The Thing That Couldn't Die

1958 "The grave can't hold it ...nothing human can stop it!"
4.2| 1h9m| NR| en
Details

A 400 year old disembodied head hypnotizes a female psychic, who recovered it using a dowsing rod, to search for the rest of its body.

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Reviews

Glucedee It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.
WillSushyMedia This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.
Humbersi The first must-see film of the year.
Tobias Burrows It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.
oscar-35 The Thing That Couldn't Die (1958) *Spoiler/plot- Devil worshiper head in box killed by Sir Francis Drake in northern California. Looks for his body in present day time.*Special Stars- William Reynolds, Andra Martin, Jeffrey Stone, Carolyn Kearney, Peggy Converse, Robin Hughes, James Anderson, Charles HOrvath, Forest Lewis.*Theme- Evil can effect matters after death.*Trivia/location/goofs- Opening film credits re-used the music from the famous sci-fi film, 'This island Earth'. Original music: Henry Mancini (uncredited music). Final film of DIR; Will Cowan. Final feature film for actress Carolyn Kearney. Watch for Robin 'Twilight Zone: Howling Man" Hughes.*Emotion- This film is a suspenseful and eerie horror film incorporating some historic elements of pirates and California Bay area history tinged with horror.*Based On- Horror tradition.
Michael O'Keefe Written by David Duncan and directed by Will Cowan, this horror tale is also known as THE WATER WITCH. A bit scary with situational terror, THE THING THAT COULDN'T DIE, or wouldn't die. Using a dowsing rod on her aunt's ranch, a young female psychic makes a startling discovery. A box is recovered from the ground and it contains a 400 year old head! This is the living head of a 16th century devil worshiper named Gideon Drew(Robin Hughes). The dismembered head's whispers will hypnotize anyone listening to search for its separated body. The dowsing rod figures to be important in the search, no matter who uses it.The players include: Carolyn Kearney, William Reynolds, Andrea Martin, Charles Horvath, Peggy Converse and Jeffery Stone.
mlraymond The main problem with this movie has been pointed out already by other viewers: not the low budget, or the recycled music, which is pretty well used, or the basic story, etc, but that many of the characters are pretty annoying. Jessica, the sweet young thing with the psychic gift, is just too bland to be much of a real heroine, and the hero does very little. Boyd, the sleazy ranch hand is supposed to be unlikable and he does a good job, as does the big, Lenny like guy as a well meaning , but simple character. The drunken artist is understandably P.O.'d at the way his model/fiancée Linda is acting.The characters and performances that really stand out for me are Andra Martin as Linda, doing a very good job as the nice model, who turns into a really sensuously sinister character, under the influence of sorceror Gideon Drew. Considering he spends most of the movie as a disembodied head, Robin Hughes is very good as the undead magician.Once he's back in one piece, he delivers some effectively menacing lines quite well.The aforementioned are probably the best performances, but the third memorable one stands out as being one of the most presumably unintentionally dislikable characters in a movie. Aunt Flavia as written is certainly not very appealing, but the actress portraying her makes her so obnoxious that she nearly sinks the picture. Other posters have referred to her "dental drill voice" and that they hoped the bad guy would get her before the picture was over, or a tree would fall on her, and I concur.Ever since one poster referred to " the closet gay leading man", I've been forced to look at the movie differently. A couple of posters have mentioned a vaguely lesbian subtext to some scenes involving Linda and Jessica, and I have to admit, seeing the two good looking ladies sharing a bed was kind of exciting, but any possible undertones of that nature would have to have been pretty well hidden for a Fifties movie.It certainly isn't a good movie by most standards, but it does have a kind of creepy atmosphere that works fairly well. I think it's worth seeing once, any way.
babeth_jr This 1950's B-flick falls under the "it's so bad that it's good" movie category.I watched this picture numerous times as a kid on t.v. and hadn't seen it in years when I lucked out and caught it on American Movie Classics a few years back.Time had not changed the cheesiness of the plot, or the terrible acting by most of the lead actors, but who cares? This movie was made in the 1950's, when cheesy horror and sci-fi movies were all the rage.The plot revolves around a psychic young woman, Jessica, (portrayed by Carolyn Kearney, who wildly over acts in every scene she's in) who discovers an ancient chest buried on her Aunt's ranch. The chest contains the severed head of Gideon Drew (Robin Hughes), who was put to death several centuries earlier for satanism. Drew wants his head to be reunited with his body, and hey, who can blame him? There are several hilarious scenes of Drew's head being carried all over the ranch by the ranch's imbecile ranch hand Mike, as well as the head being hid in a hat box, etc. Can you stand it? They just don't make movies like this anymore.I love everything about this movie, from start to finish! It's not scary, just fun.