1970s Spanish Horror Part Seven - (León Klimovsky Edition)

THE VAMPIRES NIGHT ORGY

(1973)

Overall: MEH

One of the strangest blood-sucking fiend demises in cinema history aside, (in the form of their sexy Countess leader falling asleep after being hit with a cross in the backseat of a car and then turning into a pile of maggots once the sun rises), The Vampires Night Orgy, (La orgía nocturna de los vampiros, Grave Desires), is an incredibly dull and formulaic outing.  A bunch of tourist's buss breaks down in a weird village that apparently does not exist, they are forced to stay there and get picked off by the undead locals, two good looking strangers immediately fall in love, more car trouble happens, fill in the blanks, etc.  Several Spanish and overall Euro-horror players are present, most notably Jack Taylor, Dyanik Zurakowska, and Helga Liné, but the violence and nudity are sparse for anyone expecting such things.  Director León Klimovsky does manage to pull off a few effectively creepy set pieces, at least when someone remembers to shut off the horrendously inappropriate music that plays at random intervals throughout, which of course is another silly hallmark of such movies that is unfortunately abused here.  The pacing is sluggish too, so outside of its highly predictable framework and low-end production values that will be of interest to those clamoring for such tropes, this does not have much else to offer.

THE DRACULA SAGA

(1973)

Overall: MEH

 

A somewhat inventive though ultimately lackluster vampire yarn, The Dracula Saga, (La saga de los Drácula, Death, Death, Death), offers up a unique narrative to an age old, Gothic framework.  Stylistically, director León Klimovsky leans heavily into the type of Hammer horror aesthetic that countless Euro-genre films adhered to.  It is set in a remote village with a spacious, creepy castle full of noticeably pale-faced undead who drink unnaturally bright red blood and dress in exquisite burial clothes, plus it even throws in the deformed, mute character for pure shock value.  Said monstrosity is the result of the Dracula family's many decades of inbreeding, (gross), and certainly does provide some gasps due to its hilariously garish appearance as a child-sized, alien-craniumed, pink-fleshed cyclops.  The always alluring Helga Liné once again returns in her usual role as a gorgeously evil fiend and the Spanish Vincent Price Narciso Ibáñez Menta plays none other than Count Dracula himself in a less vile and ergo sympathetic manner as his sole interest seems to be in simply continuing the family bloodline.  Despite some quirky attributes and a plot line that does more than simply rehash countless other such films, the story gives way to a monotonous structure that is too easy to tune-out of along the way.  Far from the worst, (or only), 70s European horror movie to bare the Dracula title, it is at least worth a look at least amongst the horde.

I HATE MY BODY

(1974)

Overall: MEH

There is much going on in León Klimovsky's topsy-turvy I Hate My Body, (Odio mi cuerpo), an interesting exploitation movie where as the tagline properly promises "The brain of a man... the body of a woman... the sexual horror story of our time!".  The theme is relentlessly on the nose of male chauvinism reigning supreme in a society where all women in all walks of life or employment are at the mercy of the sex-crazed, macho scumbags holding positions of power.  As the male-turned-gorgeous-female lead, Alexandra Bastedo is effective as she seems repulsed and furious at her current predicament after Narciso Ibáñez Menta's bold scientist performs an impossible operation that renders her not only incapable of landing the job she is qualified for, but also incapable of going through a single day or a single male encounter without fighting off their repugnant advances.  The film says a lot about women's place in such a sexist driven society and uses its silly, science-fiction concept for taboo purposes as several scenes inter-cut Bastedo with Manuel de Blas as the character that she/he actually is, thus making particular rape and seduction scenes that much more uncomfortable.  More of an interesting movie than a good one, Euro-trash fans will probably find it worthwhile.

 

NIGHT OF THE WALKING DEAD

(1975)

Overall: MEH

A combination of cliches and strangeness, Night of the Walking Dead, (El extraño amor de los vampiros, Strange Love of the Vampires), suffers many of the pratfalls of 70s Euro-trash for better or worse.  As always, director León Klimovsky seems to use incidental music as an afterthought at best and there are several moments where the stock soundtrack is laughably at odds with what is happening on screen, especially when it appears to be taken right out of a whimsical Disney movie.  Elsewhere, the story itself, (which has multiple screenwriters contributing to it), is period set, has a cursed village, a forbidden castle full of vampires, a beautiful young woman who falls inexplicably in love with said castle's white-haired Dracula stand-in, and plenty of moronic dialog that may as well be cut and pasted from gallons of other undead films that were already released at the time.  The dubbing is extremely atrocious, but it is also in keeping with the spirit of such midnight movie exports.  It is all far too derivative to be of much merit, but Klimovsky still manages to pack the proceedings with some creepy visuals and even a gala ball where the blood suckers kidnap townsfolk, dance around New Years Eve style, and hang a guy up by his feet to bleed him out like a pig for their amusement/nourishment.

