The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave (1972)

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

This Italian-made attempt at Gothic Horror takes place in England— except most of the characters have jet black hair and Mediterranean complexions, and they drive on the right side of the road.The plot: Alan Cunningham, a wealthy English lord, has just been released from an insane asylum. He had suffered a mental breakdown following the death of his red-haired wife, Evelyn, whom he feared was cheating on him. A free man, Alan scours the local bars and dives for lovely redheads willing to come back to his decaying castle in the country—where he seduces, tortures, and murders them.Alan eventually remarries. Not long after, he starts seeing visions of his dead wife, and his live-in relatives are turning up brutally (if creatively) murdered. One is bitten by what looks like an ordinary grass snake and is buried alive in a shallow grave. Another is bludgeoned to death and fed to a cage full of foxes. At least I think that's what happens, but who can tell through the poor lighting?About the only thing this film has going for it is the eye-catching (if misleading) title. It's rife with Gothic clichés: cobwebs, mist, creaking floorboards, and a nasty rainstorm, for example. The plot is byzantine and contains not one, but three, false endings. There are long stretches where nothing happens. The editing is choppy. Not one character is likable or sympathetic. Alan's wheelchair-bound aunt looks much younger than he is. Fans of gore won't appreciate the mildness of the murder scenes. There is, however, plenty of Italian cheesecake on hand.Speaking of which, a strong current of misogyny permeates the film. The women are all passive and subservient, from the maids to Alan's murder victims to his new wife. Finally, the ending feels like an afterthought. It leaves a gaping plot hole (or six) and lets a murderer go free.There is no reason to see this turgid, malevolent, muddled excuse for a thriller.

A wealthy English lord is suffering a mental breakdown following the death of his red-headed wife, Evelyn, whom he feared was cheating on him. He tours local bars and dives, scouring for lovely red-heads willing to come back to his decaying castle in the country, where he seduces them, then tortures and kills them.This is the first of two giallo films directed by Emilio Miraglia, and both revolve around a woman named "Evelyn" who has died. Is there something behind this? Probably, but who knows. Miraglia had a bit of a history in Italian film at this point, working his way up to director after assisting others, including Lucio Fulci. Miraglia only directed a total of six films of any genre, so no surprise if you are less than familiar with him.Troy Howarth actually says the film is not strict giallo, but calls this a hybrid of giallo and modern Gothic, which is a fair claim. It stars Anthony Steffen, the royal-blooded Italian Clint Eastwood, best known for "Django the Bastard" (if he is remembered at all). But the biggest name in this film is Erika Blanc (known for Bava's "Kill Baby Kill" among others). She may in many ways be here more for her looks than her acting, but her acting is nothing to sneeze at.Bruno Nicolai, second only to Ennio Morricone (and maybe Caludio Simonetti) supplies the soundtrack, though not all of it is fresh. We have, for example, a re-use of Nicolai's "Criminal Sex" for the early, memorable naked whipping scene. But when you already have a good tune, why use something else?On VHS and DVD, the film has been released by various labels over the years with questionable legitimacy to the rights and subpar, truncated presentations. Finally, thanks to Arrow Video, we get the ultimate release -- uncut, in both English and Italian, and loaded with extras. Of particular interest is the audio commentary from author Troy Howarth, an expert on this sort of film. Erika Blanc also has an interview.

This film is known as 'The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave', 'The Night She Arose from the Tomb' and it's original title 'La Notte che Evelyn Usci dalla Tomba' (1971).The film is a horror and mystery with some sexploitation. A man's wife recently died and he was afraid she was cheating on him all along. He's starting to drive himself insane with these thoughts. He goes out and lures young women to his castle and has his way with them by having sex with them then torturing the women. His doctor is trying to help him by "freeing his mind" from his insanity but is this cure what he really needs? It's a somewhat entertaining film with seances, a ghost, a castle, torture chamber, insanity, and a possible hope for a cure. He is very sadistic madman towards the women who only wanted to have some kinky fun with him.6/10

This Italian semi-horror movie starts out very much like a soft core porn movie and turns into a mystery that has a few to many loose ends to be good, that and the fact it is rather dull just makes this film rather unwatchable for my tastes. The only thing really worth watching are the many boobs spread throughout the film. The story has a guy who at the beginning of the movie luring girls to his castle where he proceeds to take them to his dungeon, go berserk and seemingly kill them. They show the nudity, but they never really show the murders at this point in the film. Then the guy finds a nice red head at a party and proceeds to make out with her and marry her. He has a thing for red heads you see as his beloved former wife Evelyn was also one, she also died under circumstances that must have not been the viewing audience's business. After a lot of talky scenes murders start to take place involving snakes, foxes and such. At this point it is easy enough to figure out who is responsible for the murders and what the motive is then you have a nonsensical ending where everything wraps up not so nicely. This movie just did not work for me, it left me with to many questions and the last third of the film just did not have the boobs of the first two thirds of the film. Explaining Evelyn's death would have helped the film as would have some sort of ending where Evelyn did rise from the grave. Granted the title is not totally misleading as she did sort of leave the grave, just not under her own power. The gore is very light for the most part as there is a scene with the foxes and a scene at the end with quite a bit of blood too. I just thought for the most part this movie was a tad dull.