Vincent Price is superb in this depiction of the tyrannical, evil "Matthew Hopkins", tasked amidst the English Civil War to bring fear and terror to the population. Playing to just about every phobia and superstition, he travels the land seeking out and punishing those who worship or serve the devil... There is a magnificent scene in which he divines that a man dropped into the river with stones tied about him will be a witch if he floats, innocent if he sinks (and drowns!)... Sums up the science, really - and the really quite perturbing attitudes that prevailed, even amongst those deemed educated or sophisticated. Ian Ogilvy is "Richard Marshall", a man determined to stop these atrocities and at risk to himself and his family - and we have now watch a battle royal between the two men as worthy as any fought in the war. It's, at times, quite gruesome to watch - and the whole look of the film adds oodles to the sense of menace evoked by this truly malevolent man. Again, based on the vivid imagination of Edgar Allan Poe, this film is a cracker for late on a winter's night with a glass of red wine and a rogue branch tapping on the window.
