Truly Dreadful Film

Good concept, poorly executed.

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

An aging Boris Karloff, prince of cut-price horror classics of yesteryear, is Professor Montserrat, a washed-up old psychologist with specialism in hypnotherapy. His scientific reputation was destroyed years before, and no one takes him seriously any more. Mike (a young Ian Ogilvy)is a slightly bored, dissolute man who is picked up in a Wimpy bar (remember those?) by the old eccentric to be taken back to the lair (an old apartment) where he lives with his wife, Estelle. They want to recruit him for their experiment, which contrary to usual rate of scientific progress is immediately a resounding success. Why someone who isn't high or possessed of a sub-standard IQ would go along with a strange old man who introduces himself by saying "You look very bored, young man" is anybody's guess. While the dialogue overall isn't bad, this particular scene made me burst out laughing, which wasn't the intention on the director's part, methinks. I guess they wanted to get into the meat of the story as quickly as possible, but the set-up was very clumsily handled. Some classic 60's psychedelia ensues, with lava lamp-style colour swirls, funky sound effects and camera work where the shot zooms in and out to signify something druggy going on. This is probably the least effective part of the film, as this sort of thing was done ad nauseum in the 60's.This scene signifies that Mike has been successfully hypnotised, and mysteriously this allows the Montserrats to link their minds to Mike's. They test out their level of detection and control before sending him away with an instruction to forget, none the wiser to his bizarre experience. Professor Montserrat dreams of using his procedure to do good, but his wife, it turns out, has other ideas. She yearns for increasingly unpleasant vicarious experiences at Mike's expense, and there is seemingly no way out for Mike or Professor Montserrat, who is physically and mentally powerless to prevent his increasingly deranged wife from committing second-hand acts of evil. Incredible to think that, although Boris Karloff died just 2 years after the release of The Sorcerers, he starred in another 9 titles (3 of them released after his death). Aspects of British 60's youth culture are nicely portrayed in this film, particularly the live music club scene and the attitudes toward personal relationships peculiar to the era; Mike's increasingly eccentric behaviour goes almost unnoticed by his friends, because he is apparently a 'complicated' person. All in all, I quite enjoyed this vintage horror film, and I'm quite prepared to overlook some of the more unimaginative elements (mentioned above) in favour of a rather good core horror concept (the evil inherent in controlling other people against their will) and a deliciously malevolent performance by Catherine Lacey.

An elderly hypnotist (Boris Karloff) develops a new technique that allows him to not only control the mind of a person but also share their experiences. In an unintentionally hilarious scene, Karloff approaches a young man about participating in his experiment ("I can offer you an unusual evening..."). When the guy agrees, Karloff and his wife (Catherine Lacey) hook him up to their machine, put him under hypnosis, and start controlling his every move. Soon the wife starts enjoying the power she has over the young man a bit too much.Interesting and sometimes fun British thriller (not really a horror movie, despite its listing as such). It's slow-going but with some decent atmosphere and good performances. Catherine Lacey delightfully hams it up as the villain. Karloff is solid as always. Ian Ogilvy is fine as the man the old couple controls. Susan George has a small part as one of his girlfriends. It's a decent movie, especially for this point in Karloff's career. His fans will likely enjoy it more than most.

