1960s Foreign Horror Part Eleven

THE MAD EXECUTIONERS
(1963)
Dir - Edwin Zbonek
Overall: MEH

 

Sex murders and a kangaroo court of hooded gentleman who have an underground lair to capture, sentence, and execute all manner of corporate scoundrel join forces for screen time in The Mad Executioners, (Der Henker von London); a film which packs a good amount of horror motifs into its otherwise bog-standard krimi framework.  This was one of several Bryce Edgar Wallace adaptions done during the 1960s that competed with the cinematic retellings of Bryce's more famed father Edgar, whose pulp novels were being brought to the screen by various studios at a hefty rate.  Tonally, it bounces around with light comic relief and grisly killings that never get visually explicit, as is common within the genre.  The hooded executioners of the title make a striking and malevolent impression though, condemning their victims before even going through their redundant sentencing rituals, throwing them into a coffin while the hapless saps scream their innocence, and then taking them somewhere to be hung by a museum piece rope that they keep managing to steal.

 

"AWATAR", CZYLI ZAMIANA DUSZ

(1964)

Dir - Janusz Majewski

Overall: MEH

 

This adaptation of the Théophile Gautier short story "Avatar" was adapted for the small screen and written and directed by Janusz Majewski, who would later go on to make the famed Polish folk horror film Lokis.  Quirky in tone, "Awatar”, czyli zamiana dusz, (Avatar or Exchange of Souls), is more of a light and fantastical melodrama than a proper work in Gothic horror, but its premise at least has an otherworldly undercurrent that may appease genre hounds.  It concerns a mysterious "doctor", (who may or may not officially be Satan), who proceeds to switch the bodies of a Count and a lowly Parisian man, the latter seeking the doctor's services to get his hands on the Count's Countess.  Even at less than an hour in length, it is a labored watch, with an elongated first act that takes its time getting to the soul switcheroo, at which point the narrative spins its wheels some more until the doctor pulls off one more mischievous trick on the humbled sap who came to him in the first place.  It can be viewed as a cautionary tale of misplaced wish fulfillment warranting some comeuppance, or just the usual lesson of not realizing the merit of one's own life until living in the shoes of another.  There have been plenty of body-swap movies over the decades, but this one is less memorable than the lot of them and has understandably lingered in obscurity.

 

CIRCUS OF FEAR

(1966)

Dir - John Llewellyn Moxey

Overall: MEH

 

A British/West German co-production, Circus of Fear, (Das Rätsel des silbernen Dreieck, Mystery of the Silver Triangle, Scotland Yard auf heißer Spur, Circus of Terror, Psycho-Circus), has a top-billed Christopher Lee, who is joined by fellow English actors Skip Martin, Suzy Kendell, Leo Genn, and Anthony Newlands, all of whom had and/or would appear in other horror-adjacent works.  Lee's role is actually supporting yet still prominent, but Klaus Kinski has an even smaller part, doing his usual krimi shtick of lurking around silently while looking unwholesome.  Speaking of krimis, this technically qualifies with it being barely adapted from Edgar Wallace's 1928 novel Again the Three Just Men, even if it is shot in color and the big top setting is miles removed from the usual hustle and bustle of a wet and shadowy London.  The plot still has pretty girls getting harassed, someone out for revenge, blackmail, coveted money, and someone posing as a person that they are not, but the body count is comparatively low, and the character with the personal vendetta is actually not out for murdering unrelated circus performers left and right.  Lee talks with a German accent and gets picked on by a little person though, so there is that.

1950s British Horror Part Eight

ALIAS JOHN PRESTON 

(1955)
Dir - David MacDonald
Overall: MEH

Christopher Lee fans may rejoice at this obscure B-feature that he starred in for the American Danzinger brothers; pre-Hammer and in the title role no less.  Alias John Preston is a pedestrian affair from top to bottom, one that was clearly a rushed work and made on the cheap to slap on the bill of a comparatively more memorable A-production.  It runs a mere sixty-six minutes so one could hardly complain that it overstays its welcome, but it also represents an interesting historical footnote for Lee who had delivered few if any performances with this much screen time beforehand.  While his American accept slips regularly, he still proves himself to be an intimidating presence as a mysterious wealthy man who arrives in a small community, charms many of the locals, buys up property, gets himself on the city council, gets engaged to a bank lender's much younger daughter, and shows increasingly evidence that his mental facilities are on the fragile side.  The narrative loses its intrigue once Lee starts explaining his detailed and disturbed dreams to a therapist, at which point it crawls to an inevitable finish that everyone will see coming.  Also, director David MacDonald merely points the camera at his actors in order to get the job done, so there is no sense of style or agency anywhere to be found.

1984

(1956)

Dir - Michael Anderson

Overall: GOOD

The first theatrically released adaptation of George Orwell's famed novel, 1984 took its cue from the BBC production from two years prior.  Tweaking the ending of the source material while adhering to its nightmare-via-oppression tone, these are ideas that would continue to get expressed over virtually every other totalitarian sci-fi work going forward.  Not without its foibles, the relationship between Edmond O'Brien and Jan Sterling is abrupt and feels forced, intentionally to a point considering that the story exists in a world where feelings of love and personal closeness are foreign to everyone.  Still, their romantic bond is further hindered by O'Brien's oafish performance.  Once again though, it makes sense that his perpetually nervous Average Joe would stand out enough to Sterling, even if their chemistry is consistently lacking.  Besides that, director Michael Anderson handles the ever-imposing reach of Big Brother accordingly, providing only fleeting moments away from its all-powerful eye, or so our hapless protagonists are lead to believe.  The inevitable third act is when things kick into higher gear and doubles as the moment where O'Brien finally gets to let loose, all-in-all creating an agreeably paced and chilling cautionary tale of humanity's potential downfall.

 

THE SPANIARD'S CURSE

(1958)

Dir - Ralph Kemplen

Overall: MEH

 

A bog-standard thriller without any oomph, The Spaniard's Curse also stands as the only directorial effort from editor Ralph Kemplen.  Kemplen also co-authored the screenplay along with Kenneth Hyde and Roger Proudlock, which is an adaptation of Edith Pargeter's 1958 novel The Assize Of The Dying.  Things begin promising enough with a likely innocent and ill-stricken man being convicted of murdering a young lady actor, the man going on to curse the lot of people responsible for his condemnation.  Once some curious younger people begin investigating the details, (including the wise-talking news reporter son of the Judge), the film settles into scene after scene of characters walking into rooms to ask other characters questions.  Kemplen has no sense of pacing from behind the lens, though there are one or two suspenseful sequences that finally arrive in the third act which indicate who the culprit has been all along.  The music is curiously inappropriate at times, as if taken from more cheerful melodramas. doing the opposite of creating a tense atmosphere in the process.  Performance wise it is fine, since British thespians were by and large able to adequately deliver even humdrum material such as this in a manner void of scenery chewing.  That said, some pizazz on the actor's parts would have actually helped matters since few things need more assistance than an uninteresting murder mystery.

1970s American Horror Part Eighty-Four - (John Hayes Edition)

DREAM NO EVIL
(1970)
Overall: MEH

Writer/director John Hayes made a hefty number of genre and exploitation films throughout the 1960s and 70s and Dream No Evil, (The Faith Healer, Now I Lay Me Down to Die), is a more personal one.  It was allegedly inspired by his own sister who was brought up in a religious convent only to later suffer from mental illness.  The material may hit closer to home for Hayes, but the movie itself is regrettably dull.  Though it opens with a child having a nightmare, nothing else remotely of interest to horror fans arrives until past the halfway mark.  For the drive-in movie crowd of the day, that is a generous amount of "making out in the car" time.  Hayes's cinematically toys with some psychological aspects around a troubled woman with severe daddy issues, but his direction is persistently bland.  The talking just goes on and on and on, which would be forgivable to a point if there was an interesting pay-off.  Suspense-less and comatose-inducing, it is as forgettable as they get.

 

GRAVE OF THE VAMPIRE
(1972)
Overall: MEH

There are several redeemable qualities to co-writer/director John Hayes' Grave of the Vampire, (Seed of Terror), a movie that is still ultimately bogged down by some of the usual low-budget genre mishaps.  Based on the novel The Still Life by David Chase, Hayes' maintains a serious mood which affords little if any humor.  He also keeps things atmospheric at regular intervals, particularly in the opening cemetery sequence which is as appropriately fog-ridden and creepy as any from the era.  The music is refreshingly low-key as well and there is a striking moment where a woman cuts her breasts in order to feed her newborn and partially undead baby.  While the narrative features such surprises here or there and it jumps ahead several decades unexpectedly after the first act, the production cannot afford enough riveting moments to keep the momentum going.  William Smith is awkward once he is introduced as the main character, maintaining a cold demeanor until he unintentionally camps it up in the finale and coming off jarring in conjunction with the rest of the tone.  Other aspects of the script do not add up and it concludes more puzzlingly than shocking, but it is also just unique enough amongst other vampire films to recommend.

 

GARDEN OF THE DEAD
(1972)
Overall: WOOF

 

On paper, the premise for John Hayes D-rent zombie cheapie Garden of the Dead, (Tomb of the Undead), should wield wacky results.  Yet unfortunately, the movie does not understand what kind of movie it is, becoming a dull mess in the process.  Shot in Topanga Canyon for only enough money to afford fog and some undead makeup, it concerns a prison chain gang who become addicted to formaldehyde, gets punished by their warden for failing to report a botched escape plan, and then said escapees come back to life as groaning corpses who are hellbent on snagging some more formaldehyde to get high on.  What sounds like a goofy comedy is instead played straight for some ill-conceived reason, with no humor anywhere, either intentional or unintentional.  While the high-as-a-kite zombies look nasty and also run, talk, and formulate plans, Hayes does nothing clever with them.  They also die by normal gunfire wounds and not exclusively from a shot to the head, raising the question of how they came back to life in the first place and why the first time that they got killed was not enough but the second time did the trick just fine.  At least it is less than an hour long.

 

END OF THE WORLD

(1977)

Overall: WOOF

Scoring Christopher Lee and equipped with a plot about aliens taking over a small convent and disguising themselves as priests and nuns in order to rid the universe of humankind, one would think that there was enough to work with here to warrant some schlocky fun.  "Fun" is the main thing that is lacking though in the D-grade Charles Band production End of the World; a disaster movie that is actually a disaster.  Coming from Band, the lack of quality is hardly surprising and Lee was still a working actor who needed a paycheck as much as anyone did in the late 70s, but even with one's expectations adjusted accordingly, this is as lazily handled as it gets.  Kirk Scott and Sue Lyon are wooden AF in the leads and hardly anything happens to them for the first half of the film, until they finally run into Lee and his clergy of extraterrestrial visitors who simply explain their plan and make nice with them.  The plot slams home the point that there is danger facing planet Earth, but as far as showing any evidence of that danger, there was no budget for such a thing.  Instead, we have a plodding waste of time with unnecessary shots going on for ages, everyone talking and talking and talking, minimal production values, stock footage, a blippity-bloopity soundtrack, and one brief shot of an alien mask.

1950s Italian Horror Part Two

THE MACHINE TO KILL BAD PEOPLE
(1952)
Dir - Roberto Rossellini
Overall: MEH

Long lost and presumably left unfinished by filmmaker Robert Rossellini, The Machine to Kill Bad People, (La Macchina ammazzacattivi), fuses neorealism, fantasy, and comedy within a story about a camera that either kills or merely freezes people in the perpetual state that they posed in for the photograph.  Even with seven credited screenwriters, the otherworldly specifics are loosey-goosey at best and the plot has a disruptive quality where everyone talks over each other and nobody is all that likeable.  This, the on location shooting, and the social commentary about how noble intentions can often be manipulated and taken advantage of by people's inherent selfishness root it clearly enough in the neorealism movement which Rossellini championed, but the humorous elements fall flat due to the film's rambling yet sluggish presentation.  There are some clever bits scattered about, (like the bookending segments where a narrator introduces the tale with picturesque scenery and models being placed in front of each other by someone's hands), and the closing reveal of a mysterious hobo being some form of lower devil is fun, but it gets lost in its agenda along the way.

