UnowPriceless hyped garbage

Stellead Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful

Siflutter It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Abbigail Bush what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

bnwfilmbuff Outstanding film dealing with people confronting death and their fear of death. The movie opens with the viewer experiencing what the professional solder must face: death by execution, pestilence, and war. Then we find a group of disparate people living on an island cemetery trying to avoid the war only to find themselves suddenly quarantined with the plague. This exposes fears that go beyond death to premature burial and vampirism. The casting and the acting were marvelous. For all but Karloff, this was probably their finest moment in film. The mood goes from melancholy to resignation to horror. No there are no scary monsters or overly introspective dialog. Just an expertly directed and produced melodrama. Highly recommended especially to anybody questioning if it is possible to make a great film on a limited budget.

Nigel P Greece, 1912. It must be pretty miserable to hear that a spreading plague necessitates strict confinement to your home; when one of your house-guests is Boris Karloff, that misery takes on a new dimension.'Isle of the Dead' is an RKO horror film, one of a series produced by Val Lewton. Whereas Universal had cornered the monster market, with increasingly exploitative meet-ups between Dracula, Frankenstein's monster and The Wolfman, Lewton specialised in less obvious, more psychological dramas. The horror here is more prevalent in what you don't see. Whereas 1942's 'Cat People' may be the most successful example of this approach, Lewton produced a hugely impressive body of work, among which this production stands tall.When the shadow of Gen. Nikolas Pherides (Karloff) falls across a scene, there is an instant atmosphere of jeopardy, of cruelty, disease and fear. Pherides has a reputation for cruel efficiency, and he brings this to his authority when dealing with the house-full of potential plague carriers, himself amongst their number.The stand-out scene for me is when Katherine Emery as Mrs. Mary St. Aubyn (Katherine Emery) falls into a cataleptic trance, is subsequently buried, and wakes screaming in her casket. We hear her fear and desperate scratching as the camera lingers on her incarcerated wooden tomb, the shadow of blowing branches fallen across it, relentless drip-dripping of the damp stonework upon it. The box splinters and is pushed open as the camera maddeningly pulls away to another scene. Her friend Thea (Ellen Drew) goes in search of the escapee in a perfect studio-set nightmare, her white nightdress blowing in the wind – St. Aubyn has seemingly been driven out of her mind by the experience and parades the house and its surrounding grounds like a vengeful ghost. No-one is safe it seems, especially Pherides, who, for all his sins emerges as a kind of misunderstood anti-hero … Melodramatic it may be, there's no denying the intensity brings with it a true spirit of dread.

Al Westerfield I first saw Isle of the Dead as a double feature in 1953 when I was twelve. Or rather, I didn't see it because my head was buried in my lap for the coffin close up. With many films I saw in my youth, re-approaching them as an adult usually results in disappointment. When I watch The Phantom Empire serial now, I know it's trash. But that doesn't stop me from seeing it for the nostalgia rush. However, with Isle of the Dead the chill down my spine still remains, no matter how many times I watch. I consider the final 15 minutes to be the longest sustained horror in the history of films until Alien.It is obvious from the comments that many reviewers have read Bansak's Fearing the Dark; The Val Lewton Career. I love the work and agree with almost every opinion expressed. However, I would reverse the comments he makes in his reviews of Isle and The Body Snatcher. I found the latter rather boring until the final 30 seconds of absolute horror. Isle is far more interesting throughout and it's horror is sustained rather than momentary. While The 7th Victim is my personal favorite of Lewton's films, my intellectual side says Isle of the Dead is his finest.

utgard14 During the Balkan war of 1912, Greek General Pherides (Boris Karloff) and American reporter Oliver Davis (Marc Cramer) visit the island where the General's wife is buried and are shocked to discover her crypt desecrated. Seeking answers, they go to the home of retired archaeologist Dr. Aubrecht (Jason Robards, Sr.) and find him with a houseful of guests. After staying the night, one of the guests is found dead of what is believed to be the plague and the house is quarantined. Aubrecht's superstitious housekeeper (Helen Thimig) has another explanation for the death, however. She believes it to be the work of a vampiric creature called the vorvolaka. She says the vorvolaka is one of the houseguests (Ellen Drew) and that they are all doomed. At first the General laughs at the idea but as more people die he begins to believe that the vorvolaka is real and it is his duty to protect the others from death at her hands. Add to this a woman (Katherine Emery) deathly afraid of premature burial and you have a powder keg of claustrophobic tensions and superstitious fears.The eighth of producer Val Lewton's nine psychological horror classics from the 1940s. Considered by many to be one of the lesser Lewton films, Isle of the Dead is perhaps my favorite of them all. It's a truly underrated film that typifies the Lewtonian approach to horror. The hauntingly shadowy atmosphere, the eerily ambiguous plot, fine acting, excellent writing, and moody direction are all trademarks of the Lewton horror films. Obviously I'm not alone in my admiration for this classic. Martin Scorsese placed it on his list of the 11 scariest horror films of all time. It's a truly great film that should be more widely appreciated. It's one of Boris Karloff's greatest performances and is a must-see for any of his fans.