User reviews

... with all of the talk of missing keys, key duplicates, and jiggling of locks, but it is probably going to be a bit of a bore for anybody else.

An architect and his wife are staying at a big rambling castle of a house built by the Rochester family. He is hired to do an architectural survey of the house so that the owners can determine if they should remodel, sell, or just demolish it. But then keys start disappearing and reappearing. And when they reappear some keys are missing. And some of the doors to which those keys match are locked from the inside. There are strange figures in the shadows, noises, and things that simply cannot be - like a live severed head - that appear and then disappear.

Then the architect's boss and wife show up, and things start to get soap opera like with the boss and his wife not having the best of marriages. Did I mention that the previous tenant just disappeared? AFTER paying up his rent and leaving everything in the house in good order?

I will give it points for having great creepy atmosphere. The Rochester castle is everything you would ever want in a haunted house. Best scene? A nurse in an insane asylum receives a telephone call to check on a resident and make sure that this person has not escaped. The bored nurse goes to the room, is attacked by this person who seems to be completely out of her mind, they wrestle in hand to hand combat with the insane person trying to strangle the nurse, and then the next scene is the nurse looking completely unfazed and telling the caller "Yeah, she's in her bed in her room". Just another day for this nurse with nerves of steel????

Director Maury Dexter's films are, it seems, generally not much appreciated, but personally I found just about every one, with the exception of Young Guns of Texas, to be thoroughly engaging little support features that were often a cut well above the main attraction. House of the Damned came about mid-way through his early sixties output,and was beautifully lit and photographed in the particularly pleasing combination of black and white with the added benefit of CinemaScope. This is no film for horror fans. It is an atmospheric drama with a sad,low-key ending. Solid cast with popular leading man of the times Ron Foster, and Merry Anders, always a joy to watch, and especially good in Dexter's Police Nurse. House of the Damned rated X for over 16's only, topped the bill at the Rialto Theatre Coventry Street in London's west-end. A limited release in the capital's suburbs saw it supporting another Fox entry Witchcraft. Dexter's output was unpretentious but consistently entertaining, and it would be nice if the Fox Archive people were to release some, if not all of his films in their correct theatrical release ratio. Maury Dexter's contribution to the illustrious history of 20th Century-Fox may be small but it is certainly worthy of recognition.

Estranged couple Richard Crane and Erika Peters have just taken possession of a creepy old mansion which has a few interesting legends attached to it and a murder allegedly committed there by the wife of a past owner who is in a loony bin.

They've invited architect Ron Foster and Merry Anders who is Foster's wife for the weekend to look over the place to decide on needed changes and repairs.

But someone or a few is scaring the two couples pretty good and such is the basis of our plot.

I won't say any more, but think of the great Tod Browning classic Freaks and you'll know a great of what is happening.

Because of that connection this film had the germ of a good idea for a movie. Sadly a mediocre production and a substandard script fixed that.

"House of the Damned" is a quickly made Fox second feature, (inexplicably shot in CinemaScope) which offers the viewer pleasing performances from Ronald Foster, the always fine Merry Anders, and Richard Crane, who apparently is playing fast and loose with his new French bride (Erika Peters) whose acting is - how shall I say? - lousy. These four are exploring an old house with a grim history (what else is new?) which the owners want remodeled. Occasional scares, (supposedly) unexpected events, and undeveloped story reduce this one to a series of build ups to nothing in particular. The photography, however, is above average for this sort of thing. Unfortunately, it's mostly wasted here. Try "House of Dark Shadows", "House of 1000 Dolls", "House of Whipcord" or "House Of Women" instead. Incidentally, the original movie posters announce the film thusly: ''13 Keys Open The Doors To The House Haunted By The Living Dead!' If ever there was a case of fraudulent advertising, this was it. Any appearances by The Living Dead are strictly in the minds of the 20th Century-Fox publicity department.

"House of the Damned" is a short (barely over one hour) and definitely not-so spooky haunted house chiller from the early 60's that remains extremely slow-paced and never really reaches any atmospheric highlights. There are no famous names in the cast or crew list, so maybe if this were a Hammer or William Castle production; it might have been a bit more appealing. It's actually not even a full-blooded haunted house movie, as none of the menace ever comes out from the house. Usually in this sort of films, like for example "The Haunting", the house is introduced almost like one of the main characters, but here it's just a piece of decor. An architect and his wife are sent up to a remote house on a hill after the previous tenant mysteriously vanished without leaving a message. The owner and his attractive foreign wife come to meet the couple the next day and, for a short while, the script resembles more of a melodramatic soap opera instead of a supernatural thriller. Perhaps the "Damned" in the title refers to the poor suckers, like me, who were tricked into watching this dull nonsense and expected something good. Eventually there does appear to be something wrong with the house; namely unknown residents with hairy hands that like to steal keys. Then, suddenly and out of the blue, the architect couple also discovers that the place once was inhabited by a crazy old lady who now resides in a sanatorium. Whatever twist the screenplay attempts to bring forward, it's totally useless. The ambiance simply isn't as compelling as it should be. Nothing to recommend here. Even Disney's "The Haunted Mansion" is at least a dozen times more disturbing than this. The climax, which comes abrupt and totally random, is too insane for words and left me staring at a black screen for certainly five whole minutes after the finishing of the closing credits! What the hell was that? Was I too stoned, drunk, temporarily unconscious or did I REALLY witness this ending? It's the most nonsensical, random, unworldly, grotesque, irrelevant and deranged twist-ending ever! The Oscar for dementia inarguably goes to "House of the Damned".

An obscure and rather uneventful but nevertheless atmospheric and effective little chiller which presents us with a new twist on "the old dark house" theme which may ultimately disappoint some viewers. I won't divulge it here for those who may feel inclined to check this one out: I'll just say that it combines elements from two well-known Tod Browning movies - FREAKS (1932) and MARK OF THE VAMPIRE (1935) - and leave it at that!

The plot deals with an architect and his wife having to spend the night in the infamous (and supposedly uninhabited) Rochester castle, who are later joined by the former's boss and his sassy girlfriend. However, before long, things start to go bump in the night: a bunch of keys mysteriously disappear and reappear with a couple of them missing, a few doors are inexplicably forbidden to the house dwellers, the girlfriend disappears after a quarrel with her intended, etc. It all seems to point in the direction of the crazed proprietress of the mansion who is currently spending her days in a mental institution but, eventually, we discover that there are even stranger forces at work here...

As I said before, the moody lighting and occasional 'scary' set-pieces are the whole show in this one but, despite the lack of star names, the foursome acquit themselves quite adequately under the circumstances; in the latter stages of the film, Richard "Jaws" Kiel also makes an appearance as an unexpected 'guest' of the Rochester mansion.

The low-priced Fox DVD is accompanied by a theatrical trailer which should not be viewed before the main feature as it virtually shows snippets from all the film's best sequences; interestingly, the much brighter trailer enabled me to make out some details which had eluded me during the film itself!

House of the Damned (1963) is a movie I watched off my DVR after recording it on FXM. The storyline follows an architect and his wife who has been asked to survey a house that was built for an eccentric lady. As they try to complete what should be a simple task they are approached by strange things within the house. Will the young couple be able to escape the house or will they be bound there forever?

This movie is directed by Maury Dexter (Hell's Belles) and stars Ron Foster (The Money Pit), Merry Anders (Tickle Me), Richard Crane (Behind Green Lights), Erika Peters (GI Blues) and Richard Kiel (Happy Gilmore).

This is an early 60s movie in black and white that honestly feels more 50s than 60s. The acting is very good and the dialogue is well written. The horror elements rely on circumstances and background music. They did do a good job creating a few good jump scares and there's some classic scream scenes (Psycho like).

Overall this is a fun, above average addition to the genre if you enjoy horror films from this era. I would score this a 6/10 and recommended seeing it once.

In the sixties, Robert Lippert's Associated Producers scored a contract making black and white 'Scope B movies to run with Fox's big pictures and turned loose house director Maury Dexter on them. The results were uneven but one group - the contemporary thrillers - the Los Angeles films - were more striking than most of the big films that elbowed them out of the advertising space.

Along with WOMAN HUNT, AIR PATROL and the later RAIDERS FROM BENEATH THE SEA, HOUSE OF THE DAMNED spins a thin budget into something surprisingly memorable. It succeeds where the Tod Browning film FREAKS failed in making it's circus performers real rather than monsters. The film's curious gentleness is one of its surprises.

The building of tension is nicely crafted - the unanswered phone, moving shots of the deserted private road, disturbing detail like the broken sculpture, the thirteen keys and the re-appearing sign.

Throw in the winning Merry Anders, anticipating the self reliant seventies woman and the atmospheric Hollywood Hills mansion setting which was once actually a haunt of bootleggers. People I see this with are always surprised that such a film exists.

