Even though 1972's Tower of Evil is directed by the awesome Jim O'Connolly  — he did several episodes of "The Saint" spy series, and one of my all-time favorite Ray Harryhausen effects extravaganzas, The Valley of Gwangi — I'd never heard of it before.

As I watched Tower of Evil in joyous, giggly thrall, I couldn't help but thinking, "Wow! This is just like a live-action, sexy adult episode of Scooby Doo!" (Then I saw a few reviews of the movie online and realized I'm not the pioneer of that thought… ah, well. Never said I'm original.)

The movie, alternately entitled Horror on Snape Island, begins with two salty seamen making their way via dinghy across choppy waters to an isolated, windswept island that holds the ruins of a lighthouse, a crumbling casa, some hidden treasure, and plenty of dead teenagers. As the grizzled, grumbling duo discover the array of nude, dismembered and skewered corpses, we take a bad trip back in time to when they were alive… and what led to these blokes' and birds' gruesome ends.

A lot of the set up involves the four unfortunates as they explore the island (and each other's bodies). The lighthouse (our titular tower) isn’t actually evil, but it's built upon the final resting place of a long-dead Phoenician king  (don't ask why he's buried in Britain), the statue of Baal which guards his tomb, and the treasure. Are supernatural forces at work, or is just greed?

Along with our intrepid investigators there's a handful of interested archaeologists, a surly detective, a suspicious local fisherman, and a hapless teenaged boy. The who's who of U.K. TV and cinema cast includes Bryant Haliday (Curse of the Voodoo), Jill Haworth (Haunted House of Horror), Mark Edwards (Blood From the Mummy's Tomb) and Derek Fowlds (Mistress Pamela), Robin Askwith (Horror Hospital), John Hamill (Trog), Candace Glendenning (Satan's Slave) and Anna Palk (The Frozen Dead).

Tower of Evil is fun zig-zag back in time to natural breasts with tan-lines, silver fillings, tight polyester pants, and everyday use of words like "groovy" (cool) and "ball" (sex). Nothing terribly remarkable, but if you love 70s-sploitation, you're definitely in for a treat — and if you're a Brit horror fan, so much the better.

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