I lunghi capelli della morte

I've just recently discovered the Italian horror film. This one is pretty decent. I could have been much improved with a little effort at editing. Everything is set up nicely for revenge. You have the evil of witch burning as an innocent victim is set afire. She curses the people who put her there and we all know she'll be back. Nasty stuff begins to happen in the dukedom as the plague begins to decimate the population. The bad guys prosper pretty well, isolated from the rest of the rabble, but then a young woman (Barbaba Steele) returns. To keep her quiet, the patriarch of the castle pushed her off a cliff. She comes back to help her sister who has been forced into an ugly marriage with the young master. There are a series of efforts to kill this woman and things come to a satisfactory ending for the audience. The problem is the pacing. It drags on and on. There are these meandering trips through the castle, seemingly going nowhere. The whole effort to cover up a murder seems so convoluted. Let's just say there are simpler ways to go about these things, especially when you wield a lot of power. Still, I mostly liked it. Visually it is interesting and the acting is quite good.

Being a fan of Italian horror, particularly from the 50s and 60s, I was looking forward to this film having recently located a copy of it. However, it was somewhat disappointing. Most European horrors from this era don't move terribly fast, so a slow pace was neither surprising nor a problem in and of itself. This one, however, lacked something to keep it very interesting. The atmosphere wasn't bad; there was a castle and tomb that looked alright. The mood just didn't live up to expectations. It lacked the spooky feel of the greater films of this type such as Mario Bava's Black Sunday and Black Sabbath.

The plot, roughly, concerns a supposed witch burned at the stake in the late 1400s. She vows revenge, which it is assumed will take form in her two daughters, one of which being Barbara Steele (Black Sunday, Shivers, Castle of Blood). Barbara is as lovely as ever, particularly her long black hair. I prefer not to say more since I personally like seeing a film knowing as little as possible about it. The plot is nothing new anyway; originality in plot is rarely ever the reason fans of the macabre watch this type of film anyway.

For fans of gothic horror, and Barbara Steele, this is worth seeing though I would not say it is at the top of the list.

The Long Hair of Death was one of the cycle of Gothic horror films released by Italian studios in the 1960's. Like the majority of them, it was filmed in black and white for budget reasons although from today's perspective this does give the film a certain atmosphere and classy look. Set in the 15th century, a young woman is accused of being a witch and is burned to death. She casts a curse on the house of the men responsible and returns from the grave many years later to enact deadly revenge.

The director here was Antonio Margheriti working under his anglicised moniker Anthony Dawson. Margheriti was a director who made films in most of the Italian genres, from peplums and spaghetti westerns to gialli and poliziotteschi amongst others. He displays some care with the Gothic horror genre taking care to build a moody atmosphere and slowly constructing the story. But the main draw here is probably Barbara Steele. This British actress was the queen of the 60's Gothic horror film, appearing in movies from both sides of the Atlantic although she is primarily associated with the Italian strain of the sub-genre. Her strong, seductive features were perfectly suited to these films and, once again, she is more aggressor than victim here.

This is a fairly typical entry in the Italian Gothic sub-set. It's a solid entry, if not in the upper bracket. It does have some well-staged scenes and nice location photography though and it ends on a satisfyingly macabre note. While it obviously benefits considerably by the presence of Steele. The title doesn't really mean an awful lot but it sounds good.

Well, it's obvious that The Long Hair of Death takes a lot of its influence from the Mario Bava masterpiece 'Black Sunday', but even so; Antonio Margheriti's film manages to deliver a good horror story in its own right. The plot is pretty much your classic Gothic horror yarn, and focuses on a small village. A woman is accused of being a witch and promptly put to death. However, her eldest daughter knows the real reason for her death revolves around the lord, and she's promptly killed also. The youngest daughter survives and is taken in by the murderous lord's family, eventually marrying his son. Soon after, a deadly plague threatens the village; and the older daughter reappears to avenge her mother's death. The main standout of this movie is definitely the atmosphere - director Antonio Margheriti does an excellent job of giving the movie a foreboding feel through the eerie black and white cinematography and the imposing sets. The plot can drag a bit at times, which is a shame; and so it's lucky that Margheriti was able to give the film an atmosphere as it keeps it going when the plot takes a downturn.

Another standout about this film is, of course, the fact that it has a leading role for Barbara Steele. Of course, she was almost certainly cast because of her success in Black Sunday, and as such; this isn't her greatest performance, but she's always nice to see and she does play the resurrected woman well. It does quite often seem like Margheriti is dragging the plot out and this is a shame as the film is overlong as a result and it has to be said that The Long Hair of Death would have benefited from a shorter running time. Antonio Margheriti made some good films in his career, though the fact that he doesn't get good recognition along with the likes of Sergio Martino and Lucio Fulci doesn't surprise me. This film was released in between Margheriti's successes with The Virgin of Nuremberg and Dance Macabre, and although I prefer both of the mentioned films; this one is still worth seeing for the Italian Gothic horror fan. The film boils down to a somewhat predictable ending, but it's a nice ride getting there and overall, despite the fact that The Long Hair of Death may not be the most successful film of it's type - it's still worth a watch.

"I lunghi capelli della morte" by Antonio Margheriti is a classic b/w Gothic movie. Take a flickering candle, go down into the crypt, past the spider webs - and you wouldn't be surprised if Bela Lugosi was lurking in the shadow. Actually it's Barbara Steele which you can't complain about, either. Giorgio Ardisson plays Kurt, the son of a Count, who commits a murder, blames it on a witch, the witch is burnt and leaves a terrible curse behind - maybe the story is not something new, but it matters most in this movie to show how a man is slowly trapped in a revenge plan - so slowly that for most of the running time, he doesn't even realize the torment already began. That not much is happening, as sometimes reviewers do say, is done on purpose: Kurt would like to move, but he is becoming aware more and more of his helplessness, his inability to hide. "I lunghi capelli della morte" is a movie with intensity, atmosphere and beauty in its black and white imagery, and while I just wanted to check out the first chapter for the disc quality when the DVD arrived in the mail, I ended up watching it till the end - it was mesmerizing and really that good. Fans of the genre, don't miss it!