“That almost looks like an image from a Roger Corman Edgar Allen Poe movie” says the Messiah of Evil audio commentary the first time the lead girl gets to the beach. “Don’t mind if I do,” said I. This was the first of the Price/Poe movies, made the year after A Bucket of Blood, and the color is really nice but they didn’t have their groove down yet, it feels draggy and drawn-out.
Visitor Phil makes a poor first impression, throwing a fit over being asked to remove his shoes indoors, then insists he’s the fiancee of sickly Lenore and is taking her away with him. Her brother Vincent disagrees (a delicate shut-in, this must be the performance the Burton cartoon was based on). Vincent goes on to explain that all his ancestors were evil and so is the house itself, and anyway, whoops, Lenore just died. But the butler slips and mentions catalepsy, so Phil goes barging through the family catacombs trying to rescue his beloved. She’s either driven insane from being buried alive or just wants revenge on her gothy depressive brother, and they go up in flames together.
Ever since Tales of Terror I’m collecting shots of Price being throttled in front of fire:
Phil was Mark Damon, who went on to exec-produce Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning, and Lenore would guest-star on TV’s Batman. The butler is Harry Ellerbe of The Haunted Palace, which also has Elisha Cook Jr., so could’ve been an equally smart double-feature with Messiah of Evil.
Phil, having a foggy dream that used up the movie’s entire dry ice budget: