User Reviews

An assistant professor (Lloyd Bochner) from Boston travels to France for his thesis on Cagliostro and purchases a mirror covered over with paint that once belonged to the evil magician. Back home, he scrapes away the paint and finds the diabolical prestidigitator waiting -and eager to get back to the world of the living...

In this far-fetched fantasy, Cagliostro (played with sinister glee by Henry Daniell) is able to hypnotize anyone gazing upon the mirror into leaving their body and entering its fourth dimension; he then inhabits the shell left behind to live life to the fullest by going on a serial killing spree. Marion Ross plays the professor's fiancée and at one point he proposes a toast to her saying "Happy Days!". One of Louis XVI's mistresses is trapped in the mirror to keep Cagliostro company while he waits for his next victim and the tale is very dark indeed with nearly the entire cast killed off in one way or another. One of the best in the series!

This episode involves Count Cagliostro...a man who died more than 200 years ago. In the introduction, Boris Karloff says "...was he a legend...perhaps'. No, he wasn't. He was a psychic from the late 18th century and at the time he was seen as a very powerful man...though over the years most folks have come to believe he was a charlatan....but he DID exist. And, it's apparent that the producers of "Thriller" loved Henry Daniell, who was in probably more episodes than anyone but the host! This is one of five appearances by the actor.

The theme of this episode is that although Cagliostro died in 1795, his evil spirit lives on and makes folks do horrible things. In the prologue, you see a man in 1905 commit a brutal murder due to Cagliostro and then it switches to 1961 where the bulk of the story occurs.

It begins with Professor Langham discovering a weird mirrow among Cagliostro's possession. It was weird in that the glass had black paint all over it. When he scraped away the paint, he saw a woman trapped inside...the SAME woman who was buried long, long ago and whose corpse never aged! Oddly, however, when others look into the mirror, they cannot see the lady! What's next? See the show for yourself. But rest assured...it's pretty weird!!

So is it any good? Well, it is very original. And, like the better episodes has a lot to do with the supernatural.

I love this show and almost everything about it. From the opening cafe scene with the simple Nouveau grill-work door/window to the final stark fade-out, it's filled with great ideas, images, situations: the tomb of Yvette, the antique shop, Lloyd B. sitting in the dark in his room staring at the mirror, the fairy-tale ambiance as Yvette appears and lights the candles....all extremely well-done.

For some reason I missed this on its initial run back in '61; I caught it on its summer rerun, and the opening scared the %^#*& out of me! The gradual shadows that engulf David Frankham, the increasingly diabolical look on his face, etc....strong stuff for a 10-year-old back then.

Lloyd Bochner's performances always have...umm..perhaps just a slight whiff of HAM about them, and I'd say the same for his Cagliostro persona. However, to be fair, it's mighty tempting to overplay this sort of thing. Basically I think he pulls the overall role off very well. Marion Ross is great as the slightly daffy, befuddled, but hot-to-trot fiancee (I still don't understand their relationship and that of her brother; are they all shacking up together or WHAT?)

Much cool tension in the final build-up; the fight scene in the room, with the real Lloyd collapsing in desperation within the mirror is a GREAT concept and beautifully staged. Very impressive and unexpected conclusion.

I only wish that Herschel Daugherty had called for another re-take of Jack Mullaney's incredibly limp "You killed my sister" line; (Say..Jack,..could we try it again, with a little more feeling this time?).

Another wistful, romantic waltz score by Morton Stevens, with the stark strings and tolling chime lending a touch of solemnity to the final fade-out. Nice going!

PS--If you happen to have a lot of spare time on your hands, do a freeze-frame/slo-mo advance on the final shot of Lloyd Bochner's face turning into the skull; it's pretty darn cool, and gives an idea of the care that went into this relatively simple effect. LR

Lloyd Bochner stars as Professor Harry Langham, who is obsessed with learning more about a mysterious magician and rumored sorcerer Count Cagliostro, who lived in Paris, where Harry discovers a painted-over mirror that once belonged to the count, and was considered most important to him. Harry has it sent back to his home in America, where he scrapes the paint off it, and discovers that the count(played by Henry Daniell) inhabits it with a beautiful young woman named Yvette(played by Pat Michon) and intends on taking over his body so that he will live again, while Harry is trapped behind the mirror with Yvette... Eerie premise is well handled here, though low budget limits what can be done visually, leaving the mirror world a bit vague, but a fitting finale makes up for it(though leaves a pair of loose ends...)

"Prisoner in the Mirror" continues our season ending winning streak, offering Henry Daniell a third series role as Count Alexander Cagliostro, evil 18th century alchemist, escaping death by encasing his soul inside a mirror through which he can lure unsupecting victims to give up their mortal bodies for his own use, a vampire who desires life instead of blood. The opening scene features David Frankham's Marquis de Chantenay enticing a young woman to her death in the year 1910, a reign of terror conducted against his will by the wicked Count, forcing the innocent Marquis to foil his persecutor in covering the mirror glass entirely with black paint before taking his own life. Modern day professor Harry Langham (Lloyd Bochner) is composing a thesis about Cagliostro, examining the tomb of the Count's muse Yvette Dulaine (Pat Michon) to find her beauty still intact when by all rights she should have become a skeleton. When he finds the mirror in an antique shop it is shipped to his home for a place in his bedroom, eagerly stripping away the paint to search for signs of Yvette in the forbidding glass. His sweetheart (Marion Ross) finds herself neglected by his obsessions, culminating in Cagliostro taking control of Langham's body, but it won't be long before the police are on his trail after the strangling of a waterfront prostitute. Robert Arthur would go on to script "Dialogues with Death" and "An Attractive Family," but this would be his best crafted, most downbeat episode as directed by Herschel Daugherty, veteran of 16 THRILLER entries and two for STAR TREK. Daniell's appearance is disappointingly brief but excellent, while another familiar face is that of Frieda Inescort, from Bela Lugosi's "The Return of the Vampire," David Frankham soon to play opposite Vincent Price and Basil Rathbone in Roger Corman's "Tales of Terror." Boris Karloff himself did have one previous run in with Cagliostro, as he was to have been the subject of what evolved into Imhotep for Karl Freund's 1932 "The Mummy."