Norman J. Warren was a leading figure in the New Wave of British Horror during the 70s; along with fellow schlock-meisters Pete Walker and Alan Birkinshaw, he was instrumental in pushing the boundaries of UK cinema in terms of gritty violence and sex. For that reason, I have always maintained a certain degree of admiration for the man, despite the fact that the majority of his films are technically shoddy efforts, suffering from muddled scripts, weak editing, poor acting, low production values, and amateurish special effects.In a lot of respects, Terror is no exception—the story makes little sense, the cast are dreadful, much of Warren's visual style is cribbed directly from Dario Argento's Suspiria, and the gore is unconvincing—but after all is said and done, this film still manages to be one of his more entertaining efforts. This is primarily thanks to the unrelenting violence—there's bloody stabbings, impalements, be-headings and mangled corpses aplenty—but it doesn't hurt that the film also features several easy-on-the-eye actresses, some gratuitous sleaze, a few silly red herrings, and loads of wonderfully dated 70s trappings (wide-lapelled suits, a yellow cortina, flares, blatant product placement for Daz, and the filming of a typically daft soft-core sexploitation flick called 'Bathtime With Brenda').Fun moments that are particularly worthy of a mention: a bear trap positioned with unbelievable accuracy; Annie Lennox's ugly twin performing an S&M strip-tease for a man with a huge nose; Peter 'Chewbacca' Mayhew unwittingly terrorising the film's heroine before uttering the immortal line "You want a mechanic?"; aspiring actress Viv (Tricia Walsh) unable to distinguish between red paint and blood (even when it's all over her face); and tasty bit of skirt Carol (Blake's 7 hottie Glynis Barber in her first screen role) doing nothing to help the blonde stereotype by locking herself in a shed full of tools when chased by a psycho killer, but failing to arm herself before making a break for it.

A strange creature swears revenge for its death on a young British heir and his close friends.From colonial times in Britain to modern day... some of the accents are a bit thick for my American ears. Filmed at Acorn Studios in London, whatever the heck that is.There's a film-within-a-film about the family that has a nice beheading, also some filming of soft-core porn? It's a surprisingly good video and sound quality for the budget.The movie was directed by Norman J. Warren, who also made "Satan's Slave" and "Thriller: A Cruel Picture", which is why you can see those posters prominently displayed in a few scenes.But, I must protest about the weird, bleached haired stripper in leather with a whip (Tanya Ferowa)... drapes don't match the carpet, and she doesn't strike me as being in the right place (though in the same scene a man asks a woman if she does "sucking"). Isn't sexy and gets even less so as it goes on too long.Not good, not bad... I don't regret watching it, but most likely never will again.

Film crew who made a film about a witch who cursed the people who burned her at the stake reawaken the evil and have to contend with deadly happenings as a result.Solid late 70's fright film is full of graphic violence such as stabbing, beheadings and other damage you can inflict with sharp objects (though one policeman is run over by his own car). The plot is a well worn one of an ancient evil revived but its done so as to hit all of the right notes at the right moments. It may not be jump out of your seat scary but it does create a good amount of tension, even if you're like me and you've seen this a couple of times before.Worth a look for those who want a good solid film and don't mind the blood and gore effects from a few years prior.

He didn't make Hammer rip-offs and he didn't make counterfeit Amicus flicks, either. Norman J. Warren created a horror sub-genre instead, and "Terror" is the second best of these while "Prey" is the best. Though this was clearly inspired by "Suspiria" and equally ropey in terms of structure, is is still an entertaining hour and a half.The opening film-within-a-film, a witch burning sequence, has better production values than the rest of this shocker, but it is, nevertheless, a graphic slasher (for its time) that takes some risks. Most of the murders are knife murders and we get lots of knife POV's and a procession of red herrings. A car lifted off the ground and up into a forest canopy shows some creativity and a poor sod impaled on spikes notches another one up for bloody horror.Despite good transfers, the Warren films still look ugly because they were not lit too well. Some of the interiors are overexposed and the hard lighting looks more accidental than planned. The performances range from adequate to somnambulistic (perhaps intentionally) and the electronic score (by Ivor Slaney) is more noisy than musical.Worth seeing, sure, but not anything groundbreaking.