Mill of the Stone Women

Pretty weird Italian horror film that reminded me a bit of Frankenstein. Not great and I kind of lost interest halfway through but it does pick up in the finale and all in all found it to be entertaining enough. 3.5/5

What’s going on inside the spooky old windmill?

In 1890’s Holland, a writer (Pierre Brice) visits a mill where a reclusive sculptor lives (Herbert Böhme). One of the attractions is the artist’s odd carrousel that displays ghastly statues of women. Then there’s his striking daughter (Scilla Gabel) whom he won’t allow out of the mill for some reason. What’s going on? Wolfgang Preiss is on hand as the sculptor’s in-house doctor.

An Italian/French production, “Mill of the Stone Women” (1960) is colorful and atmospheric Hammer-esque horror that combines the basic set-up of the Dracula story whereupon a young man visits a strange, Victorian abode hosted by an eccentric old man mixed with bits of the Frankenstein story and “House of Wax.”

Redhead Liana Orfei (Annelore) is a highlight on the female front, but so is Dany Carrel (Liselotte) and the aforenoted Scilla Gabel.

“Mill” is quaint entertainment in a macabre, Grand Guignol way. The drug-addled portion in the middle gets tedious, but the last act makes up for it; and you can’t beat the unique setting of the massive windmill in the flat countryside of the Netherlands. It was the first Italian horror production shot in color.

The flick runs 1 hour, 35 minutes, and was filmed in Holland and Belgium with studio scenes done in Rome.

GRADE: B