Vincent price Archives

The Haunted Palace (1963)

Posted on October 23, 2022October 23, 2022 by fenrisfil

Tonight’s movie is the Roger Corman horror “The Haunted Palace”. Although considered part of the series of Edgar Allan Poe adaptations Corman did with Vincent Price in the 60’s (Starting with House of Usher in 1960), it is actually an adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s “The Case of Charles Dexter Ward”. Corman wanted to do something different but the studio didn’t want to take the risk so they worked in Poe’s poem “The Haunted Palace” and presented it as another Poe adaptation. Retrospectively this is a shame as this is actually the very first adaptation of Lovecraft’s work and as far as I can tell the first appearance of the Necronomicon in a movie. The “Haunted Palace” in Poe’s poem was actually a metaphor for the human mind, but here it is implied to be about the mansion in which most of the action happens.

October Review Challenge – Day 23

The movie is set in the fictional village of Arkham (A regular Lovecraft setting, though not actually the setting in the source material). A dark shadow looms over the town thanks to a curse placed by the evil warlock Joseph Curwen (played by Vincent Price) upon his death at the hands of the villagers. It is believed the curse has caused many of the new born of the village to have horrendous mutations (often missing one or both eyes) and after 110 years these mutants are numerous. The remaining non-mutated ancestors of those that killed Curwen live in fear of the second part of Curwen’s curse which was his promise to return and take direct vengeance on those that burned him to death. Curwen’s old mansion looms over the town from a nearby cliff and has remained abandoned since his death.

Into this comes Curwen’s descendent, Charles Dexter Ward (Also played by Prie) and his wife Anne (Debra Paget in her final motion picture performance before retiring from the business). Ward is a decent man and not a superstitious one, but having just been notified of his inheritance (Curwen’s mansion on the cliff top) he has decided to visit his new property and assess what to do with it. Due to his striking resemblance to Curwen the villages are on the whole hostile to him and they all encourage him to depart and burn the deed to the mansion. Ward ignores them and travels to the mansion where he is greeted by a painting of his ancestor. The painting seems to have a hypnotic effect on the man.

Yog-Sothoth and the Necronomicon

Over time Curwen’s evil presence starts to take over control of Ward and while in control he continues his plans which revolve around two things, his revenge on the villages and his original goal which he was engaged in prior to be lynched over a hundred years ago which was to use the ancient evil book, The Necronomicon to summon the Elder God Yog-Sothoth and then breed captured women from the village with the creature with the goal of creating a race of super beings and unlocking the door to Yog-Sothoths realm. This it turns out is the reason for the deformities amongst some of villagers.

Curwen with the assistance of two other necromancers manages to bring his fiancée (Cathie Merchant) back from the dead, meanwhile Anne has sought help from the local doctor, Dr. Willet (Frank Maxwell) and the townsfolk after finding two of their own dead are ready to form a new lynch mob to take care of Curwen’s descendent. Curwen and his evil group capture Anne and plan to give her to the Elder Gods, but as the mob reach the mansion and set it on fire, they burn the painting of Curwen giving Ward a chance to take back control. But will it be enough? I’ll leave that part for you to find out should you chose to watch.

Assessment

The movie features a strong cast. Vincent Price gives the kind of powerful and creepy performance you expect from his horror appearances, but getting to play a villain and a victim he also gets an opportunity to show more vulnerability (something he was also very good at when needed). The rest of the cast includes a number of recognisable faces, probably most notable is Lon Chaney Jr (A horror legend himself as 1941’s “The Wolfman”), but I was also happy to see character actor and Horror and Film Noir regular Elisha Cook Jr. (“The Maltese Falcon”, “Rosemary’s Baby”). To be clear though Price is who people are tuning in for though and he doesn’t disappoint.

The plot is a little messy. It certainly has interesting elements but it feels a bit like it should have been a little more simplified or increased in length to properly explore the different elements. The Elder Gods and Necronomicon are somewhat wasted on a plot that didn’t really need them, though the deformed villagers certainly give the piece a bit of a Lovecraftian tone but they too are underused. Ultimately as tends to be the case with Corman’s horrors the source material is largely pushed to the side to allow for something that seems a little bit generic and it’s a shame when dealing with something so unique as the first Lovecraft adaptation. Slapping on the Poe poem doesn’t add anything of worth, this is a Corman film first, a Lovecraft film second and Poe Film a very distant third.

Conclusion

The movie is above average for a horror, but far from exceptional and this isn’t a surprise as that was pretty much Corman’s thing. Regularly producing decent horror films on a low budget. Not many of them could be considered classics, but many managed a good enough standard to entertain the audience in the day and to entertain me decades later. This one was weak in some places almost descending into self parody but strong in others, especially in Price’s performance. Overall it made for an entertaining experience and I do recommend checking the movie out. I’m going to give this a firm 6/10.

House on Haunted Hill (1959)

Posted on March 17, 2022April 15, 2022 by fenrisfil

For tonight’s horror viewings I have “House on Haunted Hill”. Directed by William Castle and written by Robb White. The pair would later make the infamous gimmick horrors “The Tingler” and “13 Ghosts” that tried to encourage audience participation in the movies. Castle would also be the man behind getting Rosemary’s Baby made into a film, though he didn’t direct it (Which was a requirement of getting the rights, likely to avoid “Tingler” like gimmicks). The movie was remade in 1999, to minimal acclaim though that movie did spawn a sequel.

