Witchfinder General

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Customer Reviews:

Vincent Price's best performance, and quite an extraordinary film.... [Posted on 2008-08-11]
I remember seeing this film on regular TV (WFLD-TV in Chicago to be exact) at 2 in the afternoon. I remember the bone chilling screams from the prison scene. I searched far and wide for this film, and when I saw the whole film, I had seen a masterpiece.

Witchfinder General (aka Conqueror Worm) is an extraordinary film. It's one of a handful of features directed by Michael Reeves. This is the film he's most famous for, and it's as bleak and as terrifying as you've heard. It's not a "gorehound" film (even though there's gore galore in it); it's an immensely intelligent film. It takes place during the English Civil War where law and order had pretty much broken down, and local magistrates were running amok. Frequently, witch hunters were employed to rid the countryside of "wrongdoers" (or people they just didn't like), and Matthew Hopkins (played by Vincent Price) was one of these men. Hopkins was a real witch hunter, but this story is not completely based on fact.

The film, despite its limited budget, is wonderfully shot in the English countryside, giving it a really gentle flavour at times, which is ironic, as the film is very violent and cruel. It's not a happy film, in fact, quite brutal and bleak. The torture scenes are incredibly brutal and realistic, and are very difficult to watch, as they are not slick like modern Hollywood. The veneer of civilization is lifted, and the underbelly of society comes out with a venegance.

This, I believe, is Vincent Price's best performance. Here he drops the campiness and hamminess and shows that he was a great, brilliant actor. He plays it entirely cold, giving his performance a shade of sadism and cruelty, something not found in his other work. Michael Reeves, the director, was rather distant from Price, which angered Vincent deeply. Vincent later admitted that Reeves's treatment of him enabled him to give the cold, dispassionate performance you see here.

The film has been hard to find in its original version. When it was first released here, it was slightly cut and retitled Conqueror Worm. AIP (Corman's outfit) released the film here in North America, and they retitled it to coincide/cash in on Corman's Edgar Allen Poe's adaptations. They also used a different score for their release. On this DVD, you get the original UK edition with the original score, commentary by Ian Oglivy (the 2nd lead actor in the film) and the producer, and a featurette on Michael Reeves, who died shortly after making this film. This is quite an extraordinary film considering the time it was made, its budget, and the inexperienced director. Everything meshed here, and the film is still chilling today.

Classic horror still chills the blood [Posted on 2008-09-08]
This is a story of persecution and revenge filled with Vincent Price's manic leering, which has never been better. This is great entertainment, dark brutal fun.

Vinny the P gets Medieval on us [Posted on 2008-09-22]
Everybody loved Vincent Price. In the 60s and 70s, he was crowned the King of Horror but no matter how many horror movies he appeared in, people still loved the guy. He could do horror classics like MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM or THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM or show up as the villain Egghead on TV's "Batman" or even pop up in a cameo in a Frankie & Annette Beach movie...and everyone still liked him, no matter what he did.

Then he did THE WITCHFINDER GENERAL.

When I saw it as a kid, it was called THE CONQUEROR WORM and, years later, Vincent would show up on "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson to do a dramatic reading of that Poe poem about a maggot. I wonder if this is on youtube. I'll always remember his delivery: "...for the play is the tragedy, Man...and its hero...the conqueror worm."

As a lot of other reviews here state, THE WITCHFINDER GENERAL is probably Vincent Price's greatest performance. He is diabolical here but with none of the campy fun of his other films. He is sinister, corrupt, evil. That he tears through the countryside as a gov't/church-sanctioned official only makes him more repellent and horrible.

I remember reading an interview with Vincent and he said making this movie was an unpleasant experience for him. He didn't get along with the director or, if I remember right, the director's personality was darker than Vincent wanted to deal with! The director died of a drug overdose but--again, if I remember this correctly--Vincent was turned off by his dark side and his interest in Satanism (does anyone else remember that? The director was into Satan worship or something).

I'm glad to see the extras so I will be adding this to my horror DVD collection.

Classic. Chilling. A worthy re-issue of a stand out horror classic. [Posted on 2008-09-29]
This British horror film from 1968 is definitely worth a look. Price gives a career best performance as the evil, self-serving Matthew Hopkins, who abuses his position as Witchfinder General in order to satisfy his own vices - all the while condemning vice in others. It's an adult, disturbing movie, which captures the raw quality of seventeenth century English life, while reflecting back some of the sexual preoccupations of the late 1960s. It also speaks to our own era, in that it deals with corruption and depravity at the top. The ending is bleak, and terrifying, and will stay with you a long time after you have put the DVD safely back in its box.

Not worth 4+ stars [Posted on 2008-11-06]
Seriously, this movie is not worth the more than 3 stars many people give it. Yes, give credit to Price for playing a vile character sans the usual "camp" factor, but that praise on its own makes neither his acting nor the whole of this film great. I found myself fast forwarding through several sections that would have offered nothing more if I let them play at normal speed. This type of "self-editing" we do on occasion with movies at home just goes to show some professional editing should have been done in the first place. In fact, I'd go as far as to say it should have been edited to the degree of a whole new film, that would better serve Price's resume and our viewing pleasure.

Some complain they don't know how this is categorized as "horror" -- I don't know where or if it is, but I don't think it was intended to be. Although the Witchmaker General does inspire TERROR amongst those he chooses to target for torture and the stake. That being said, I did miss the usual lavish, rich, and gothic sets from Price's Poe-inspired movies.

This movie is a one-timer for viewing.

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