Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Best British Western Ever ? The Witchfinder General, October 16, 2005
... or maybe the best horror western ever. What you make of this will depend on two things. How much you like old British horror and how much you know about the production of this particular film. When you realize that this is the last production of a young talented Director, Michael Reeves, who died (25 - accidental overdose) on the path to being one of the all time greatest film directors, and that this is his third, last and best film, you will under its value (as an example of his talent watch the shot in this film of young children cooking potatoes in the ashes of a `witch' that has just been burned). It is a notch above your average late 1960s early 1970s horror films. In fact it is a notch above nearly every British film making it one of the British modern classics.
The story is based on the real life times and crimes of the lawyer and Witchfinder General - Mathew Hopkins, who set about destroying alleged witches across England with the full power of the law. This film depicts the various acts of torture and trials conducted on witches making it an extremely important historical document (as a note the Western influence comes from the gallant long countryside horseback riding shots, mobs in the villages and things like gallows being erected in the same vein as the cowboy movies in the USA of that era. It WORKS extremely well!) It is also certainly the best rendition of such grim persecutions to date on the screen (US viewers should think Salem Witch Trials x 100).
There is an interesting plot involving a young soldier whose fiancée's father - a priest, is put on trial for witchcraft while the soldier is away. When the soldier returns he vows to track down Hopkins for the crimes he has committed against his wife and father and so the movie is essentially a story of revenge as this soldier chases Hopkins across the countryside passing through villages where Hopkins has been.
Some find this film hard to watch because of this subplot but stick with it because after the first twenty minutes or so the film really takes off. This is also Vincent Price in his best role ever and some would say his best work although the production values are somewhat low (a very restrictive budget with a young director practically making it by himself). Many of the scenes are underexposed, dirty, bad cuts, lots of zooms (a no-no in cinematography these days), daft credits that almost underexpose Hopkins face in the background and other elements of film making associated with tight finances. However ALL of the fight sequences and torture sequences are very well done. In fact some of those scenes had to be cut!
The real gem in this movie though is to know how much it has been through. The director set out to make one of the most violent films ever conceived in the UK. The UK censors immediately cut it to ribbons saying that it would shock the viewers too much. Also the US censors agreed that the violence should be toned down considerably but agreed that the US version could contain different takes with nude women. This led to several versions of the film over the years.
This review refers to the superb DVD version of the film. You can only currently get it on PAL but it contains 2 versions of the films, excellent bonus materials including documentaries, Empire Magazine's Kim Newman provides excellent production notes (best seen on any DVD to date), trailers and biographies. It is dirt cheap. Get it!
Anyway the DVD has 2 versions - The Directors Cut (featuring NO nude women and all the restored cuts) and the Export Version (featuring nude women and all the restored cuts). The VHS version is CUT. However this decade one scene was restored that was originally omitted from the screen version - of the infamous boot in the eye sequence. So all new VHS versions of the film have this restored... but the DVD has also restored - (1) A priest being tortured, (2) A women being slapped, (3)An extended version of the river dunking, (4)A witch missing her eye being tied up and burnt alive, (5)A woman being tortured and (6) the notorious axing sequence. Unfortunately these cut scenes had to be restored from a poor quality tape recording in the Director's own personal collection, so these cut scenes look very different from the quality of the actual film - however this is only a minor point given that the film is over 30 years old and was made on a shoe-string budget. The fact that we get to see these cuts at all on a DVD in SUBLIME for fans!
So for the first time ever - The Fully Restored - Witchfinder General as it was meant to be seen is now available!
CLASSIC!
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9 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
One of the Most Unspeakably VILE Works Ever Committed to Film!, August 13, 2006
Back in 1971 I saw CONQUEROR WORM on the bottom of a QUADRUPLE feature of horror films at the Venus Theatre in Houston, TX. I've never forgotten it. I've never been ABLE to. I think director Michael Reeves would be proud of that fact. I went in expecting a film with SOME sort of supernatural aspects. Instead I saw a "HISTORICAL Horror Film", depicting the real-life persecution and legalized MURDER of those who happen to be on the wrong side of the English Civil War. In the midst of it, Vincent Price plays the single most irredeemably EVIL [...] of his entire career!