The Set up

In this movie though, Vincent Price stars as Frederick Loren an eccentric millionaire that has challenged five people to spend the night in a haunted house for the prize of $10,000 if they survive (about $100k in today’s money). They are joined in the house by Frederick and his cynical unhappy wife Annabelle (Carol Ohmart). Our five strangers are the heroic Lance Schroeder (Richard Long), the level headed Dr. Trent (Alan Marshall), the neurotic Nora Manning (Carolyn Craig), journalist Ruth Bridges (Julie Mitchum) and the houses traumatized owner Watson Pritchard (Elisha Cook Jr.).

The door are to be locked at midnight trapping whomever is inside until morning. Things begin with a few frights and a lot of cynicism and it becomes clear that it may not be the ghosts that people need to be afraid of in this house (I mean they are locked in a house with Vincent Price, what do you expect). The only guest that really believes in the ghosts is Pritchard, who was traumatized by staying there previously (and the often underrated Elisha does an excellent job here of selling the supernatural aspects to the audience in the face of everyone else’s cynicism). Nora though is certainly afraid and is the victim of a campaign of terror. The truth is though she is not the real focus, but merely a pawn in a cunning plan.

The Execution

So this movie is really more of a macabre murder mystery than an actual haunted house movie and as such it’s worth noting that it isn’t at all scary. The haunting aspects are basically just goofy, Carolyn Craig sells her terror well enough but I doubt even in the day the audience really believed the ghosts were the problem. As a murder mystery it’s not the most complicated but it is definitely satisfactory and has some good twists. Vincent Price is of course a joy to watch in this kind of role and he plays it about half way between his serious roles and his more over the top ones (Such as the classic Dr.Phibes). The music and sound design is very 1950’s and so feels dated but fitting for the kind of movie it is and I loved the use of the Theremin.

Overall, this movie lacks rewatchability and frankly is not scary, however largely thanks to Vincent Price it is still entertaining in a campy sort of way.

The Long Night (1947)

Posted on November 15, 2021November 16, 2021 by fenrisfil

Tonight’s Film Noir is Anatole Litvak’s “The Long Night” from 1947 staring Henry Fonda (The Grapes of Wrath, 12 Angry Men) with support from Barbara Bel Geddes (Vertigo) and Ann Dvorak (Scarface) and the legendary Vincent Price (Who despite being mostly known for horror, actually did quite a lot of Film Noir too).

The Long Con

Before I talk about the plot, there is an interesting story involving this film that is a real lesson about just despicable Hollywood was historically. This movie is actually a remake of the French movie “Le jour se lève” from 1939. RKO acquired the distribution rights for the movie in preparation for remaking it and then set about buying up any and all available prints of the original film. These weren’t collected for prosperity, no they collected them to destroy them. They actually found a story they thought would be good for their market, bought it and then tried to completely erase the original movie to prevent the public from ever finding out their version wasn’t the original.

The moral of the story? Hollywood was always a cess pool. Fortunately more prints were later recovered in the 1950’s so their effort was for nothing. Sadly that was actually the second attempt at suppression for the movie as it was also banned during the occupation (Apparently for being demoralizing). Despite all that it didn’t stop the critics of the day from comparing this remake to the original and find it wanting.

The Long Story

Anyway, the plot starts of in a very traditional Film Noir style with our lead “Joe” (Fonda) barricaded into his top floor department after killing a man. The police are outside and we are given the impression Joe won’t survive the night as he seems determined not to surrender. Of course while he waits for the end he thinks back to how he got into this situation.

The story that lead him there is pretty straight forward really. He fell in love with a a woman, Jo (Geddes) but she was involved with another man. This Man, Maximillian (Price) is a real dirt bag. Charming but manipulative, lying and determined to have his prize. He has a novelty act as a dog trainer, though it turns out he abuses the dogs. At first Joe backs off and instead gets involved with another woman that shares his dislike of Maximillian, his former assistant in his dog show Charline (Dvorak). Eventually though he wins Jo around and in doing so discovers just how much of a dirt bag Maximillian is. After realising it’s over between him and Jo, Maximillian heads to Joe’s apartment with the intention of shooting him but ends up being shot by his own gun.

The Wrong Night

There are a lot of changes to this movie from the original French version. The biggest one being the ending, which is actually quite puzzling. We know Hollywood likes happy endings but the change here is jarring and doesn’t really fit within the Noir genre. Instead of the fatalism that is present in the majority of Film Noir we are presented with a much more hopeful picture. In some ways Joe is the opposite of a character like Philip Marlowe. While Marlowe is a white knight in a Noir world, Joe is a miserable fatalist surrounded by optimistic people that want him to know they care. It’s a strange thing to see in the genre.

For most of the movie Joe and Jo seem simple and naïve. This makes them easy pickings for the manipulative Maximillian. Charline by contrast though is a great character. A woman of genuine strength and wisdom that really deserves much better than jerks like Max and fools like Joe. She wants Joe to fall for her but figured pretty early on that he was in love with someone else. The truth is though, the ease with which she deals with things doesn’t make her feel that genuine and that is a big problem I had for all these characters. None of them felt real.

The Song Night

The acting though is pretty good from all involved and the film looks and sounds good. Of particular note is the score that makes heavy use of the Allegretto second movement of Beethoven’s seventh symphony. It’s a great piece of music and it does enhance the feelings of absolute despair in the siege scenes. The problem being that since the ending swerves on the viewer all the tension built up from the score seems a bit wasted.

Overall. Well it’s a very average movie really. It starts well and has its moments, but ends like a totally different movie. Characters are stupid and inconsistent and ultimately it feels like a poor take on strong source material (And that is without having seen the French original).