THE ISLAND MONSTER
(1954)
Dir - Roberto Bianchi Montero
Overall: WOOF

A rare, pre-Mario Bava Italian production to score Boris Karloff, The Island Monster, (Il mostro dell'isola), suffers from top to bottom, not least of all due to its misleading title.  Combining the words "monster" and "Karloff" together would logically indicate "horror", but this is not the case.  Instead, the film is a dull and moronically plotted crime caper where Karloff plays a drug kingpin mascaraing as a philanthropist who kidnaps the daughter of a drug task force agent because stupid.  Besides a quick introduction, Karloff is absent throughout the rest of the first act which leaves all the time in the world for a snore-inducing love triangle and some badly-dubbed military officers and criminals to talk to each other.  Even the Ischia island setting is poorly utilized since Augusto Tiezzi's cinematography is merely of the "point the camera at the actors until they're done saying stuff" variety.  Karloff does his respectable best and was still spry enough at this point in his career to perform some physical action, but there is hardly enough overall for him to do to elevate such uninspired tripe.  Hopefully he at least got a nice vacation out of the assignment.

 

UNCLE WAS A VAMPIRE

(1959)

Dir - Stefano Vanzina

Overall: WOOF

Christopher Lee makes his first of many appearances in an Italian production, playing a member of the undead for the second time following his breakthrough in Hammer's Horror of Dracula with Uncle Was a Vampire, (Tempi duri per i vampiri, Dracula is My Uncle, Hard Times for Vampires, Hard Times for Dracula, My Uncle, the Vampire).  Sending up his image already in a hare-brained slapstick comedy directed by Stefano "Steno" Vanzina who is mostly known in his home country for making such movies, Lee proves to have a keener sense of humor than anyone else involved in the proceedings here, which are exactly as stupid and not-funny as one would suspect.  As was common for Italian movies of the era, there are numerous people credited with screenwriting yet none of them were able to come up with any amusing gags.  Renato Rascel portrays your typical weaselly protagonist until he becomes a vampire, which ushers in much dopey mugging and monologuing to himself in a reverberated voice.  Lee fans will be doubly disappointed since he disappears for the entire second act and is dubbed in English by a guy with an Italian accent, making this one of the horror icon's least essential movies by a mile.

1980s Foreign Horror Part Twenty-Two

THE SCARECROW

(1982)

Dir - Sam Pillsbury

Overall: MEH

 

A Kiwi Southern Gothic melodrama as well as filmmaker Sam Pillsbury's full-length debut, The Scarecrow, (Klynham Summer), is meandering and boring for the most part, though it has a redeemable performance by John Carradine in a mysteriously sinister role.  Set in the 1950s in rural New Zealand, it is an adaptation of Ronald Hugh Morrieson's novel of the same name.  The story mostly revolves around coming-of-age teenager dynamics that meld sluggishly with off-screen murders, until the point where it becomes tiring to keep up with every side plot.  Unremarkable characters are introduced one after the other, then disappear for long periods, then get reintroduced with other unfamiliar faces joining them and even with regular narration from the young protagonist, it is too easy to get lost in the mild stakes of it all.  Carradine has some impressive if narratively ill-defined moments early on though as a stranger who may or may not have a sinister agenda as he rolls into town performing magic tricks.  Well acted and well photographed, there is simply nothing to hold onto story-wise and it ends up being a rightful obscurity.

ALCHEMIK

(1988)

Dir - Jacek Koprowicz

Overall: GOOD

For his third full-length, Polish filmmaker Jacek Koprowicz ventures into the middle ages with Alchemik; a dark fantasy movie that is mostly grounded within the superstitions time period except for some prominent moments where the gloves fly off into the otherworldly.  The alchemist of the title is a conman who is both desperate and ambitious in unlocking the forbidden knowledge of transmuting common elements into gold as he is threatened and pursued by malicious princes.  It is episodic in structure and just shy of two-hours in length, so it occasionally spins its wheels along the way.  Thankfully though, Koprowicz' script is punctuated with instances that are bizarre and brutal like a gore-ridden, supernatural birth scene, a heart-racing Satanic ceremony, and a surprise ending that brings in even more uncanny components.  The central theme is a fundamental Christian one where man's pursuit of off-limits wisdom, (especially wisdom that would alleviate one's suffering and garnish them a level of wealth and prestige), seals their damnation, but the mystical forces at play seem more mysterious and ancient than what is represented in mere Catholic dogma.

MURDER STORY

(1989)

Dir - Eddie Arno/Markus Innocenti

Overall: MEH

Music video director duo Eddie Arno and Markus Innocenti made their first full-length debut Murder Story in the Netherlands, with none other than Christopher Lee appearing as a crime fiction novelist who teams up with Alexis Denisof's young, aspiring writer to solve a string of suspicious, local deaths.  The first two acts when Lee is regularly present are more interesting, not just because the actor commands the screen even in a normal, unassuming role such as this, (i.e. not a villain or supernatural expert), but also because Arno and Innocenti's script is peppered with clever and comedic quips.  The silly, homosexual panic that Denisof's mother briefly undergoes may be dated and unnecessary, but nothing here is played for sleazy laughs or exploitation value.  In fact the film has a mild tone overall even with a quick detour to the red light district of Amsterdam, with Denisof and his love interest Stacy Burton making a cute, cookie-cutter couple and the violence being tame by late 1980s standards.  Though the plot loses its footing in the final act with details that are both convoluted and uninteresting, the rest of the proceedings are adequate enough to get by.

Rankin/Bass Productions Horror

JACK O'LANTERN

(1972)

Overall: GOOD

For their Halloween installment in the Festival of Family Classics anthology series that aired throughout a late 1972-early 1973 season, Rankin/Bass produced Jack O'Lantern which takes the Irish tradition of caving up vegetables and turns it into a kid-friendly tale of a helpful Leprechaun who rids a well-meaning farmer, his children, and their talking livestock of a pesky witch and her effeminate warlock husband.  Such a narrative route was likely taken in that instead adapting the Irish legend of Stingy Jack, (a drunkard who makes a deal with Satan and ends up roaming the earth as an animated pumpkin), would have been too macabre for the kid-targeted audience of such a program.  Even with the cackling villainess flying around on her broomstick while threatening children and commanding a legion of demons to do her bidding, this is still tame stuff that is not likely to deliver the chills for anyone watching.  What it lacks in ghoulish atmosphere or even half-baked chuckles though is forgivable for its charming voice cast and whimsical be it simple, fable-esque storytelling.

