A bad movie and a mediocre one coexist under the same title: first, a bland story of a horny French journalist turned tourist promoter, courting a blank Spanish girl, who falls prey of a sadistic bitch; and second, a horror tale involving a blind sculptor and his crazy wife, who kills animals and people with her lover's assistance to provide real bone structures for her husband's 3-D evocations of famous paintings. Characters go back and forth from A to B for 97 endless minutes. Pity is that both Lindfords and Karloff try hard to make any sense of the whole affair. Not a bad idea, but poorly executed, with dreadful music and silly special effects and nightmares. Be warned.

I loved horror movies as a kid. Now when I go back to the genre I once loved it is sometimes surprising just how good Boris was. Not long ago I bought the complete series of the Colonel March of Scotland Yard British TV series. And man Boris was good in that. Even here, a dying man, he still has that commanding voice and charisma.This movie in it's parts is quite good. The cast is strong, the plot has potential, the production values look good. There are moments where you think this movie is going to start to kick ass. However the whole does not equal the sum of it's parts. It drags in spots. There are long sequences that add little to the story. I know the movie was produced over many years and the continuity is lacking. Some careful editing down may have made this a more enjoyable film. Still, another evening with Boris is never a bad thing.

Watching the film on videotape, I got to wondering about the incredibly meandering plot and how many of the characters don't really have anything to do with each other. Then it hit me-- this flick was assembled over a period of years! The original movie centered on Karloff but his ill health left that section far too short. Over the next couple years, it looks like the producers added to the flick whenever there was cast and money available. And of course as movies got more explicit, they added more scenes to make this stew commercially viable (like the lesbian model scene).

Producer Robert D Weinbach originally wanted Claude Rains for the role of Badulescu, but due to Rains's illness, he was replaced by Karloff. Originally titled Blind Man's Bluff, the film was shot in and around Madrid. Filming began in Februrary 1967 and lasted almost three months. Karloff was in ill health himself, but never wanted to give up acting and worked in his craft until he died in 1968. Karloff worked hard as a laborer and even a truck driver between acting roles when he was first starting out in Canada and knew what it was to miss a few meals. Karloff made this film a classic and it will be viewed and talked about from generation to generation whether we like it or NOT!