The Faceless Monster

Rating:
Summary: A Classic Of Intense Horror and Suspense
Review: 1965: Nightmare Castle is a lesser known film starring the favorite horror film actress Barbara Steele. Barbara Steele is the spotlight and the heroine in this film, as she is always in every film she does, portraying the beautiful tragic wife of a scientist. Steven, the scientist, is unaware that his wife is having an adulterous affair with their gardner. After he discovers them in a coupling, he storms into a heated fury and extracts his revenge. Chaining the lovers to a wall in his dungeon, he beats them and tortures them with his electric machinery. They die. Years later, he remarries a look-alike of his dead wife. This is when things get scary and confusing. The ghost of the dead lovers seem to appear again and haunt the castle. The special effects may be crude in contrast to today's horror imagery, but nevertheless has a 60's and Gothic feel to it with the right punch. The music is very effective, romantic piano and light chamber orchestra, and appropriately darker in certain sections. This film is a classic and a great collection to your cult horror favorites.

Rating:
Summary: NIGHTMARE CASTLE.....
Review: AKA "Nightmare Castle" and directed by Mario Caiano this is another Gothic Italian horror film with the unearthly Barbara Steele in two roles: the unfaithful wife Muriel and her blonde half-sister Jenny. Muriel's husband Stephen is a doctor working on electrical impulses and their effect on blood. She is having an affair with another man until she's caught by Stephen. He tortures them both and kills them using his electrical device. Stephen then attempts to drive Jenny mad to keep her from inheriting anything but the ghosts of Muriel and her lover come back to haunt him and to possess Jenny. This is a fine atmospheric shocker in b&w and has only been available in cheaply done and shoddy DVD form. I'm hoping this is Synapse that is producing this and that it is done as well as "Castle of Blood". In fact, it could be called a companion piece to that film. Steele is beautifully photographed here and the entire film is very well done in spooky Gothic splendor. So it is highly recommended for Steele fans and fans of stylish Italian Gothic horror. Keep your fingers crossed that it's worth the wait to finally see it as it was meant to be seen.

Rating:
Summary: Completely incomprehensible! Must see!!
Review: Another Spaghetti horror that helped propel the stunning Barbara Steele to the top as Queen of Horror films. Basically, a trite and routine Italian horror romp, that largely benefits from Steele powerful presence. She has a duo role as a wife cheating on her scientist husband and her cousin. Does she not know it's dangerous to cheat on mad scientist hubbies? He is working with electrical impulses in human blood that cause murder victims to rise up from the grave to seek vengeance. Well, anyone worth their popcorn can see where this one will go....Directed and written by Mario Cairano.

Face it, at this price it is a steal for Steele groupies!

Rating:
Summary: DREADFUL TRANSFER !
Review: I adore Barbara Steele, but this transfer is truly one of the worst DVD transferd ever. It looks to have been mastered from a videotape without any type of effort to clean it up whatsoever. It has a constant fluttering throughout most of the film which gives the picture a quality that is NOT in anyway seamless.
The box art is [bad] and this is definateley a sub par release.
In comparison with SYNAPSE'S beautiful job on CASTLE OF BLOOD starring BARBARA STEELE this disc is an atrocity.
THE ONLY REASON to buy this DVD is if you are such a fanatic for BARBARA STEELE that you cannot wait for someone else to put out a better copy. Surely, and hopefully, someone will. Cuz RETROMEDIA'S release would not even be competition if someone came out with an even slightly better version.
I mean they should pay people to watch this disc rather than charge them.

Rating:
Summary: DISAPPOINTING BUT STILL 5 STARS....
Review: I can't say that I'm not a little disappointed that cheapo Retromedia released this and not Synapse. The print isn't nearly as good as it could've been with Synapse. However, I still give it 5 stars because it's the best print of this film I've seen yet. It's watchable and the music score is good. It's 100 min. which is longer than what's previously been available. And the storyline is more twisted than I remembered. I'm a Steele fan so I have to be more forgiving because I consider this a real collector's item. So what we have here is "The Faceless Monster" version of "Amanti D'Oltretomba" (AKA "Nightmare Castle"). Just not the best print. The dubbing isn't great either but I don't care. I'm just glad to have it at all.

Rating:
Summary: SEE THIS MOVIE
Review: I lovee this movie so much from the opening scene to the credits.Starring legendary horror queen Barbara Steele this movie is quite a laugh with more over acting bad special effects and tacky sets this movie is a B-Movie in the best use of the term but that makes it a classic truly a cult classic

Rating:
Summary: A Classic Of Intense Horror and Suspense
Review: Like the other posts have mentioned: the video quality is decidedly poor. It seems to have been taken from a videotape source due to the numerous drop outs that are evident througout. Still, it's by far the best version available (aka Nightmare Castle on other low-quality labels) and it's far from unwatchable and even fairly crisp in spots. The audio is okay, the dubbed dialogue is clear even if there's a slight hiss to it.

