I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Sadly Over-hyped

Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Curse of The Crimson Altar, as it's known in the UK, is very loosely based on a story by H.P. Lovecraft - The Dreams In The Witch House. But it's a pretty poor movie overall and the winter night shooting could only have contributed to Boris Karloff's worsening emphysema - in fact he caught pneumonia while filming. Christopher Lee actually looks as if he WANTS to catch pneumonia, and Barbara Steele, in her only British horror movie, is totally wasted.Curse concerns Mark Eden's search for his missing brother, and Eden's zero charisma performance is what helps sink the movie from the beginning. Years later he was to end up as Rita Fairclough's murderous partner in Coronation Street, memorably expiring under a Blackpool Tram! If only that had happened here.Eden's character Robert Manning soon makes his way to Greymarsh Village, where he encounters Christopher Lee's Squire Morley, who seems remarkably liberal to let a wild party take place in his mansion while he quietly reads upstairs! Cue scenes of people painting each other...After Virginia Wetherall's character utters she's expecting Boris Karloff to show up - he promptly does! So we're soon introduced to Boris and his collection of torture implements. Karloff may have been in poor health but he still outshines everyone else. He is, of course, just a red herring. Along the way we've been watching She Hulk and her portly assistant in an antlers and leather thong combo prepare for some diabolical rite. Lovecraft's original tale concerned a trans-dimensional witch and her monstrous human-faced rat familiar Brown Jenkin. Yep, superior for me to She Hulk and Antler Man, any day.For the 876th time in horror films, the mansion grows up in flames at the end. And for the first time in horror films Christopher Lee turns into a woman - the witch Lavinia, who has apparently been possessing him. Bet Lee was chuffed with that...

I'm neither old enough to have seen this sort of horror at the time (barely born, in fact) nor a real horror fan, but this came up late on BBC2.The opening scene is nicely weird enough, with various symbols of witchcraft, with various symbols in sorts of colourful panto vignettes and then soon settles into normal life, old cars, Britishness and all that.Looking for his disappeared brother, Robert Manning (a fairly ordinary, nice Mark Eden) drives off to this lodge, from where his brother's last letter was addressed from. On the way up, he is told that the village in question is holding an anniversary witchcraft celebration and finds cars of men chasing a girl running through the woods.Reaching the Lodge, the owner, one J D Morley (Peter Cushing, no less) naturally denies any knowledge but offers him a room for the night. As one (naturally) does, in a big, strange old house, where there was a party that involved painting young lady's breasts (and similar!), Manning accepts. A joke with one young seductress about 'the sort of old house from the movies, where Boris Karloff appears' is nicely tongue-in- cheek, as the other big star here, is indeed, Karloff himself.He plays a wheelchair-bound professor, who's hobby is collecting instruments of torture. And, of course there's a dodgy chauffeur who goes around shooting at things in the woods (including 'our' man) and who so happens to be mute and an even stranger caretaker. Them there's loads of kaleidoscopic hallucinatory nightmares, with electronically distorted sound FX that our Robert suffers, which are interesting, at least. Then he toddles off, sleepwalking down to the local graveyard.It's all hoary nonsense, of course, but whilst a bit dated, there's enough interesting characters played by interesting - and/or sexy people, if you get my drift, for the film to remain entertaining and enjoyable.I'd give the actual film 5/10 for its real merit and maybe 7 for the other, entertainment aspects, as I've outlined. I don't think many fans of this genre would be too disappointed either and for them it's definitely worth checking out.

Not sure if this is a "Hammer Horror" but it sure feels like it and goes head to head with any of their better 70s Gothic style out put. The main protagonist is set on journey to find his missing brother and ends up at a typical Gothic spooky castle where he walks into a swinging psychedelic party. The new guest is invited to stay and the weirdness unfolds with an odd homage/festival in honor of a witch burned at the stake some 300 years prior and in strange pagan ritualistic dream sequences. All in all there is some really nice set pieces, excellent cinematography and wonderful performances by an all star cast of genre regulars. Highly recommended for any fan of Hammer Horrors, euro-horror and any late 60s/70s cult films.

When Robert Manning doesn't hear from his brother for some time, he sets off to look for him to make sure he is alright. He travels to a remote country house where his brother was staying when he last was in touch with Robert. He finds a strange place with relaxed young people engaging in ceremonies and two older men living out their years as country gents (Morley and Prof Marsh). The place does have a slightly odd feel to it but that is so often the way with such isolated places and Robert puts this out of his mind with the help of Morley's attractive and bubbly niece Eve. The mystery of his brother's location remains though and for some reason Robert has started having very odd dreams.A strange affair this film. Like many others I was attracted to this by the top billing given to Karloff and Lee, hoping that it would be a classic horror worthy of their names. What it actually is though is a rather dated 1960's British horror movie that has a simple mystery plot spiced up with the star names, bits of nudity, drug use, young people and so on. As a total product its main value comes from being a curio piece rather than anything else as it doesn't actually thrill, scare, mystify or really even engage all that much. It isn't awful by any means but it is just the type of British horror movie that one feels was pushed out for the sake of making it as one of countless others – sure nobody pretends it is that good, but at least we're still making them. It is helped by the weird atmosphere that makes it at least distinctive. The colourful lights, the use of colour as part of the Gothic rather than the shadow I thought worked reasonably well, but these are not enough.The story does drag a bit as it has little to offer and it is hard to escape the feeling that 1960's material of drugs and kids have been added along with certain S&M-inspired design in the dream sequences to give the film a feeling of freshness and originality. If it worked back then it doesn't really now as I just felt like these were slotted in regardless of the film – just to get this effect. The two lead names are both reasonably good – nothing to really get their teeth into but they are both still good presences and seem to enjoy themselves. If only the former could be said of Eden, who looks and acts more like someone who should be doing TV adverts of the period – not leading such a film. But I suppose, in his defence, he is the type of person that often lead this type of film while the "stars" were in the darker roles rather than being narrative devices such as Robert. Steele is weirdly sexual as the witch while Wetherell doesn't really have the looks or charisma to be a good person for the Eve character.It is not awful though and that is worth repeating since I have pointed out lots of weakness without a lot of praise going back the other way. It does have a weirdly dated feel to it that is quite nice, while the star names are a massive draw for any fan – just a shame that ultimately it is quite straightforward and seems to have been made with a certain amount of "production line" mentality. A curio piece then that has some entertainment value but is not what the Karloff/Lee banner would make you hope for.