The Ghost Of Sierra De Cobre Comes Calling On Blu-ray

When there are so many films and TV shows to watch, it can be hard to contemplate watching two versions of the same thing. The interest is there, but the time can be tough to find. Never before released on Blu-Ray and DVD, The Ghost of Sierra de Cobre is the feature length version of a pilot that wasn’t picked up for a show called The Haunted. Until recently that pilot was thought to be lost, but as Eric Grayson, whose print was used for this release, explains on his commentary track, he was able to purchase a copy on eBay in 2010 and the subsequent years have been spent getting it legally squared away.

Both The Ghost of Sierra de Cobre and The Haunted are included on Kino Lorber‘s Blu-Ray. David J. Schow, whose extensive knowledge fueled Kino’s Outer Limits sets, does the commentary for Sierra de Cobre. The Outer Limits connection is key because many of the same people, both in front of and behind the camera, are responsible for this film. After he left Outer Limits at the end of season one, having written such memorable episodes as “Nightmare” and “The Zanti Misfits,” The Haunted was supposed to be Joseph Stefano’s new project. Starring Martin Landau (who featured in Stefano’s Outer Limits episode, “The Bellero Shield”) The Ghost of Sierra de Cobre is Stefano’s only directing credit (he also wrote and produced it) and is about an architect named Nelson Orion (Landau) who investigates paranormal activities in his spare time.
Henry Mandore (Tom Simcox) thinks his mother’s haunting him. One of her greatest fears was being buried alive so, when she died, she had a phone installed next to her coffin. Naturally, when Henry starts receiving phone calls from a sobbing woman, he thinks it’s his mom calling and hires Orion to help.
From there Mandore is oddly sidelined, while Orion works closely with Mandore’s wife, Vivia (Diane Baker). Mandore’s blindness shouldn’t require such an arrangement but it undoubtedly would be the excuse given as Vivia and Orion act like Grace Kelly and James Stewart in Rear Window, without the husband hanging around to ruin the effect.
Originally, I thought I would listen to Grayson’s commentary for The Haunted and let that be my way of experiencing it, instead of watching The Haunted so close to having watched Sierra de Cobre, but that’s exactly when you should watch it. Schow, especially, talks about the differences between the two in his commentary but it’s not the same as noticing them for yourself. The Haunted is much more traditionally edited and there are pluses and drawbacks to that. On the plus side, you don’t have scenes like Orion reading and lighting candles that is already pushing it when he starts relighting the candles again. A cameo by Dolores Starr was already a loose end in Sierra de Cobre so isn’t missed, and then there are the scenes where the characters have time to react but don’t, allowing bad things to happen.
Ultimately, though, there’s a strangeness to The Ghost of Sierra de Cobre that’s lost when you edit the long takes (or “shoe leather,” as Schow calls them) and that strangeness, while occasionally dumbfounding, is a huge part of Sierra de Cobre’s success. There’s a sequence, for instance, when Mandore gets a call from the sobbing woman. It starts at the mausoleum, follows a telephone wire to Mandore’s mansion, then follows the wire back to the mausoleum, where Orion’s waiting for Vivia. It’s heavy-handed, to be sure, but in The Haunted the telephone call and the mausoleum are treated like two, separate scenes and it’s far less arresting. Sierra de Cobre also has a few more scenes with Nellie Burt (Outer Limits’ “The Guest”), as Orion’s housekeeper, Mary Finch. She’s the dream sidekick for our architect X-Filer.
Neither is a perfect picture but as a curiosity for Outer Limits fans, who will recognize many of the names involved, The Ghost of Sierra de Cobra has too much going for it not to wonder how it holds up.
The Ghost of Sierra De Cobre is available now on Blu-Ray and DVD from Kino Lorber.