“The face of evil is ugly to look upon. And as the pleasures increase, the face becomes uglier!”

You've got to wonder why this film wasn't called Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, or some variant thereof. What you' ve basically got is the story, most of the characters, and the setting - but with one huge difference. The main protagonist is called neither Jekyll nor Hyde.

That said, this is probably the one of the better such films made. For one thing, it's got Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing in it. For another, it's got the wonderful Mike Raven in it. The producers even give him the longest speech in the entire film. "Don't cock it up, Mike," they probably said.

Lee's kindly but distant doc is experimenting with inhibition relaxing drugs (just the thing for Victorian England - while you're at it, why not invent the boob tube?) and after giving a dose to the cat proves fatal (for the cat) he does what any self respecting GP would do, he tries it on himself (potential Harold Shipmans take note). This (of course) turns him into a shambling madman. You can tell he's a madman by his messy hair, buck teeth and comedy musical theme.

Of course, eventually the madman takes over, with disastrous results. What makes this film great? Well, the makers ran out of money half way through and had to make do with what they had already filmed (always a sign of quality), and Lee's performance is actually very good - most of the transformation is actually down to his acting skill.

The only downside is Raven's speech, which sees him walking down a street telling us a scene which would have much improved the film had it actually been in it. I suppose the money must have already been running out at this point.