This is one of those films from 1965 that my friends and I went to in our small-town movie theater. I remember it as being full of those jump-out-at-you moments with people in the theater screaming. Connie Stevens is the heir to her father's estate but must stay in the old house for seven days. He is one of the great magicians of his time and has promised, upon his death, to return to the house. The house itself is great fun, full of remnants of his magic world. There is a cabinet that opens when a switch is flipped, allowing a skeleton on a wire to come face to face with the unwary victim. The guillotine in question is part of the act that killed the man's wife and assistant. Stevens then was farmed out and never saw her father again. She also never knew what happened to her mother. It's full of fun stuff with a plot that shouldn't be too closely evaluated. There are two characters that are left out of the will who become suspects. What they really know is always in doubt. Connie Stevens was a cute TV star at the time and well worth watching and makes a good victim. She is stubborn on the one hand and terrified on the other. She can also scream with the best of them. Dean Jones (a long time Disney staple) plays the love interest.

"Two On A Guillotine" looks for all the world like a WiIliam Castle spook epic, but it's not. Its actually a bit too mild to match up to one of Mr C's works, which is saying something. However if you are a fan of things like "House on Haunted Hill", you should enjoy this.There's a very slim plot: perky Connie Stevens plays Cassie, called to the funeral and will-reading of her eccentric father who was a famous magician, although the two had been strangers for many years before his mysterious death. The will states that Cassie must spend 7 nights in her fathers mansion or lose the inheritance, which will instead to go two housekeepers. And as soon as she moves in spooky things start happening..will she be frightened into to leaving the house or clever enough to work out who is behind it?Talk about the creakiest of old plots! There's really nothing in the plot to get excited about, although at least the script does not paint the characters as idiots - Cassie (and her protector/suitor) find out almost straight away that the spooky occurrences are being faked, so at least that's one plot twist out of the way. But who is doing it and why? Again, as I said, there's not much plot to go around and there are hardly any characters in the cast, so guessing the truth is not that hard.However I still enjoyed the movie. It's nicely shot, in widescreen crisp black and white (well, mostly crisp, as focus goes off now and again), and the dialogue is entertaining. Soem shots are actually very stylish, and there's a pretty cool sequence set in a noisy nightclub that culminates in an embrace, which is set up very strangely, but I really liked how they did it. There's very little to actually scare you, although there is a bit of fun to be found in a couple of "body horror" effects (I'm trying not to reveal what they are!)Curiously I've been seeking out kooky horror movies my whole life and had never even heard of this film until now (2014), which shows how hard to find it has been, Thankfully now released on the Warner Archive label, it;s a lovely looking print, and worth getting if you like not-too-serious 1960's chillers.

I saw this movie several times in the late '60s to mid '70s on local (Los Angeles) television and then it disappeared. I enjoyed it a lot, especially Cesar Romero and Connie Stevens. I had wandered over here from Connie Stevens' biography.The viewing I remember most occurred in 1975. I was in Harbor General Hospital in Torrance, California (Los Angeles County). I had just given birth to twin girls a day or two previous; new mothers and babies were kept in the hospital for three days back then. The babies weren't kept in the room with us. Being a county/teaching hospital they didn't put extras like TVs in the rooms and there were four beds to a room. One of the gals brought her 13" b/w set complete with rabbit ears. Since it was across the room on the other side from me on the window sill, I sat on the edge of another new mommy's bed and watched it.Reading various areas of this title I've found out it's out on DVD. I'll have to see about getting hold of it and see if I still enjoy it as much as I remember. I always got a kick out of that kind of movie. They never really took themselves seriously. Vincent Price appeared in a lot of those and it wouldn't have been surprising if he'd been in it instead of Romero. Would have been right up his alley.

As for the gory movies of today, This movie is not as scary as The Nightmare On Elm Street. I wish this movie could be released to video. I haven't seen it, since I was a child. Please put this movie on tape I likewise wasn't fond of Parley Bear, when he played Mayor Roy Stoner, on The Andy Griffith Show.