The Witchfinder General was success a success at the box office that it ushered in a second cycle of Poe movies from AIP with Vincent Price (even though Witchfinder hardly had any connection with Poe). This was meant to reunite Price and Hilary Dwyer with Michael Reeves, but the latter died during preproduction and was replaced by Gordon Hessler who does a decent enough job... maybe Reeves would have done better, but Hessler has been unfairly neglected due to the fact he didn't die young.
Anyway the plot has Price as an English lord whose brother is disfigured and sent insane in the West Indies, so Pricey does a Jane Eyre and locks him up at home. When he thinks the brother has died he does a body swap requiring some body snatching... at which point it became clear this movie was ripping off a whole slew of others.
It's not a bad story, the avenging voodoo-worshipping West Indians, pretty English actresses (regal Hilary Dwyer and likeable maid Sally Gleeson), a masked brother, a family curse, body snatching Christopher Lee... But dramatically it suffers from dropping Price from the middle and focusing on his brother, who is masked (Alister Williamson), and who we never get a feel for. Dwyer is wasted - what's the point of having her in the film? They would have been better off having a love triangle between Price, Williamson and Gleeson... or have Price aware of what was going on instead of being passive...
I know this is back seat scriptwriting but I can't help it - watching the film is frustrating. There's so much good stuff going on (Lee and Price together, Price back in the Poe saddle) it's a shame it wasn't better. Still apparently production was a hard slog and its meant to be a miracle they got this, so that's something.
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