The Thing That Couldn't Die

On a California farm, folks uncover the served head of an evil colonial man which begins to possess people.

A rather inventive story makes this old B film a stand out from the other monster flicks of its day. Director Will Cowan gives this film some compact direction, making a nicely dark atmosphere for the movie, even creating some occasional eeriness and a few good shocks along the way. The music score for this film is the same spooky score used for the sci-fi classic This Island Earth (1955). The cast is pretty good, Hughes is especially good as the films non-deceased villain. Not a bad watch for those looking for a B flick that's a little different from the average rubber-monster movie.

** 1/2 out of ****

"The Thing that Couldn't Die" actually turned out to be a very pleasant surprise! I was expecting a totally cheap, insignificant and rather silly Z-grade horror flick, but what I got was … Well, I got a totally cheap, insignificant and rather silly Z-grade horror flick, but one that was vastly more entertaining than I thought! The film has a compelling plot, albeit familiar and simplistic, and the atmosphere and special effects are far more unsettling and spooky that I expected for a camp 50's flick like this. Jessica is a shy but beautiful young girl with psychic powers who lives on the Californian guest ranch of her aunt. With her dowsing rod she discovers an antique chest buried deep underneath a tree. Jessica feels that the content of the chest is evil, but her aunt and all the guests at the ranch insist on opening it anyway. The chest contains the bodiless head of a medieval Satanist, and it promptly possesses some of the guest with his penetrating eyes and hypnotizing powers. The head naturally wants to recover its body, which is buried elsewhere on the premises, in order to continue his evil Satan-worshiping activities. Particularly the scenes with the head are effectively creepy and atmosphere. Whether carried by a minion or stored in a hat-box, the head is scary! The actor depicting the head also looks a lot like Vincent Price. The makers of this cheap flick perhaps couldn't afford to hire Vincent Price, but at least they understood that the role required loads of evil charisma and thus opted for the Argentinian born lookalike Robin Hughes. Furthermore the film contains a couple of admirable footnotes, like for example a link with the famous naval commander Sir Francis Drake, and a reasonably good pacing. And, oh yeah, the ending is downright hilarious! This film has the biggest "What … that's it?!?" climax in the history of cinema. Turns out "the thing that couldn't die" dies pretty easily after all.

Jessica (Carolyn Kearney) has the power of divination, the young woman using a dowsing rod to locate water and long lost objects, such as the still-living severed head of Gideon Drew (Robin Hughes), a man executed for sorcery 400 years earlier. Unearthed, the head uses its 'evil eye' to control people to try and find its missing body.

To be honest, The Thing That Couldn't Die is a fairly bad film, too uneventful and sluggish for the most part to be an effective horror. That said, the basic premise is wonderfully inventive and suitably ghoulish, and those scenes that do feature the severed head, silently mouthing his commands, are actually very creepy. Kearney is also a good reason to watch the film - she's very appealing and it's a wonder why I haven't sought out more of her work (so far, the only other thing I've seen her in has been an episode of The Twilight Zone).

The head is finally reunited with its body, but, within minutes, the film ends, Gideon Drew quickly reduced to a pile of bones by an ancient amulet. Just as it was getting good...

4.5/10, rounded up to 5 for IMDb.

Yes,the movie is not a piece of art but the first time I watched it I was 10 years old,my parents were out and I stayed home with my two brothers.It was May 1970(I know that because I found a note about the cycle of horror movies that one network had).It's one of the most vivid memories I have with the guys.We ended all in one bed and covered up to the head! Our very first horror movie! We kept talking about it for years and laughing about the moment.Those were horror movies.Nowadays horror movies are always the same.Or was it better when we were kids enjoying without analyzing the plot and the cast and the dialogs? Most sure it was that.But for me this is a great movie!

I saw this movie when I was 13 years old. From the perspective of a young teen-ager the movie made a lasting impression (along with "The Tingler" as two of the best horror movies I've seen (I'm now 56). The performance of Robin Hughes as the beheaded devil worshipper is compelling and downright scary - particularly when he stares at his quarry to capture them in his spell. The back & white film also establishes the feeling of cruelty of late 1500's justice..brought to the 20th century in the form of this brooding, evil headless character hell-bent to "get even" with humanity. I really want to see this movie again now that I'm an old guy. It has a "feel" that is uncomfortable, scary, musty, steeped in puritanical blindness, and antiquity.