“Nella Stretta Morsa del Ragno” is considered by many to be an inferior remake by director Antonio Margheriti of his previous Gothic masterpiece, “Danza Macabra" (Castle of Blood). That’s unfair as the latter film very much stands on its own feet as a slice of fantastically overblown Gothic romance. The story, by a combination of Giovanni Addessi, Bruno Corbucci and Giovanni Graimaldi, sees a debauched Edgar Allan Poe (Klaus Kinski) and journalist Alan Foster (Anthony Franciosa) making a bet with the sinister Lord Thomas Blackwood, that Foster cannot spend a night in Blackwood’s supposedly haunted castle. Foster accepts the bet and shortly after arriving at the castle encounters the beautiful Elisabeth (Michèle Mercier) and her buxom, raven-tressed friend, Julia (Karin Field). It isn’t long before Foster finds himself in the midst of a ghostly dance macabre.

Although the storyline has more than a passing resemblance to “Castle of Blood", it is Margheriti’s, beautiful and full-blooded amalgamation of Gothic staples that makes “Nella Stretta Morsa del Rango” a beautifully atmospheric film. His approach is terrifically arch with all the stylish Gothic staples in place from cobweb shrouded tombs, to billowing white curtains, flickering candelabra and a doomed romantic heroine in flowing gowns. The film has a highly stylised look thanks to the some superb widescreen photography which helps generate an appropriately ethereal and atmospheric mood. Thiat mood is further enhanced by an entrancingly odd, but fitting, score by Riz Ortolani. Both Michèle Mercier and Karin Field are great as the romantically inclined heroine and her knife-wielding nemesis. Anthony Franciosa makes for a reliable lead while Klaus Kinski delivers a wild and delirious cameo turn as a violent, whisky-sodden Edgar Allan Poe. Overall “Nella Stretta Morsa del Ragno” brings little originality to the Gothic horror romance and the story has a tendency towards slowness and repetition. What Antonio Margheriti does, however, is to hone the key Gothic tropes into their purest form, delivering a lavish, rich, beautiful and highly stylised film. ( )