As for the film... it's a blast! This is my favorite Barbara Steele performance and she plays two roles: the insatiable, insane, raven-haired Muriel and the demure, blonde and driven insane Jenny. The whole thing's encased in a fog-thick atmosphere of dread, sadism and passion that even outdoes many of the Corman/Poe adaptions. Witness the doctor's torture of Muriel and her lover and then Muriel's gleeful climactic revenge. Pretty powerful stuff even by today's standards... and although it's draggy in spots it has many memorable scenes that make it worthwhile.

The print's uncut and 100 min. It's incorrectly framed at what looks like 1.50:1 instead of 1.66:1 and the first couple of credit titles are video generated. There also seems to be some new sound efx of crickets and such added over the first scene for some inexplicable reason.

The box cover art is hideously wretched (doesn't Retromedia have a designer that knows rudimentary Photoshop???). The slightly animated menus are passable as is a small photo gallery set to Ennio Morricone's cool theme.

Again, the quality should have been WAY better but if you can score it for $... so (and you're a fan) than it's definitely worth it... until a superior version comes along.

Rating:
Summary: Poor Transfer... Still Worth Owning
Review: Like the other posts have mentioned: the video quality is decidedly poor. It seems to have been taken from a videotape source due to the numerous drop outs that are evident througout. Still, it's by far the best version available (aka Nightmare Castle on other low-quality labels) and it's far from unwatchable and even fairly crisp in spots. The audio is okay, the dubbed dialogue is clear even if there's a slight hiss to it.

As for the film... it's a blast! This is my favorite Barbara Steele performance and she plays two roles: the insatiable, insane, raven-haired Muriel and the demure, blonde and driven insane Jenny. The whole thing's encased in a fog-thick atmosphere of dread, sadism and passion that even outdoes many of the Corman/Poe adaptions. Witness the doctor's torture of Muriel and her lover and then Muriel's gleeful climactic revenge. Pretty powerful stuff even by today's standards... and although it's draggy in spots it has many memorable scenes that make it worthwhile.

The print's uncut and 100 min. It's incorrectly framed at what looks like 1.50:1 instead of 1.66:1 and the first couple of credit titles are video generated. There also seems to be some new sound efx of crickets and such added over the first scene for some inexplicable reason.

The box cover art is hideously wretched (doesn't Retromedia have a designer that knows rudimentary Photoshop???). The slightly animated menus are passable as is a small photo gallery set to Ennio Morricone's cool theme.

Again, the quality should have been WAY better but if you can score it for [cheap] (and you're a fan) than it's definitely worth it... until a superior version comes along.

Rating:
Summary: Cult Classic Horror From 1965
Review: Nightmare Castle, originally released in 1965, stars Barbara Steele, the leading "scream queen" of the 60's. She starred in countless of horror films through the 60's. With her good looks, sex appeal and mystery, she was perfect in movies dealing with the supernatural and the macabre. This film I first saw in Macabre Theatre, a monster movie showcase in a lesser known station KDOCTV here in Southern California and it's now on cable channel KHIZ. The hosts were Butch Patrick (Eddie Munster from the 60's show The Munsters) and Ivonna Cadaver, a younger Elvira look-a-like. This film does have camp or cult classic value because so much of this material is not considered frightening today. In today's horror movie scene, blood, gore, excessive violence and a scary soundtrack is what does it for today's audiences. But for it's time in 1965 this weird movie must have scared audiences or at least creeped them out. Although it does not reach the heights of horror that Dawn Of The Dead did later in the 60's, Nightmare Castle is chilling, Gothic and genuinely haunting.

The owner of a large castle, a scientist, is happily married to his beautiful wife (Barbara Steele). But while he is away, she engages in an affair with the gardener. When the scientist husband discovers their relationship, he becomes insanely jealous. Unleashing his fury and revenge, he tortures them with electric shock. These scenes are graphic, intense and disturbing, even for a 1965 film. I was very surprised by it. The torture is enough to kill the lovers. Years later, the scientist marries a beautiful replica of his wife (Barbara Steele again) She begins to be haunted by an evil presence in the castle. It becomes so bad that a therapist is hired to help her with what they think is psychological problems. The therapist, however, discovers that the castle is haunted. Guess by who ? The dead lovers that were killed years ago by the jealous husband! Eventually, there is a showdown between the ghosts, the scientist husband, the look-alike wife and the therapist, whom we are lead to believe is her new love interest. After many frightening confrontations, the castle burns down and our heroine Barbara Steele makes it out alive with her therapist boyfriend. This is a truly great film, despite its obscurity and its camp value. For a black and white film, it's visually impressive. The music as one review mentioned, is nothing dissonant or typical of horror movie soundtracks. It's subtle, it's romantic, making use of a lot of piano (Barbara Steele plays the piano in this movie). A must have for fans of Miss Steele or classic horror films.

Rating:
Summary: BS is Back!
Review: Print was acceptable with 20 min. additional footage missing from previus versions. I've seen far worse prints. Give it a chance!