The Sorcerers is directed by Michael Reeves who also co-writes the screenplay with Tom Baker from an original idea written by John Burke. It stars Boris Karloff, Ian Ogilvy, Catherine Lacey, Victor Henry and Elizabeth Ercy. Music is by Paul Ferris and cinematography by Stanley A. Long.When aged scientist Marcus Monserrat (Karloff) tries a new hypnosis machine on bored young man Mike Roscoe (Ogilvy), he and his wife find they can control his actions and experience what he is experiencing. Initially this breakthrough is a rewarding one, but Marcus' wife Estelle (Lacey) wants more and soon things start to get decidedly amoral.Michael Reeves sadly died of an accidental drug overdose aged just 25, this having crafted the Cruel Britania brilliance that was Witchfinder General. Prior to that he helmed The Sorcerers, an equally great production, a sci-fi horror fusion that pulses with a pessimistic tone. There's no great budget for the talented young director to work with, but it barely matters, in fact it benefits the film greatly, as the two elders (Karloff wonderful, Lacey magnificent) live vicariously through Roscoe's (Ogilvy fresh faced and perfectly exuding a bored man after further thrills) misadventures. But the kicker here is that it is Karloff's scientist who recognises things are going out of control, and it is he who strives to stop his obsessed wife from committing heinous acts.Set to the backdrop of swinging sixties London, with mini skirts, Brit pop music and Norton motorbikes firm period reminders, The Sorcerers captures the zeitgeist of the time. Blending psychedelia with sci-fi and amoral horror with wistful yearnings, film comes out as an original piece of work. Thematically, as has been noted by the critics who have afforded this under seen classic some time, it says youth is wasted on the young while also planting us the film viewer in the metaphor chair. If Reeves was being caustic we will never know, sadly, but it does bear thinking about in light of how horror films, and their blood thirsty fans, would evolve come the millennium. Michael Reeves a visionary?From Lacey bringing one of horror's forgotten monsters to life, to a no cop out ending of pure bleakness, The Sorcerers never lets up on gnawing away at the senses. An original film made by an original director, and deserving of more widespread exposure. 8/10

The once great hypnotist Prof Marcus Montserrat has fallen on hard times since being ridiculed by the press. He now lives in a tiny flat with his loyal wife, selling his services in the window of newsagents. His master project of mind control sits without a subject until wife Estelle hits on the idea of offering the mind-control device as some sort of wild new trip to a generally disaffected youth looking for the next thrill. With this they manage to recruit one Mike Roscoe and find that they can influence his actions and also experience the sensations that he is feeling, whether it is washing his hands or the flutter of desire for a young woman. The power of the device demonstrated, Marcus has plans for the direction it will go but Estelle finds the ability to experience youthful sensations again in your young body to be a great gift that she is unwilling to part with so easily.Everything about this film screams that it will be poor. From the very start we learn that it is dated by throwing in so many "hip" aspects in an attempt to appeal to a younger audience while also being a film late in the life of Boris Karloff where it appears he has selected it because it means most of his scenes are done indoors. The gaudy colour/cinematography doesn't help either and within about ten minutes I could feel my brain writing this review already – dismissing it as a trashy piece of 60's trash, trading on "hip" clichés of youth and music while also alluding to better by having Karloff at the head of the cast. To some extent this first impression is correct because it is very much all of these things but yet it manages to have enough about the central plot to prevent it being a cheap and easy horror film but is something better.It does this by making the scenes with the Monsterrats the most important and engaging scenes in the film and all the 1960's trimmings and young people remain just that – trimmings. The real battle is occurring within this tiny front room and somehow the two cast members manage to make this work despite spending most of their time pretending to feel stuff or concentrating really hard with their eyes closed. Sure Karloff is the star here and does do good work but the film is stolen by a great turn from Catherine Lacey as his wife Estelle. Her fall into madness is well delivered and she becomes the dark heart to the story, even overpowering Karloff himself. Outside of these two the film is generic young people. Ogilvy does reasonably well to convince at being controlled, Ercy and Henry run around and Sheridan looks drop-dead gorgeous. As director Reeves is guilty of some obvious shots and places but when he is in the flat with just Lacey and Karloff, he does manage to produce a genuinely tense atmosphere that is maintained in that room all the way to the memorable final shot.The Sorcerers is not a perfect film by any means but it is much better than I thought it would be and much better than all the trimmings suggest it deserves to be. It has dated and is deliberately "hip" but it works thanks to Karloff, Lacey and some genuine tension in the confines of a grotty little flat.