Cheap To The Devil A Daughter (DVD) (Richard Widmark, Christopher Lee) (Peter Sykes) Price

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Customer Reviews of To The Devil A Daughter

Lesser Hammer Thriller Still Intrigues
If it weren't for a deeply miscast Richard Widmark, this "Exorcist" wanna-be (and final Hammer horror picture) might have a better reputation. Christopher Lee commands the screen when he's on it (as always), and there's something both dirty and delightful about Nastassja Kinski's very early appearance here as a wayward nun. Denholm Elliott and the gorgeous Honor Blackman are on hand too, to class up the joint. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense - especially the ending - but as a collective of occult-themed spookshow scenes, it casts a minor spell. Or it does, at least, when a grumpy and drunken Widmark isn't clearly trying to bring the proceedings down around him.

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Golden - Well, OK, Silver - Oldie
For anyone who loves horror movies and has a robust sense of nostalgia, there is a certain warm and cosy feeling that creeps upon one on seeing that something is a Hammer Film Production. And here is one of the more durable products of that late lamented outfit. Nastassja Kinski, who would go on to become one of the iconic faces of 80s cinema in movies like "Tess", "Paris, Texas" and "Cat People" is Catherine who has been carefully raised by the sinister and ambiguously named Children of Our Lord sect in Germany to be rebaptised as a personification of the God Ashtaroth. Her dad Henry Beddoes (Denholm Elliott) is signed up to the conspiracy but loses his nerve and seeks help from a writer of supernatural horror fiction John Verney (Richard Widmark). So the movie is a conflict between the effective if rather out of is depth Verney and Chief Baddie Michael Rayner (Christopher Lee - who else?).

It isn't exactly terrifying. The climax is something of an anticlimax and there are misjudged touches such as the rather silly and not very frightening demom baby Catherine dreams about. But it's enormous fun. It looks great. Widmark and Lee are value for money. Kinski of course is gorgeous if a bit too passive to be very much else. And the show is completely stolen by Elliot. Cinema history is full of people - folk like Gary Cooper, Gregory Peck, Bruce Willis, Russell Crowe - who were ever so good at depicting strong heroic types. But if it's weakness you want, Elliott really has no rival and his portrayal here of a weak man in a constant state of spineless abject fear is a brilliant illustration of that fact. Some much needed humour is supplied by splendid little cameos, most notably by Frances de la Tour as a zealous Salvation Army group leader and Brian Wilde as a pedantic old lady of a librarian. A minor classic. Definitely minor. But definitely classic.

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To the devil, a bit of a problem
It is something of a puzzle that having delivered his son Damien to the world in 'The Omen', the devil should hedge his bets by delivering a daughter through the back door. Was this wise? There is the thorny issue of sibling rivalry to consider, and one can imagine more than the obligatory dipping of hair in the inkwell from these two. A more pressing concern for old scratch is how to prevent Damien's followers from defecting to the distaff camp the moment they clap eyes on Nastassja Kinkski in a neglige. There are signs of nervousness very early on in the proceedings when the devil dispenses with his usual supernatural approach to assassination by resorting to the modern method of actually sending a hitman around to his enemies house to do the business. But it seems the would-be assassin is so distracted by the thought of Ms Kinkski in a nun's habit that he allows his target to casually open a draw, take out a gun and defend himself most vigorously while doing nothing to stop him. The head satanist played by Chris Lee is not much better. Kinkski lying on an altar is so very very distracting to the poor man that he allows himself to be taken out in a most embarrassing manner. And in a public place, too. Perhaps anticipating this 'grave' incompetence, the devil had already returned to the tried and tested remedies such as setting fire to people without the help of an assistant. But is it too little, too late? Has the devil blundered? Will he force Richard Widmark to strip instead in a doomed attempt to distract us from the fact that he's really not all that? (And neither, frankly, is the film.)