Film #5: The Conqueror Worm a.k.a. Witchfinder General

Among the horror genre’s most criminally overlooked classics, 1968’s The Conqueror Worm, which was US distributor American International's Corman-esque way of linking the film to the classic, long dead horror writer Edgar Allen Poe. Poe was then a big box office draw, the inspiration of many Hammer horror vehicles like The Pit and the Pendulum, House of Usher, The Raven, and The Tomb of Ligeia, among many more, though the author's connection to this film is tenuous at best; his words are repped only as some snatches of opening and closing poetry. Better known in the U.K. as Witchfinder General (the Poe-less title under which it was eventually released on an MGM Blu-Ray box set including the Poe-connected anthology film Tales of Terror, the raucous two-film Dr. Phibes series, and the superb, Shakespeare-tinged horror black comedy Theater of Blood).

Reeves' version of this extraordinarily downbeat tale is a jaw-dropper. Despite its low budget, it succeeds in placing viewer right in this life-cheapening era. It, of course, stars Vincent Price as Matthew Hopkins, the real-life henchman for Cromwell's war-torn 17th century Britain who's assigned to locate and prosecute witches hidden within the country’s tiny townships. He’s an intriguing character because, with his obvious intelligence, he should be able to mitigate his dark side with common decency. Yet Hopkins is so consumed with lust and power that he can’t help but take advantage of the vulnerable, especially in a time where almost everyone was mad with fear and ignorance.

Rest assured, Price plays all this to the hilt in one of his very finest non-tongue-in-cheek horror performances. Without even the briefest moment of relief from the terror gripping the UK in this period of its history, the film is smartly helmed by the long-depressed director/co-writer Reeves, who spearheaded two dire, similarly-flavored pictures (The She-Beast and The Sorcerers) before accidentally overdosing in 1969. In keeping with his previous unsparing works, The Conqueror Worm is disturbingly set in a Hell where all moral boundaries have been violently erased, and all subjugated characters are capable of atrocities against even their closest confidants. It's no walk in the park, but it is frankly unforgettable.