we just absorbed the whole.)

Aside from Bava's cries for attention throughout the movie, the end also suffers from a touch of "deux ex machina". It's an ending that makes sense and which is well-founded in the events of the film, but I would have liked the hero and heroine to have been just a little more directly involved in the resolution. I can see the rationale for why they weren't--the fact that the village sorceress (Dalin) is ultimately the one who stops the ghost plays into the conflict between science and superstition that is part of the movie's core. However, I think the ending would have worked better if science and sorcery came together to resolve the curse that gripped the town.

(And, frankly, given the way the sorceress deals with the root of the problem, even Erika Blank's damsel-in-distress character could have played a part.)

Although flawed, "Kill, Baby... Kill!" is a decent ghost movie. Fans of European horror films from the '60s and '70s should enjoy it. Heck, the fans of stringy-haired Japanese ghost girls will find quite a bit to like in this film, too.

Victim pays back killer from beyond grave

Hatchet for the Honeymoon
(aka "Blood Brides" and "The Red Mark of Madness")(1969)
Starring: Stephen Forsyth, Laura Betti, Jesus Puente and Dagmar Lasssander
Director: Mario Bava
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

A serial killer and designer of bridal gowns (Forsyth) commits his murders in an attempt to unlock a traumatic event from his childhood that he has blocked from memory. But when he murders his wife (Betti), he experiences some of the horror he has been visiting on his victims as she makes good on her promise to "never leave him."

"Hatchet for the Honeymoon" is a stylish little horror/ghost movie that fans of the TV show "Dexter" may enjoy. The protagonist is cut from the same kind of cloth--he's a serial killer who knows exactly how twisted he is and who functions as a perfectly normal and successful human being. Well, in the case of John Harrington, the murderer in this film, he functions normally until he kills one victim too many. (It should be noted that John is not quite a likeable as Dexter and that his victims don't fall into the category of "deserving it". But, like in "Dexter", this movie turns the traditional murder mystery on its head, and we watch it unfold from the side of the killer.

Aside from being one of the few films where I didn't feel like Mario Bava's trademark stylish flourishes were all about calling attention to his clever camerawork--here the odd shots of reflections in pools of liquid or strange angles and lighting choices worked to underscore the mood of the film instead of just being there for the sake of being there--the film is populated with a host of characters who come across as real due to little touches presented through actions rather than dialogue.

This is a film where strong performances from talented actors and skillfull direction combine to create a world that draws the viewers in, whether we want to be or not. We never sympathize with John Harrington, but he and his victims come across as fully realized enough that we care about what happens.

Another impressive aspect of "Hatchet for the Honeymoon" is that Bava manages to present a brutal murder with showing very little gore. The murder of Harrington's wife and his confrontation with the police immediately afterwards are among some of the best thriller moments ever put on screen... and it's the sort of sequence that justifies those comparisons to Hitchcock that some Bava fans like to make.

It's also impressive that the movie doesn't fall apart or lose momentum when it starts morphing from a psychological thriller into a ghost movie. (And it really leaves very little room for doubt; the ghost that haunts Harrington in the second half of the movie is eventually shown to not be a figment of his diseased imagination.)

From the movie's prologue and its chilling opening scene--where John tells us about who and what he is--to its final moment, "Hatchet for the Honeymoon" is a great blend of horror and drama. Although I rarely see the film mentioned on lists of Mario Bava's greatest work, it's another one that makes me understand why some consider him a genius on the level of Hitchcock.

"Hatchet for the Honeymoon" can be ordered from Amazon.com. I highly recommend adding it to your collection.

The best Hercules movie from the 1960s saw him entering a Haunted World

Hercules in the Haunted World (aka "Hercules in the Center of the Earth" and "Hercules vs. the Vampires") (1961)
Starring: Reg Park, George Ardisson, Christopher Lee, Leonora Ruffo, Franco Giacobini, and Ida Galli
Director: Mario Bava
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

When Hercules (Park) and his best friend Theseus (Ardisson) return home after another extended bout of adventuring, they find Hercules' betrothed, Deianira (Ruffo), in the throes of a strange illness and her kingdom governed by a sinister regent, Lico (Lee). The pair embark on a new quest for the one magical artifact that will cure Deianira that will take them into the very depths of Hades, land of the dead. Successfully restoring Deinira isn't the end of Hercules troubles, as Lico isn't just sinister-looking... he's bent on obtaining immortality at the expense of the lives of Hercules and his lady-love!


"Hercules in the Haunted World" is a gorgeous-looking, well-acted fantasy epic. Although the constraints of a low budget are almost painfully evident at times, and the Underworld and most of the sets have that very plastic, very 1960s feel to them, the great camerawork and creative lighting very much makes up for the shortcomings. There are times when the film takes on an almost dreamlike, fairytale quality that conveys the mood of the never-neverland of heroes and gods-walking-the-land is is so necessary for a film like this to succeed and which is so often absent in fantasy films.

Story-wise, the use of Greek mythology, the traditional structure of Hercules' quest to save Deianira (as well the various components of that quest), and many truly suspenseful and chilling sequences--such as when Hercules is set upon by dozens of undead in the service of Lico-- combine to tell a tale that has the feel of the ancient adventure stories that inspired this movie.

