The Keeper

I have recently become a fan of British horror film actor Christopher Lee. I have found that there are bad Christopher Lee movies such as "The Passage," "End of the World," "To The Devil A Daughter," "Bear Island," and "Howling II."

And, then, there is "The Keeper."

Lee plays a psychiatrist who runs a mental asylum for the wealthy and is murdering the relatives of his patients so he can gain access to their fortunes. Many of these murders have been set up to appear as accidents. A private investigator and the police hope to eventually "catch him in the act."

Not even Christopher Lee can save this movie. I found this movie in the Horror section of my video store but it is actually more of a detective movie((Another Lee movie, "The Wicker Man," also combined different genres(Including the Horror movie and Detective story), but please don't try to compare this movie to "The Wicker Man." There is absolutely no comparison.)) At best, parts of the story are unclear. The screenwriters don't even give Lee's character an actual name; he is simply referred to as "The Keeper." Lee's character is somewhat physically disabled and operating completely on his own, so it's not made clear how he is able to commit all of the murders so adeptly. Lee's performance is fine but the rest of the acting in the film is hopelessly amateurish. The film is apparently meant to be a serious suspense film but lame humor is inexplicably weaved throughout the entire story. The hypnosis sequences in the film are absolutely laughable.

For a great Christopher Lee film, see "The Wicker Man," "The Devil Rides Out," and the ORIGINAL "Horror of Dracula."

I give this film 2 points for hiring a well known actor like Lee. I give it another point for making it a historical film(set in the 40s or so)without any glaring anachronism and another point for having adequate camera and sound (which should be a given but I'll be kind as it was made in my place of birth).

This is a terrible boring film. Likely the worst Christopher Lee film I have watched--even worse than his Jess Franco Fu Manchu movies. Worse than the Star Wars prequels. Worse than the Crimson Cult. Worse than Howling 2.

By general bad movie standards it is worse than Dracula vs Frankenstein. At least those films had some entertainment value--this really has none other than wondering what Lee must have thought as he was making it.

Canadian movies can and often do lack passion, imagination, and when all else fails turn into feeble comedies. 9 times out of 10, if you hear about a Canadian sci-fi or horror movie made by native-born Canadians, chances are its a /comedy of some sort.

In this case the film is likely inspired by Chinatown and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest combined with 1930s street drama and any kind of mad doctor story you can think of just to make it have low budget commercial appeal.

The private investigator Driver attempts to act suave and cool like Sam Spade and fails, but isn't aware of it. It isn't funny in a Leslie Nielsen kind of way.

The dialogue is disjointed and poorly thought out so you get exchanges like this: Private Eye: Has there been any murders at the asylum? Police Chief: Yes, seven--but what troubles me is, what if these deaths were actually murders? Its an amateur film on almost every level except the picture and sound are functional (perhaps to the viewer's detriment) with a decent enough use of locations and period costumes. There's no attempt at moody lighting, and the soundtrack is a 70s electronic score of some kind --not keeping with the era it is presenting.

This is the first Canadian genre film made in British Columbia by Canadians (other than a porn film) and it is a complete failure. Not even useful as a so bad it is good kind of experience. If you don't believe me, waste an hour and a half of your life and find out.

`You are with The Keeper, and The Keeper will keep you alive!,' so says the evil Keeper in this 1975 Lionsgate offering, perhaps the rarest and hardest to find Christopher Lee film. This one is not even catalogued in Leonard Maltin's 2002 Movie and Video Guide. Lee is indeed the keeper at Underwood Asylum, where wealthy patients check in and soon after their relatives begin to die, leaving The Keeper (who apparently had no name) the sole heir of their well-being and bankbooks. Private investigators Dick Driver and Mae B. Jones are hired to get to the bottom of it and almost pay the ultimate cost in doing so. This is where the seriousness of this film ends and the silliness begins. The Keeper could not quite make it's mind up as to whether it is a serious horror film or comedic horror spoof. Some of Lee's scenes show him at a huge control panel torturing his hapless patients electronically and those are truly disturbing. Other scenes, particularly the ones involving exchanges between the police and private investigator Driver, are intended to be humorous but come off as embarrassingly amateurish. Lee, who appeared to phone his performance in, and Tell Schreiber as the male private eye Driver are the only two notable performers here, with the exception of Ian Tracey as the streetwise shoeshine boy. The Keeper suffers from subpar production values, as it appears grainy at times with poor dialogue, and the camera angles are poorly done. At times, one would think beginning film students made this film but then again even beginners could probably do as well or better. In the end, the police and private eyes get their man and they all leave Underwood asylum to apparently live happily ever after. The Keeper is notable only because of it's lack of availability and presence of Lee, whose body of work over the course of his lengthy career is extraordinary.

actually call me crazy everyone one else has.but i liked this movie true it's not one of his best but for a low budget movie it's not bad. it does need a lot of work on it and the special effex on it aren't that great but i look at it this way what do u expect from a 1976 low budget movie?

I do not know what it was with Christopher Lee during the mid-1970s, but he seemed to accept pretty much every script that came his way in an attempt to obtain for himself some kind of Guinness World Record for movie roles played (which he probably holds anyway)!; with this in mind, a sizeable amount of titles from his extensive career remain obscure to this day and, having watched a few of them already in my ongoing tribute to him, I regret to say that this status is justified certainly for the majority emanating from this vintage (with only ALBINO {1976} emerging thus far as being undeservedly forgotten).

This Canadian thriller (erroneously considered horror by some sources but, then, this would often prove the case with this particular genre icon) is a genuine dud, and one really has to strain to determine just what could have attracted the star to become involved!; it may have been the fact that he plays a cripple, but his condition is never explained and has no bearing whatsoever on the plot, or perhaps the notion that he can control minds by way of hypnosis – but the sessions conducted are downright laughable, with himself adopting a perfectly idiotic diabolical countenance throughout! Anyway, he plays the head of an insane asylum but insists on being referred to as "keeper": it transpires that his patients (one of whom turns out to be a "sympathetic" twin with another, shady character within the narrative) are all well-to-do and that their relatives – in line to inherit them – are being eliminated; since this would make Lee the eventual beneficiary of their fortune, a cop has been infiltrated into the establishment to investigate…but he too has been virtually reduced to a puppet in the master's hands!

Incidentally, this is given a period setting – complete with trenchcoat-sporting detective hero (though far removed from the hard-boiled prototype) and a resourceful shoeshine boy – but, since there was no concerted attempt at sustaining mood, the option was no more than a randomly-deployed gimmick! However, perhaps the most head-scratching decision here was to make the inevitable Police Inspector – first clashing with, then abetting – the protagonist a highly-strung and accident-prone buffoon, obviously intended to supply comedy relief but only serving a litany of cringe-inducing antics one would think hard before including even in an outright slapstick comedy! I am afraid THE CRAPPER would have been an equally appropriate moniker