 

MAD MAD MAD MONSTERS

(1972)

Overall: GOOD

A lighthearted companion piece to 1967's Mad Monster Party?, Jules Bass and Arthur Rankin Jr.'s Mad Mad Mad Monsters is not as enduring as its predecessor, yet it delivers the ghoulish nyuck nyucks just fine.  Released in late September of 1972 as part of The ABC Saturday Superstar Movie series, sadly Rankin and Bass' excellently stylized stop-motion animation is replaced by the tradition variety which is akin the CBS's Groovie Goolies cartoon that aired for a single season the following year, perhaps purposely so.  Once again Baron von Frankenstein, (here changed to Henry instead of Boris as Mr. Karloff was replaced by Bob McFadden in the voice department), finds an excuse to gather the usual monster suspects together for a bash, this time as he marries off his hulking Creation to the Bride.  Impressionist extraordinaire Allen Swift returns to handle every male monster in the lot, including but not limited to Count Dracula, Claude the Invisible Man, Igor, and Ron Chaney the Werewolf, with Rhoda Mann stepping in taking the female roles, including Nagatha the Invisible Woman whose nagging banter with her husband is the highlight of the entire affair.  Most of the jokes are groan-worthy and/or fit for a three year old, but it is still hard for monster kids young and old not to fall for such campy charm.

 

THE LAST UNICORN

(1982)

Overall: MEH

One of the final theatrically released films from Rankin/Bass and yet another collaboration between them and the Japanese animation studio Topcraft, The Last Unicorn brings Peter S. Beagle's fantasy novel of the same name to well-crafted life.  Realism is purposely skewed in order to give each character and creature on screen a unique design which fits the mystical setting full of wizards, harpies, dragons, talking skeletons, blazing fire bulls, and of course forest-dwelling unicorns who in this particular story have been banished to the sea by Christopher Lee's distraught King Haggard.  Besides Lee whose voice is the most instantly recognizable, the cast is full of heavy hitters such as Mia Farrow in the title role, Alan Arkin as the second-rate magician with a heart of gold, Angela Lansbury as a wicked crone, Jeff Bridges as the heroic Prince, and Robert Klein as a singing butterfly.  Though Beagle penned the screenplay and remained faithful to his own source material, the story regularly meanders with most of the characters endlessly repeating themselves and speaking in either platitudes or riddles.  Also the soundtrack composed by Jimmy Webb and performed by America is lousy and because of this, the fact that several songs are stacked on top of each other in the running time becomes a problem, though Farrow, Bridges, and Klein prove to have adequate, unique enough singing voices for what the material calls for.

1970s Spanish Horror Part Fifteen

CUADECUC, VAMPI

(1970)

Dir - Pere Portabella

Overall: GOOD

 

The second full-length from experimental filmmaker Pere Portabella, Cuadecuc, vampir utilized the bizarre yet ingenious idea to take footage from the making of Jesús Franco's Count Dracula and turn it into an avant-garde, black and white silent film that is eons more atmospheric and engaging.  It hardly takes any effort to one-up a Franco movie, but even though the narrative follows the same linear time frame that is based off of Bram Stoker's novel, the approach here goes one further than simply telling a straight-ahead story or providing a behind the scenes exposé.  Composed of fly-on-the-wall material that captures the cast and crew goofing around on set mixed with shots done from alternate angles than what Franco used, the exceptional, ambient, and often industrial sound design would fit right at home with David Lynch's Eraserhead.  At other times the soundtrack cuts out entirely or utilizes a couple of seconds of conventional music, but it is always jarringly juxtaposed with sounds or silence that create an endlessly unsettling, tension-fueled tone.  Worth checking out for such mood-setting as well as its singular, genre-defying approach, it stands as one of the most surreal Dracula movies ever made.

 

BEYOND EROTICA

(1974)

Dir - José María Forqué

Overall: MEH

 

An unpleasant, lackadaisical thriller, Beyond Erotica, (No es nada, mamá, sólo un juego, It's Nothing Mama, Just a Game, Lola), plays the exploitation game in a more sincere manner than most, focusing on vile people doing vile things with no nods or winks towards the audience.  That is to say that it is a plantation drama that clearly demonstrates how the indigenous working class are tormented and exploited by wealthy foreigners, and it does this bluntly and humorlessly which is fitting for the ugly material.  David Hemmings plays the sexually depraved, sadistic, and spoiled son of a family whose financial power goes unchecked by the village that they inhabit, with his mother Alida Valli creating a nurturing atmosphere for his perversities.  Elements of incest, back-stabbing, and Stockholm syndrome play into things as well and everything ends on the most cynical of manners where the abused become the abusers and all parties on screen are unrepentantly villainous.  Hemmings is effectively odious, Vallis is pathetically disturbed, and Andrea Rau makes for an alluring victim who turns the tides in her favor.  Throw in some animal cruelty, rape, people hunting people, and Rau getting fed a sandwich full of worms and you have yourself a nasty affair.

BILBAO

(1978)

Dir - Bigas Luna

Overall: MEH

For his grisly debut Bilbao, Catalan filmmaker Bigas Luna showcases the coldly deranged mind of a pervert with OCD for over ninety minutes, basking in the kind of unflinching exploitation allowed in a post-Franco regimented Spain.  The director's penchant for mixing food with eroticism is grossly on display as Àngel Jové narrates his obsession with a prostitute while pouring milk over his much older wife's body and stuffing sausages in the mouths of fish.  As an examination of severe mental illness where detached depravity has completely consumed a miserable individual, the stark presentation goes a long way.  Nearly the only dialog is Jové's inner monologue which means that long bouts of silence and the same two or three pieces of music make for a punishingly repetitive slog of a watch, a watch which is as boring as it is ugly.  The cinematography is persistently poor and perhaps purposely so as there are entire sections shot in almost total darkness where it is impossible to decipher what is even happening when Jové's loathsome character is not cluing us in.  It all leads to an icky yet inevitable abduction climax and scene where Isabel Pisano's title character has her public hair shaved for what seems like seven hours.  It is fascinating in its intimacy and unapologetic grime at least to a point, but it also overstays its welcome and leaves the worst kind of sour taste in one's mouth, again no doubt deliberately.

