I lunghi capelli della morte

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Movie
Original title I lunghi capelli della morte
Country of production Italy
original language Italian
Publishing year 1964
length 100 minutes
Rod
Director Antonio Margheriti
script Antonio Margheriti
Bruno Valeri
production Felice Testa Gay
music Carlo Rustichelli
camera Riccardo Pallottini
cut Giorgio Giovannini
Mario Serandrei
occupation

I lunghi capelli della morte (in English: the long hairs of death ) is an Italian horror film from 1964. Directed by Antonio Margheriti , Barbara Steele and Giorgio Ardisson star .

action

Central Europe in 1499: Adele Karnstein is accused of witchcraft and the murder of Count Franz, who ruled the region, and imprisoned in the noble's castle. Adele has two daughters: a younger named Lisabeth and another, Helen Rochefort, who immediately interceded with the murdered Count's brother for her mother, as she was convinced of her mother's innocence. She assumes that someone at the castle was much more interested in Count Franz's death. Franz's brother doesn't want to brush aside Helen's assumption and puts Helen off. Adele's death by burning at the stake has long been a done deal, but only he decides when. And so he consoles Helen and demands that she give herself to him in the meantime.

Franz's son Kurt, however, has good reasons not to wait too long for the father's order to execute and gives the order on his own to set the pyre lit. Little Lisabeth is brought in by the count's servant Grumalda and has to watch her mother burn up in the flames. Before she dies, the damned utters wild curses and curses on those guilty of her fire and the villagers. On the last day of the late century, all Humboldts are said to be the last to die. Helen, who now fears the worst for herself and Lisabeth, tries to escape, but is overtaken by the count's brother and plunged deep into a river on a cliff. Grumalda sweeps up the ashes of the alleged witch Adele and buries them with Helen's body at a grave, so that at least Lisabeth, who is supposed to live in the castle, can have a place for her silent mourning. Lisabeth, who is exactly like her mother, grows up at the Humboldt Castle and, according to the count's wishes, is to marry Kurt. In a dispute with his father, he confesses that he actually killed his brother or his uncle Franz because he wants the entire inheritance - title, claim to power and castle - to himself.

Kurt is then disinherited by his father. The last day of 1499 has dawned. The plague rages everywhere, and Adele's curse seems to be coming true, because the people in front of the castle walls are beginning to blame the Humboldts for the plague and are about to storm the castle. Then there is a strong thunderstorm, and as a result of a lightning strike, Helen wakes up from the dead and climbs out of her cool grave. During the holy mass in the chapel at the end of the year, the woman believed dead appears and the old count literally scares himself to death. Helen tells Kurt, who falls in love with her in a flash, that her name is not Helen at all, but that her name is Mary. In just a few hours, “Mary” has gained so much power over Kurt that she can even instigate him to poison Lisabeth. With Mary's appearance, the plague in front of the castle gates suddenly comes to an end, and preparations are made immediately at the castle to celebrate this event accordingly.

Here, the court marshal von Klage falls back on an old tradition: A large jointed doll is made and the long hair that has been cut off - symbolizing the transience of everything earthly - of the survivors of the plague is attached to the puppet. Meanwhile, Kurt begins to develop visions and goes to the family crypt to look for Lisabeth's poisoned body. But this one has disappeared. Suddenly the dead woman appears to him like a ghost that has come back to life, and Kurt believes he is close to madness. In her greatest triumph, Helen aka Mary reveals that she and Lisabeth faked the death of their little sister only to get revenge on him and the other Humboldts, just as both mother Adele prophesied at the stake. Kurt is gagged and bound and is completely motionless. So Kurt himself becomes a life-size marionette and dies, as is the custom with a marionette after a difficult time, as a human burn victim, the soul-cleansing death by fire. Adele's terrible prophecy was accomplished by the daughters, and vengeance was taken.

Production notes

The Italian premiere of I lunghi capelli della morte was on December 30, 1964. The film did not start in Germany.

Reviews

England's Monthly Film Bulletin in 1967 found on the one hand that the film was "unevenly written, unusually awkwardly dubbed and terribly sagging in the middle of the film", but on the other hand praised the fact that it was a "pleasantly atmospheric Gothic story".

Video Librarian saw the film as a "less important classic of Gothic horror", but which had "many beautiful pictures and an ominous atmosphere".

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Monthly Film Bulletin. Vol. 34 no. 396. London: British Film Institute. 1967. pp. 142 f.
  2. ^ Video Librarian. Vol. 30 no.2 p. 41 f. ISSN 0887-6851

Web links