Friday, April 24, 2020

The Headless Ghost (1959)

A light hearted ghost story. Three foreign exchange college students visit a dusty old castle owned by the Earl of Ambrose (Jack Allan). He tells them that the castle is haunted but Americans Bill (Richard Lyon) and Ronnie (David Rose) scoff at this. They decide to stay in the castle overnight with Ingrid (Lilane Sottane) to find out the truth.

Stuck in the castle, they find indeed there are ghosts. In fact there seem to be ghosts everywhere! Most of the ghosts are manifested as voices but there is also the Fourth Earl (Clive Revill) whose portrait comes to life... and a knight in armour wielding an axe! The three students eventually meet a headless ghost and are told they cannot leave until they find his missing head!

The scares are fairly low-thrill and offer a rather stereotypical view of castle life. The comedy is about as weak as the horror element but the film is reasonably entertaining. At times it  resembles a medieval reenactment with overly keen amateurs and that does add an element of (probably) unintentional fun.