1970s Foreign Horror Part Twenty-Two

THE LADY KILLS

(1971)

Dir - Jean-Louis van Belle

Overall: WOOF

For his follow-up to the vampire comedy Le sadique aux dents rouges, French writer/director Jean-Louis van Belle made the plodding, wretchedly monotonous The Lady Kills, (Perverse et docile); an early rape and revenge film with no style or purpose.  Carole Lebel sleepwalks through a movie that seems to be on tranquilizers in the first place, playing a woman who witnessed her sister's rape at a young age and then sets out in adulthood to murder all of the scumbag parties involved.  Episodic in nature, she travels across Europe, locates all of her victims easily, and then toys with them to fill out the running time until the perfect opportunity presents itself to do them in.  At no point are we ever given any insight into Lebel's character and nothing changes structurally the whole way through, which would not be a problem if it was not so dingily made.  The movie merely presents one unnecessarily elongated sequence after the other, with stock music replaying over and over again, only stopping for roughly five seconds or less at a time.  Excessive as far as nudity is concerned, its minimal-effort-attempts at being exploitative are pathetic at best and anyone unfortunate to come across it can merely watch the first fifteen minutes in fast forward to get the whole gist.

 

DRACULA AND SON

(1976)

Dir - Édouard Molinaro

Overall: MEH

 

Notable for containing Christopher Lee's tenth and final screen performance as the titular Count, Dracula and Son, (Dracula père et fils), exists in more than one version with different jokes thrown in depending.  Lee's voice is thankfully intact in both French and English cuts, though Bernard Ménez' dub was done by someone doing an effeminate Don Adams via Kermit the Frog impression that is persistently annoying, if still fitting to his weaselly character.  Such is the father/son dynamic between he and Lee, the latter as a noble, aristocratic, and stone-faced Count and the former as a pathetic dweeb who cannot even murder his own victims for nourishment.  The script by director Édouard Molinaro, Jean-Marie Poiré, and Alain Godard has only a small handful of clever bits at its disposal and it also uses some lazy plot devices like Ménez turning human for no decipherable reason as well as he and Lee caught in a love triangle between a woman who is the spitting image of the former's mother.  So, eeewww.  Some of the Hammer atmosphere is appreciated even if it fails to be sent-up as humorously as one would prefer and though it is refreshing to see Lee taking a lighthearted stab at his most famous on-screen persona, the movie is more awkwardly dull than funny.

 

BORN FOR HELL

(1976)

Dir - Denis Héroux

Overall: MEH

Inspired by the mass murder of eight nurses in Chicago by Richard Speck, Born for Hell, (Die Hinrichtung, The Execution, Naked Massacre), is a dour co-production between West Germany, France, Italy, and Canada that was shot on location in both Dublin and Belfast, Ireland.  While Mathieu Carrière's disturbed Vietnam vet is almost entirely historically inaccurate from Speck, some of the details of the killing spree are intact such as him holding up his victims merely with a knife and as the film's title would suggest, the "Born for Hell" tattoo on his arm directly alludes to the "Born to raise hell" ink that Speck sported.  Set during the Northern Ireland Conflict, the movie's bleak backdrop is fitting for such an ugly story where Carrière's character is left to roam around a grungy, bomb-torn Belfast in a downtrodden daze that leads him to a nursing school out of a combination of self-destruction and boredom.  Some of the sequences are jarring such as him forcing two naked women to perform fellatio on each other as well as the penultimate scene of him slicing his wrists open over a disgusting public toilet.  French-Canadian director Denis Héroux maintains a gritty, uncomfortable tone, but the soundtrack choices are often odd as if somebody is playing random classical music records at full blast during arbitrary moments.

1970s Foreign Horror Part Twenty

LOVE BRIDES OF THE BLOOD MUMMY

(1973)

Dir - Alejandro Martí

Overall: WOOF

 

One of the defining characteristics of Euro-trash which made such films exploitative in the first place was that rape played a predominant role in the narrative, as well as being unabashedly shown on screen.  The second and last directorial effort from Alejandro Martí, Love Brides of the Blood Mummy, (El secreto de la momia egipcia), particularly abuses this trope with a "plot" that insultingly and merely serves as an excuse for such unwholesome nonsense.  Save for two book-ending segments that allow for George Rigaud's wealthy Egyptologist the opportunity to regale fellow Egyptologist Frank Braña with his perverse yarn, it is no exaggeration to state that the only thing that happens here is one scene after the other where a stone-faced mummy, (that is also a vampire because movies are stupid), violently undresses, mildly tortures, rapes, and then bites women.  In fact they even throw a tasteless montage in at the end, just to slam home the point that the entire film is a pointless exercise in lazy sleaze.  A musical score is oddly absent throughout, which can often be an effectively eerie, mood setting device to create a sense of tension, but here it just further enhances the lethargic pacing.  The finale is just as disappointing as everything else and save for its brazen commitment to be so noxious as to inadvertently be fascinatingly bizarre, it still ends up a loathsome, hugely boring watch.

PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK

(1975)

Dir - Peter Weir

Overall: GOOD

 

A conventional horror film Peter Weir's Picnic at Hanging Rock certainly is not, yet its aggressive stance against upholding any of the genre's cliches in place of enigmatic, anti-storytelling is likely to perplex viewers who are not accustomed to nearly two solid hours of meandering, period-set musings on largely impenetrable themes.  An adaptation of the 1967 novel by Joan Lindsay that was filmed on location in Victoria, Australia, it has many moments that are uniquely chilling merely by suggestion and the Pink Floyd-via-flute musical score creates a haunting atmosphere that is atypical along with the bright, sunny scenery.  A mystery with no resolution, the story is imprecise about what it is actually exploring since it deliberately skews conventional narrative, hinting at supernatural forces that could represent a threat against European colonialism and/or adolescent sexuality and intrigue.  The audience is left grasping for straws with such assumptions though, which is either a pivotal part of the movie's spell or a hindrance on the experience.  In any event, this remains a lauded work in the Australian New Wave and largely set off the rest of Weir's successful career.

