Mill of the Stone Women

Mill of the Stone Women is a 1960 Italian horror film directed by Giorgio Ferroni, starring Pierre Brice and Scilla Gabel. It follows a journalist writing a story on a sculptor in 19th-century Holland who falls in love with the artist's sequestered daughter; meanwhile, a series of missing person cases seem to encircle the windmill where the artist lives and works. The film is notable as the first Italian horror film to be shot in color. Plot Writer Hans van Arnhim travels to a remote island in Holland to research a story about the fabled Mill of the Stone Women, a carousel of female statues created by art professor and sculptor Gregorious Wahl. Gregorius allows Hans to stay in the mill's attic, where he stores some of his unused sculptures. Hans meets and quickly falls in love with Elfie, the professor's attractive but ailing daughter. When Hans's girlfriend Liselotte comes to visit him at the mill, she is highly disturbed by the carousel of sculptures and she faints. Later, Professor Wahl informs Hans that Elfie suffers from a mysterious illness that took her mother's life as well, and that their live-in physician, Dr. Loren Bohlem, provides her with around-the-clock care should she need medical intervention. That night, when Hans attempts to break off his romance with Elfie, she becomes hysterical, threatening to go as far as killing him. In her rage, she collapses and emits blood from her mouth. Hans hurriedly carries her to her bedroom, and notices strange lesions appear on her face before she suddenly dies.