TRAUMA

(1978)

Overall: MEH

Near the final directorial work in León Klimovsky's filmography and the last one to fall into the horror-by-giallo field, Trauma, (Violación fatal, Sarsinti), has a single, isolated setting, minute cast of characters, and a simple slasher agenda that manages to occasionally entice along its predictable route.  Actor/producer/behind the scenes man Heinrich Starhemberg flees from his gorgeous wife played by Sandra Alberti due to undisclosed circumstances, only to end up at a vacant boardinghouse run by the even more gorgeous Ágata Lys who speaks with her handicapped husband that is never shown to answer her.  This is the type of minimalist thriller where the details play a predominant role.  Though it is made all too abundantly clear who the murder is from the get-go, Starhemberg's possible unwholesome intentions are still teased along with his closeted homosexuality to obscure the true nature of his character, helped effectively by the actor's aloof performance.  In typical slasher movie fashion, the kill scenes are mostly routine and boring in the sense that each of the murder's victims are impossible not to point out from the moment that they arrive on screen.  Still, Klimovsky manages to slightly toy with a few of the viewer's expectations along the way and leaves the film with a preordained yet satisfyingly ambiguous ending.  Certainly not the most clever of giallos out there, but it is also far from the most hare-brained.

1970s Paul Naschy Part Eight

THE CRIMES OF PETIOT

(1972)

Dir - José Luis Madrid

Overall: MEH

The second giallo collaboration between Paul Naschy and co-writer/director José Luis Madrid, The Crimes of Petiot, (Los crímenes de Petiot), is n unrelated follow-up to the duo's Seven Murders for Scotland Yard which was released the previous year.  Essential narrative components are all there, like a black-gloved killer picking off victims while the police try and narrow down suspects, all pointing in various red herring directions along the way before the big reveal of who the murderer is utilizes a traumatic past for his excuse.  This particular story is very loosely/not really at all based on Dr. Marcel Petiot, a French serial killer who was discovered a few years after World War II, though the version here paints a more sympathetic picture driven by unwilling vengeance.  Unfortunately, such psycho analyzing sounds far more interesting than the actual movie which is plagued by a monotonous structure that consists almost entirely of characters sitting in rooms saying variations of "Well maybe YOU'RE the killer" only to be followed by, "Well there can be no doubt, THIS guy is the killer".  Also, virtually one piece of music plays on the soundtrack over and over and over again and it proves obnoxious even before the opening credits are finished.

 

KILMA, QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE

(1974)

Dir - Miguel Iglesias

Overall: MEH

A dopey and bog-standard amazon woman jungle adventure, Kilma, Queen of the Jungle, (La diosa salvaje, The Jungle Goddess), has all of the preposterous elements that you would expect from such silliness.  After a helicopter full of diamonds crashes in the jungle, a young child, (who is the lone survivor), grows up to be a smoking hot, body-hair-shaved, makeup wearing, raven-haired babe with a leopard print bikini on who plays with monkeys and wields a leather whip at any humans that come her way.  Her mother then has dreams about her daughter still being alive as a female Tarzan, her complaining husband with dubious, alternate intentions stages an expedition to find her, the mother is never seen again, a dashing hero guy falls in love with Kilma, other greedy assholes show up, primitive natives are there to keep the cultural insensitivity in check, etc.  It is more harmlessly silly than actually fun, with regular monotonous intervals that slog the pace along which are only occasionally broken up by the dated goofiness of the presentation.  For his part as the aforementioned shady husband, Paul Naschy gets plenty of screen time and makes his inevitable villain reveal convincing enough even under the typically atrocious English dubbing.  Otherwise though, this is definitely to be missed.

