Customer Rating: 
Summary: Another fine Vincent Price performance
Comment: I love this movie! It has a strange atmosphere and a unique twist on demonic possesion. Of course its always a pleasure to watch a performance of Vincent Price.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Another Fine Performance by Vincent Price
Comment: I'd never watched this movie until a few nights ago, but the description sounded interesting and I'll watch just about anything with Vincent Price in it, so I gave it a shot.
My favorite parts in the movie were (1) the scene where he pulls the clay away from the sculpted head (very nice); and (2) the Horla's disembodied voice, performed admirably by Joseph Ruskin. And Price was in fine form, as usual.
I was very disappointed when the magistrate was about to kill, only to be thwarted by - a reflection on the knife? Come on, that was ridiculous. Even with the story problems and somewhat cheesy effects, it is definitely worth watching. I will give it an extra star for Vincent Price's performance; otherwise, it would get 3 stars.
Customer Rating:
Summary: one of vincent's gems
Comment: Vincent Price was really amazing. He could be a villain. He could do comedy. He could do camp and he could do serious. He also showed a talent for playing a sympathetic victim. Judge Simon Cordier has been possessed by a horla, a kind of evil spirit and it makes him do terrible things. Simon is a moderate, kind, sensitive and artistic man and seeing the horla destroy both his life and reputation is really touching. His love for the doomed Odette wins the audiences heart and when the horla goes after her it's a shock. There's not a whole lot of gore in this movie. A family of adults and teens could watch it without any embarrasment but it has genuine chilling power.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great Forgotten Classic
Comment: Even many of Price's fans are ignorant of this one - and literature students who should know better have forgotten the Guy de Maupassant classic short story, "The Horla," on which it is based. Which is a pity, because they're both great.Price plays a French magistrate who passes a death sentence on a convicted murderer, who insists he was driven to the act by an invisible obsessing/possessing spirit. After the criminal's demise, Price finds himself suffering amnesiac missing time episodes exactly like those claimed by the executed killer, during which - or so it would seem - he performs a number of progressively more dire crimes. Eventually, he ends up beheading a woman...at which point he finds a way to force the demonic evil spirit out into the open, for a fight to the death.
This is a gorgeous film, beautifully scripted, acted and photographed, with stunning period sets and costumes, and it's amazing it isn't better known than it is. Price is less camp and hammy than usual, playing it straight as an intense supernatural crime melodrama. If you're a horror fan - and a fan of Price's, especially - you won't want to miss this movie. The "invisible" effects are quite good - and the scene in which Price discovers the missing head of the slain Nancy Kovack is especially gruesome and memorable, worth the price of admission alone.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Underrated Horror of the Horla
Comment: This is an interesting story of a worldly pernicious spirit called the Horla. The Horla uses mortal men as hosts to commit acts of mayhem and murder. Based on the story "La Horla" by Guy de Maupassant Vincent Price plays magistrate Simon Cordier who becomes enchanted by the evil specter. Price is excellent as a man who is poised in his official capacity, shows almost juvenile affection for Odette (Nancy Kovack) an artist's model he falls in love with and gains sympathy as he gradually loses all dignity under the spell of the Horla. The pace of this film is slow and methodical but it is the performance of Price and his predicament that keeps it interesting. The direction by Reginald LeBorg is rather pedestrian but the art designs by Daniel Haller and colorful cinematography by Ellis W. Carter are very good.
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