I first watched this a few years ago when I was discovering the Corman Poe Cycle, and although I think I thought it was amusing enough, I think I largely dismissed it as not being a "proper" Corman Poe film - I guess because it is so light-hearted and fluffy, and clearly not really based on the source material. Although, to be fair, a faithful adaptation of The Raven would entail a man sitting glumly in a house and then being startled, then amused, then scared, then angry and then glum again just because a raven flies into his house and perches on a statue saying "Nevermore" - hardly likely to be riveting viewing.

Although I was suitably cognizant of the presence of three genre titans in Price, Karloff and Lorre, I was still a bit early in my appreciation of all three of these guys. In the years since, I have seen countless wonderful performances by Price and Karloff (to the point where they are now two of my all time favourite actors) and I have also seen M - after which no one can doubt the incredible talent of Peter Lorre (and I just saw him in Mad Love and he was fantastic in that, too).

So now, I just love this movie for being 90-odd minutes of these three beloved geniuses camping it up and having the time of their lives. All of them are terrific here, but nothing beats the joy of watching Vincent Price act so ridiculously for the sustained run time. He is simply wonderful. (That reminds me: my daughter and I found an old Muppets Show episode on Disney + last week where Price was the special guest - it almost gave me tears of happiness to see him in that, and his performance here is very similar).

My daughter is fascinated by the idea of horror movies but is actually quite easily scared to the point of being turned off a film entirely, but she saw the Simpsons Treehouse of Horror version of The Raven and wanted to know what it was based on - so I pulled this blu-ray out and said "This one! Except not really" but she wanted to watch it and she absolutely loved this. That's my girl!