Nightmare Castle, originally released in 1965, stars Barbara Steele, the leading "scream queen" of the 60's. She starred in countless of horror films through the 60's. With her good looks, sex appeal and mystery, she was perfect in movies dealing with the supernatural and the macabre. This film I first saw in Macabre Theatre, a monster movie showcase in a lesser known station KDOCTV here in Southern California and it's now on cable channel KHIZ. The hosts were Butch Patrick (Eddie Munster from the 60's show The Munsters) and Ivonna Cadaver, a younger Elvira look-a-like. This film does have camp or cult classic value because so much of this material is not considered frightening today. In today's horror movie scene, blood, gore, excessive violence and a scary soundtrack is what does it for today's audiences. But for it's time in 1965 this weird movie must have scared audiences or at least creeped them out. Although it does not reach the heights of horror that Dawn Of The Dead did later in the 60's, Nightmare Castle is chilling, Gothic and genuinely haunting.
The owner of a large castle, a scientist, is happily married to his beautiful wife (Barbara Steele). But while he is away, she engages in an affair with the gardener. When the scientist husband discovers their relationship, he becomes insanely jealous. Unleashing his fury and revenge, he tortures them with electric shock. These scenes are graphic, intense and disturbing, even for a 1965 film. I was very surprised by it. The torture is enough to kill the lovers. Years later, the scientist marries a beautiful replica of his wife (Barbara Steele again) She begins to be haunted by an evil presence in the castle. It becomes so bad that a therapist is hired to help her with what they think is psychological problems. The therapist, however, discovers that the castle is haunted. Guess by who ? The dead lovers that were killed years ago by the jealous husband! Eventually, there is a showdown between the ghosts, the scientist husband, the look-alike wife and the therapist, whom we are lead to believe is her new love interest. After many frightening confrontations, the castle burns down and our heroine Barbara Steele makes it out alive with her therapist boyfriend. This is a truly great film, despite its obscurity and its camp value. For a black and white film, it's visually impressive. The music as one review mentioned, is nothing dissonant or typical of horror movie soundtracks. It's subtle, it's romantic, making use of a lot of piano (Barbara Steele plays the piano in this movie). A must have for fans of Miss Steele or classic horror films.