The Devil's Messenger

1961
4.6| 1h12m| en| More Info
Released: 01 January 1961 Released
Producted By: Herts-Lion International Corp.
Country:
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
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Synopsis

In this feature version of the Swedish TV series "13 Demon Street," a 50,000-year-old woman is found frozen in an ice field, and a man's death is foretold in dreams.

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Reviews

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.
ChanFamous I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.
Plustown A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.
Gary The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.
simeon_flake No. 13 Demon Street--sounds likes a nice place to visit & maybe I would want to stay. But seriously, folks, is there anything here of note beyond the presence of Lon Chaney as Satan. As far as Satan on the big-screen, what could have more fitting during this time than Mr. Chaney--who, unfortunately at this point in his career was probably getting by more on name value than anything else. Not to say the man couldn't anymore, but I'm sure all the serious Lon fans know about the live tv drunk incident that sent his career to B-movie hell.At any rate, Chaney does make a great Satan (shocker, I know). At's that is pretty much the big draw for this film. Satanya is nice to look at, the stories in between Satan's segments passable entertainment & the closing reel is pretty good. Basically this is for the hardcore Chaney purists who will watch pretty anything the man did--even dreck like "La Casa Del Terror."
Rainey Dawn Lon Chaney Jr plays Satan - the devil himself - in this fun, often funny, little film. There are 3 segments and in-between them you will see Satan (Chaney) giving Satanya (Kadler) her next assignment which leads to the next segment.The first segment is about a photographer who is a sex pervert. He commits murder and a woman that helped him regrets helping him. There is a photograph that will "haunt" the photographer... he becomes literally scared to death.The seconded segment is of some miners that discovers a whole and well preserved prehistoric woman frozen in ice. They get her out with ice still surrounding her. One man falls in love with frozen woman, he believes he was with her in a past life... he becomes crazy. (An excellent segment).The third segment is of a man who keeps having a reoccurring dream, tells his psychiatrist and the doctor has the man to sorta play out the dream. The man ends up at a fortuneteller who sees his fate in her crystal ball - he will die at midnight by her.The film is not scary but it is fun to watch in it's way.8/10
MartinHafer This feature film is taken from three episodes of a Swedish TV series "13 Demon Street". Oddly, the show was made in the US in English and was then subtitled for Sweden! An odd pedigree, to say the least! While I have never seen the actual show (there's not a whole lot of Swedish television being shown here at the present time), it appears to have been a rather low-budget horror series. Whether or not it was all connected together by a demon (played by Lon Chaney, Jr.) in the show or just this movie is anyone's guess.The show begins with Chaney on his throne in Hell--enjoying his job immensely! He summons a young suicide victim and gives her some assignments back on Earth. These assignments are the three segments taken from three separate TV episodes.The first involves a sex pervert photographer. At first, he just seems really creepy but later when he commits a meaningless murder, you realize what sort of sick, twisted freak he really is. The woman, then, is the means of passing judgment on the guy--making him see visions in one of his photographs that literally ends up scaring him to death. Afterwords, the woman regrets her involvement in this, but considering how sick the man was, the viewer is left celebrating the death--and thinking perhaps this demon isn't such a bad fellow after all! Next is a tale about the discovery of a prehistoric woman who is discovered frozen in ice. Naturally, this woman is the agent sent by old Mr. Diabolical himself and it is imbued with strange powers. Despite being in suspended animation, when men see her naked and encased in ice, there is a strange reaction within them--they are transfixed by her beauty and must possess her. As one of the workers talks to her and imagines a weird past-life relationship with her, you realize just how strange this particular segment is! And, by the end, the guy is a raving nut! The third segment has this female agent of evil bringing a crystal ball to a fortune teller. It begins with a guy talking to a psychiatrist about some recurring dreams. The doctor gives a rather tenuous interpretation that the guy is dying to know the future--though the guy says he has no desire at all to know! But, following the doctor's advice, he seeks out a fortune teller. Looking into this evil crystal, she tells him he's about to die! And, it seems, she is fated to kill him! She says she has nothing against him and has no desire to kill him, but it WILL happen because the crystal ball says it must!Despite the high 'cheese-factor' and low budget, I did enjoy the film. One reason in particular was due to Chaney. While he certainly was no thespian, here he is quite enjoyable because he gets into the part--laughing and playing it up quite a bit. He was very entertaining and it's among his better work. Plus, the stories were pretty good--and quite different from the stuff you'd see on "The Twilight Zone" or "Alfred Hitchcock Presents". I'd sure like to be able to see the rest of the series to find out if they're all as good as these selected episodes.
Hitchcoc First of all, the use of a hell-like place is sort of fun. The problem is, it is handled so poorly and so dully by Lon Chaney, Jr. that is becomes pointless. More of a problem than that are a trio of pretty dull stories. They are highly predictable with weak endings. A decent writer could have been given these three premises and made them very scary. As it is, we start with the photographer who must be psychotic. He murders a young woman who doesn't want her picture taken. Then images keep reappearing. The second, and weakest, is about a deranged anthropologist who kills his rival so he can hook up with a woman, frozen in a chunk of ice. It doesn't get much more asinine than this. The most intriguing is about a man who is told by a fortune teller he will be killed by midnight "and by her." The setup is good. Things work their way out. But the ending is a real disappointment and fizzles. These are TV like and apparently were, originally. Chaney must have really fallen on hard times. He looks old and tired. But he does have a document for mankind at the end. They should have sent it back.

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