AIP pulled a serious con job on US audiences by retitling WITCHFINDER GENERAL to try and pass it off as a "Poe" film. Apart from the rather appropriate excerpt read in his usual classic style by Price, it has nothing to do with Poe, and with its shoestring budget looks and feels nothing like any of the other films in AIP's series. We're talking down-and-dirty "realism" in the manner of the Monty Python historicals-- but there's nothing even remotely funny here. It's one of the most viscious, vile, dispicable things ever committed to film. Despite this, it features 2 of my all-time favorite actors, stunningly beautiful landscapes & photography and sweeping, romantic music. All of this seems to work as tremendous contrast to the excessively BRUTAL violence and lengthy torture scenes, all of which contain what I'd call "real world" SCREAMING rather than "movie-style" screaming. The director, the LATE Michael Reeves, allowed his singlular obsession with proving the danger of violence to overwhelm his work, and made it hard to get his point across to audiences. The violence escalates as the story continues. You keep hoping things will turn around... THEY DON'T! The situation gets worse and worse and WORSE, UNTIL-- the climax, when the hero breaks loose (in part because the villain wanted him to get a close look at his wife SUFFERING!!) and attacks Price with an AXE. It may be the most violent death scene in Price's career-- but after all his character did over the entire length of the film, IT'S TOO GOOD FOR HIM!!!!! The hero apparently went completely insane, and the film ends with his wife SCREAMING in reaction to it all for nearly a whole minute. I recall leaving the theatre completely disgusted, whatever movie-going innnocence I may have still had at that age completely destroyed. This makes BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES look like a kiddie film.
The only time I ever ran across an interview with Ian Ogilvy, it was in an issue of FANTASTIC FILMS, and they were discussing his very good friend-- the LATE director! I suddenly discovered that this APPALLINGLY offensive piece of film-making had starred Ogilvy, who 10 years later became one of my favorite actors for his portrayal of Simon Templar in RETURN OF THE SAINT.
He described how Reeves wanted Donald Pleasence-- but Vincent Price was under contract, so that's who he got forced on him. Reeves drove poor Vincent mad on the film, continually badgering him about his "style". Like... "You're doing that THING." "What thing?" "THERE! You're doing it AGAIN!!!"
At the UK premiere, a woman in the press corp stood up halfway thru the film and addressed the crowd, saying, "This film is utterly DEPRAVED, and so are ALL of you unless you leave with me right now!" She left, they stayed... Later, after the Hollywood premiere, Vincent wrote Reeves a 3-page letter, thanking him profusely. He told him he finally "got" what the guy was after, and thanked him for bringing out of him the best acting performance of his career! Good grief. (Knowing Price, I'm sure he was sincere. Someone else might have been sarcastic, but he's too sweet a guy!)
Years back a friend told me he saw the film in a theatre with his then-girlfriend, and they were so offended they walked out 15 minutes before it was over. I started laughing, and told him how "lucky" he was-- because he missed the WORST part! --and THEN I told him WHAT he missed. Some things don't leave you.
When Channel 3 in Philly ran it on SATURDAY NIGHT DEAD with "Stella, the Maneater from Manyunk" (don't be fooled, she was really from the Mafia neighborhood in South Philly), it was CUT profusely. In fact, I'd swear 5 of the last 10 minutes were cut!!! Guess what? It IMPROVED the picture! (At least now it's watchable.)
For years I envisioned what the film might have been like if the director had had more taste, more sense, and more "restraint". Then one day I saw HOUSE OF THE LONG SHADOWS. In that film, Price gets killed in the EXACT same fashion as this one-- hacked to pieces with an axe. But it was so artfully done, with quick camera cuts, close-up reaction shots and the action seen only in a silhouette on the wall, I realized it was EXACTLY as I pictured the climax of CONQUEROR WORM should have been-- but wasn't. I know Reeves was trying to make an important point, in an era of people whose senses were being DULLED to the effects of violence, but I often wonder if he couldn't have gotten his point across much better if he'd just had the maturity to match his ambition. The STORY itself is disturbing enough-- EVEN with every single bit of violence cut.
In addition to Price & Oilvy, neat cameos to watch for are Patrick Wymark (WHERE EAGLES DARE) as Oliver Cromwell, leader of the war against the King, and Wilfred Brambell ("Johnny McCartney", Paul's grandfather, from A HARD DAY'S NIGHT!) as a horse trader.
Around the same time I taped this I also managed to see CRY OF THE BANSHEE. I was surprised that that film had almost the identical plot as this one-- except BANSHEE's plot contains REAL witches and supernatural elements. I enjoyed that film more than this one, but while WITCHFINDER went overboard on violence, BANSHEE went for excesses of nudity-- all of which was cut on TV! Damn.
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1 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Bleargh. Boring, Nihilistic AND Preachy? No Thanks..., July 21, 2007
I've seen several reviews of this movie claiming that "Conqueror Worm" (a title this movie is also known as) is Vincent Price's greatest performance. I can only imagine that these people's knowledge of Vinny P. is limited to this movie, because anyone who has actually watched an excellent Price movie like "House on Haunted Hill" or "Last Man On Earth" would view this slice of British 60's schlock as just what it is: an awful film. Boring, preachy and utterly predictable, "Witchfinder General" also mixes in a healthy dose of nihilism and hopelessness just to make everything that much harder to take. I would not buy this movie and I wouldn't recommend that anyone should watch it. Although a friend of mine, who likes to go on and on about how evil the Catholic Church is, actually claims to like this movie. So, if you fall into that category, this movie may be up your alley.
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![Witchfinder General (Uncut) [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.0 Import - Australia ]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41S4TGKGDNL._SL75_SS50_.jpg)
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