Scott LeBrun So says Eric Hartman (John Ireland), a horror film director making a movie about the "real life" occult-related murders that occurred in the mansion where he and his crew are now working. The old caretaker, a man named Edgar Price (John Carradine) warns them that they shouldn't be messing with things they don't understand. A cast & crew member named David (Jerry Strickler) decides to read from a "Tibetan Book of the Dead" because he finds it fascinating - but we all know that's always a huge no-no in any story like this. Hartman spends a lot of time dealing with difficult cast members - Gayle Dorian (ever lovely Faith Domergue, in one of her final film roles) and Christopher Millan (Charles Macaulay) - and other problems, and eventually the filmmakers begin to be murdered by a returnee from the grave.This is irresistible to a point, at least for any B movie lover who relishes the truly old fashioned "old dark house" type horror films; the location chosen here is fantastic, and director / co-writer Paul Harrison and company milk it for as much atmosphere as possible. They do give it a modern touch with a fair bit of gore. Certainly some viewers may grow impatient with all the set-up - it isn't until the final third that things really get rolling. Another review here mentioned this movie in the same breath as "Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things", which is quite on-the-money. There was a long wait for the payoff in that movie as well. Still, this is fun and amusing and ultimately worth sticking with. The veteran cast makes a difference: Ireland, Domergue, and Carradine are all great. Irelands' character is a real s.o.b., to boot! Macaulay is a hoot as Christopher and Carole Wells is a looker as Anne the ingénue.Among those playing the victims in the nifty opening credits sequence are stuntman Charles Bail and future cinematographer Ronald Victor Garcia, who was the art director here. The cinematographer on "The House of Seven Corpses" is Don Jones, who was also a director of movies such as "Schoolgirls in Chains" and "The Forest". And B movie legend Gary Kent was the production manager and one of the associate producers. The choral music is composed by Robert Emenegger, and it's hilariously unsubtle stuff.All in all, a reasonably enjoyable outing with an interesting finish.Seven out of 10.

LeonLouisRicci For Horror Completest only, this is not an awful attempt at making a low-budget Horror Movie about the making of a low-budget Horror Movie. But it is too confusing in Plot development and is an erratic and disjointed delivery of an incoherent Storyline.This does have a few ironic Scenes but the Movie within the Movie contains the best Violent and disturbing Horror Movie turns and since it is known that these are being filmed there is a total lack of scariness.There are elements of a good First-Draft Script here that seems abandon and rushed. The layers are thin and the in-comprehensiveness is just too much to make this an enjoyable Entertainment. Not enough incompetence to make it a Good Bad Movie and not enough Professionalism to make it anything more than a lifeless look inside the backside of B-Movie Making.

sol ***SPOILERS*** Making a low budget horror movie at the haunted Beal House director Eric Hartman,John Ireland,is having trouble with the script until one of his assistants David, Jerry Strickland, find a book in the Beal family library "The Tibetan book of the Dead". Inspired by the "Book of the Dead's" contents Hartman starts filming feeling it will give him the inspiration to make his somewhat B or third string like horror movie into an all time cinematic classic. What in fact the new script did was bring back the ghost from the past, the Beal family, to recreate the terrible situations that lead to the deaths that they suffered in the house to Hartman and his cast and crew!We already see what happened to the Beals at the very beginning of the movie and it wasn't pretty! It's as Hartman starts to direct his classic strange things begin to happen that's not exactly in the script. Like the star of the film former Hollywood glamor queen now washed up second rate actress Gayle Dorla's, Faith Domergue, pet cat Cleon disappearing.Cleon was later found in pieces on the lawn as Gayle was being filmed in a scene of hers in the movie. It's the creepy house caretaker Edger Price, a word play with the names Edger Allan Poe & Vincent Price, played by John Carradine who's on to what's really going on in the house. But in fear for his life Price keeps it secret. That in the fear that he may well end up becoming one of the house's future victims!****SPOILERS**** Watching the film you don't exactly know what's happening on the screen. Are the events real or make believe or acting on the film crews part. That's until the very end when it becomes very apparent that the past horrors of the real Beal House and family were being duplicated and are the real McCoy not just part of Hartman's movie. Careaker Price who did everything to prevent the carnage from happening became the house first victim! After that everything that we've seen at the beginning of the movie,the Bael family murders, happens to director Hartman and his crew of actors and stage hands. What rattled Hartman more then anything else, even the deaths of his cast and crew, was that he found the film of his masterpiece movie had been exposed and now completely worthless! With his life work now slated for the trash can all Hartman could do is wait for the inevitable to happen. That's with a heavy some 100 pound movie camera unit dropped from the balcony of the Bael House on his head by this Ghoul Man, Wills Boad, who was conjured up by the "Book of the Dead". And with that finally putting the by now emotionally and mentally destroyed Eric Hartman out of his misery!

daleja-dale I saw this Schockley horror film a half of dozen times since the 1970's and although anyone who seen it would have to admit it very flawed, it to me was a lot of fun to watch! It is an old school type of horror film,doesn't go to far with the blood and gore and relies on spooky atmosphere, music, and sound effects! And man was that atmosphere spooky, especially the opening score! In my own personal opinion, the opening score was one of the spookiest ever in a horror film, and I have seen many! The music from the chorus, the creepy looking house and paintings, the sound effects, and showing how each Beale family member died make that intro very, very, scary! If the rest of the film was as good as the introduction this film would have been a classic, but they didn't seem to want it to be that way! But, for some reason, I still love this film and hope someday they make a remake of it, with the same atmosphere, music, sound effects and creepy mansion, this time focusing on the Beale Family and what lead to their demise!