Castle Freak starts as American John Reilly (Jeffrey Combs) inherits a large 700 year old castle in Italy, he travels there with his blind daughter Rebecca (Jessica Dollarhide) & his wife Susan (Barbara Crampton) who has never quite forgiven him for killing their son & blinding Rebecca in a car accident. However there is a dark secret lurking in the castle, a secret that has been hidden for decades but now it's free, it has nine fingers & wears a bed-sheet. Oh, & it's also a deformed cannibalistic killer...
Co-written & directed by Stuart Gordon I thought Castle Freak was a decent enough horror film but didn't quite reach the heights of greatness. The script by Gordon & Dennis Paoli was based on the story 'The Outsider' by H.P. Lovecraft & is a reasonable way to pass 90 odd minutes but I just felt there was nothing here that really stood out & grabbed my attention, you know what I mean? There's the family who inherit a property with a dark secret & that's about it only we know what the dark secret is within five minutes because the freak monster is seen even before the opening credits have started. Also, why didn't the freak bite his own thumb off years ago to escape? How did it open the huge locked cell door exactly? Who put & subsequently removed the picture of John's dead son in the family crypt? The body counts consists of exactly four, it's hardly the most exciting film ever made & it just feels a bit too routine, predictable & ultimately rather forgettable as there just seemed to be too many shots of people walking/running around the same corridors. It's still a good horror film make no mistake about it & has some positives going for it but I think I'd have completely forgotten about it by the end of the week.
Director Gordon knows how to turn in a decent flick & Castle Freak is a nice enough looking film, it has a a great setting & the real castle location adds to the atmosphere immensely. There are some creepy moments but don't let anyone fool you into thinking this reaches the gory heights of Gordon's Re-Animator (1985) or From Beyond (1987) as there's not much gore here, the one & only real gore scene involves the freak biting the nipple off a prostitute & then there's some shots of her dead body with further bite marks & a bit when someone has some skin bitten off their face, the special make-up effects are good on the freak & there's a fair amount of blood splatter but overall this isn't that gory.
Technically the film is good, certainly better & classier than the majority of Full Moon productions that's for sure. Actually being shot in a real castle (owned by the head of Full Moon) in Italy helps give the film a great look. The acting is pretty good, it's always nice to see Combs in a genre film & he is reunited with Crampton as they both appeared together in a couple of other Gordon horror films Re-Animator & From Beyond.
Castle Freak is a watchable, well made & perfectly decent horror film but while I definitely liked it I didn't love it, Gordon has done better but this is still worth a watch.
Co-written & directed by Stuart Gordon I thought Castle Freak was a decent enough horror film but didn't quite reach the heights of greatness. The script by Gordon & Dennis Paoli was based on the story 'The Outsider' by H.P. Lovecraft & is a reasonable way to pass 90 odd minutes but I just felt there was nothing here that really stood out & grabbed my attention, you know what I mean? There's the family who inherit a property with a dark secret & that's about it only we know what the dark secret is within five minutes because the freak monster is seen even before the opening credits have started. Also, why didn't the freak bite his own thumb off years ago to escape? How did it open the huge locked cell door exactly? Who put & subsequently removed the picture of John's dead son in the family crypt? The body counts consists of exactly four, it's hardly the most exciting film ever made & it just feels a bit too routine, predictable & ultimately rather forgettable as there just seemed to be too many shots of people walking/running around the same corridors. It's still a good horror film make no mistake about it & has some positives going for it but I think I'd have completely forgotten about it by the end of the week.
Director Gordon knows how to turn in a decent flick & Castle Freak is a nice enough looking film, it has a a great setting & the real castle location adds to the atmosphere immensely. There are some creepy moments but don't let anyone fool you into thinking this reaches the gory heights of Gordon's Re-Animator (1985) or From Beyond (1987) as there's not much gore here, the one & only real gore scene involves the freak biting the nipple off a prostitute & then there's some shots of her dead body with further bite marks & a bit when someone has some skin bitten off their face, the special make-up effects are good on the freak & there's a fair amount of blood splatter but overall this isn't that gory.
Technically the film is good, certainly better & classier than the majority of Full Moon productions that's for sure. Actually being shot in a real castle (owned by the head of Full Moon) in Italy helps give the film a great look. The acting is pretty good, it's always nice to see Combs in a genre film & he is reunited with Crampton as they both appeared together in a couple of other Gordon horror films Re-Animator & From Beyond.
Castle Freak is a watchable, well made & perfectly decent horror film but while I definitely liked it I didn't love it, Gordon has done better but this is still worth a watch.