Best movie of this year hands down!

not as good as all the hype

Great visuals, story delivers no surprises

An Exercise In Nonsense

Or so the movie's opening text says. Too bad there aren't any vampires in this movie because that might have been something to see. Still, it's an enjoyable enough little horror film from Universal International, written by the great Jimmy Sangster and filmed in a manner that very obviously was mimicking what Hammer was doing at the time. The story involves a doctor (Vincent Ball) being sent to a prison run by a mad scientist (Donald Wolfit) conducting experiments on the convicts. Amusingly, Wolfit has been made up to look like a poor man's Bela Lugosi and his hunchback henchman (played by Victor Maddern) looks like a cross between Dwight Frye and Lon Chaney, Jr. One would assume this was intentional. The lovely Barbara Shelley also stars as the fiancée of Ball, who goes undercover at the prison to help him. It's not a bad picture, despite the misleading title. There's a good deal of blood, violence, and a fair share of heaving bosoms. So it's like Hammer, though lacking the vibrant visuals or the screen presence of a Peter Cushing or Christopher Lee. Worth a look, though.

There were two outstanding aspects to this formulaic film about a "mad scientist," No, there are no vampires in the film. It is about a doctor who performs experiments in a prison to cure his illness. The Nazis who experimented on prisoners in the camps would applaud his efforts.One thing that impressed me was the quality of the film. Monty Berman's cinematography was so outstanding that you were distracted from the story at times.The other outstanding feature was the characters and the actors who portrayed them. Donald Wolfit was perfect as Doctor Callistratus, the doctor performing the experiments. He was assisted by Carl (Victor Maddern), a deformed hunchback that has to be seen to be believed; and Andrew Faulds as the chief guard, who always had a sinister look on his face.Jimmy Sangster, who was a major force behind Hammer Films, wrote a script that managed to keep you interested. Minor improvements would have made this an outstanding film.

Decent Hammer imitation with a script by that studio's chief scribe, Jimmy Sangster. Producers Monty Berman and Robert S. Baker competed with Hammer in the horror stakes during the late 1950s/early 1960s (with Berman usually doubling also as cinematographer) via such efforts – besides the one under review which was actually their first – as THE TROLLENBERG TERROR aka THE CRAWLING EYE (1958), JACK THE RIPPER (1959), THE FLESH AND THE FIENDS (1960) and THE HELLFIRE CLUB (1961). Director Cass is best-known (if at all) for the Alec Guinness comedy LAST HOLIDAY (1950), itself recently retooled for the dubious talents of Queen Latifah! The film (which I had been looking forward to for ages after viewing stills from it in critiques of the genre penned by film historian Alan Frank) is a lurid melodrama in vivid color and with, pardon the pun, full-blooded performances – but the contrived end result somehow misses the mark. For starters, the script seems uncertain whether it wants to be a Dracula (given its title and 'bloodthirsty' villain) or a Frankenstein (in view of the villain's guinea-pig experimentations with moribund or dead subjects) clone; the fact that it is almost entirely set in a mental institution-cum-prison (that includes future "Carry On" member Bernard Bresslaw as a rowdy jailbird) brings forth comparisons with the superior final Hammer Frankenstein entry FRANKENSTEIN AND THE MONSTER FROM HELL (1974)!Distinguished thespian Donald Wolfit is surprisingly but effectively cast in the lead, while Victor Maddern has a memorable look as his knife-wielding henchman (although, again, bearing hideous features that are never explained); future Hammer startlet Barbara Shelley and Vincent Ball (playing a character saddled with the amusing name of John Pierre!), then, are reasonably appealing as the romantic leads. The rousing score is equally notable – as is a nasty climax featuring a pack of wild dogs prefiguring the one in Georges Franju's EYES WITHOUT A FACE (1959)! Incidentally, there is a very noticeable jump-cut during one of the lab scenes (suggesting that the film had censorship issues back in the day); incidentally, the Dark Sky DVD – which cleverly pairs it with the aforementioned THE HELLFIRE CLUB – amusingly allowed one to watch the show just as if it were playing in an old-fashioned Drive-In (complete with a host of schlocky trailers, ads and announcements)

What should make this film a classic is the opening vampire staking scene. The greatest staking scene in movie history, with Kiss Of the Vampire second. I have this film on a 1978 VHS release with excellent color, and I also saw it in the theatre at the time. It's strong effective stuff. As some say, it can also be draggy in the middle. The laboratory scenes of working on blood samples may be dreary. But it has vicious dogs released on escaping prisoners, sneaking and climbing up into the maiden's room, a deformed hunchback, a good climactic scene, and great colorful sets. Good Gothic. The same producers also made The Hellfire Club, Jack the Ripper, and The Flesh and the Fiends (about Burke and Hare). I'd like to know which video releases have faded color and which have good.