Barbara Stanwyck & Barbara Parkins in A Taste of Evil (1971)

Susan Wilcox (Parkins) is finally coming home to San Francisco, after 7 years in a Swiss sanatarium. She's come to terms with being sexually attacked as a child and has come back to her loving mother, Miriam (Stanwyck). Upon arriving home she's met by her step father, Harold (William Windom) and the handyman on the estate, John (Arthur O'Connell) All is well until Susan starts to feel haunted by the past. She senses someone watching her in the woods, hears a man breathing in a dark room at night. She starts to feel as if she's coming unhinged when she sees her stepfather drowned in her bathtub and faints, only to find out that nothing is amiss when she comes to. Will Susan be able to leave the past behind her or is someone making that impossible?

This thriller has some unexpected twists and turns to it and it's fun to see Parkins in something other than Valley of the Dolls (1967). She looks great here in a hippie-chic kind of way. Look for Roddy McDowell as a doctor who's trying to help. This title has never been released on DVD. It is available in full on YouTube, however. Part one is above, uploaded by TVTERRORLAND.

Obscurity factor: 9 (not on DVD, available on YouTube, largely forgotten)

Barbara Stanwyck in The House that Would Not Die (1970)

Ruth Bennett (Stanwyck) and her niece Sara Dunning (Kitty Wynn) are delighted to see the beautiful old colonial home they've been left by a reclusive relative. It's full of antiques, charm and - as they discover after a few harrowing experiences - ghosts. With the help of Pat McDougal (Richard Egan), a local professor and one of his students, Sam Whitman (Michael Anderson Jr.), they delve into the history of the home and find a scandal that involves a revolutionary war general and his daughter who's spirits take possession of Sara and Pat's bodies. Will they solve the mystery and murder at the heart of it before the spirits reenact it in the guise of their possesed bodies?

This atmospheric story is fun to watch, thanks to screen legend Stanwyck and some great elements of suspense. Look for veteran character actress Mabel Albertson in a small role. It's not available on DVD, though it's been uploaded in full to YouTube by TVTERRORLAND. Part one is above.

Obscurity factor: 9 (not well remembered, not on DVD, available on YouTube)

Barbara Stanwyck & Gig Young in The Gay Sisters (1942)

Obscurity factor: 7

The title of this film is a bit of an intentional misnomer. These sisters are anything but gay - in any sense of the word. Susanna Gaylord (Nancy Coleman) is drearily trying to find happiness after a 4 hour marriage the groom refuses to annul, Evelyn Gaylord (Geraldine Fitzgerald) is bitter and spiteful and Fiona Gaylord (Stanwyck) is hard as nails and completely unforgiving. They've been orphans (albeit rich ones) since they were children, and the estate their father left them has been in probate for 20 years. It's being held up by developer Charles Barclay (George Brent) who wants to buy the family mansion, tear it down and build a complex. Fiona refuses to sell and the standoff has been a stalemate. Of course there's more to this than real estate. There's more to the relationship between Fiona and Charles than meets the eye...

This super soaper is the film that gave Gig Young his name. He plays an artist who forms the sticky point of a love triangle between Susanna and Evelyn. Warner Brothers decided after casting him in this film that he should take the characters name professionally. It's sort of odd to hear the character referred to by name so often in the film (And they do it endlessly, using both given and surname so it almost seems like a parody) knowing that since then, the name also refers to the actor.

The Gay Sisters has yet to be released on DVD, though it can be watched in its entirety on YouTube, thanks to an upload by heapsoflovenozomi. Part 1 is above. It's also occasionally screened on TCM, which is where I saw it. The poster above is available at MoviePosterShop.com.

Obscurity factor: 7 (not on DVD, mostly unknown to the general public)