O Ente Diabólico

British exploitation filmmaker Norman J. Warren sure knew how to lay on the gratuitous shocks -- thick and fast. On "TERROR" he doesn't disappoint. In what is definitely the most fun, I've had with a Warren film. With that in mind, his previous 1977 "PREY" would still be my favorite. It's hard not to think Warren was influenced by Dario Argento's "SUSPIRIA", in what clearly looks a crude, downbeat and cheap knockoff.

Anyhow, Warren does the best, with what's in front of him. Working with such a stringy plot where clichés form the basis. It's easy to see what we get are set-pieces looking to shock and thrill. As the build-up of those highly-charged moments (with an ominously dynamic electronic score) are far more enticing, than that of the thinly detailed dramas in between. Well, outside of a few amusing moments caught on a film-set. The actual central story involving a witch cursing the family descendents of those who burned her at the stake remains an afterthought --- almost becoming a shadow to the mean-spirited violence and nightmarish absurdity. I must say best not to delve too deep into the narrative, as making sense is the furthest thing on mind. Even the lead performances of John Nolan and Carolyn Courage are fairly po-faced, but, I guess, it's only natural when there's no escaping your foretold doom. At least there are colourful minor supports, like Glynis Barber and Elaine Ives-Cameron. Another bright inclusion was the posters of "THRILLER: A CRUEL PICTURE" (1973) and Warren's "SATAN'S SLAVE" (1976) making their way into a few shots. Sure the former poster would bring a smile to cult-fans.

Like most of Warren's presentations, pacing can be bumpy, yet his nonchalant handling, atmospheric lighting and use of authentic locations pays off. What starts slow and conventional by playing out like a slasher / giallo --- gradually begins to go off the rails when the supernatural fury of our string-pulling entity comes to the forefront, where each death madly outdoes the last. It's well worth-the-wait, as during the creative third act when the action returns to the cottage, there are some crazy stunts, like the evaluating car and maniac light-show climax.

He didn't make Hammer rip-offs and he didn't make counterfeit Amicus flicks, either. Norman J. Warren created a horror sub-genre instead, and "Terror" is the second best of these while "Prey" is the best. Though this was clearly inspired by "Suspiria" and equally ropey in terms of structure, is is still an entertaining hour and a half.

The opening film-within-a-film, a witch burning sequence, has better production values than the rest of this shocker, but it is, nevertheless, a graphic slasher (for its time) that takes some risks. Most of the murders are knife murders and we get lots of knife POV's and a procession of red herrings. A car lifted off the ground and up into a forest canopy shows some creativity and a poor sod impaled on spikes notches another one up for bloody horror.

Despite good transfers, the Warren films still look ugly because they were not lit too well. Some of the interiors are overexposed and the hard lighting looks more accidental than planned. The performances range from adequate to somnambulistic (perhaps intentionally) and the electronic score (by Ivor Slaney) is more noisy than musical.

Worth seeing, sure, but not anything groundbreaking.

There's not much to like about Norman J. Warren's work…. 'Inseminoid' (a.ka Horror Planet) was like the lamest Alien rip-off ever made and 'Satan's Slave' was a dreadfully tedious vehicle about a devil-worshiping cult (it starred horror maestro Michael Gough, but still…). To think those two disappointment almost held me from watching this 'Terror'! This film is Warren's finest achievement! A modestly produced, but blood-soaked and nasty horror film that'll keep you entertained for a good 80 minutes. The plot of 'Terror' is standard shlock, handling about a film producer who inadvertently awakened the spirit of an ancestral witch while shooting a film about his own family's history. Things start to go horribly wrong the film premieres in the old family mansion and the young niece gets possessed with the witch's soul. The film doesn't contain the slightest bit of continuity and numerous murders are completely random. Not one horror lover will complain about this, though, since every single slashing is darn gruesome and presented with the nastiest make-up effects possible. There are a few (beautiful) young girls stabbed to death and pinned to a tree, a film crew member is crushed by the set pieces, a cop is road-killed by his own car and there are multiple neat close-ups of slit throats and severed corpses! Every killing is a horror feast and – sometimes – that's all there is needed to satisfy fans of the genre. At some points, Warren even succeeds in creating tension through atmospheric camera-work! How about that? The sequence where the blond girl is chased through the woods almost feels like 'The Blair Witch Project' 20 years ahead of its time! Although the film doesn't feature an actual climax (everybody dies…period!) or no depth in general, it's still receives warm recommendation thanks to the bright dialogue, stunning camera-work and loads of fun it delivers.

A witch's curse causes bad things to happen to all the people involved in the production of a horror movie and the witch herself might have possessed one of its stars.

Clearly inspired by the work of Dario Argento, Terror is one of those movies where it's best to leave logic at the door and enjoy the gory set pieces and colorful lighting. It starts off slow and even frustrating since there's not a lot of plot or character development to latch on to, but something happens midway through where, if you just turn off your brain and go along for the ride, you'll have a good time.

When Norman J.Warren (auteur of such shrill, purposely gruesome films as Inseminoid) and exploitation stalwart David McGillivray got together in the late seventies to create this low-budget shocker, the end result could only be a solid winner, and TERROR delivers the goods. It's not for all tastes, but the effective atmosphere (Warren had obviously seen a few Dario Argento films, which helps) and the well-staged scenes of death and supernatural mayhem in the last half of the film are worth the price of admission alone. It's certainly head and shoulders above the 'typical' British horror films of the day - such as Alan Birkinshaw's atrocious KILLER'S MOON and THE LEGACY, a tedious schlock-fest in which Who vocalist Roger Daltrey dies during a trachaeotomy to remove a fishbone he never ate(!) - and the widescreen photography, coupled with appropriately garish colours courtesy of (one assumes) outmoded film stock, looks superb. There's also a neat cameo from Milton Reid, one of those "I know his face, but what's his name?" actors if ever there was one, and a decapitation set-piece that curiously plays like a low-budget homage to David Warner's grisly death in THE OMEN, whilst pointing the way forward to the lift-shaft carnage in that film's lackluster sequel. This is a solid-gold classic example of the kind of film that would never get made nowadays, anywhere, and will undoubtedly bring back fond memories of late-night horror double features down at the local fleapit for British viewers of a certain age.