 

THE KEEPER

(1976)

Dir - T.Y. Drake

Overall: WOOF

 

This highly confused and unengaging comedy/thriller hybrid inexplicably scored Christopher Lee in the title role, yet it is otherwise a complete mess of a movie.  The Keeper is the only directorial effort from screenwriter T.Y. Drake, who stepped in behind the lens at the last minute and handles his own lackluster material with the expected clumsiness of such a newcomer.  The film is unavoidably boring and the only moments of liveliness occur when Lee's apparently mischievous doctor sits on the other side of a glass wall and hypnotizes his patients into regressing to childhood, all for reasons that are never convincingly explained.  Besides Drake's unfocused story itself which is incomprehensible to a point, the biggest problem is the tonal inconsistencies and lazy performances.  Every attempt at humor is so awkwardly placed and dry that they seem more accidentally odd than anything, so therefor none of the intended comedic beats land in anyway.  Besides Lee, (who still manages to save face even if his presence in something so lackluster and amateurish is perpetually confusing), all of the other actors seem to be merely collecting a paycheck with the thespian abilities of a local theater group at best.

1960s Italian Horror Part Eleven

THE PLAYGIRLS AND THE VAMPIRE

(1960)
Dir - Piero Regnoli
Overall: MEH

Unoffensively riddled with cliches and ergo passable, The Playgirls and the Vampire, (L'ultima preda del vampiro, The Vampire's Last Prey, Curse of the Vampire), delivers some mild titillation and undead silliness. Piero Regnoli had a prolific career as a screenwriter and he generally bounced around from genre to genre when he got a chance to get behind the lens, this standing as his only directorial work in horror.  The cinematography by Aldo Greci makes an effort to sell the Gothic atmosphere, with some clever camera angles thankfully keeping the whole affair from being just another stagnantly framed melodrama.  It is still a heavily talky movie that utilizes lazy tropes like all of the women being berated, one of them getting smacked around by a dashing man who she just met and then immediately professes her unwavering trust for, vague warnings from characters who refuse to divulge useful information, convenient plot maneuvers, and the ole "the roads are bad so we all have to hold up in a creepy castle" setup.  Being a sexploitation film in some respects, nudity is alluded to while women show off their bodies and bust into hilariously arbitrary strip teases, but there is not enough of these sleazy moments or vampiric ones to keep it from just becoming more forgettable Euro-fluff.

 

CASTLE OF THE LIVING DEAD

(1964)

Dir - Warren Kiefer

Overall: MEH

 

The first of only four films made by American writer/director Warren Kiefer, (all of which were Italian productions), and the only one to be in the horror genre, Castle of the Living Dead, (Il Castello dei Morti Vivi, Le Chateau des Morts Vivants, Crypt of Horror), is enormously lackluster stuff despite the presence of Christopher Lee as a deranged Count and Donald Sutherland playing three different roles.  Conceived of as a cheap way to break into the movie business by Kiefer and producer Paul Maslansky while both were working abroad, the film is also notable as one of Michael Reeves' earliest credits, him serving as second unit director.  Unfortunately, some of the personnel involved cannot elevate it above being another sluggish, low-budget cliche-fest where a madman performs macabre experiments, people experience disturbing events while staying at his castle, and a brute, a dwarf, and a cackling witch, (the latter played by Sutherland), all serve no other purpose than to just be stock horror movie fodder.  Sutherland seems to be enjoying himself under the unrecognizable crone garb and Lee does his admirable best with the lousy material, plus as opposed to some of his other European genre works, his highly recognizable voice is actually intact for the English dub.  Besides all of that though, this is advisable to avoid.

 

KONG ISLAND

(1968)

Dir - Roberto Mauri

Overall: WOOF

An unwatchably boring, D-rent jungle export from filmmaker Roberto Mauri, Kong Island, (Eva, la Venere selvaggia, Eva, the Savage Venus, King of Kong Island), has a fraudulent title that may have tricked one or two unfortunate movie patrons into thinking that it was an Italian King Kong knock-off of some sort.  While there are guerrillas present, (or men in guerilla suits to be precise), they are standard-sized and controlled in a small handful of scenes by a mad scientist, all for cartoon bad guy reasons that are not worth getting into.  In fact none of the movie is worth getting into as it is insultingly lifeless from top to bottom.  Though jungle women films with alluring, Amazonian vixens and superstitious, local guides had long been a thing by the late 1960s, this was made before the cannibal boom really took off, so the exploitative elements are merely reduced to some brief shots of naked, female body parts here or there.  The movie is so exasperatingly dull that it only partially bothers with being too talk heavy, though there is still plenty of repetitive dialog mind you.  Most of the running time is just people walking around high temperature foliage to awful, stock music, only occasionally breaking things up with a shirtless guy eating a banana and a topless lady smiling at him while electronically controlled apes grab and murder a person or two.

1960s British Horror Part Fourteen

HOUSE OF MYSTERY

(1961)

Dir - Vernon Sewell

Overall: MEH

 

British writer/director Venon Sewell filmed Pierre Mills and Celia de Vilyars' French play L'Angoisse four times throughout his career, House of Mystery, (Das Landhaus des Dr. Lemmin), being the final such adaptation and one that was later presented on the American anthology series Kraft Mystery Theater.  Told as a flashback within a flashback that bounces between three different timelines, the structure is clunky, though there are some interesting ideas at play.  A combination of murder mystery, infidelity drama, and ghost story with some scientific experiments thrown in as well, the under an hour running time does not lend itself to expanding on anything going on.  While this gives it a rushed feel coupled with the shifting chronology, it is also incredibly talky and difficult to pay attention to due to a severe lack of action.  That said, the finale almost makes up for the lumbering bulk of the movie as it introduces a clever comeuppance scheme and an effective, spooky twist to go out on.  Said twist might be predictable and the sly, pseudoscience maneuver at the end by Peter Dyneley may seem silly, but they still provide refreshing components to an otherwise stock production. 

