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I saw this film years ago when it used to air on independent TV stations in the afternoon & haven't seen it since. Pity because this is a good film. Unfortunately, it never made it to video.

In the early years of Reed's career he did mostly horror films where he was the "true Phantom Menace". He had a distintive glare that became his trademark. Well, he shows all that & then some in this film. This story centers around insanity, murder & family skeletons in the closet or in this case, in the shuttered room.

If you like "Jane Eyre", I think you will like this one.

weird hearing Sutherland's voice coming out of Zebulon odd casting two Brits in film as well as location Australian, Americans double for Young how'd she get bra back on? cool ending with aunt and 'thing' "The Shuttered Room" is a very good horror movie. It's consistently creepy and offered a few surprises.

The film is difficult to place. While some of the cast are Americans and the countryside looks a bit American (especially with the American car which is prominently seen throughout the film). But, the film also features some Brits and at least on Aussie--giving the film a rather strange pedigree. But, this is a minor concern.

"The Shuttered Room" begins in the past. Some weird creature is living in a house and has escaped--and Dad rushes off to return it to its attic lair. Now the film jumps ahead about 20 years. The young child in the beginning of the film has grown (now played by Carol Lynley) and has returned to this weird village after having been removed and raised in New York soon after the initial scene. She has now returned with her husband (Gig Young) to reclaim her home--one that apparently has sat gathering dust during this intervening period. But the family matriarch (Flora Robson) warns them not to enter the home...it's cursed! While you know that they will eventually move in to the home, in the meantime another evil force is afoot. The lady's cousin (Oliver Reed) is a bit of a sociopath and he and his friends seem bent on rape and/or murder--all for 'kicks'! So who should the couple fear--the cousin, the 'thing that is in the attic' or both?

Overall, the film does a great job of setting a creepy mood and providing lots of terror for the couple. The acting isn't bad, though the idea of Young playing an action hero seemed a bit silly--as did the bad use of a double in his fight scenes (it's so obviously NOT him). Howver, the good easily outweighs the bad and it's well worth your time if you like creepy movies...and I do.

By the way, early in the film it was rather disconcerting to hear Zebulon speak, as it clearly was NOT his voice but Donald Sutherland's! I am not sure why they had him dub this man, but he is listed in the IMDb credits for this.

The Shuttered Room is an entertaining, sporadically suspenseful mystery-chiller which gets great mileage from a clutch of good performances. Out the four leading characters, only Carol Lynley seems misplaced. Gig Young, Flora Robson and Oliver Reed are all spot-on, especially Reed who simply excels as a lecherous thug. The story is atmospheric and unsettling, though the solution at the end resorts to an overused "monster-in-the-closet" explanation, which actually slightly damages the whole movie.

Young plays a middle-aged smoothie who has recently wed a much younger blonde bombshell (Lynley). She is amiable enough, but has frequent panic attacks related to something or someone that scared the hell out of her when she was still a baby. Young persuades her to return to the small, isolated community of her birthplace and to re-unite with the old family, hoping that by confronting her past she will be able to find out what caused her trauma and get over it. However, it turns out to be something rather threatening....

The film is nicely paced, with few tedious moments. It is well photographed too. The film has a dated look, with fashion, music and dialogue very much of its time (though, of course, that would be hard to avoid). However, for those who prefer their horror movies with subtle chills and a spooky build-up (none of that modern Hollywood gore and special effects-wizardry) this is a worthwhile experience.

I mirror the comments of the plethora of those before me. Saw this as a 9-year-old on the telly and it stayed with me for a long time. The suffocatingly Gothic overtones, lovingly twisted POV camera-work, evocative jazz score and wonderfully creepy, dilapidated locations still spiral through my brain from time to time. Perhaps most memorable are Oliver Reed's warped, leering eyes staring at a helpless Carol Lynley through the dollhouse window, which has to be one of the more simultaneously terrifying and arty shots from any horror movie of the past 30 years.

This is a flick where the sum of the parts may not quite match the individual moments, but what a bunch of moments they are. The extended cat and mouse stalking of Lynley, the bizarre and frightening secret in the basement, Gig Young and Oliver Reed's spot-on hammy genre acting, the moody cinematography; it all adds up to a movie any fan of Gothic or horror will definitely want to check out. Surprisingly tense and graphic given the era; easily one of the more suggestively violent movies I ever saw on local channels during daylight hours in the 1970s, and considerably more graphic than PSYCHO but clearly owing a debt to it. Quintessential movie for Oliver Reed and Carol Lynley fans; among their best, most interesting work on celluloid.

Creepy! This is an unfairly unappreciated and extremely effective Gothic horror flick from the late 60's. It is also one of the better attempts to bring literary mastermind H.P. Lovecraft to the screen. The acting is magnificent! Carol Lynley and Gig Young are in top form as the bewildered young couple whose arrival in the small, tranquil village seems to trigger off a series of bizarre and ultimately deadly occurences. Veteran character actress Flora Robson is genuinely affecting as the strange old lady who seems to know a great deal more than she's telling about the secret that's hidden away in THE SHUTTERED ROOM. Oliver Reed is appropriately menacing as a young roughneck. This one is a little tough to find these days. It's not readily available in video stores, and though once popular on late night television, they rarely run it on TV. But should you be so fortunate to come across it, don't pass it up!