This is not to say the film is not without some serious flaws. Without fail, Bava draws out lead-ins to action and establishing shots to the film to the point where the viewer becomes annoyed and bored when he should be pulled deeper into the film. The worst of these is the above-mentioned battle between Hercules and the undead. Bava SHOULD have established that they're emerging from their graves and then moved onto the excellently done fight sequence, but instead he establishes the dead emerging again and again and again and again. Meanwhile, Hercules stands there and looks back and forth, to and fro, like an idiot, instead of taking action. The movie grinds to a complete halt here instead of leaping forward into the action that follows.

As always with a Mario Bava film, the visuals are stunning and there is true artistry in the composition of every shot, with Bava's background as an artist and a cinematographer serving him and the audience to great effect. It's the story-telling that he has trouble with. This was, however, only is second directorial effort (the first being "Black Sunday," which I review here.)

The movie also suffers from the standard affliction of fantasy movies made on shoestring budgets: It's got a Big Monster that's supposed to be scary looking, but is just goofy. Here's it's some sort of demon made of stone. To make matters worse, the scene in which it appears devolves into something that comes across as a parody of "Goldilocks and the Three Bears". There's underlying horror in the scene, but the stupid-looking creature (with its mouth hanging open as if it rode the short bus to its underground lair) and its blathering about short and long beds make the scene unintentionally comic. (I have to pause to wonder if kids might find the sequence scary; I'm not the audience for this film, so maybe I'm just not "getting it"?)

Finally, the film suffers from the fact that every time Christopher Lee opens his mouth, is it not the deep, resonant voice we movie lovers have grown use to over the years, but instead one that is far more high-pitched. Like all Italian movies of this vintage, it was shot silently and then dubbed into numerous languages later--and they obviously didn't hire Lee to loop his own voice, and the film is less for it.

For all its problems, however, "Hercules and the Haunted World" is one of the few decent fantasy films that have been made... and it's a film that even lovers of monster movies will be able to enjoy. It's not a masterpiece, but it's also not a bad way to waste some time.

Bava gave strong showing in directorial debut (as well as made a star of Barbara Steele)

Black Sunday (aka "The Demon's Mask", "The Mask of Satan" and "House of Fright" and "Revenge of the Vampire") (1960)
Starring: Barbara Steele, John Richardson, Andrea Checchi, Enrico Olivieri and Arturo Dominici
Director: Mario Bava
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

A devil-worshipping witch and her consort (Steele and Dominici), executed 200 years ago return from the dead as a strange breed of vampires after a traveler exploring her tomb (Checchi) callously damages the specially built sarcophagus that was supposed to keep them interred forever. The witch sets about claiming revenge against the descendants of those who executed her, as well as trading the body of her last living female relative (also Steele) for her own time-ravaged one.


"Black Sunday", Mario Bava's directorial debut and the film that established Barbara Steele as a horror movie icon on par with Vincent Price and Boris Karloff, has been hailed as a masterpiece in many quarters, and I have finally gotten around to seeing it.

I feel a litle bit like I did when I saw Universal's original "Frankenstein"--I don't think the film is quite worthy of the reputation it has. It's a decent horror flick in the gory-gothic mode that Hammer Films and director Terence Fisher brought to the fore with "Horror of Dracula" and "Curse of Frankenstein", but I did not find this film to be the masterpiece I'd been promised. (I'd even argue that Bava's "Hercules in the Haunted World" and "Diabolik" are both superior to this effort.)

The first and biggest problem the romantic subplot between Our Hero, the dashing Dr. Gorobec (played with perfect blandness by John Richardson) and Damsel-in-Distress Katia (Barbara Steele) falls completely flat because of a near-complete lack of chemistry between the two performers and because it's one of those Insta-Romances that even less believeable than average.

The film also suffers from number of unintentionally silly moments where Bava goes overboard to drive home a dramatic point or to make something clear to the denser members of the audience. The worst (or best, if you're watching the movie for its badness) is when a vampire is sneaking invisibly through the castle halls. Apparently, Bava wanted to make sure we knew the vampire was sneaking invisibly and he didn't feel some ruffled wallhangings or shifted chairs was enough to show it, so he has the vampire knock down everything he passes, including several suits of armor that go clattering loudly to the floor. I found myself wondering what the point of being invisible is if you're so drunk you can't walk straight... and moments later I was laughing when members of the household were claiming they'd been awakened by a terrible scream, but none had apparently heard all overturning of furniture and knocking down of armor that the drunken, blind and/or spastic vampire had been engaging in moments before.

There's also a hilarious bat attack that has got to be among the worst creature effects ever put on film.

That's not to say the film doesn't have some truly scary or cool moments. The opening sequence of the witch's brutal execution is fabulously done, with the hammering of a spike-lined mask onto the woman's face being especially squirm-worthy. The ressurrection sequence of the witch is also very creepy, with lighting, camera angles, and sound effects all being deployed with perfect precision to make it a great scene. Finally, the film's ending is perfectly done (and I can't say much more without spoiling one of the movie's most shocking moments), so, while there are flaws, Bava does get the movie's finale exactly right, a rare feat. Bava's ending is also more modern in nature than many films of this vintage, with a denouement after the main action has concluded.


And, of course, there is Barbara Steele's dual performance as the evil witch and the innocent young woman whose body she is intent on possessing. Steele does a fine job of portraying both characters, undergoing a transformation that almost rivals that the great Boris Karloff did in his great dual role in "The Black Room" (review here.)

While "Black Sunday" may not be the masterpiece some claim it is, it's worth checking out, particularly if you're a fan of Hammer Films-style horror or an admirer of the exotic beauty that is Barbara Steele.