Devil Doll (1964)

User Rating:

3.0/10   

Director:

Lindsay Shonteff

Writers:

Ronald Kinnoch (writer)
Frederick E. Smith (story)

Release Date:

September 1964 (USA)

Genre:

Horror

Tagline:

Can a Beautiful Woman Be Enslaved Against Her Will?

Plot:

An evil hyponotist/ventriloquist plots to gain an heiress' millions.

Plot Keywords:

Ventriloquist | Mind Control | Miniaturization | Beautiful Woman | Soul

Cast

Bryant Haliday	...	The Great Vorelli
William Sylvester	...	Mark English
Yvonne Romain	...	Marianne Horn
Sandra Dorne	...	Magda Gardinas
Karel Stepanek	...	Dr. Heller
Francis De Wolff	...	Dr. Keisling
Nora Nicholson	...	Aunt Eva
Philip Ray	...	Uncle Walter
Alan Gifford	...	Bob Garrett
Pamela Law	...	Woman with Garrett
Heidi Erich	...	Grace, a showgirl
Anthony Baird	...	Soldier
Trixie Dallas	...	Miss Penton
Margaret Durnell	...	Countess
Ray Landor	...	Expert Dancer

Runtime:

81 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Australia:M | UK:15 (video rating) (1997) | USA:Approved (cut) | Canada:G (Quebec) (2002) | Canada:PG (Manitoba) | UK:X (original rating)

Company:

Galaworldfilm Productions

Trivia:

Like the ventriloquist dummy in the similar segment of Dead of Night (1945), the doll's name is Hugo.

Quotes:

Bob Garrett: Hey, how'd you know I was still in bed?
Mark English: It figures, boy, it figures.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Mystery Science Theater 3000: Gorgo (#10.9)" (1998)

Alternate Continental version

The Image DVD of this film includes both the original release and an alternate Continental version. There are the following differences in the film.

(a) the initial opening credits are slightly different. The original print has a separate starring credit for Bryant Haliday "as the Great Vorelli" but the continental print credits William Sylvester above Bryant Halliday (sic). There are also some differences in the production company credits with an "Anglo-Amalgamated" credit missing from the Continental print.

(b) 41m14s to 44m40s

The scene between Haliday and Sandra Dorne in Haliday's dressing room (a fairly important scene in establishing Dorne's character and providing a motive for her later murder) which ends with them going into a side room for some (off-screen) sex is missing from the Continental print. Instead, an entirely new scene has been substituted (16s longer in total) which shows Haliday's stage act once more. In this new scene (which does not appear in the original version and was especially filmed for the Continental print) he invites a woman on stage and hypnotizes her into performing a striptease which continues at length until the woman is topless.

(c) 48m15s

A shot of Dorne turning in her sleep is filmed in an alternate cut in the Continental print to show more of her exposed breast.

(d) 48m54s

In the follow-up shot of Hugo approaching to stab Dorne the Continental print has an alternate take in which you see her exposed breast.

(e) 49m47s to 51m07s

Sylvester has a phone conversation with an American colleague in Berlin. This man is accompanied by a young woman who fiddles with her hair and sits on his bed. In the theatrical print she is wearing a bikini and a see-through negligee. The Continental print is an alternate take in which she (the same actress) is topless.

In my view the original cut is definitely superior because the deletion of the dressing room scene from the Continental print (and its replacement by the gratuitous striptease) makes Dorne's subsequent murder abrupt and seemingly arbitrary - the character had also been hanging around the periphery of the action waiting for an appropriate exposition scene to explain her that, in this version, never comes.