AllMovie

Probably the best thing that can be said about A Name for Evil is that, at 74 minutes, it is short. If it were some 73 minutes shorter, it would undoubtedly be even better. In other words, Evil is a muddled mess, through and through. Devotees of rotten films will get a kick out of it for a while, but unfortunately Evil is too confusing and, consequently, just plain dull to hold the attention of even the most dedicated bad movie maven. The basic premise -- haunted house exerts an unholy hold upon residents -- has been done many, many times, almost always better, and the plot that is hung upon this premise is a mish-mash of incidents and events that are pretty much thrown up on the screen without a great deal of logic or development. Needless to say, character development is similarly slipshod, and is not helped by dialogue that is both dated and inane. There's also some rather gratuitous nudity, but since it livens things up a bit, it can actually be counted as a plus. Robert Culp and Samantha Eggar do the best they can with ridiculous parts. Perhaps a stronger director could have helped them (and the film), but, a few striking visuals aside, Bernard Girard's work alternates between lame and distracting. There's some decent cinematography, but other than that, there's next to nothing to recommend this Evil.