The Hound of Blackwood Castle (1968)

The Hound of Blackwood Castle (Der Hund von Blackwood Castle) is one of the later colour krimis made by West Germany’s Rialto Films. It came out in 1968. It was directed by Alfred Vohrer, the man responsible for many of the best of these Edgar Wallace movies.

We start with a man mauled to death by a huge savage dog. Since the man was out on the moors in heavy mist we immediately get a bit of a Hound of the Baskervilles vibe. There’ll be more of that vibe later.

Even before the opening credits roll things get creepier. A big guy with an eye-patch is taking a dead body somewhere in a rowing boat, on a fog-shrouded river. Later we find out that the eye-patch guy is Grimsby, an old family retainer of the now deceased owner of Blackwood Castle.

Then we move into full-on Edgar Wallace krimi mode. There’s a semi-derelict castle. The owner has recently died and has left the castle (Blackwood Castle) to his beautiful young blonde daughter Jane Wilson (Karin Baal). There are lots of suitably gothic cobwebs all through the castle. And I haven’t mentioned the castle’s collection of deadly snakes yet.

There’s some concern at the local inn. One of the guests, a Mr Tucker, went for a walk and never came back. A howling dog was heard that night.

A man named Connery (Heinz Drache) arrives at the inn and immediately disappears into a secret passageway. His behaviour in general is suspicious, but then everybody in this movie behaves suspiciously. New suspicious characters just keep on arriving. Fairbanks (Horst Tappert) seems very suspicious indeed.

Another mysterious stranger turns up at the castle and tells Jane’s lawyer Jackson (Hans Söhnker) that he’s prepared to offer a ludicrously large amount of money to buy the castle, but Jackson doesn’t inform Jane of the offer.

Another body turns up, it gets dragged away by one man just as Grimsby shows up, apparently also intent on dragging that body off. The body turns up at the castle, Scotland Yard is called, and the body disappears again. Other mysterious characters turn up and they’re clearly up to something secretive.

This is all classic outrageous Rialto krimi stuff, and that’s the stuff I personally love.

The plot outrageousness continues and the bodies keep piling up. Sir John of Scotland Yard (Siegfried Schürenberg) is perplexed. Sir John has great confidence in his own investigative capabilities but that confidence is sadly misplaced.

There’s at least one nefarious conspiracy brewing here but there may be more than one. There's also a very clever mystery regarding the various murders and that dog.

A lot of the regulars of the early krimis had departed by this time. For this movie Rialto still managed to assemble a very capable cast, with Heinz Drache being particularly good. Karin Baal makes a fine heroine (assuming she isn’t a villainess and in this movie you can never be sure of anyone) and adds some glamour.

The departure of the series’ regular comic relief actor, the very popular Eddi Arent, was a blow. This time the comic relief is mostly provided by Sir John’s personal assistant, Miss Finley (Ilse Pagé). She’s genuinely amusing and Miss Finley is an appealing character. It’s Miss Finley who really runs Scotland Yard, not the bumbling Sir John. There are amusing hints that the relationship between Sir John and Miss Finley might not be purely professional. She is also more than a comic relief character. She is no fool and of all the people trying their hands at investigating the mystery she’s probably the sharpest and the cleverest. She became a regular in the later krimis, and a very popular one.

Peter Thomas’s score must be mentioned - his bizarre scores were a distinctive feature of Rialto’s krimis.

Alfred Vohrer directs with plenty of gusto.

Visually the movie is a delight, with the gothic trappings laid on extra thick.

The Hound of Blackwood Castle is very much a typical krimi but somehow it makes the forrnula seem fresh and exciting, even at times inspired. This movie is a complete delight. Very highly recommended.

The Tobis Blu-Ray offers an excellent 16:9 enhanced transfer and English-speaking viewers there’s a choice between the English dubbed soundtrack and the German soundtrack with English subtitles. The latter is very definitely the better option.