The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave

Lord Alan Cunningham (Anthony Steffen) attempts to escape from Dr Richard Timberlane's clinic but is captured. The credits roll and Alan is inexplicably free. But, given his penchant for picking up prostitutes and taking them back to his castle for a spot of S&M and murder, he really shouldn't be…

Tiring of the failure of Timberlane's ministrations Alan decides to try an alternative therapy hoping that if he can get in touch with the spirit of his dead wife Evelyn, who died in childbirth a year ago, via a seance he will be free.

Feeling better, Alan relocates to London and forget all about his beloved. His cousin George (Roberto Maldera) advocates a life of hedonism and sets him up with Susie (Erica Blanc), a stripper from the Kittycat Club who performs a kinky routine that sees her rise from a coffin.

Unfortunately when Alan takes the girl back to the castle (or, rather Italian villa), offering her £1000 for her company and agreement to do whatever he asks, his insanity reasserts itself and he quickly moves from whipping to running the girl down as she tries to escape. Another pay off to the gamekeeper Albert, who also happens to be Alan's brother in law…

Richard suggests that Alan avoid the big city and remarry. At a party Alan meets George again and has to deny ever meeting Susie, then meets the beautiful Gladys (Marina Malfatti) and is immediately smitten, making a marriage proposal that very night.

She accepts and it seems that Alan is free from Evelyn's legacy. But that would just be too easy as the dead woman's presence makes itself felt.

Is Alan mad, someone trying to drive him insane or both? Who, if anyone, can be trusted?

The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave appears to be a classic piece of Eurotrash, mixing supernatural and giallo elements with liberal doses of sleaze and kinkiness, a good cast – although Erika Blanc should really have a bigger part to accommodate her talents, if you know what I mean – and a winning Bruno Nicolai score that mixes lush romantic themes with familiar S&M garage/trash rock cues culled from Eugenie: The Story of Her Journey into Perversion.

Unfortunately it's also a film that's suffered at the hands of the distributors over the years, with the original 103 minute version hard to see compared to its tamer 88 minute counterpart.

In any case, this Region 1 DVD from Sinema Diabolo runs somewhere in between these two lengths and is, to be quite frank, a waste of time. The picture quality is pathetic, washed out, sub-VHS dupe level and replete with scratches and almost haptic levels of grain and dirt. Though touted as letterboxed the image is cut off at the sides and appears to be stretched somewhat. At one point the frame even gets split between the top and bottom of the screen.

There are no extras.

While it's good that films like The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave are becoming available on DVD, what's the point if opportunistic fly by night enterprises put out shoddy product like this?