This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

DEVIL'S PARTNER is a forgotten little American horror flick that looks and feels like a contemporary western with a few horror touches added to the mix. I'd never heard of it before I sat down to watch it, and while it's certainly no classic, it's an adequate time waster that's difficult to dislike. The film was shot by TV director Charles Rondeau who creates a cosy atmosphere despite all the supposed horror going on.The story is about a guy who makes a Faustian pact with the devil for eternal youth. There are shades of Dorian Gray here along with all the old-time deal-with-the-devil movies of the 1940s. Unfortunately youth isn't enough for this guy and he also enlists the black arts to help bump off anyone who opposes him. There are some cheesy animal attack scenes mixed in but most of the film concentrates on the resolutely dull heroic characters trying to get to the bottom of the mystery. Again, no classic, but this is a what-you-see-is-what-you-get type movie.

A few years after Ed Nelson was 'introduced' in this film he got a great career break playing in the television version of Peyton Place for several years. But I'll bet the folks who produced Peyton Place never saw Nelson playing in a monstrosity.Devil's Partner finds Ed Nelson as an old man who's apparently got the hots for this young woman. But naturally she won't give him the time of day. So he makes a deal with the devil who grants him all kinds of powers and he starts making his moves on Jean Allison daughter of the town physician Edgar Buchanan.Part of his deal with the devil has him becoming young and he becomes the Ed Nelson familiar to us from the Sixties as Dr. Michael Rossi on Peyton Place. He can also shapeshift like Odo and command the animals to do his bidding. I'll let you see the film to see what he has them do.Where was Edgar Buchanan's agent to allow him to do such a monstrosity of a film? For that matter Richard Crane who was television's Rocky Jones in the Fifties was similarly dumped on by his agent. Crane plays the filling station owner that Allison has her heart set on. Crane was on the downside of his career, but Buchanan was a respected character actor and Nelson had a future despite this film.The ending, ripped off from The Invisible Man. I'll bet the cast members wished they were invisible after being in this.

"Devil's Partner" is one of the few movies I have seen in a long, long time that actually managed to creep me out. The way to see it is all alone in a darkened house in the middle of the night when you can really let it's atmosphere sink in. There's one scene in particular where someone turns out to not be whom he originally said he was, and under the right circumstances it will send shivers up & down the spine of even the most hardened horror movie fan.It's also deceptively tightly plotted. Turn away at the wrong critical minute and you might lose track of the plot as it arcs it's way in and out of what now seems to be familiar material. The film even gives away it's big secret within the first fifteen minutes but still manages to hold viewer interest for another hour as it unfolds like a nightmare. And one with a creepy musical score played on what sounds like one of those Ondes-Martenot electronic keyboards.True the low budget & television stock acting probably works against the overall effect, but if you look beneath it you'll find a very demented little study on Southwestern American supernatural horror that would be revisited again & again: "Race With The Devil" (1975), "Brotherhood Of Satan" (1971), "Enter The Devil" (1972), "The Devil's Rain" (1974) all took a cue from "The Devil's Partner". Which was made just as the Italians were exporting their Gothic horrors from Mario Bava, Riccardo Freda, and Antonio Margheriti. The Europeans had their Gothic castles and misty cobweb filled catacombs, we had the equally Gothic arid, barren Southwest. It would be interesting to trace where the American horror tradition of Southwestern settings began.Others have summed up the plot elements well enough: A youngish, super-slick and super nice guy drifts into a Death Valley town looking for his ne're do well uncle and everything goes straight to hell, and quickly. What makes it work is the way the film was constructed, including the sharp black & white photography making the night scenes lit by the stark lighting more unsettling than it would have been in color. I also mentioned "Twilight Zone" in my header because the pacing of the film is very reminiscent of that show, as are the themes of urban satire, ironic vengeance, and ironic justice.Just watch the movie. It's only 72 minutes long and a public domain title so you can probably see it online for free. It's turned up on budget line $.50 cent DVDs at the dollar store (under the title "Enter The Devil"; somebody screwed up) and on those ridiculous 50 movie bargain sets. Worth it just to be completely freaked out for those precious few minutes, if you let it.7/10

The phrase Don't judge a book by its cover certainly applies to this movie. The cover of the DVD shows a naked woman riding a centaur, in a storm, through a cemetery. Forget all of that. You won't see it. It doesn't exist in this movie. It has nothing to do with the movie. The movie is actually very tame. My copy of 'The Devil's Partner' is by Alpha Video. There are some problems with the actual quality of the film. This is primarily in the beginning of the movie. For me, it wasn't bad enough to be a major problem and I quickly forgot about it. With that being said, I really liked the movie and enjoyed it more than I expected. It's an old B movie, and it does have some problems with the plot, but the acting is pretty good and it is an enjoyable, entertaining film. In my opinion 'The Devil's Partner' is an average 1950s B horror movie, is under rated, and is worth viewing.