Tuesday, July 16, 2013

The Witch's Curse (1962)

Maciste shows up in Scotland in the dark ages (16th century or so) to help a village remove a witch's curse.  It's making all the women go crazy.  No one seems surprised at all to see him there.  Which is one of the charms of the movie.
This has been called a remake of HERCULES IN THE HAUNTED WORLD, a movie I've tried to watch several times.  It's not bad, but it is rather overrated.

Maciste enters the Underworld to free Martha Gaunt's soul from being cursed.  He is opposed by the minister that sent the original Martha Gaunt to Hell, and by Martha herself.  Unfortunately, Martha falls for our hero despite herself.  One can guess how this ends...
The movie makes use of a couple other peplums, notably ATLAS IN THE LAND OF THE CYCLOPS done with some skillful editing to make you think is Gordon Mitchell. When originally viewed late at night on TV, a casual fan would probably never know there was a difference, even if they'd seen the earlier movie.
The print Something Weird has is decent, though a fullscreen version.  it's watchable, just like the movie!

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