The Evil - Die Macht des Bösen

The familiarity of the premise (yet another haunted house, ominous sounds, good-vs-evil battles, etc) places a burden on this movie right from the start, a burden that the competent direction and the above-average acting cannot quite shake off. Ultimately, "The Evil" is just as undistinguished as its title, but it remains a respectable, sometimes even imaginative (the "quicksand" scene) time-spender. (**1/2)

I've been watching horror movies for 40 years or more but The Evil has somehow passed me by. That was until now, just watched it on an old VHS tape (this somehow found itself on the British Video Nasties list under Section 3, goodness knows why!). A bunch of people start renovating a large house with a creepy past. One of them, played by the very attractive Joanna Petter, starts to see ghostly apparitions, a warning about an evil force that lurks in the house. They carry on with their work regardless but spooky things start to happen, people start dying (some of these deaths are pretty inventive) and they find themselves trapped inside by an invisible force. All the while a storm rages outside. As haunted house movies go this was pretty good, it held my attention all the way through. The special effects are good and the film does maintain a level of fear. I did feel that the finale was a little weird, but having Victor Buono play the Devil does at least serve as something of a curiosity. One character turns out to be a practical joker, much to his victims' annoyance. We got to see many more of these, turning up in slasher films of the 1980s. Naturally it does look dated - the fashions, the hair, the cars, even the slapping of a woman's face to calm her down. But I enjoyed it and would certainly recommend it as a supernatural horror movie.

"The Evil" (also known more appropriately as "House of Evil") is a very simple, relatively low-budge film that was shot in only 30 days. So, you'd expect it to be crap...but oddly, it isn't.

Richard Crenna and Joanna Pettet head a cast of various folks who are soon to become victims of a demoniacally possessed mansion. However, most of the folks spend much of the film trying to rationalize and explain away the weird and malevolent happenings in the place. But when folks start getting tossed about like rag dolls and the place seems to have a mind of its own, the only reasonable explanation is evil!

The film has a lot going for it. The ghosts look amazingly realistic and the stunts do as well. Plus, the film is more than just gore and death. Well worth seeing if you like horror flicks.

Way before I rented this, I kept hearing about the horrendous climax with Victor Buono as the devil. I figured I could just look past it and enjoy the rest of the movie, and though the scenes are amazingly cheesy, they don't *kill* the movie. If anything, it's a unique idea.

Richard Crenna and Joanna Pettet star as CJ and Caroline Arnold, a couple that has just bought the old Vargas Mansion, and have invited some friends and former patients from CJ's psychiatric group (? I know, I thought it was sort of odd) to help clean the place up. Caroline begins to notice creepy things about the house, including a transparent apparition that disappears when she takes a second look. She even finds an old diary of Emilio Vargas, the deceased owner of the house, and eventually, she gets the feeling they are all being warned to leave the house. While looking for Mary's (Cassie Yates) dog, who has run off and gotten itself frightened by something, CJ finds a cross in the basement, over a latched passageway in the floor. As he pries open the doors, they begin to lift and open themselves, and all hell breaks loose. (Literally.) The house shakes violently, one stock character being electrocuted along the way. Then all the windows seal and the doors all are jammed shut. After realizing they are trapped, the survivors struggle to find an explanation to what's going on, and in their pursuit to survive the night, the evil begins claiming their lives one by one....

All slightly typical fare, with some inspiration by "The Haunting," no doubt. The characters are all likable, though, and the movie can be entertaining at times. Yet ridiculuous explanations to legitimize what's happening, some loose ends, and a predictable play-out all make the movie below-average. Like, what ever happened to Laurie (Marie Louise Weller), and why did A) Ray (Andrew Pine) give up so easily on helping her, and B) why didn't he tell Felicia (Lynne Moody) in the next scene? That was my biggest problem with the movie, along with the scene where Caroline finds CJ, Laurie, and Ray possessed. She (supposedly) drove the evil out of them, but I was just sort of left unsatisfied by the fact that the scene didn't seem to matter by the next scene. The rest I can deal with. As for the climax....Well, it was an okay idea. ("The Beyond" had the same idea, of the hotel being over one of the seven gates of Hell.) But unlike "The Beyond" this movie executed that idea in a pretty weak manner. The Devil just didn't seem to threatening to me. Seemed a bit more like a child molester than the epitome of all evil.

Alright, you could do worse. And I could have done far worse when I rented this. I suppose if you can get past the plot holes, the terribly cheesy music (especially that way-too-happy music in the ultra-cheesy ending!), the excessive deaths-by-execution, and the somewhat weak climax, you may enjoy this.

"The Evil" is a fun 70's horror movie. Low budget, cool location, some attractive and familiar cast members, the comforting presence of Richard Crenna, a fabulous troll-like Buono cameo...all add up to a demonic good time if you're in the mood for it. And check out those slacks on Andrew Prine--are those Angel's Flight pants you're wearing?? (Anybody remember those disco-era items?)