Grimerlana Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

Pluskylang Great Film overall

InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

Anders Twetman Oh, the pauses, there are so many pauses in this movie. Touch of Satan is pretty much just dialog interspersed with a few scenes of action. The problem is, said dialog is exceedingly slow, and the actors keep making pauses, like they are afraid to sound rushed or something. When there is no flow in even the simplest conversation, there is really no flow in the movie. You could actually make this movie as a series of stills, and lose non of the pacing.In most other aspects, I guess this film is sort of OK, just slightly below mediocre. The slow pacing just kills it. Oh, and another thing, the music; there is an abundance of creepy music in the film, probably to heighten the tension, but when played over a scene depicting a guy skipping rocks over a pond on a sunny day, it doesn't really work, it just makes the movie makers seem slightly incompetent.

geminiredblue I first saw this movie years ago when Mystery Science Theater (or MST3K) showed it. Since then, thanks to the miracle of something called videotape (and more recently on DVD), I've gone back to the definitive version (with the Bots) numerous times! Putting aside their funny antics, I'll try to rate the movie based on its own merits (or lack thereof.) First, the acting is uneven. The main character, Jodie, is kind of a bland Donald Sutherland. His hair, clothes, and mentality firmly point out that he's from the 70s. He's also pretty naive. Even though there's a lot of foreboding, Jodie is completely unaware of it. The actress who plays Melissa is equally bland, pretty but still bland. Between these two will pass numerous uncomfortable pauses. And when I mean pauses, I mean P... A... U... S... E... S... This is another one of those movies where you get the feeling the filmmakers didn't have enough material to make it a feature-length, so they compensated by putting long, slow pauses. Now mind you, pauses work when done right. Anton Chekov made a ton of plays using the pause to enhance meaning. The problem is when there's too much of a pause, it loses meaning. Not to mention, considering Jodie and Melissa are supposed to be budding lovers, it seems odd that they still share so many uncomfortably long pauses. The acting gets slightly better with the supporting cast. My personal favorite is the actress playing the witch/sister/great grandmother (depending on who's telling the story) Lucinda. When she flips out, it's convincing and startling. Good make-up too! In fact, that is the best feature about the film: killer witch/ sister/ great grandmother! Getting back to the love story, it's just as uneven as the rest of this film. Having just met Melissa, Jodie automatically agrees to stay for a few days with her creepy family. He's completely oblivious to their "less-than-welcoming" mood. As the movie goes on, we learn that Melissa is thought of as a witch in town. What follows is some of the blandest events to unfold. You get the feeling that there is a demonic force going on, but the pace needs to be ramped up! The ending is eerie, though it still seems out-of-place considering that the relationship between Jodie and Melissa doesn't appear to be that serious. Throughout the film, it's obvious there is no real chemistry between the two actors and it makes their relationship seem forced. Oh, did I mention the laughable dialogue? My favorite is when Melissa stops by a pond and says "This is where the fish lives." Huh, the fish? Just the fish? Just one fish? What does that have to do with anything?! And why, oh why, did they have "Amazing Grace" play at least three times in this movie? Public domain? The overall problem is that there is a decent and scary little witch movie buried within. Unfortunately, it's so buried underneath ho-hum acting, poorly paced scenes, and those god-awful pauses that it isn't scary. Could you imagine if they remade this nowadays? Here's one movie I wouldn't mind seeing the studios remake!

otisfirefly2001 This is completely stupid. I joke to film making everywhere.::The main problems::Acting is so terrible, it actually made me cry when I heard the dialogue being spurted out of the actors mouths. Not one of the actors could act and I bet they never got another job afte that. though they were probably too busy doing drugs to complete any other movies. The story is very lame, stupid, and annoying. Choke full of crap that would make even the most amateur film maker want to stop making movies. We get something in the story about witches and Satan, but nothing really pans out at all. It all just falls flat within the first three minutes of this lame movie, but by then you have probably turned the channel already. Which if I was not viewing the MST3K version, I proboby would have done within the first minute of this trash!The mood is overdone completely and really goes into overkill within the last few minutes of the movie. I think they tried to set too much mood and didn't take enough time on the plot, which might of helped this movie.The special effects are lame, and really only consist of bad face make-up which is really very lame. Though it is probably just the time period and might not have been helped. I do not want to recommend this movie to anyone....At anytime....Anywhere. This movie is very lame, and a venture down amateur film making lane! If you take a stop on crap film making street first of course.Do not see this movie unless it is with the help of Mike Nelson, Crow T. Robot, & Tom Servo. You can find it on Mystery Science Theater 3000 Volume 5. You might be sorry if you do not view it with them, as it is a headache inducing movie.

tfrizzell A young man (Michael Berry) on a cross-country trip to California stops one day to have a little lunch and meets a beautiful but highly suspicious farm girl (Emby Mellay) in "The Touch of Satan", one of the very worst movies ever put on celluloid. Naturally Mellay is not what she seems, she is really a 120-year-old witch who sold her soul to save her sister as she was being burned at the stake by an angry mob that believed she herself was a witch. Mellay makes a deal with Satan to save her sister, but pays her soul in return. Rumors around the spooky town come up and the suspense builds for Berry, but in the end will he try to destroy the curse or will he lose his soul as his love (or lust really) grows for Mellay? Whacked situations, a squeaky soundtrack, sophomoric performances, bargain-basement visual effects and a crummy script make this production one you should avoid unless you like those movies with camp value. I don't. Turkey (0 stars out of 5).