Pretty Good

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

Arriving at his fiancee's mansion, a man looking to retrieve her to be married together finds that her controlling brother is trying to remove him before a terrible family curse takes hold of them and tries to ensure her safety before it can come to pass.This is one of the best in the Corman/Price/Poe series. Being the official start of the series, the Gothic atmosphere surrounding the film is completely overwhelming and at times can suffocate with it's dread. There's numerous encounters here filled with old, creaky caskets, a long, winding staircase into the darkness and cob-webbed decor surrounding the rooms while featuring candle-lit lighting and large, opulent splendor that's bright and spacey that solidifies its true Gothic mindset. That goes hand-in-hand with the fact that the castle grounds are in the traditional Victorian style on a fog- covered grounds, dark dead trees, musky swamplands and it makes the sequences showing it pretty spooky. Likewise, the curse befalling the family is quite chilling with the line of history and how it's doomed to repeat itself makes for a great revelation that jumps off quite fittingly from the house's location and surroundings into the big plot-point about her being accidentally buried alive in order to fulfill the family curse. That as well leads into the film's great action scenes, where their first trip in the basement is a great set-piece that has a great shock effectively using a skeleton in the casket while a dream sequence also comes off rather well as it's pretty creepy for the time and actually came as a surprise. Still, it's the final half hour which scores so well here as that is one continuous Gothic set-piece with the banging doors, the blaring thunderstorm in the background and the thrilling resurrection that is cleverly done showing a close-up following of a blood-trail along the floor out of the crypt back into the house and leading into the big final fight that make this a spectacular series of events. The conflagration at the end is an only more than appropriate ending, as it's action-packed and suspenseful in its own way, serves itself well with the great brawl for the Gothic-styled revenge which is a great ending to the series of events and ends it on a high note. Perhaps the best part, though, is Price's creepy performance as Roderick Usher. He gives one of his best performances, being creepy, mysterious and fun to watch as well and is certainly a career highlight in that respect. These here make this quite a spectacular effort that does have more than enough to overcome the one minor flaw in here. There is really only one thing that holds this back as every new and then, Price's constant speeches about not understanding the Usher curse got old. It wouldn't take up that much to officially explain what happened, and it would take away from the speeches and get to the story, so that kind of sticks out here. Though some may have a problem about how close it is to Poe's story, that's of a viewer-discrepancy issue rather than anything to do with the actual film itself and really isn't a detriment like the other factor is.Today's Rating/PG: Mild Violence.

If you've seen any of the other Corman/Poe films, then you'll know exactly what to expect from this one. It's a straightforward adaptation of the Poe tale , with some very nice photography and camera-work - all achieved on a low budget, as par the course for Corman. The sets are beautiful and authentic-looking, there's plenty of dry ice floating about all over the place, and the costumes are pretty. Like the other films in this series, THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER works best in creeping up on you unawares, assailing you the viewer with some of Poe's worst fears - in this case, namely being buried alive.A blond (!) Vincent Price haunts the picture, once again giving an excellent performance which helps to lift the whole film. It's safe to say that Price is so good that in any scene without him, you find yourself looking forward to his return. In this film, he's mad (what's new), and puts in a frightening portrayal of total insanity. He believes he's pure and surrounded by evil, when in fact the opposite is true. Price also has some really bizarre mannerisms, he can't bear to be touched and he hates loud noise (later, in THE TOMB OF LIGEIA, he couldn't bear bright light either). Fahey makes a believable transition from damsel in distress to insane killer, and while Damon is occasionally wooden, he acquits himself in the hero role well.Richard Matheson is the scriptwriter in this case, adding to Poe's original story of madness in the family strain. I'm sure that Matheson is the one responsible for some of the choice dialogue here, which was definitely missing in later Poe films. Apart from an out of place dream sequence, which threatens to go all psychedelic on us, everything slots in nicely. The spookiest bit comes when Damon follows a trail of his fiancée's blood through the secret passageways of the house. There are also lots of cobwebby skeletons sitting around and adding to the atmosphere. Just wait for the predictably fiery and nihilistic climax when the house burns apart and collapses. Sombre, slow, creepy, haunting, subtle and atmospheric are all adjectives that can be applied to THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER, and it turns out to be one of Corman's best films (that's saying something when all of the Poe films he made were above average). For those who like Gothic spookers, this could be the one for you.

The first adaptation of the Edgar Allen Poe movies was already an enjoyable experience. It's more about atmosphere and some creepy sequences than story. I guess Legend of Hell House must have gotten its ideas from this one. Even though not as good as other haunted house movies it's one that I'm pondering over to have in my collection. And Vincent Price gives as usual a great performance. What makes this movie strong is the setting of the mansion. We have the paintings of the gruesome ancestors on the walls, the coffins in the basement and the mansion itself bathing in a big cloud of mist to just name a few things. Usually I think black and white creates the right atmosphere but here it was actually the color that added to the experience. A few creepy scenes such as chandelier falling and almost dropping on a visitor, coffin falling open to reveal a skeleton and the visitor having a dream about the ancestors of the Ushers in the form of ghosts. That the back story of the Ushers was eventually more interesting than the story displayed in the movie didn't take away the overall enjoyable experience for me. And Myrna Fahey was really beautiful as Madeline, could easily compete with Barbara Steele.

The first of Roger Corman's Edgar Allan Poe Adaptations opens with a stark, ultra-bleak landscape, as Mark Damon plays Philip Winthrop, who arrives on horseback to see his love Madeline Usher(played by Myrna Fahey) only to be told by her brother Roderick Usher(Vincent Price, superb) that she has fallen into a catatonic state, and he is afflicted with overly acute senses, rendering him listless. Apparently, the Usher's are under a curse that has finally taken affect on them, and their mansion. Philip refuses to believe this, but stays in hopes of helping Madeline, though events will prove to be beyond his control...First-rate adaptation of the memorable short story is atmospherically directed by Roger Corman and well written by Richard Matheson, both conveying well the palpable sense of gloom and decay that has afflicted the Usher estate. A bit slow at times, but a minor quibble in such a striking film.