Isle of the Dead (1945)
Country: US
Technical: bw 72m
Director: Mark Robson
Cast: Boris Karloff, Ellen Drew
Synopsis:
During the 1912 Balkan war, a group of individuals is kept quarantined on a Greek island with a general in charge of them. He is convinced they will fall victim to a vampiric force operating on the island.
Review:
As often with Val Lewton's horror output, there is considerably more talk here than actual horror, but even by comparison with its companions this is certainly a dull entry, with nothing remotely supernatural or ghoulish going on. The setting has possibilities, not least in the presumed allusion to Arnold Boecklin's symbolist painting of the same name, but the island is totally unexplored apart from a few bushes and temple to Hermes. However, the unusual, almost incomprehensible, plot premise makes it an undeniable curiosity, and Karloff is as eccentric as ever.
Country: US
Technical: bw 72m
Director: Mark Robson
Cast: Boris Karloff, Ellen Drew
Synopsis:
During the 1912 Balkan war, a group of individuals is kept quarantined on a Greek island with a general in charge of them. He is convinced they will fall victim to a vampiric force operating on the island.
Review:
As often with Val Lewton's horror output, there is considerably more talk here than actual horror, but even by comparison with its companions this is certainly a dull entry, with nothing remotely supernatural or ghoulish going on. The setting has possibilities, not least in the presumed allusion to Arnold Boecklin's symbolist painting of the same name, but the island is totally unexplored apart from a few bushes and temple to Hermes. However, the unusual, almost incomprehensible, plot premise makes it an undeniable curiosity, and Karloff is as eccentric as ever.
Country: US
Technical: bw 72m
Director: Mark Robson
Cast: Boris Karloff, Ellen Drew
Synopsis:
During the 1912 Balkan war, a group of individuals is kept quarantined on a Greek island with a general in charge of them. He is convinced they will fall victim to a vampiric force operating on the island.
Review:
As often with Val Lewton's horror output, there is considerably more talk here than actual horror, but even by comparison with its companions this is certainly a dull entry, with nothing remotely supernatural or ghoulish going on. The setting has possibilities, not least in the presumed allusion to Arnold Boecklin's symbolist painting of the same name, but the island is totally unexplored apart from a few bushes and temple to Hermes. However, the unusual, almost incomprehensible, plot premise makes it an undeniable curiosity, and Karloff is as eccentric as ever.