1964
Who’s in this? Well, my first two thoughts are that most of the principle cast are not people that were in a lot of British horror films although almost anyone who acted in British film between 1957 and 1973 ended up in a horror film or two. The other thing is there are a lot of people in this film who were early on in their careers but went on to act in three or four decades.
Heather Sears as the newly married Lady Elizabeth Fordyke who is soon going to realize that she married a suspected murderer and that ghosts ride through her new estate nightly. Horror fans will likely recognize her from Hammer’s Phantom of the opera. Despite not being the main character in this movie she still received top billing.
John Turner as Sir Richard Fordyke. Recently married to the woman above and he returns home to his family’s manor after being away for a while. His first wife Anne committed suicide. John Turner was in a lot of things for decades but mainly British TV.
Ann Lynn as Diane the always frowning sister in law of the deceased first wife Anne. She helps take care of Sir Giles. Ann Lynn had a four decade long acting career mainly in British TV.
Peter Arne plays Seymour, Richard’s friend and he handles the financial affairs for the family. You will likely recognize him from numerous TV appearances and movies including Straw Dogs, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and several Pink Panther films. Arne was unfortunately killed in 1983 at the age of 62.
Raymond Huntley plays magistrate Colonel John Wentworth who gets called in to investigate the strange goings ons that will soon take place. Here’s a guy whose career spanned 50 years including lots of TV appearances like Upstairs, Downstairs. Horror fans may rcognize him from Hammer’s The Mummy.
Francis DeWolff as the bitter blacksmith Black John. Not a big role, but he deserves a mention. You’ll no doubt recognize him from numerous roles from Hammer’s The hound of the Baskervilles, The two face of Dr. Jekyll and others.
Joseph Tomelty as Sir Giles Fordyke. Father of Richard, Lord of the manor. He had a stroke a few years ago and is in a wheelchair. He uses signs to communicate and Diane translates for him. He was in Moby Dick as well as some genre films including the Atomic Monster and Devil girl from Mars (I need to review this). The Black Torment was his last film.
Patrick Troughton as Regis. Another small part. but an actor you know from tons of stuff. He was Dr. Who, he was in TV versions of several Shakespeare adaptions plus he was also in everything from Jason and The Argonauts to The Omen. A great character actor.
Lots of characters in this film and I am chopping out quite a few, but here’s one more.
Edina Ronay as Lucy Judd. She has no lines, but she is the first person we see in the film and her image is on a lot of the publicity for the movie. Genre fans will likely recognize her from her starring role in Hammer’s Prehistoric Women (I need to review this at some point).
What’s this about? We hear breathing and eventually a woman is running through the woods with eyes full of fear. She is soon strangled by a hand belonging to someone unknown. Sir Richard, his funky looking facial hair and his new wife are returning to the family manor. Sir Richard has been away for some time and the family has yet to meet his new wife. Hold the hurrahs though as there is unrest in the countryside. Local girl Lucy Judd was murdered and gasp- she spoke Richard’s name as she died. Plus several people in the town have seen Sir Richard riding across the countryside on his horse being pursued by a woman in white on horseback calling “murderer”. Not exactly the welcome Ricahrd expected, but it will get worse. Around this time we learn that Richard’s first wife Anne killed herself because she felt pressure to have a male child to be an heir to the estate. She began to hate Richard and her father in law because of this pressure she felt. She ended up throwing herself out of a window. Yes, that will solve everything, but wait I guess we needed this grim back story to set up the spooky things yet to come-awhooooooo! One night Richard wakes up because a window is a banging in the wind-boom-boom-boom. He goes to check it out and swears that for a second he saw a woman in white standing outside on the grounds below-ewww. Oh, oh,oh I forgot that this window that was banging was the one that Anne threw herself out of -oh my skin it is a crawling. Then one of Elizabeth’s servants is fooling around in the barn with the blacksmith’s apprentice. They hope to marry but need Richard’s permission. The servant girl mentions about thinking Richard is handsome or some such rot and her boyfriend blows a gasket so he leaves. Someone enters and low and behold another friggin’ cold blooded murder takes place. So if you are an attractive and young woman living in this area it might time to get out of dodge now. The local magistrate arrives and tells Richard about people witnessing him riding with the woman in white behind him. Richard denies it, but then the blacksmith’s apprentice arrives yelling and accusing Richard of murder, Richard yells back as he does a lot in this film. Look at me I’m rich and can yell real loud. The next night Richard sees the woman in white again, this time he takes action. He gets his horse and heads out, but she ends up behind him yelling murderer. Poor Richard runs into the magistrate and despite his yelling a bunch of people now begin to think that Richard is a nutcase. Soon Richard is looking for the family bible to add Elizabeth’s name, but the bible is nowhere to be found. Someone must have it out and will soon have some overdue fines. Anyways her comes an odd scene. Richard blasts bast Elizabeth and Diane and leaps into a carriage and takes off-go Speed Racer go. The women go inside and Giles wheelchair rolls down the steps with no Giles in it. Then Seymour steps put and talks to them from a room, but we hear Richard screaming (what else) from that room. The woman are dumbfounded, oh how could this be because he just left? Is this a demon, a dopple ganger or does Richard own a transporter? The door to the room closes behind Seymour and he’s locked out. Richard (the one from the carriage) comes back and yells some more. He tries to help Seymour open the door and when it finally opens there is Giles hanging by the neck until he was dead, dead, dead (it’s a Star Trek-Squire of Gothos-reference). Okay so now our characters are way confused and so was I. Giles also had ink on his face and at dinner Richard believes the ink has something to do with the elusive family bible, but then he gets woozy and has to go sleepy time. While upstairs he sees the woman in white and stumbles after her. Then he sees Giles wheelchair coming at him with a person in it-if Richard didn’t crap his drawers at this then he never will. Richard confronts the figure in the wheelchair and it looks just like him-well, holy heck! Hold on, kiddies it’s a wild ride from here on out. Elizabeth hears screams and goes up the steps running right into a snarling Richard. The lady in white tells this Richard to kill Elizabeth, he tries but she has a gun and eventually ka-blam this Richard gets it and falls over. Then another more sane Richard appears-this movie is beginning to make less sense than a Pirate of the Caribbean sequel. Okay this is the real Richard and he reveals the lady in white to be Diane. She blamed Richard for the death of her sister. The dead Richard was really an invalid brother who Giles had put away years ago, but Diane got him to help her in this twisted plan. This is why the bible was hidden because it would have told that there was a brother. Dianne tries to flee and Seymour appears, but then he stabs her-oh do you think he’s in on this too? Yep, he wanted money. So a big old sword fight breaks out between Richard and Seymour and you can guess who wins. Richard and Elizabeth get all lovey-dovey now that this ghost-spirit-murder-revenge-drive everyone insane with evil twin business is over. Roll the credits.
Stats-
Number of times Diane smiles-0, if Elizabeth had died I think she would have smiled.
Number of times that Richard gets all huffy and shouts-about 15
Number of day for night scenes-three I believe, but it wouldn’t a British horror films without a few of these.
The Negatives-The movie has a major plot hole. When Richaard’s brother appears he is a drooling beast. Could he have killed those woman at the orders of Diane? Yes. Could he have spoken from the room that Seymour exited and held other conversations described in earlier parts of the movie? No, but they skip past this as the movie is concluded.
The positives-This is a decent enough chiller. The costumes and sets make it look more expensive then it is probably was which is a credit to the people in charge of those departments. The pacing is a strong point as well.
Lasers, monsters and barbarians oh, my! 