When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.

The acting in this movie is really good.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

With a fear of witches among the local peasants, a vengeful witch hunter and his assistant travel to a remote village supposedly steeped in witchcraft, and once a group of soldiers learns of their treacherous behavior set out to hunt them down and bring them to justice.There is a lot that really impresses in here. One of the main features involved here is the fact that the film is for the most part historically accurate in what happens. The characters, the towns, the accusations and the tortures and executions are all real- life scenarios and events that makes what happens all the more terrifying in knowing that what happened to the people in the film where actually done in real life. Watching the torture scenes where people are chained to a rock wall, stabbed and sliced with knives or constantly slapped around until a confession is heard, dumping the bodies into a river to see if they sink or swim and adjust the punishment according to what happened are extremely brutal and uncompromising, which makes them all the more terrifying when added to the realistic attitude and feel to the film. The realism extends to more than just the violence, which has some really impressive sets and setting, with the towns being realistically captured and giving off an impressive air of menace and foreboding that really works to the film's advantage. The rural villages and countrysides are even better as the wide-open spaces and large plains make them all the more spectacular and a real treat for the eyes. It also extends beyond that as well as Price has never been more evil, and he's never been this campy. You are never given the impression that you are supposed to like him or celebrate his acts, and this is one factor that makes the movie work. It's a great performance that really enlivens the proceedings and is an absolute joy to watch. This really isn't that bad of a film without a lot to dislike, but what's there is pretty big. The biggest issue is that the film itself doesn't seem as gory and violent as the reputation gives it. Returning to its grim tone and torturous violence today seems like a humdrum exercise, not because it has lost its power, but because the model it ushers in is a worn-out, overused feel to those of us with a passing interest in what happened. The tortures mainly consist of being slapped around until a confession and then the real torture begins, but the fact that most of the torture time is spent with the slapping technique, it leaves the feeling that it's more brutal in reputation than in practice. It also wastes a great opportunity by never concerning itself with any sociological or historical analysis of what that led to the conditions under which the witch-hunts occurred. It would've been a lot more interesting had the film actually done the trials and accusations to really amp up the rest of the hypocrisy and corruption present. That would've added to the feeling of total dire that the film exudes, and is a shame that it wasn't done in that manner. All in all, it's not bad but does feature a few big flaws.Today's Rating/R: Graphic Violence, Nudity, Language, an off-screen Rape and a mild sex scene.

While it's not as mind-numbingly, relentlessly gruesome as the later MARK OF THE DEVIL, WITCHFINDER GENERAL comes about as close as a movie of this period probably could: we see hangings and drownings and a surprisingly graphic witch burning; add to all that perhaps the VILEST performance of Vincent Price's career and you're in deep with this one. Price is as dour and as malevolent here as he's ever been in any movie- sans, thankfully, the almost tongue-in-cheek attitude and ever-present smirk just waiting to happen that normally characterizes his performance(s). Herbert Lom and Reggie Nalder would eventually make Price's Witchfinder look almost TAME by comparison, but that had more to do with the fact that MARK OF THE DEVIL pushed the envelope as far as GORE effects went. (We were given "vomit bags" upon entering the theater to see MARK OF THE DEVIL- "The first movie rated V for Violence!"- and I thought they were going a bit far with the schlocky marketing campaign. But I was a kid, and I had no idea what I was in for. There were actually police officers manning some of the entrances. Again, I smiled at the theater owner's shenanigans. But then I got a whiff of air as we entered the theater and it was that foulest of stenches just this side of decaying flesh: VOMIT. People were scrambling for the bathrooms; some appeared to have been physically assaulted... Enough. See my comments on MARK OF THE DEVIL under the User name "Poe426.") WITCHFINDER GENERAL, for all its despicable doings, is a finely-crafted tale and one worth seeing.

The movie is definitely horror with the torture scenes in order to get a confession of witchcraft out of the poor victims as the main attraction, Next to the torture scenes (being called interrogations by the witch hunters) there is the hanging, the water test and burning at the stake accurately showing how cruel the witch hunting must have been and many died innocently just because witch hunters were greedy, abused the superstition or fear of people. Anyone making trouble for the authorities was likely going to be accused of witchcraft. Even though it is as usual another great performance from Vincent Price as the titular character he has not really that much screen time. To give the movie not too much of a documentary feeling they did put a story in it from a girl and her husband (who is a soldier) seeking revenge upon the witchfinder Matthew Hopkins for falsely condemning the girl's uncle of witchcraft which resulted in death by hanging. How accurate this story of the witchfinder general is, I have no idea. I don't think it ended the way it did. The ending I believe is to create still some sort of feel good and it clearly feels rushed.

The third and final film directed by Michael Reeves before his tragic death at the age of 25, this is my favourite of the 80 or so horror films that I have watched this year. The reason that it is so effective is that it does not involve gods and monsters but human beings who brutally tortured and killed their fellow human beings. It's an excellent exploration (and damning indictment) of the darkest part of human nature. It's also interesting in that it is based on actual events, albeit barely loosely. For instance, Price was 56 at the time while Hopkins only lived to be 26-27.It's well known that Reeves and his co-writer Tom Baker - no, not that one but that would have been awesome! - wanted Donald Pleasence rather than Vincent Price, one of the Old Masters of the horror genre, to play Matthew Hopkins as they thought that the former's acting style was more suited to the role. This often lead to conflict on set between Reeves and Hopkins. While Pleasence - who excelled at playing creepy characters in part because of his in no way intimidating appearance - would have been excellent, Price delivers one of the best performances of his long career, playing Hopkins with a wonderfully subtle level of menace in stark contrast to his generally more flamboyant style. The rest of the cast is very strong as well, particularly Ian Ogilvy (a close friend of Reeves who appeared in all three of his films), Rupert Davies, Hilary Dwyer and, in a small cameo, Patrick Wymark as Oliver Cromwell.