This is truly a dreadful movie. The Twilight Zone served up this sort of thing much more efficiently on a weekly basis at the same time, with production values that were hardly any worse, but infinitely more entertaining. Any of Serling's writers could have compressed this into 25 minutes with no loss whatsoever, and they could have shot it in an afternoon. Glynis Johns, for all she has to work with, could not possibly be less sexy, even by early 60s standards. The only redeeming feature is perhaps the historical interest of exposing how appallingly stupid psychiatric theory was at the time, and for many still is. But lots of other contemporary movies accomplish this in a much more interesting way -- say, David and Lisa, any movie with Anthony Perkins, even all those forgettable movies featuring the absurd psychiatrist with the vaguely cosmopolitan accent, and a perfectly trimmed lip mustache. It's a shame that they used the Caligari name, which is the only thing that keeps this alive.
Review of The Cabinet of Caligari
