George Zucco and Lionel Atwell in a thriller - how can you go wrong? This highly atmospheric and dark drama features a good cast but a weak script and uneven direction drag it down. The plot is solid and complex: Zucco is freshly out of prison, wrongly serving time for embezzlement, and invites his accusers for supposedly a dinner of reconciliation at his island home. Additionally, he suspects one of the invitees of having murdered his wife. Unfortunately, any time that some tension starts to build, director Morse seemed driven to relieve it with the ill-timed interjection of the love interest between Zucco's step daughter, shapely Sharon Douglas, and the son of one of the deceased invitees. At just a little over 68 minutes long there isn't much time for character development or allowing some of the eerier aspects of the film to play out like the séance or exploration of the secret passages. Still it's watchable but could have been much better with a little more budget and better direction.

Wow, Atwill and Zucco together at last. I was expecting crackling transformers, electrical arcs, and monsters galore. No such luck. They do have one minor face-off, but I don't think the producers knew what sinister potential they had in these two veteran madmen.It's a typical PRC cheap budget— a big drawing room, some secret passages, and an underground room that becomes a swimming pool at inconvenient times. And that's about it. The plot's supposed to be about an island host (Zucco) using a ruse to get people who wronged him onto his island as guests so he can get revenge. Maybe the premise is not very original, but it does have potential. Trouble is there's very little development producing either suspense or mystery. Mostly, it's scattered dialog and playing hide and seek in semi-darkness. In short, the narrative's a series of individual occurrences that fail to build beyond themselves. Thus, we're left with a few interesting set-ups but little more. Too bad. Oh yes, mustn't forget not just one spider woman, but two—Borg and DeWit. Both are tall, forceful, and attractive. Like Zucco & Atwill, they do have one minor face-off, but I guess I was hoping for an all-out catfight, or more aptly a lioness fight. Now that would have been memorable. Anyway, the film does have its moments, but fails to cohere into anything more.

A modestly crisp, but unspectacular black/white low-budget murder-mystery / revenge yarn (adapted of the stage play "Angel Island") with certain horror elements.After being framed and serving time in prison. Leo invites a group of people (old work buddies) to his secluded mansion on an island to seek revenge and single out the one who killed his wife. The temptation is there for the group, as hints are given to a possible hidden fortune to be found if they stay over the weekend.The old dark, creaky house set-up is made to good use as it's implanted on an remote foggy island (which the mist could play out like a metaphor for the growing unease and not knowing what lays ahead for these guests) and the involving material stays calculative. Moments tend to get blurry, but it's an interesting setting has above-average looking production. Sometimes the pace can flounder and the script gets dubious, but a strong cast (led admirably by a neurotic George Zucco, headstrong Lionel Atwill and classy Veda Ann Borg) seem to rise for the occasion. Director Terry O. Morse ('Unknown World (1951) 'and the American version 'Godzilla, King of the Monsters (1954) ') demonstrates a serviceable slow-burn style and lets the odd assortment of possibilities play out with well-placed suspense. Karl Hajos' moodily potent score seems to suit the growing actions and atmosphere rather well.Simple, but amusingly staged b-fodder.

First time of watching: entertaining low budget spooky house mystery with Zucco and Atwill at their eye-popping peaks. Terrible print - the negative must look transparent, so I would definitely recommend switching the lights off (or a cinema) for optimum viewing.It's a PRC stagey mix of And Then There Were None (in this case, Two) and The Cat And The Canary, with a few extra twists, but with only nine characters. The butler was a short-lived oddball however, quickly dispatched with gusto from the plot to the cynical amusement of Zucco. To my cynical amusement it's at that moment that Zucco is reminded that he "blew his top" when he was in prison - not hard to imagine!The male romantic lead was even more wooden, impetuous and prescient than the rest of the cast (Jerome Cowan was wasted yet again), but overall I enjoyed the film, nice atmosphere when the print allowed and an almost believable nasty-revenge storyline.