THE PEOPLE WHO OWN THE DARK

(1976)

Dir - León Klimovsky

Overall: GOOD

 

A post-apocalyptic movie from director León Klimovsky, The People Who Own the Dark, (Último deseo), has a number of familiar faces present to liven up what is essentially a dour production.  Nadiuska, Alberto de Mendoza, Julia Saly, Antonio Mayans, and of course Paul Naschy had all made their names to some degree at least in other genre movies from the era, yet this particular film is of a different breed from straight, low-budget Euro-sleaze and unabashed Gothic horror.  A handful of wealthy, borderline unlikable people throw a tasteless party at a remote mansion where prostitutes are invited to perform in strange, occult ceremonies for a gag, all of which sets things up to be some soft of sadistic captive story.  This is ultimately not the case though as an extreme shift happens in the plot which turns it into a survivor-style hold up where said crop of characters fend off against a town full of newly blinded commoners once a nuclear war breaks out.  As one could guess, the millionaire's back-stabbing, "every man for themselves" nature quickly dominates while others simply lose their marbles in the chaos of it all.  It all culminates in a tense, cynical finale that nevertheless serves as a highlight, leaving things off on a bleak series of images that is more memorable than what is usually allowed. 

1970s Paul Naschy Part Seven

THE FURY OF THE WOLFMAN

(1970)

Dir - Jose Maria Zabalza

Overall: WOOF

 

Easily the worst in Paul Naschy's Waldemar Daninsky series until Fred Olen Ray took an embarrassing crack at it over thirty years later, The Fury of the Wolfman, (La Furia del Hombre Lobo, Wolfman Never Sleeps), is a botched effort solely due to its trainwreck production.  The initial director was to be Enrique Lopez Eguiluz, a friend of Naschy's who was then replaced by José María Zabalza, a veteran in Spanish cinema that was allegedly drunk and volatile during the shooting.  Coming in too short for proper theatrical release, additional, "out for a stroll" werewolf scenes were shot with a stand-in, footage was then recycled from two earlier Naschy Daninsky films, and further distribution problems resulted in numerous cuts of the movie which did not get circulated until several years after everything wrapped.  As one could surmise, the result is virtually incomprehensible with plot points that are both rushed and boringly drawn out, random stock music thrown in anywhere, and abrupt editing that gives it a lazily slapdash feel throughout.  Certain moments are unintentionally hysterical like an early, sloppy dream sequence where a Hindi man says "Pentagram" over and over again and a later scene where Naschy in full lycanthropian garb casually gets into a screaming woman's bed for a few seconds, only to then get up and leave with her laying there unattacked and still screaming.

DEATH OF A HOODLUM

(1975)

Dir - León Klimovsky

Overall: MEH

 

The last collaboration between director León Klimovsky and Paul Naschy was the crime drama Death of a Hoodlum, (Muerte de un quinqui), one of a handful of lesser known works during the actor's 1970s heyday to never receive an English dub or US release.  Not that fans on the other side of the Atlantic were particularly missing out as this is hardly a memorable effort for all parties involved.  Naschy penned the screenplay as he was wont to do, this time writing that he successfully seduces a mother and daughter under the same roof.  At least this time the women on screen do not find him irresistible from the moment they lay eyes on him, but it still provides the movie with one of Naschy's most steadfast and silly tropes.  Elsewhere, this is dull stuff that is similar in some respects to the 1973 giallo Blue Eyes of the Broken Doll which also found Naschy's unwholesome character looking for work, holding up in an isolated house, and banging more than one woman in a family.  Klimovsky's direction is entirely flat though, with no stylistic choices whatsoever besides the same piece of horrible music showing up several dozen times to give it the wrong, romantic tone at random intervals.  Naschy's character has some disturbing trauma involving his parents which cause him to occasionally lose his cool, call women sluts and bitches, and resort to violence, but besides that, it is a snore.

THE FRENCHMAN'S GARDEN

(1978)

Dir - Paul Naschy

Overall: GOOD

During the late 70s, Paul Naschy was stepping away from his nostalgic, Gothic horror reworkings to prioritize more boundary pushing and challenging works, turning "The Frenchman's Garden Murders" of 1904 into an incredibly stark, understated film whose tone was miles away from the Spanish Wolfman's norm.  Though he appears in the lead, Naschy omitted his name from all promotional materials as to not mislead audiences into thinking that this was akin to the movies that he was known for, though the result is one of the most personally sincere in his filmography.  The Frenchman's Garden, (El huerto del Francés), primarily focuses on the sin of pride and how if left unchecked, can lead to a series of misfortunes at the expense of others.  As the brothel owner Juan Andrés Aldije 'El Francés', the character's selfish need to sleep with as many women as he wishes, murder as many wealthy passers-by as he wishes, and all with the explicit excuse to prove himself worthy of his wife's disapproving parents, sets him up as a severely flawed man.  Naschy's performance is wonderfully nuanced though.  He rarely comes across as the on-paper brute that he is, routinely seeming concerned and compassionate towards those around him, even if it is ultimately a cold affront to the deep seeded darkness within, (a darkness that is literally shown in a few sequences through some lighting maneuvers).  The entire film which deals explicitly with abortion, murder, adultery, and even homosexuality is played virtually exploitation-less, showcasing a bold move for Spanish cinema in general of the era which was only a few years removed from the Francoist Period.

