Early '70s Italian Gothic horror about a journalist, Alan Foster (Anthony Franciosa), who makes a bet with Lord Thomas Blackwood (Enrico Osterman) that he can stay overnight in Blackwood's castle... and survive. Blackwood is good friends with Edgar Allan Poe (Klaus Kinski). Such is the vapid nature of this film that Poe's character is totally inconsequential to the plot. Six writers cobbled together the mishmash of a script. Franciosa spends the majority of his on-screen time wielding a candelabra and looking handsome. Finally, some eye candy shows up in the personae of Elisabeth Blackwood and Julia (Michele Mercier and Karin Field). What could have become a ghostly threesome devolves into a convoluted plot about romantic intrigue amongst the better-off-than-you, as shadows of the past reunite for a fancy ball, witnessed by Foster and his unsolicited companion, Dr. Carmus (Peter Carsten), who shows up halfway through the film: He manages to suck whatever life there was out of it, as he assumes the role of expositor and waxes eloquent about what happens to snakes after they are chopped in half. The principals' psychodrama plays out in front of them, and there is much murder and mayhem. Foster interacts effortlessly with these spirits, oblivious to the notion that there might be a trick being played on him. By the time the action ensues, we are ready to call for our last dance card. So cheap was the transfer of this film to video that the copyright shows up about five minutes before the end of the film, an end that doesn't come nearly soon enough.
Review of Web of the Spider
