There are two versions to Equinox, one more coherent than the other. Unfortunately both have several issues. Both, do have a certain charm however. For such a low budget production the effects are okay, there's some early stop motion effects by David Allen (Laserblast). These effects are decent but jittery and at times a little sloppy. Allen's later work is certainly better. There are several creatures on display-all from Allen's wonderful imagination. There's a King Kong-like demon ape (seen on the film's poster), a Cthulhu-like squid creature, and a devil-like demon. Presented in all its weak and terrible glory is a man painted green in an animal pelt who resembles the Jolly Green Giant. The stop motion creatures are serious and diabolical, clicking with the film's tone-then along comes that eye sore which comes and then goes. The characters are bland but occasionally likable but the acting ranges from moderately decent to awful. The story is actually pretty interesting and inspired Sam Raimi's Evil Dead (1981). Basically there's two versions to the film (hurray for confusion) there's the 1967 film and the 1970 film.67 Plot- David receives a call from his teacher (who resides in a cabin in the woods). David sets out to visit his friend with 3 other friends. They find the place in shambles and all begin to explore. Vickie finds a castle and gathers the others. Once inside they wind up in a cave with an odd old man. He gives them a book and tells them to leave. David skims through the book and reads a note left by his teacher. The book is a gateway between the realms of shadow and light. His teacher snatches the book away as they're attacked by a monster, then the Jolly Green Giant appears, as does a demon...70 Plot- Best friends Jim, David, and their girl friends go on a picnic. They have a run in with Asmodeus the park ranger (cool name), find a book, and monsters.The 1967 film is highly recommended, it has a dull driving sequence but has a fluent flow. The 1970 film is a real chore to get through with sloppy editing, odd/uneventful pacing, and is overall awful. Sadly people are most familiar with the 1970 version, which is why so many people hate it. I say give the 67 film a watch, it's no Evil Dead but for a low budget horror film from the 60s (a time when sci-fi was all the rage) it's pretty entertaining and imaginative with a campy charm.

"Equinox" is a low-budget and wholly independent precursor of Sam Raimi's "The Evil Dead" about a group of teenagers,who accidentally unleash supernatural forces after reading passages from a mysterious book Necronomicon found in the woods.The main difference between "Equinox" and "The Evil Dead" is that the latter is drenched with gore and violence,whilst"Equinox" plays more like 50's creature feature combined with cheesy stop-motion monster roaming the woods.I must say that the stop motion monster effects are pretty impressive as are the split screen effects.The acting is amateurish and the writing leaves a lot to be desired.Who would of ever guessed that Park Ranger Asmodeus would turn out to be Satan incarnate.Still strong 8 out of 10.

It's a fun spooky movie with a different look and without the usual nighttime menace. It's also an independent production that managed some notoriety, mainly for surprisingly impressive special effects. Actually, Equinox was sort of the Blair Witch Project of its day—a bunch of unknowns hitting it lucky with a shoestring effort. If memory serves, the film even had a run at one of the prestige theatres along Hollywood Blvd. The effects are not so impressive by today's digital standards; however, by 1970's norms, they were the unexpected equal of any A-production.The story itself is pretty well structured in flashback with an effective "hook" to get viewers interested. The plot doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but then it doesn't have to, since we've got King Kong's albino brother, a castle that comes and goes, a lost book of the occult, and a shape-shifting forest ranger who's definitely not Smoky the Bear. Most of the scenes are well staged, except when the ranger gets in the girl's face, contorts his lips, and slobbers, in what I suppose was a wacky metaphor for supernatural sex. Sharp-eyed viewers may recognize Frank Bonner (Boers) from TV's WKRP in Cincinnati as Jim. He's easily the most accomplished of an uneven cast. In fact there's an appearance of a time warp between the clothing fashions worn in the movie and the 1970 release date. In short, the hair styles and skinny pants of the movie are a long pre-Vietnam way from the bell-bottoms and long hair of counter-cultural 1970. I don't know what accounts for this apparent disparity unless release was held up for several years. Anyway, except for the rather hollow sound of the dialogue dubbing, this accomplished little indie remains an underground original.

"Equinox" is so exquisitely crap-tacular, I have to give it such a high rating. This film really enters the heights that "Plan 9 from Outer Space" rules, and possibly surpasses that legendary Ed Wood opus. It doesn't just fail magnificently, but does so in SO many ways.Where else will you find such deliciously bad dialog, very poorly looped (I'm sure more than half of the dialog was looped - where the dialog wasn't able to be recorded live and had to be dubbed in later, not always by the same person), the worst stop-motion animation on film (was it Claymation?!), stock background music thoroughly misused for their scenes (although the opening theme is way cool), and the most amazing eyebrows ever created for a movie (at least I hope they were fake, for the sake of the writer/director/star - we're talking Brezhnev with eyebrow mousse here).AND it features a young Herb Tarlek! But "Equinox" does deserve its props. Sam Raimi pretty much lifted the plot for "Evil Dead" from this movie. (To much better effect, of course, but still...) And writer/director/star Jack Woods comes up with some clever solutions to shooting difficult scenes. For one scene, where the cast is running through some spooky old caverns, Woods must have thought: "How can we film that? No way can I shoot in the caverns, it'd be impossible to get the light right." Woods solution: show a pitch black picture, with the occasional torch moving across it. Brilliant! There's also a bit where the two male leads have to climb up a steep, almost vertical hill, in order to look for an invisible castle. (Don't ask.) Hey, your boy Herb Tarlek is a manly man, but he ain't climbin' no rock face for you, Jackie boy.So... he has them stoop over on a horizontal section of a trail, and turns the camera so that it looks like they're climbing a steep hill! (I half expected to see Adam West and Burt Ward to pop their heads out of gopher holes.) There were so many times I laughed out loud while viewing "Equinox" that I absolutely recommend it to discernible viewers of unique film landmarks.As Leonard Pinth-Garnell would say, "Awful! Awful! Truly bad! Really bit the BIG one!!"