Well, I finally had a chance to watch this public domain classic, an infamous early feature from an ambitious and talented young director Francis Ford Coppola, shot in creepy black and white photography with some chilling underwater sequences, concerning a series of ax murders around the estate of a troubled matriarch's Irish castle. What haunts Lady Haloran(Eithne Dunne)is the drowning of her daughter under mysterious circumstances several years ago and how she annually has the family gather to visit her grave. Her sons, sculptor Richard(William Campbell), planning to wed visiting fiancé Kane(Mary Mitchel),and tormented Billy(Bart Patton), plagued with nightmares concerning the dead sister when they were children, suffer under the gloomy shadow of their mother's deteriorating mental state. After burying her husband underwater(..along with some things, setting up a fake scenario regarding a business trip), who had tied of a heart-attack while rowing a boat, Louise Haloran(Luana Anders)sets her sights on her mother-in-law's inheritance, concocting a plan to gain an advantage by tricking her using the idea of the daughter's ghost returning from the grave. While in the midst of setting up the scheme, someone, cloaked in darkness, attacks her with an ax, which sets up the rest of the film..who is the ax-wielding psycho, and does it have to do with the dead girl? Patrick Magee is the family head-shrinker, Justin Caleb, not regarded highly for his acidic, biting comments and sharp wit towards them. He becomes amateur sleuth when unusual occurrences begin to take place, such as the missing Louise, Lady Haloran's near death at the hands of the psycho who destroys the playhouse containing her dead daughter's wax corpse, discovering a make-shift grave for the girl after draining the estate's lake(..motivating the lake's draining was when dolls from the dead girl's room surface;put there by Louise before she was butchered), while also happening upon a grisly sight which sets in motion his plot to catch the killer.
While I found a bit sluggish, pacing wise, it has some atmospheric moments and a striking setting regarding the castle. The story is actually strong despite some familiar themes, such as greed and guilt. I thought the effects on the family due to a devastating loss was well executed, and the attacks(..while nowhere even close to as gory as reputed to be)are rather impressive thanks to how Coppola frames his ax-murder..the less is more approach. The unveiling of Louise's corpse is an obvious painting, but effective enough, I guess, to at least draw a gasp from some viewers, shocked at her bloody body hanging from a meat hook. The underwater scenes where a body is dumped, slowly sinking to the bottom, the wax corpse of the girl is discovered at her grave, and a victim is attacked as she's about to exit the lake, are among my personal favorite sequences because of their eerie presentations. Magee is superb as the deducing psycho-therapist attempting to unlock the psychological answers plaguing his patient's disturbed family. Luana Anders, as the scheming daughter-in-law, makes the most of her time on screen, and is quite alluring(..particularly when she disrobes down to her bra and panties, diving underwater to plant toys to spook the Lady of the castle) when she isn't plotting how to swindle inheritance from her late husband's mother.
While I found a bit sluggish, pacing wise, it has some atmospheric moments and a striking setting regarding the castle. The story is actually strong despite some familiar themes, such as greed and guilt. I thought the effects on the family due to a devastating loss was well executed, and the attacks(..while nowhere even close to as gory as reputed to be)are rather impressive thanks to how Coppola frames his ax-murder..the less is more approach. The unveiling of Louise's corpse is an obvious painting, but effective enough, I guess, to at least draw a gasp from some viewers, shocked at her bloody body hanging from a meat hook. The underwater scenes where a body is dumped, slowly sinking to the bottom, the wax corpse of the girl is discovered at her grave, and a victim is attacked as she's about to exit the lake, are among my personal favorite sequences because of their eerie presentations. Magee is superb as the deducing psycho-therapist attempting to unlock the psychological answers plaguing his patient's disturbed family. Luana Anders, as the scheming daughter-in-law, makes the most of her time on screen, and is quite alluring(..particularly when she disrobes down to her bra and panties, diving underwater to plant toys to spook the Lady of the castle) when she isn't plotting how to swindle inheritance from her late husband's mother.