Terror Creatures from the Grave

Rating:
Summary: great fun for Barbara Steele fans!
Review: 5 tombe per un medium directed by Massimo Pupillo, is a lackluster spaghetti horror (as in spaghetti western?)! Also known as Cemetery of the Living Dead, this Italian chiller thriller benefits largely from the presence of the stunning queen of horror flicks Barbara Steele. Generally a bunch of nonsense about a terrible plague, in which the victims are then summoned from the dead by an idiot for some vague reason. The transfer is good, but then film was dodge and dubbed to begin with so beware. Still for Steele fans a nice treat at this price.

Rating:
Summary: great fun for Barbara Steele fans!
Review: 5 tombe per un medium directed by Massimo Pupillo, is a lackluster spaghetti horror (as in spaghetti western?)! Also known as Cemetery of the Living Dead, this Italian chiller thriller benefits largely from the presence of the stunning queen of horror flicks Barbara Steele. Generally a bunch of nonsense about a terrible plague, in which the victims are then summoned from the dead by an idiot for some vague reason. The transfer is good, but then film was dodge and dubbed to begin with so beware. Still for Steele fans a nice treat at this price.

Rating:
Summary: Oh, The Terror! The Terror!
Review: A lawyer (Walter Brandi) receives a letter from a strange client named Jeronimus Hauff, who wants a will drawn up. Upon his arrival at the dark castle of Jeronimus (complete with a glass case full of mummified hands), the lawyer finds out that he's been dead for a year! It seems that Mr. Hauff was dedicated to the supernatural, especially raising the dead. His castle was once a hospital where plague victims stayed and died. Five men circulated a petition to have him run out of town, so Jeronimus gathered them together and threatened to expose the bad things he knew about each of them. One of the five killed Jeronimus to the collective glee of the others. Jeronimus cursed them all with his dying breath. One year later, the five men are turning up dead, covered in icky sores. One of them commits suicide by impaling himself on a sword. The lawyer falls in love with Jeronimus' beautiful daughter and must figure out how they can stay alive. There are some interesting sequences in between stretches of dullness. Barbara Steele plays Jeronimus' cheating wife. Her huge eyes are definitely a high point. There's a nice bathtub scene with, alas, too many bubbles. Her Morticia-esque looks and perma-frown are perfect for the gloomy happenings. Check it out...

Rating:
Summary: Absolutely worthless
Review: I want to reinforce the prev. reviewer who said steer clear of the Alpha Video DVD. I can tolerate a slightly subpar transfer, but this is intolerable.
You can barely tell which actress is Barbara Steele. Avoid.

Rating:
Summary: Low Grade Euro Horror.
Review: Low budget horror flicks can be delightfully loony. Low budget European horror can be even loonier. With that disclaimer, we will proceed. A deceased spiritualist and his disciples return from the grave to exact vengeance on his unfaithful wife and a host of enemies. The script claims inspiration in the writings of Edgar Allan Poe. Well, maybe. The assertion of source material probably has more to do with the success of Roger Corman's adaptations of Poe than with the Dark Master of American letters. The bleak B&W photography and the average video transfer of the low priced DVD diminish the impact of Barbara Steele, although her dark good looks still manage to project. She appears briefly in the bathtub, and another scene displays ample leg and thigh, but don't get too excited. It isn't that sort of movie. The monsters are zombies (sort of) that carry the plague in their very touch. One problem, the viewer never actually sees the creatures. Hands emerge out of graves, around corners, etc. but the menace is largely unseen, except for the grisly results. The period detail is okay, but the movie lacks the power punch of a Hammer Films color display. Despite the limitations, die-hard fans of ghostly horror can have fun with this movie. Other viewers should creep on by. ;-)

Rating:
Summary: Great Movie, presentation could be better
Review: The Movie:

This is quite a little, silly, gothic zombie movie with all the right ingredients to keep you hooked. Beautiful Barbara Steele in a bath tub, severed, crawling hands, zomies, murders, guts and beautiful landscape photography.

Set in 1913, a laywer recieves a letter to come to a lonely castle to record the will of a dying man. Arriving there he finds out that this guy is already dead and only his beautiful widow and daughter (from the first marriage) are living there. As this movie actually is a murder mystery and a zombie flick thrown together, the plot twists and turns to keep both lines going. In the end, the movie therefore becomes quite mixed-up. Pretty gory for its time (and even now), this is for mature audiences.

The DVD: The movie was shot in b/w, with the american export version having 82 minutes (this is the one on the DVD, although the cover sais something about 61 min running time ...). The italian version is longer on plot-explaining scenes but misses nearly all the gruesome stuff included here. It looks like the video source was a pretty good vhs tape, so this is not as bad as some Alpha-DVDs, but not something you could watch on anything bigger than 51". Switching the TV to b/w with high contrast and black values, it becomes watchable. Extras, you can't expect for that price, but a nice little trailer is also on the disc.

Verdict: Good value for money. The movie is 4 stars, the transfer 2 (I've seen worse, but not many).

Rating:
Summary: Wretchedly Poor DVD Transfer
Review: This Alpha Video DVD release of an impressively moody and generally underrated Italian horror yarn is a wretched, unwatchable mess. The image is blurred and smeary, and appears to have been taken from a murky fourth-generation bootleg videotape transfer. The horribly garbled sound renders nearly all of the dialogue unintelligible, and absolutely ruins Aldo Piga's score. This is one of the absolute worst legitimate DVD releases I've ever seen, easily on par with Madacy's hideous TRACK OF THE VAMPIRE/NIGHTMARE CASTLE combo. Barbara Steele and Euro-Horror fans are strongly advised to steer clear of this one, despite the tantalizingly cheap list price.

Rating:
Summary: Wretchedly Poor DVD Transfer
Review: This Alpha Video DVD release of an impressively moody and generally underrated Italian horror yarn is a wretched, unwatchable mess. The image is blurred and smeary, and appears to have been taken from a murky fourth-generation bootleg videotape transfer. The horribly garbled sound renders nearly all of the dialogue unintelligible, and absolutely ruins Aldo Piga's score. This is one of the absolute worst legitimate DVD releases I've ever seen, easily on par with Madacy's hideous TRACK OF THE VAMPIRE/NIGHTMARE CASTLE combo. Barbara Steele and Euro-Horror fans are strongly advised to steer clear of this one, despite the tantalizingly cheap list price.

Rating:
Summary: BARBARA STEELE AT HER BEST
Review: THIS IS A 5 STAR MOVIE,,,REGARDLESS OF WHAT THESE OTHER REVIEWERS HAVE SAID,,,THEY GIVE YOU THE RATING ON THE QUALITY OF THE DVD,INSTEAD OF THE MOVIE ITSELF,,PEOPLE THIS IS AN OLD MOVIE AFTER ALL!!IF YOU LIKED NIGHTMARE CASTLE,BELIEVE ME YOU WILL LIKE TERROR CREATURES FROM THE GRAVE.