shatner pre-star-(trek)

ok so right at the top of the box...you can't miss it...."william shatner". so you can guess a lot of star trek nerds picked this up as a curiosity and the rest of the non-star trek nerds probably laughed and avoided this completely. but is it any good? it is.

this movie is post outer limits and pre star trek. some of the people responsible for outer limits concocted this script and filming. shatner is the lead character. it is not at all sci-fi though, its a horror flick.

the black and white is very nicely done...strictly professional stuff for the time. the script...well the premise is great, the story a tad weak, and the language (yes the language) tedious. the movie is entirely in the made up language "esperanto". apparently they thought it'd give the movie an "other worldly" feel. other than forcing everyone to read the subtitle except for a few nerds who learned that language, it adds nothing. the actors are great in the movie and honestly as far as i'm concerned they do a fine job with the language. (apparently originally screened by people who spoke the language. they broke out in laughter at how bad the pronunciations were....and who gives a flying f**k about how they pronounce a fake language? not i. the actors are good enough they could've babbled the entire thing and it'd be just the same.)

the story is a morality tale of sorts. group of succubi entice people into darkness and death, stealing their souls for the devil. a young succubi tries to tempt a honest soul, shatner, into darkness. she's warned it is impossible because love is strong. eventually she enlists the help of an incubus to ensnare him, but she also begins begins to fall in love with him.

all in all a slow but enjoyable black and white horror film with a great black goat attack ending!

as note: the film was considered lost. a fire destroyed the original, and copies were no where to be found or in awful shape. a good copy was found and restored in 2001. that copy apparently had french subtitles embedded in the film. while details of the restoration refer to frame by frame fixing...in the end the movie now has large black blocks with english subtitles in them. this is in the picture frame and is unfortunately a bit aggressive in how much it invades the picture. its nothing awful, and if thats the best there is then so be it. (i just figured with all the tech today they could've digitally removed and replaced "lost" areas in the film with a convincing "substitute" and then re-subtitled better)

8/10