Ron Foster ("Private Lessons") and Merry Anders ("Women of the Prehistoric Planet") play Scott and Nancy Campbell, a married couple hired by their friend, a lawyer named Joe Schiller (Richard Crane, "The Alligator People"), to do an architectural survey on a country estate. Soon after they arrive, they experience some strange, moderately disconcerting experiences. Knowing full well that the old crone (Georgia Schmidt) who owned the place (who's now confined to an institution) would have loathed police interference, they attempt to do their own sleuthing.

This fairly lightweight, routine "old dark house" type horror film ultimately doesn't deliver much in the way of actual horror. It's certainly well made, with some excellent black & white cinematography and camera work. (The Cinema Scope aspect ratio of 2.35:1 does help a lot.) The performances are all quite engaging and the script by Harry Spalding ("Chosen Survivors") features some mildly amusing lines. The "castle" itself is an appropriate setting, adding to the atmosphere that producer & director Maury Dexter ("The Mini-Skirt Mob", "Hell's Belles") is able to create.

Foster and Anders make for a personable main couple, with fine support from Crane, Erika Peters ("The Atomic Brain", "Mr. Sardonicus") and the prolific Dal McKennon ('Daniel Boone', "Lady and the Tramp"). A very young Richard Kiel ("Eegah", "The Spy Who Loved Me") makes an appearance as a mute giant.

"House of the Damned" is watchable enough, but it never does live up to that title.

Six out of 10.

House of the Damned is only an hour long, but somehow it manages to make that hour feel like about five hours and also manages one of the most spectacularly bad endings that I have ever seen. The plot is just your average haunted house premise, and sees an architect and his wife go to stay in a house that turns out to be haunted. The film actually gets off to a promising start when we are introduced to the characters, but things go downhill once the house itself is introduced; it's just an average place in California. I've come to expect more creepy residences from haunted house films! Once it starts proper, it soon gets very boring also and most of the film is taken up by pointless drama without a scare in sight, which is very boring indeed. To the film's credit, it does look very nice and the crisp black and white picture is easy on the eyes. Nothing really happens during the main bulk of the film and I have to say that I am very glad the film is only an hour long. The ending itself is just unbelievably stupid and makes practically no sense at all. It seems like a desperate attempt by the writer to introduce some shock value, but it doesn't work. Overall, this really is a rubbish film and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

This feels like an omnibus TV show episode on many levels, from the generic performers that seem like studio contract players and the short runtime to the occasional blackout pauses that might have been designed for commercial breaks. It is unique perhaps in having a resolution that is sort of anti-horror--"explaining all" not in supernatural or homicidal terms but something more prosaic. That twist would actually be rather touching if the movie hadn't been such a routine collection of Olde Dark House cliches until then.

It's a programmer without even the fun or quirkiness we like in good "B's," and I seem to recall the other films by this director (even the ones with irresistible titles like "Maryjane" and "The Miniskirt Mob") were also attempts at exploitation that aren't nearly as much fun as you'd hope. It's fun seeing Richard Kiel briefly in an early role (right after "Eegah!"), but that's pretty brief. In short, not exactly a find--at best it's like a mediocre episode of something like "Alfred Hitchcock Presents," in which the low-budget but still slick craftsmanship actually works against creating any spooky atmospherics.

In HOUSE OF THE DAMNED, architect Scott Campbell (Ron Foster) and his wife, Nancy (Merry Anders), move into a big, fortress-like mansion in order to survey it. It's not long before odd occurrences begin taking place.

That's about it.

The problem with this movie is that it seems like someone decided to make it, simply because they had a big house to make it in, the story being just an afterthought. It's mildly interesting at first, but there's not enough going on, and a whole lot of static scenes with nothing much happening. This all leads up to about 5 minutes of wrap-up at the end that pretty much negates any "horror" involved.

Actually, the one, true point of interest is the all-too-brief- appearance of Richard Kiel (about 2 minutes of screen time)...

Not too bad. With a running time of 64 minutes I was expecting a cheap thriller and it has a lot of setup. When things start to get weird the movie gets a little better but you know the closer and closer the end gets you will find out what's going on and then the movie will Immediately end! Kind of unsatisfactory. Some good creepy use of shadow and and the acting was better than I expected. Same thing with the production values.

This movie might have been a good movie in 1965, but by today's standards, it is terrible. The acting is awful and the plot is weak. This was like watching " The Ghost and Mr. Chicken" without all of the Don Knotts goodness. There was not an instant in this movie where I felt scared, surprised or even interested. The only thing that I felt was bored! Forget the other reviews for this movie! If you watch the first ten minutes of this movie and are bored, please do not waste your time. It does not get any better! The ending makes no sense at all. Do yourself a favor - turn this off and do something more enjoyable like doing the laundry, digging ditches, scrubbing floors, cleaning bathrooms, etc.

