Mill of the Stone Women (1960)

"Winnetou" (actor Pierre Brice) is a loser here, Hans von Arnim, which comes in a mill-house where lives a woman, Elfie Wahl, who is not normal(she is a little bit crazy and she suffers from leukemia) and who is suddenly in love with him. He does not love her but instead spending time with the one he loves, Liselotte Kornheim (actress Dany Carrel), he loses his time with the crazy one. Wolfgang Preiss(the famous Dr. Mabuse in those other German films from the 60's), he is a little crazy himself, also a doctor here, Dr. Loren Bohl. He appears together with the craziest of them all, the father of Elfie, Prof. Gregorius Wahl(the actor Herbert A.E. Böhme). Otherwise, paint instead of blood, creaking doors that open all alone, in one word, a huge bullshit. You'll eagerly be waiting for The End.

This is a film that was recommended to me - after the first few minutes I realized I have seen this movie before and said to myself "oh yes I recall seeing this years ago and this is a pretty good film...". After re-watching the film again in it's entirety, I must say it is as good as I recalled it to be. Good to see this classic again.This movie is more of a mystery than horror - but believe me there is enough horror in the film to enjoy. The movie has enough suspenseful twists and turns to keep it very interesting.Just like other reviewers have mentioned, it is a pseudo-Gothic movie. If you like Gothic films, wax museum horror and mystery classics then you just might like Mill of the Stone Women (1960).8/10

Not original or entertaining in the least. From the very first minutes it's clear that you get another version of any Wax Museum films which have been pouring out of different film studios since the early 20s: beautiful girls are boiled in wax and displayed as models in a horror section of a museum (in this case a mill-museum). The action takes place sometime around the last turn of the century. The mill looks nice, otherwise there aren't so much interesting locations - nor interesting (or beautiful) actors to that matter. It just drags along, and once you've figured the plot out, you also know, that it ends with an inescapable fire, that destroys the mill and lets the good young couple escape in the nick of time. It's really much more interesting now that I tell it, than it is on the screen. Somehow, in spite of an occasional Hammeresque look, this film doesn't sparkle in the least. If you're interested in the subject, there are much, much better films, most of them containing the word "Wax" in the title.

I thought this creaked a bit at first but had wrongly assumed this full colour production was made in the 70s and had no idea it was so early. A joint French/Italian production and the two countries offer us a beauty each, although it has to be said that the Italian Scilla Gabel would take a little beating whatever the opposition!Something of a mix of Frankenstein and House of Wax in the end but this is not apparent at first and with all the creepy Dutch landscape and creaky mill we are at first led to think more of vampires.Colourful, surprisingly graphic and all in all a very interesting discovery.