1970s Paul Naschy Part Six

LA NOCHE DE WALPURGIS

(1971)

Dir - León Klimovsky

Overall: GOOD

 

The fourth in the Waldemar Daninsky series of wolfman films to be released, La Noche de Walpurgis, (Die Nacht der Vampire, The Werewolf vs. the Vampire Woman, Shadow of the Werewolf, Werewolf's Shadow, Le messe nere della contessa Dracula, La Furie des Vampires, Le Nuit des Loup Garous, Blood Moon), is quite the memorable one, going as far as to be remade a decade later as El Retorno del Hombre Lobo.  After the previous Fury of the Wolfman which was a heavily botched production, Paul Nashcy concocted another pair-up that was akin to 1969's Los Monstruos del Terror.  The story here is much more streamlined than the aforementioned, ridiculous monster mash where Waldemar lazily survives what appear to be the events of the previous year's Fury, only to have a completely different cover as an author living in an isolated castle with his deranged sister.  Also, a vampire lady gets resurrected after some blood is accidentally spilled on her corpse.  As the first of eight films that Naschy would make with director León Klimovsky, several of the familiar motifs are adhered to with women falling effortlessly in love with Nashy's character, him only finding peace if murdered by said love interest, spooky, slow motion sequences and music, plua cheap yet effective gore and makeup effects.

THE KILLER IS ONE OF 13

(1973)

Dir - Javier Aguirre

Overall: WOOF

 

An exasperatingly dull Agatha Christie-styled giallo, The Killer Is One of 13, (El asesino está entre los trece), cannot gather nearly enough gusto out of its ensemble cast and murder mystery plot.  As one could guess, thirteen people, (plus some handymen and women which includes Paul Naschy in about seventeen seconds of screen time), hold up at a single location in a remote, spacious house where their host accuses one of them as the murder of her husband some years back.  While this is set up early enough in a long, increasingly boring dinner sequence, the rest of the movie regrettably continues on in such a trajectory.  With only the most minimal of exceptions including some very mild, nudity-less sex scenes and a few blink and you'll miss them murder sequences, (the first of which does not occur until over an hour in), the entire movie is made up of characters sitting or standing in rooms and talking with each other.  Sometimes they argue, sometimes they crack jokes, and usually they repeat the same mind-numbingly mundane information about not trusting so and so, being mad at another so and so, wanting to leave, etc.  It is impressive in one capacity that such a lackluster story was green-lit in the first place, but sitting through it is a chore that only the most dedicated gluttons of snore-inducing Euro trash can endure.

THE TRAVELER

(1979)

Dir - Paul Naschy

Overall: GOOD

For his forth time in the directorial seat, supplying the screenplay along with Eduarda Targioni, and appearing as the title character, Paul Naschy's The Traveler, (El caminante, The Devil Incarnate), is one of his more amusingly diabolical ventures.  The blasphemous premise of the Devil getting bored and deciding to live as a man ala Jesus for awhile gives way to both an endless and monotonous stream of wickedness where Naschy murders, steals, betrays, and impregnates anyone who will put a little more gold in his pockets or provide him with leisurely accommodations.   It has an odd, humorous tone for a Naschy movie though.  The sinful mischief includes piss drinking, fart jokes, and man rape, all of which is presented with gleeful, tongue-in-cheek, and hedonistic relish.  Not that one can take this seriously as a "message" movie, but the cynical theme of mankind being inherently selfish and evil is on the nose, while also not being heavy-handed.  Instead, it is presented in a fun and mockingly whimsical manner that makes the whole thing's boundary-pushing exploitativeness more goofy than sleazy.

