(1970)
Overall: GOOD
Jean Rollin's sophomore effort and first film in color, The Nude Vampire, (La Vampire Nue), is more ambitious than his debut Le Viol du Vampire though still as leisurely absurd as any of his works. Very common for a Rollin film of course, the pacing is pretty stagnant throughout. Characters routinely say things like "all will be revealed to you another time" instead of just explaining things when they have the opportune time. The film pretty much revolves around Rollin's half-brother Olivier looking like a kid who is excited to be in a movie, going from one scene to the next while being told that he will be told what is going on eventually. It is all nonsense primarily and gets more ridiculous as it goes on, but it is also breathtakingly weird at regular intervals. Not one but two bizarre, creepy cults partake of standing around in animal masks and hoods, walking about a chateau either naked or in robes while holding candles, plus the Castel twins wear outfits made of glass. As usual, the very slow presentation and nonexistent interest in telling a clever story can either enhance or hinder the experience depending on the audience member, but it is assuredly a textbook example of Rollin's singular and at the very least unusual, auteur style.
(1973)
Overall: MEH
Finally breaking the erotic vampire mold, Jean Rollin made his most deliberately placid and inconclusive movie, (saying something), with the exceptionally lethargic The Iron Rose, (La Rose de Fer). Outside of an early scene at a normal enough wedding reception and a few strange cameos including a clown putting flowers on a grave and Rollin himself as a questionable looking hobo, the film only features two actors and one location, a gargantuan, labyrinth like cemetery in Amiens, France. A knowing gamble was taken since Rollin himself has gone on record as saying that he knew the movie would be a commercial disaster, but as always, he took his non-existent budget and concocted something truly dreamlike and unapologetically strange. While the man's dedication to his own eccentric, art-house whims are routinely admirable, so little actually happens in The Iron Rose that it inescapably becomes a chore to sit through after awhile. Any moments of menace are so subtle that they may in fact not even be there. It is wholly possible that the viewer could be imagining that the movie is more intricate and creepy than it actually is. Still, there is sensational beauty to be found here as with most of the director's works. The opening, (and especially re-occurring), sequences of Françoise Pascal naked on a beach and the camera exploring the vast graveyard at night, (and not shot in day-for-night as many films of the day were), are wondrous to be sure, but it goes a little too far in its ambiguity to maintain one's full attention.
(1975)
Overall: GREAT
The first of Jean Rollin's films that could fairly be called a masterpiece, (at least by erotic, Euro-horror standards), was his return to vampirism in Lips of Blood, (Lèvres de Sang). Rollin's movies were always deliberately paced, void of any noticeably budget whatsoever, and nonsensical. Yet at his best, he was able to transcend these would-be shortcomings into something rather hypnotic and enticing. It also always helped when he was benefited with extraordinary locations to shoot in. Utilizing both contemporary Paris, graveyards, crypts, abandoned buildings, castles, and villas, Lips of Blood has beautiful scenery in nearly every shot. Any moment that take place in apartment buildings or standard, boring rooms are shot in such a flat, brightly lit manner, making the dark, bleak shadows of all the truly eye-popping settings that much more visually remarkable. This is also that very rare Rollin work where the story is downright comprehensible, though he still takes great liberties in having a number of moments remain unexplained by film's end. The final sequence involving naked people, a coffin, and the rising tide under a gloomy dawn is the kind of highly memorable and strange visual tapestry that the best of art-house horror has to offer. Rollin would transcend even what he accomplished here in a few later releases, but this unquestionably ranks among his finest.
No comments:
Post a Comment