I love the Edgar Allan Poe cycle of films directed by Roger Corman and starring Vincent Price. After Corman departed after six or seven films, American International Pictures kept the series going with a series of different directors. Most genre fans -- myself included -- consider that a big mistake. Corman had a real vision and flair for the material that the other directors lacked.
The one notable exception is the 1968 film, The Conqueror Worm, directed by Michael Reeves. It's a gruesome and unrelenting tale of witchhunting in civil war England. Vincent Price plays Matthew Hopkins, the "Witchfinder General", in a cruel and humorless manner that is a million miles away from his usual campy screen portrayals. The fact that Hopkins is convinced that he is a humble servant doing "the Lord's work" makes him all the more menacing.
I watched it on panned-and-scanned VHS last night and was convinced that it ranks up with Night of the Living Dead and The Wicker Man as one of the few truly great horror films. Why isn't this gem on DVD?
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