1970s Paul Naschy Part Five

EL JORABADO DE LA MORGUE
(1972)
Dir - Javier Aguirre
Overall: MEH

While it is true that Paul Naschy was rarely better as an actor than he was as the deformed, simpleton title character Gotho in El Jorabado de la Morgue, (The Hunchback of the Morgue, The Rue Morgue Massacres), Naschy's own script for the film in all honesty is exasperatingly stupid.  Particularly, the movies that Naschy himself wrote, (this one included), always hilariously have women falling head over heels in love with him, but the excuse he makes here is more bananas than usual.  Speaking of bananas, the mad Dr. Orla is comically narcissistic and goes from a normal scientist to one that makes excited speeches about how wonderful his creation is with zero concern for how many people he consistently convinces Nashy's hunchback to murder.  Those who help him with all of this nonsense come off even more dumb.  If you are already planning on turning the guy in to the authorities and are practically positive that he has either kidnapped or murdered your fiance, why would you go to his lair unarmed and confront him before calling the police?  It is certainly amusing to watch all of this play out and the film is plenty gory.  It even manages to throw in a torture chamber, a totally unexplained zombie for one scene, and an oozy goo monster.  Very peculiarly, the editing is virtually void of any establishing shots and as it goes along, the movie seems to be in a frantic hurry to be over with.  At least you cannot complain that the pacing drags then.

EL MARSHALL DEL INFERNO
(1974)
Dir - León Klimovsky
Overall: MEH

Based rather vaguely off the Baron Gilles de Rais of France, (who fought alongside Joan of Arc and then far less respectably died as a confessed child murderer, oops), El Marshall del Inferno is far more a historical action film than horror and not much better off because of it.  Translated to The Marshall from Hell and released internationally as The Devil's Possessed as well as Satan Possessed in Argentina, Naschy teams up once again with his frequent collaborator León Klimovsky, but the result does not generate much interest for anyone outside of the steadfast Naschy fan.  There are a few scenes of diabolical rituals and torture, but Naschy's character from the get-go is rather lazily duped by his conniving wife and her alchemist who far too easily trick him into spending years murdering innocent villagers, former allies, and then sacrificing their daughters to the point of a revolt that does him in.  Because Naschy's Barron is too pathetic and underwritten, he is never given any proper depth as to why he goes so insane.  Even after he finds out that he is being played for a sucker, the movie still goes on for twenty more minutes with him acting just as horribly to everyone.  Lots of screen time is dedicated to Guillermo Bredeston being a dashing hero rallying the townsfolk and it is just as lackluster to sit through as everything else.

EXORCISMO
(1975)
Dir - Juan Bosch
Overall: GOOD

Though it remains unconfirmed whether or not Paul Naschy did indeed pen the script for Exorcismo before The Exorcist was released as the actor always proclaimed, in either respect it is impossible not to compare it to the most famous horror movie ever made and in effect see it as the Spanish "answer" to it.  If it was simply a coincidence, (or if in fact Naschy had caught wind of William Peter Blatty's novel for inspiration himself), it is a pretty remarkable one.  There are plenty of details that are quite different though, such as but not limited to the girl possessed being much older than twelve-year old Linda Blair, the serial killer subplot, scenes of hippies conducting nude Satanic masses, and Naschy's Father Dunning is a much stronger-willed, straight good priest to Jason Miller's conflicted Father Damien Karras.  In any event, this is one of Naschy's better scripts by a mile and it successfully transcends being an exploitative knock-off.  The concept of an upper-class young woman succumbing to possession after her father suffered mental illness and then falling into drugged-out occultists, (with a perverted house servant, overbearing brother, and an over-dotting mother not particularly of any help), is plenty layered.  Director Juan Bosch never once lets the film stride anywhere near camp, keeping the music and tone perfectly in unsettling check.  The only complaint really is the somewhat ho-hum finale, but it is solid enough up until then to still warrant it as one of Nashy's all around better movies.

1970s Paul Naschy Part Two

COUNT DRACULA'S GREAT LOVE
(1972)
Dir - Javier Aguirre
Overall: MEH

Another lovable yet remarkably flawed Paul Naschy ode to the Gothic horror of both Universal and Hammer, Count Dracula's Great Love, (El gran amor del conde Drácula, Dracula's Great Love, Cemetery Girls and Dracula's Virgin Lovers), sees the man in the title role crossing off yet another classic monster movie villain from his list.  The editing is bizarrely unfocused, (often scenes appear to change locations before a character has even finished delivering their lines), and the dubbing could not be worse with most of Nashy's vampiric dialog reading more like a narration as his mouth literally remains closed while he is "speaking".  None of this helps the "buh?" story from becoming anything close to coherent and most of the outcome is simply laughable because of it.  That said, Naschy is still admirable on screen even if it makes hardly a lick of sense that he uses an alter ego in Dr. Wendell Marlow for most of the movie, bones multiple women, inexplicably falls in love with one within mere moments of knowing her, (a love which goes both ways), and daftly portrays himself as being both a romantically tragic figure and a fiend who willingly tortures women while leaving his discarded vampire wenches to burn in the sunlight.  Visually, it is one of Naschy's strongest works though since the undead are portrayed rather creepy and the dark, fog-laden cinematography is pitch-perfect.

