The Terror (1963)

[Zone Fighter]

The Terror (1963)

Producer, director, writter: Roger Corman
Associate producer: Francis [Ford] Coppola

Boris Karloff - Baron Victor Frederick Von Leppe
Jack Nicholson - Lt. Andre Duvalier
Sandra Knight - Helene
Richard Miller - Stefan
Dorothy Neumann - Katrina
Jonathan Haze - Gustaf

A French soldier (Nicholson) seperated from his regiment ends up on a beach were he meets a young woman (Knight) when the woman walks into the water towards heavy waves the soldier concerned for her safety follows. He's attacked by a hawk and nearly drowned in the heavy surf. He wakes up to find himself in a shack in the forest. The shack is the home of an old woman (Neumann). When he asks where Helene is the woman points to a hawk on perch. When he says he means the girl the woman says that there is no girl. Later Andre goes looking for the girl and he finds her, but she nearly leads him into quicksand. He's saved by a man (Haze) who tells him the girl is possessed and to look for her at the castle. Andre finds the castle and sees the girl through a window but when he asks Baron Victor Frederick Von Leppe (Karloff) about the girl he's told there is no girl and is shown a painting of Ilsa, The Baroness Von Leppe (the girl) who has been dead for 20 years.

There are strange noises in the night and the woman Helene whom the baron believes to be the ghost of his wife, appears and disappears mysteriously, the old woman Katrina, is a witch and the final scene is gruesome but there is no real terror in this film. There is a twist near the end which suprised me. The Terror is worth the $1 I paid for it.

This Roger Corman film is one of Jack Nicholson's first movies. I bought because for Boris Karloff. I'm not a Jack Nicholson fan. So I was disappointed to find that although Karloff had top billing (as the only star) and Nicholson was listed under "also starring" Nicholson actually has the lead role.

Apparently there are several versions of this floating around some of better video and audio quality than others. The one I bought is fine though not perfect. The night scenes were pretty dark but that's more realistic.

[stareater]

I saw this one after my wife bought it on a $1 double-feature disc at one of the close-out stores. I think the story behind the making of the film is much more interesting than the film itself.

Ever the opportunist when it came to saving money, Corman whipped the story out of thin air when he realized he still had the set pieces for The Raven, which he just finished filming, for another three days. He used that set to shoot The Terror, even filming Karloff and others casually walking around the set and using those shots in the film. Nicholson, Francis Ford Coppola, and a handful of others directed & filmed various parts of the film, although Corman was the only director credited.

The film was shot, written, and edited over the course of 3-4 days, depending on where you get your information. Not an awful film, it actually comes across pretty well for something that was created in the blink of an eye. Despite what any detractors may say, Corman had a certain touch for horror films that can't be denied. His worst films still have a feel that many, many big-budget horror flicks completely lack to this day.