Originally shown in 3-D, the “old dark house” thriller The Maze should be called The Castle, or The Castle with a Maze, if they wished to be more specific. Directed by William Cameron Menzies (Invaders from Mars), it follows bachelor Gerald MacTeam (Richard Carlson, Creature from the Black Lagoon) called away to his ancestors’ Craven Castle for reasons most mysterious, just as he is about to be married.

When Gerald sends a letter to his fiancée, Kitty (soap star Veronica Hurst), to break their engagement, she gets suspicious, packs her bags and her aunt (Katherine Emery, Isle of the Dead), and heads off to said Scottish castle uninvited. There, the staff is notoriously tight-lipped; the ladies are locked in their rooms at night; and strange noises emanate from the hallway.

On the grounds stands an elaborate, visually pleasing maze, but don’t expect it to play much of a part in the story outside of the “shocking” climax, in which we learn the lord of the castle is really a 200-year-old giant frog. Yes, the revelation is quite outta nowhere.

The film’s sets are something to behold, but The Maze treads its territory fairly slowly. Seeing it in 3-D may have given it an extra kick, but it would hardly explain the amphibious twist; the plague of frogs at the end of Magnolia made more sense. —Rod Lott