"House of the Damned" starts out promising enough, following an architect and his wife who visit a California mansion with a strange history. All is fairly normal at first, but after they meet a lawyer and his wife there, events take a turn.

One of the more off-the-map haunted house films of the twentieth century, "House of the Damned" is a complete oddity in just about every sense of the word. It runs an awkward hour and three minutes long, meanders without any apparent purpose for the first fifty minutes, and then nosedives into a twist that is completely out of left field.

The truth be told, there really is not much happening here, which is saying something for a feature that runs about sixty minutes. In spite of the run time, the film doesn't necessarily feel that short, but the script is a bit too skeletal, and the lack of legitimate thrills makes the audience yearn for a bit more development. It is not entirely a bad film, though. For what it's worth, it's wonderfully atmospheric, and hits notes similar to "House on Haunted Hill" and Robert Wise's superior thriller "The Haunting." The first half of the film does manage to ratchet some suspense and intrigue, with the proceedings becoming increasingly inexplicable.

The acting here is solid, with Merry Anders and Ron Foster playing the lead on screen couple convincingly. As I said before, the film's conclusion is unexpectedly bizarre; it works well enough I suppose, but it does certainly soften the film's overall bite, which isn't much to begin with.

Overall, "House of the Damned" is a fairly uneventful, single-note horror movie that is worth a watch as a genre oddity that has more or less been forgotten. It's not remarkable by any stretch of the imagination, but it is atmospheric and has two solid scare scenes that are visually fantastic. Ultimately though, it feels more like a clever episode of "The Twilight Zone" than it does a feature film—not that that's necessarily bad, but it certainly makes one wonder where the filmmakers were coming from. 6/10.

The Quick Pitch: An architect takes his wife along on a job to survey a huge, old, abandoned mansion. But after the power mysteriously goes out, keys go missing, and they hear strange noises, the couple start to wonder if they're really alone.

For a film that runs just barely over an hour, there's a shocking amount of filler to be found in House of the Damned. From unnecessary scenes of driving to endless moments of key turning to a long phone call that leads absolutely nowhere, a goodly chunk of the movie's runtime is devoted to things that do nothing to further the plot. I'd estimate there are only about five minutes of screen-time that feature anything you'd consider remotely chilling. Merry Anders and Ron Foster make a likeable couple, but unfortunately, they have nothing to do. The ending is a complete disaster. Suddenly and without warning, all of the characters come together and decide to (mercifully) end the thing. The biggest positive I can come up with is the cinematography. The movie looks much better than it has any right to. Overall, a real snoozer of a movie.

3/10

Considering that "House of the Damned" is a low budget film and it once again stars Ron Foster and Merry Anders (who starred in the terrible "Secret of Deep Harbo"), I really expected this to be an awful movie. However, to my pleasant surprise, the movie turned out to be quite enjoyable! Who would have figured?!

When the story begins, Scott receives a phone call from an old friend. It seems his lawyer friend is trying to sell off a weird old mansion and he wants Scott, an architect, to investigate the place and make sure it is habitable.

So why is the place so weird? Well, some of it is because the women who built the place was a maniac who butchered someone in the place long ago. And, since, there have been all sorts of rumors about the place.

Once there, Scott and his wife, Nancy (Merry Anders), think everything is fine...though they don't relish the idea of having to stay in this old house, but they have to since there are no hotels nearby. At night, however, someone enters their room and steals some keys...and later they find they cannot open some of the rooms.

A bit later, the old friend's wife and then a bit later the old friend arrive. They all investigate the strange place...when one of them is kidnapped! What's next?!

The atmosphere of the film is the best thing about it. Even with a low budget, the filmmakers did a fine job of making the story seem possible...and creepy to boot! Overall, a neat little horror/mystery film that I think is fun to watch.

The best that can be said about this movie was that it was short. I'm a fan of horror films from the 1960's, especially when there's a haunted house involved, but this one just seemed to be a waste of time. It's mostly two couples who try to figure out the strange goings on in the old house, rumored to be haunted, but the goings on aren't all that strange, the scary moments aren't all that scary, and to tell the truth, I would much rather have had the story be about the circus people who only make an appearance at the end. They were at least interesting, and that fat lady was a riot! (Oh, pardon me! I'll say "weight challenged" lady and bow to the PC Gods!)

Kind of a waste of time.