Taking a look at a poll being held on IMDb's Classic Film board for the best titles of 1963,I noticed that a fellow IMDb'er mentioned a film whose title appeared to be a rift on Edgar Allen Poe's famous story The Black Cat.Looking around for the movie,I was delighted to stumble upon a DVD from a company called Something Weird,which unexpectedly included a fun sounding bonus feature,which led to me getting ready to find out how lucky this black cat could be.

View on the film:

Shooting in stark B&W,writer/director Harold Hoffman transfers Poe's story to Texas so that he can give it a deep-fried Gothic Horror atmosphere,with Hoffman covering the couple's house in dark hues,which builds a gradually fear of a dark shadow covering the house.Along with the brittle chill,Hoffman shows a real skill in timing the moments of gore,thanks to Hoffman delivering them at the precise moment that Lou and Diana's relationship is on the edge.

For the screenplay of the film,Hoffman allows the paranoid horror to slowly roll into Diana (played by a pretty Robyn Baker) and Lou's (played by a wonderfully stern Robert Frost) house,as Diana begins to witness the changes that Pluto causes on Lou,as they both start to find out how unlucky this black cat will be for them.

This movie transplants Edgar Allan Poe's classic short story to 1965 Texas! Lou (Robert Frost) and Diana (Robyn Baker) are happily married. She buys a black cat for him as a pet. He becomes obsessed with the cat and ignores her. Then he (inexplicably) becomes a violent alcoholic...

The movie gets pretty incoherent from then on. Why Lou is an alcoholic is never explained. He also viciously attacks the cat he supposedly loves and then has a complete nervous breakdown! Still, if you ignore logic or continuity, this movie is OK. It has some very graphic gore for its time (an axing at the end is particularly gruesome) and it's actually pretty well done. There's also some inappropriate (but not bad) rock numbers worked in--there's a real nice visual gag on the second number. The acting is pretty good. Frost and Baker were pretty obviously hired for their good looks but aren't that bad. Baker has her moments and Frost is actually pretty good (even if he does overdo it a few times). And it does have a real nice ending.

So--no great shakes but an OK horror film.

The Black Cat, loosely based on the Edgar Allen Poe classic of the same name, is the story of one man's descent into madness, a case of unchecked schizophrenia fueled by alcoholism that ultimately results in murder. Robert Frost plays mentally unbalanced writer Lou, whose wife Diana (Robyn Baker) gets him a black cat to celebrate their first anniversary. At first Lou is delighted with the new addition to his menagerie (he also has a monkey, a toucan, a racoon and a parakeet), and gives more attention to the moggy than to his wife (who cries herself to sleep in bed), but as he spirals out of control, Lou comes to believe that the cat is evil, gouging out its eye, hanging it with a flex, and electrocuting it. Eventually, Lou's violence is turned towards Diana...

With spirited central performances from Frost and Baker, a snappy pace, and some surprisingly gnarly violence (the axe in the head scene is extremely bloody for the time), this is a very entertaining '60s take on an oft-told tale. Hailing from the era of the twangy guitar, the film is replete with energetic rock and roll musical numbers that some might find off-putting but which I found only added to the wild nature of the movie (I liked how the band wear eye-patches during one song, mimicking the one-eyed cat). I do have to wonder how much animal cruelty was involved in the making of the film-the poor puss looks genuinely distressed at times-but if you can handle the questionable cat handling, this is definitely worth a go.

6.5 out of 10, rounded up to 7 for the memorable scene in which Lou chats to a nightclub floozy, accusing her of being a witch: Frost is utterly convincing as a scarily unhinged individual with only the faintest grasp on reality.