 

THE SKULL

(1965)

Dir - Freddie Francis

Overall: GOOD

 

Amicus Productions' second horror film and also the second to be directed by Freddie Francis, The Skull also serves as the company's first collaboration with screenwriter Robert Bloch.  The Psycho author's short story "The Skull of the Marquis de Sade" was reworked by Amicus co-founder and producer Milton Subotsky as well as Francis himself; such script noodling being a frequent practice at the time.  Low on dialog, (at least during the final act), loud on music, and drenched in creepy atmosphere, the simple narrative is given an effective treatment where several unfortunate blokes including Peter Cushing are all supernaturally terrorized by Marquis de Sade's skull.  Though a highly sensationalized explanation is given as do who de Sade was, wisely the fantastical elements are never fleshed-out which gives way to several bizarre, tense set pieces that have no logical footing.  The best and longest of these is the roughly twenty-five minute finale where Francis and cinematographer John Wilcox really lean into the otherworldly mood, basking in Cushing's futile attempt to out-will the evil forces at play.  Christopher Lee, Patrick Magee, Nigel Green, Patrick Wymark, and Michael Gough round out the familiar British horror players, making this one of the better non-Hammer films with Cushing and Lee sharing a few scenes together.

THE FROZEN DEAD

(1966)

Dir - Herbert J. Leder

Overall: MEH

 

The first of two Hammer-style horror movies from writer/director/producer Herbert J. Leder, The Frozen Dead is notable as one of the early ones to combine Nazis with zombies, be it in an off-hand, sugar-coating manner.  It is viscerally uncomfortable to center the entire story on exiled Nazis in hiding who have spent the last two decades since the war ended clandestinely conducing experiments on frozen soldiers in order to eventually resurrect their political party for world domination.  Sans a few non-specific Holocaust references, all real life Nazi atrocities are noticeably omitted and things instead proceed in a bog-standard, campy, mad scientist route.  A severed, telekinetic-powered head being kept alive with wires, severed arms being kept alive with wires, soldiers that are either virtually mindless or frozen, one woman looking like a normal person when she puts on a mask to cover her scars, and various other silliness give it plenty of a tongue-in-cheek, B-movie charm.  That said, Leder's script is too wordy and padded, so the end result cannot overcome its stagnant pacing issues.  At least Dana Andrews doing a German accent is amusing though.

Hammer Dracula Sequels Part Two

SCARS OF DRACULA

(1970)

Dir - Roy Ward Baker

Overall: MEH

 

For their second Dracula sequel in one year and the sixth installment in the series overall, Hammer Films barely seems to be trying with Scars of Dracula.  Back in Transylvania yet opening with what looks to be the closing moments of the previous Taste the Blood of Dracula, a random bat spits blood on the vampire's ashes, then an angry mob burns his castle, he has another servant named Klove, (even though he also had one in Dracula: Prince of Darkness played by another actor), and we spend most of our time with some more relatively boring, younger characters than we do Dracula himself.  It is as if Hammer was in such a rush to squeeze another movie out of the series that they just grabbed a hodgepodge of cliches that were already overstaying their welcome and then haphazardly threw them together with no mind for continuity.  Some of this makes sense as it was partially constructed as a reboot in case Christopher Lee finally had enough of being emotionally blackmailed into keeping the crew working with his involvement.  There is some nasty bloodshed, Lee gets more dialog than usual, and Patrick Troughton is in it at least though.

DRACULA A.D. 1972

(1972)

Dir - Alan Gibson

Overall: MEH

Two years after retreading the same ground for the sixth time with Scars of Dracula, Hammer made the somewhat bold move to contemporize their titular vampire with Dracula A.D. 1972.  Warner Bros. commissioned Hammer to make two more films in the series that were set in the modern day after American International Pictures' Count Yorga, Vampire and its sequel had recently done solid enough business.  Though the change in locale gives this installment a shot in the arm from the same "rural, 19th century, superstitious, European town" setting, the script by Don Houghton is far from ingenious.  A spoiled, young bohemian resurrects Dracula for kicks and Van Helsing's decedent just happens to be part of his crew.  The return of Peter Cushing is another notable selling point and though he is not technically THEE Van Helsing but his grandson, he may as well be since he is an occult expert and ends up destroying the vampire by the usual means.  The hip, wah-wah guitar music by Manfred Man's Mike Vickers is positively awful and dates the film far more than the earlier, period-set Gothic ones.  Though it is nice to see Cushing and Lee back at each other's throats and we get a silly Satanic ceremony where Caroline Munroe gets bright red blood dumped all over her, the movie is regrettably still not that interesting.

THE SATANIC RITES OF DRACULA

(1973)

Dir - Alan Gibson

Overall: MEH

 

Hammer kept their titular vampire in the contemporary age once more for The Satanic Rites of Dracula, a direct sequel to the previous Dracula A.D. 1972 which once again reunites Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing as Van Helsing's occult expert descendant.  The writer director team of Don Houghton and Alan Gibson returns as well and the former's script is noticeably more ambitious than any other in the series.  Dracula's resurrection is given no expiation whatsoever as he clandestinely runs a secret society that is planning to unleash a skin melting plague on the populous.  Also, the movie is somehow a spy thriller with Satanism, plus Lee does a Béla Lugosi accent in one, (perhaps unintentionally), amusing scene.  Assuredly a mess, the first act is unfortunately a bore and as usual, Lee's absence throughout most of it is rather detrimental.  Things pick up a bit when he and Cushing finally get some screen time together, but the ending could be the dumbest out of any of the installments as Dracula gets stuck in a thorn bush, trips, and then lays there for several moments while Van Helsing breaks off a piece of a fence to stake him with.  A scrapping the barrel offering to be sure, it is rather a saving grace that Lee finally got his wish to never revisit the character again in a Hammer production after this.

THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES

(1974)

Dir - Roy Ward Baker/Chang Cheh

Overall: GOOD

Though it has its fare share of problems, the one and only joint production between Hammer and the Shaw Brothers in The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires, (The 7 Brothers Meet Dracula), gets a decent amount of mileage out of its clashing of genres.  Filmed in Hong Kong with Peter Cushing staying on board and a small handful of English actors, it fits in seamlessly with Hammer's usual crop of horror sequels while simultaneously and unmistakably being a martial arts movie.  The visual realization of the undead fiends of the title as well as the set design of their lair is ghoulishly executed.  Some further advancements to the vampire mythos, (such as the fact that in the East, the image of the Buddha serves the same purpose to ward them off as does the crucifix out west), are also a nice addiction.  As far as the kung-fu goes, it is both a hindrance and an amusingly fun tweak to the formula.  Most of the earlier fight scenes spring up out of nowhere and stall the pacing quite a bit, yet everything becomes a lot more wickedly engaging when the putty-faced, zombie-esque vampires and their minions finally throw down with ninja flips and swords in the third act.  Dracula is pathetically wasted and shoehorned in there with Christopher Lee finally through with such nonsense and a very unmemorable John Forbes-Robinson stepping in and doing his best Lee impression with what he has to work with.  An interesting experiment to be sure, but quite a silly one as well.

Hammer Dracula Sequels Part One

THE BRIDES OF DRACULA

(1960)

Dir - Terence Fisher

Overall: MEH

 

While director Terence Fisher, screenwriter Jimmy Sangster, and Peter Cushing as Doctor Van Helson all return, Christopher Lee briefly stepped away from the title role for the Horror of Dracula follow up The Brides of Dracula.  Said title is misleading as not only is the seminal, undead count nowhere to be found, but only two women fall victim to new vampire David Peel's diabolical charm and neither of them garnish hardly enough screen time to warrant a "bride" moniker.  In any event, there are some memorable, striking, bloody-eyed and fanged images here, plus Cushing brutally cauterizes a vampire bite with a scalding iron and holy water.  Unfortunately, the story leaves room for a lot of pacing lulls, particularly in the middle act which slows to a standstill with lackluster townsfolk and a random cameo from comic relief character actor Miles Malleson.  Also, this probably has the lamest vampire death in any Hammer film, though it does come after an efficiently heart-racing final showdown.  It is certainly a disappointing sequel and noticeably suffers from Lee's absence, but at least he would come back for the next six installments even if the quality, (or lack-thereof), of each was largely out of his hands.

DRACULA: PRINCE OF DARKNESS

(1966)

Dir - Terence Fisher

Overall: GOOD

 

The last Hammer Dracula film to have Terence Fisher behind the lens and the first to bring back Christopher Lee as the titular vampire, Dracula: Prince of Darkness fails to mention the previous, Christopher Lee-less The Brides of Dracula, instead serving as a proper follow-up to Horror of Dracula from eight years prior.  Opening with archive footage from the previous movie in case anyone in the audience forgot what they were seeing a sequel to, this entry helped further set the template for several that would follow.  Meaning that Dracula does not show up until at least halfway through the movie, comes back to "life" rather effortlessly, barely if at all speaks, and superstitious villagers act superstitiously.  This early in the franchise, simply having Lee back even as a blood-crazed mute is probably enough to hold over most Gothic horror buffs, but this one also benefits from a forceful performance from Hammer regular Andrew Keir as Dracula's holy man foible, who makes up for Peter Cushing's absence.  Lee's demise is both unique and pathetic, (Dracula can't swim, really?), but at least it continues the deviation from the usual stake through the heart undoing.  Though Barbara Shelley fills that particular demise quota here.

DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE

(1968)

Dir - Freddie Francis

Overall: GOOD

 

Freddie Francis had the distinction of taking over for Terence Fisher in the director's chair for both their Frankenstein and Dracula series.  The forth installment Dracula Has Risen from the Grave is a direct sequel to the previous film and a more accurate title would have been "Dracula Has Risen from Being Delicately Frozen in Ice".  Christopher Lee thankfully gets some dialog again, though his screen time is still unfortunately limited.  He excels all the same though with blood-shot eyes and a vehemently cruel demeanor that is every bit as nasty as his many other portrayals of the undead count.  Scream queen Veronica Carlson makes her first appearance in a Hammer production, filling the role of "beautiful, innocent girl who unwillingly becomes engulfed by Dracula's spell".  The vampire mythos are given a mild update as now one must pray when staking Dracula through the heart, otherwise he will just be really uncomfortable thrashing around for a few minutes before pulling the device out.  This fits in cleverly enough with the story as our dashing, atheist hero, (Barry Andrews), has an altercation with his love interest's Monsignor Uncle, (Rupert Davis), and another priest becomes the vampire's feeble henchmen.  The faith-challenging angle is not really explored much, but it gives the familiar story an interesting enough backbone at least to layer some more atmospheric, ghastly fun on top of.

TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA

(1970)

Dir - Peter Sasdy

Overall: MEH

The fifth Dracula installment for Hammer Studios Taste the Blood of Dracula is a bit of a frustrating effort.  Screenwriter Anthony Hinds returns with Peter Sandsy making his Hammer debut behind the lens and this far into the series, they were still able to tweak enough things for it not to be a complete rehash.  Opening with the ending of Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, it introduces the concept of Satanism for the first time in the series with a young, disgraced, heathen Lord, (Hammer mainstay Ralph Bates), trying to summon his "master" Dracula by way of an oddball ritual where he and a bunch of bored, wealthy hypocrites are supposed to drink the vampire's blood.  Both the way that the titular Count regains his Christopher Lee form and the way in which he mees his demise are either ingeniously bizarre or just plain lazy depending on how gracious the viewer is.  Dracula's revenge scheme is fun though, with some gruesome deaths and bosomy maiden hypnotism.  Speaking of bosoms, this was the first entry in the series to feature nudity which appears near the beginning of the film in a brothel run by a flamingly effeminate man-madame.  If it was not for the weak ending and maybe one too many sloppy plot points, this could be a more positive stand-out as opposed to just an unrealized one.