IN: Review: I first saw this movie when I was about 10 years old. Unfortunately I could not watch it to the end because it was aired late at night. Now I bought it on DVD because I can remember that I liked it.

This is really not an ordinary horror movie. It has some horror elements but I rather categorize it as fantasy. I liked it but I hoped for a bit more horror and scary scenes. Especially the scene when Anna's dad comes into the paperhouse trying to kill her is a bit short.

Now to the plot. This movie is about a young girl named Anna who gets ill. While she is ill and has to lie in her bed because of her high fewer she turns on to finishing her drawing about a house - the paperhouse. When she fells a sleep, which often strangely happens just immediately, she finds herself near the house on a big green field. She realizes that the house is exactly like the one she has drawn and that every new detail also appears in her dreams. One day she draws a boy into the house to have somebody to talk to. As she forgets to draw his legs (because he is sitting behind a window) the boy cannot walk. Later she is being told by the doctor, that a boy also has this strange disease and she realizes that with the boy she has drawn, she also got that boy into her disturbing dreams. She also notices that it gets harder and harder for her to wake up from her dreams. As she misses her father who is ofter abroad she draws her father into the house. She makes a mistake and her father is looking very angry on the painting. She tries to rubber him out but realizes that she cannot change anything already drawn. And next time she falls asleep the horror begins. Her father is mad and blind (because she draw s*** on his head to mark him as 'invalid') and tries to get into the paperhouse and kill Anna and his friend. Her dreams became a horrendous nightmare. They manage to escape and to kill her father and Anna can finally wake up. Than Anna finds her self in the hospital where her parents are sitting beside her bed. The doctors thought that she fell into a coma or so. They tell Anna that the other boy died and that they want to travel to the ocean to get over those tragical happenings. Anna draws a watchtower and notices that the same watchtower can be found near the hotel they traveled to. She runs to the watchtower and meets the boy (I am just not mentioning his name because I cannot remember it and do not want to go back to the previous html page) and can say good bye to him and forget those terrible dreams forever.

There were a few thing I did not understand in the movie. First of all it was the ending which I absolutely dislike. I think it is too long while the main part of the movie becomes a bit too short. How does the boy fly a helicopter and speak to Anna as he is supposed to be dead? Why did you have to put such a stupid radio on the wall? I hated that scene it was so dumb to me. It almost ruined the main horror scene.

Things I liked were the scene with the photograph of Anna's dad which was the first real scary and horror scene. I liked the boy. The actor was awesome. He was even better than Anna. I also liked how Anna tries to get her father out of the painting while she is asleep and how she is looking for it in the garbage.

Overall a good movie. I give it a 8 out of 10.
What is this review like?
OUT: positive

IN: Review: If you're a fan of Gothic horror, then you're definitely absolutely guaranteed to LOVE this wondrous Italian 60's film "Castle of Blood". We're really talking about creepily creaking doors, eerie portraits that appear to be moving, spontaneously dying candles although there's no wind and smoke coming from underneath heavy wooden chamber doors. Speaking in terms of atmosphere and style, this masterful piece of Gothic film-making is one of the best out there; just one tiny league below landmarks such as "Black Sunday", "The Three Faces of Fear" and "Curse of the Crying Woman". The prominent directors duo Sergio Corbucci ("The Great Silence", "Django") and Antonio Margheriti ("Cannibal Apocalypse", "Killer Fish") are successful in all areas, including a powerful plot (one that is genuinely nightmare inducing), ultra-sinister scenery and filming locations, stylish black and white photography, spine-chilling music and a brilliant gathering of talented performers. Barbara Steele, starlet of the aforementioned "Black Sunday" and Italian goth-muse number one, shines brightly again as a spiritually tormented character and she's literally surrounded by excellent co-players. One of them, Silvano Tranquilli, even gives away a fairly credential depiction of author Edgar Allan Poe. The story involves him and another wealthy visitor of a countryside tavern challenging a brutal young journalist to accept a morbid wager. If he Alan Foster would survive spending one night in the infamous Blackwood Castle, he receives the astonishing reward of $10 and a newspaper interview with Poe. Needless to say the ordeal is much more dangerous than it sounds, even for somebody like Alan Foster who's a firm non-believer in ghosts and vampires. The night starts out great for him, as he even meets up with the stunningly beautiful woman of his dreams, but gradually he learns that Blackwood Castle is a hellish place where the ghosts of the previously deceased visitors are trapped for all eternity. I don't know about you, but this is seriously one of my favorite horror movie premises of all time. Co-director Antonio Margheriti clearly was proud of this film as well, because he remade it himself a couple of years later as "Web of the Spider". That movie had a handful of trumps, like for example the casting of no less than Klaus Kinski in the role of Edgar Allan Poe, but in general this original is vastly superior. "Castle of Blood" literally oozes with atmosphere and maintains a thoroughly unsettling ambiance throughout. This truly is one of the rare films that can make the hair on your arms and back of the neck rise with fear if you watch it in the right circumstances. Watch it late at night, preferably alone and in a candle lit room, and you'll get an idea about the true definition of horror.
What is this review like?
OUT:
positive