EssenceStory
Well Deserved Praise
Rijndri
Load of rubbish!!
Lumsdal
Good , But It Is Overrated By Some
Mischa Redfern
I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.
Uriah43
Upon his death "Lord Arnold Dewellyn" (Norman Stuart) makes arrangements to be married to a woman by the name of "Karen" (Stella Stevens) even though he leaves behind a widow named "Lady Jocelyn Dewellyn" (Shani Wallis). As it turns out, the reason he does this is because he wishes to settle some old scores with everyone who supposedly loved him but were only interested in his money. Think of it as a kind of sick joke which he continues to play upon with the reading of the will in which he mandates certain instructions intended to cause even more problems for all concerned. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that I didn't particularly care for this movie that much due in large part to the absence of humor and the morbid circumstances surrounding everything. To be sure, there is some mystery here and there and Stella Stevens was definitely quite attractive. Even so, I found the overall plot to be somewhat distasteful and for that reason I have rated it accordingly. Below average.
Nina Lincoln
I remember seeing this movie when I was all of 10 years old with my older sister (who should have known better!) I couldn't sleep for days after. This movie is really really scary in a campy, early '70s way. Com'on, who wouldn't get scared with a dead body lying in its coffin, in the middle of the living room, while tape recordings arrive each morning detailing the gruesome events of the previous day -- and, in the corpse's own voice, no less!!??? It's like something out of Agatha Christie wherein relatives of the deceased must survive night after night in a creepy, booby-trapped house. The last one alive gets to keep all the money left behind....the location of which is to be revealed in one final tape! You just gotta have a ghoulish sense of humor to enjoy the cheeky macabre aspects of this horror flick send up. Plus, it really is funny the way these greedy, money hungry people die and, in the end, you kind of feel they all deserved it.
Melissa Drake (melskunk)
I've noticed there aren't a lot of comments on this film, and for good reason. It's been burried in the annals of time, from that dark age where films where made before Direct to Video that were obviously prime candidates.I managed to see the piece with my fiance last weekend on television as part of a run of 'bad movies'. We intended to go out to a show that night, but ended up caught up in the funny weirdness of the story, the sets, the acting, the whole mess, and couldn't leave. Each time we planned to get up to go, we remained seated, glued to the set, in awe of the bizzare feature. It was like some sort of perverse Estragon and Vladimir situation.And if that isn't a recommendation, I don't know what is.
It's certainly no classic. It's a pretty lousy movie. The cheerful early seventies theme that opens the feature ("How happy we'll be, together you and me... Arrrrnold, Arrrnold!") is played over the background of a funeral in an obviously small soundstage with styrafoam tombstones and the obligatory raven and fog, which is of course hillarious.But it's a fun watch. No one in it thinks they're in a classic, and the whole situation gets quite laughable frequently. It's got enough aspects of a whodunit to be vaugly interesting.Best points are probably the police constable commenting 'Now, is this place a cemetary because it's always foggy here, or is it always foggy here because it's a cemetary?' and the tapedeck in the coffin. Oyvey!The only word for it is 'hypnotic'. You'll keep watching. You won't believe what you're seeing, yet you'll have to watch more.In the words of the bobby "If I hadn't a seen it I wouldn'ta believed it!"
BaronBl00d
Arnold is a film about a recently deceased wealthy man that kills off his heirs and company from the grave. It is a dark comedy, mixing gory thrills with low-brow comedy. This mix works well overall despite a somewhat lacking script. Most of the credit should go to the cast which is superb. Stella Stevens is ever beautiful, and buxom I might add, as Arnold's newly wed wife after his death. Elsa Lanchester, yes the Bride herself, is winsome as his dottering, cat-pawing sister. Roddy McDowell is as ever charming as his penniless, conniving younger brother. Good turns also are contributed from Patric Knowles, Farley Granger, John McGiver, and Jamie Farr. The best performance is given by British character actor Bernard Fox(known for his role of Dr. Bombay on Bewitched) as a dim-witted policeman that has little tact and sense. His lines are the best and he certainly is the funniest aspect of the film. The cast dies through many grisly deaths. One person is compacted in a garbage truck, another choked to death from a suit, another interred for life in a vault, another beheaded, and a couple pressed together between two walls. Shanni Wallis sings a rather very 70ish tune by the titular name that sets the mood of the film almost immediately as do some of the stylish sets and swirling fogs of the cemetery.