MOVIE REVIEW: To The Devil A Daughter 1976Catherine (Natassja Kinski) is an 18 year old nun who has been groomed from birth to take on an important role in her "church" headed by Father Michael Rayner (Christopher Lee) , an ex-communicated clergyman who heads a flock of devil worshippers. The father of Catherine (Denholm Elliot) changes his mind about handing his daughter over to the church and seeks the assistance of John Verney (Richard Widmark) to rescue her. John is a scholar of the occult and may have knowledge of how to save his daughter's life. The church's goal is to use Catherine's body as a portal for the devil, so basically she will give birth to the spawn of the devil and then become the devil herself (makes a lot of sense huh?). John Verney takes on the duty of housing the young nun hoping the experience will make great material for his latest book. He gets more than he bargained for when strange events happen, his agent is killed and then Catherine disappears. Now John interests are more personal than professional and he sets out to find the missing Catherine and to put an end to the cult. No more spoilers from me y'all.
This was a really cool creepy flick until it got kind of silly towards the end. Some of the scenes were thrown in for shock value. The most effective scene was a freaky orgy/ritual scene, a common theme in 70's occult horror. The additional sex/nude scenes were not needed, someone felt they needed to "up the ante" a bit. Christopher Lee is a horror icon.....he is and always will be the best Dracula ever and he played dozens of other great roles as well. This film is visually interesting and the transfer to DVD is exceptional. I can't tell you how many older movies I've seen that have been transferred to DVD that look crappy and grainy as hell. Some people may object to the subject matter of this film and it features brief nudity.
VERDICT: 2 Soul Claps
Labels: Movie Reviews
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, October 03, 2006 at 4:12 PM.
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