Our latest Vincent Price vehicle leads me to wonder: which lead actor has starred in the highest percentage of movies which culminate in the destruction, often flaming, of a castle? In The Raven (1963), using Edgar Allan Poe’s poem of the same name as a jumping off point, Vincent Price is the wizard Erasmus Craven, the husband of the woman who is the subject of the poem and now two years gone. He’s a quiet, underconfident wizard, living with his daughter, his dead wife (preserved in her coffin), and opens the story with the appearance of a talking raven.
Eventually, the raven is returned to human form, a wizard by the name of Bedlo (Peter Lorre), who is in a fury about the transformation, saying he lost a battle with the wizard Scarabus (Boris Karloff), and he had seen Craven’s late, lamented wife, Lenore, at Scarabus’ domicile. Bestirred at the thought of Lenore, Craven decides to investigate by visiting Scarabus’ castle.
The plot continues, at first seeming a bit pedestrian but eventually including unforeseen, yet plausible, convolutions worth the time. The climactic battle is, for all that the film is a bit fluffy, fairly satisfying: leisurely, both serious and comedic; the points it makes are better than many to be found in today’s tense battle scenes.
As the issue is decided, the castle, built of course of stone, still manages to catch alight and collapse in a fiery burst, much as do similar structures in other Price movies, such as The Haunted Palace (1963), The Tomb of Ligeia (1964), Morella (1962), House of the Seven Gables (1963), and The Fall of the House of Usher (1960) – and perhaps others that I have not yet seen.
The raven is quite remarkable for its training. The three leads are excellent in their performances, and the supporting actors, including a young Jack Nicholson, are adequate in their work. This is a pleasantly entertaining film for those viewers who are not ruffled by the extension of Poe’s famous poem into a lengthy feature film. For those who are appalled at the thought, I can only direct you to this bravura performance:
