Slow-moving Roger Corman-directed AIP horror flick that has that classic feel. This is mainly due to Boris Karloff's presence as a brooding Baron who has secluded himself in his seaside spooky castle but there's also a witch, a young Dick Miller as Boris' servant, a face-meltdown, a bird that eats eyeballs right out of your head and enough other creepy elements to make this one watchable. There's also some twists at the end which make it worthwhile. Jack Nicholson does an OK job as a bewitched French soldier before growing his hair out and heading off to make all those great biker flicks later on in the 60s. The plot itself is just a variation on Edgar Allen Poe stories which Corman had already made(HOUSE OF USHER and PIT AND THE PENDULUM) and which are actually better movies so go watch them first.
Francis Ford Coppola helped shoot this and it's been claimed that it was all shot in 4 days but apparently that was just the scenes with Karloff.
Being in the public domain this movie is in just about every cheap-ass horror DVD set out there right alongside NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD.
AKA THE CASTLE OF TERROR and THE HAUNTING(released-to-TV-version)
There's a bunch of shitty-artwork VHS releases of this:
Here's one from my collection:
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