The Long Hair of Death

Antonio Margheriti and Barbara Steele, the same pairing that made Castle of Blood, reunite for a black-and-white revenge gothic set in a plague-year castle. A woman is burned at the stake on a false witchcraft charge, curses the family that condemned her, and comes back to collect. Steele does what Steele does, standing in doorways looking like the last thing you will ever see. It is slower and less famous than Bava's gothics, but Margheriti fills every frame with cobwebs, thunder and slow dread, and the finale earns the wait. Comfort food for anyone who thinks black-and-white Italian horror peaked around 1964.