A DRAGONFLY FOR EACH CORPSE
(1975)
Dir - León Klimovsky
Overall: MEH

Another Spanish giallo offering that is every bit deliberately Italian in style as humanly possible, A Dragonfly for Each Corpse, (The Vigilante Challenges the Police, Redkiller), sees Paul Naschy playing a police detective and the film's straight hero which in and of itself is unique.  The budget is typically small, the English dubbing typically abysmal, and Naschy and Ricardo Muñoz Suay's screenplay is typically all over the place though the red herrings are toned down more than usual.  The over the top details are readily available though, such as the killer's twisted passion to clean up the streets and target those he sees as unworthy to live, which are namely lowlifes, adulterers, homosexuals, sex workers, and drug addicts.  If this sounds a bit Seven-ish, the similarities don not stop there as there is also a package delivered with a severed head in it.  The scattered fascist symbolism gives it a mild, political layer and honestly the movie needs all the help it can get to keep one interested.  It is not very well structured as we watch Naschy and his department try and piece everything together, there are too many characters to keep track of, and the inevitable killer reveal is anything but interesting.

EL RETORNO DE WALPURGIS
(1974)
Dir - Carlos Aured
Overall: MEH

The seventh Waldemar Daninsky entry if you count the supposed second one Las Noches del Hombre Lobo which was never released or seen by anybody was El Retorno de Walpurgis, (The Return of Walpurgis, later put out in America as late as 1976 under the title Curse of the Devil).  As usual, all of the events of the previous Daninsky installments are ignored and the character is once again given another origin, be it a similar enough one to several others in the series.  On that note, the movie hardly brings anything new to Paul Naschy's beloved franchise in any respects.  It has another opening of a witch's curse, (which is actually the best part of the film, full of wonderful, blasphemous dialog and a bunch of Satan's servants getting brutally hung off a bridge), then the Daninsky line being of course cursed with Waldemar himself meeting his end at the hand of yet another beautiful woman he barely knows who falls madly in love with him.  The phrase "seen one you've seen em all" fairly applies to Naschy's werewolf movies and Walpurgis is not bad, but it is quite formulaic and makes one question its mere existence in the first place beyond just being for fans who like to keep seeing the Spanish wolfman terrorize a village in all his bloody mayhem.

1970s Paul Naschy Part One

DR. JEKYLL EL HOMBRE LOBO
(1971)
Dir - León Klimovsky
Overall: GOOD

Teaming up again with The Werewolf Vs. the Vampire Woman director León Klimovsky who he would go on to make a total of nine films with, Paul Naschy returns as Waldemar Daninsky for the surprisingly clever mash-up Dr. Jekyll el Hombre Lobo, (Dr. Jekyll and the Wolfman or Werewolf depending).  Playing out in two parts, the first half is in rural Romania and follows the usual pattern of Naschy being cooped up in a castle with textbook, superstitious villagers who of course eventually rise up against him.  While this may confuse you as to whether or not you are watching the right Naschy movie, once things switch to modern, swinging London and we meet Dr. Jekyll's grandson who has the same first AND last name, (familiar Spanish horror face Jack Taylor), the movie gets far more interesting.  Naschy gets to wolf-out in a broken down elevator, a nightclub, and best of all gets to be two iconic movie monsters at the exact same time.  His script once more glosses over most of the details with barely written characters and nods to horror cliches that while done lovingly, are still as illogical as can be.  Yet the movie is quickly paced for a change and certainly mixes up the formula in a highly memorable way.

THE MUMMY'S REVENGE
(1974)
Dir - Carlos Aured
Overall: MEH

Sadly, Paul Naschy's lone mummy movie, (not counting the monster mash wet dream Los Monstruos del Terror from 1970), is a textbook example of both lazy, endlessly re-treaded mummy film troupes and typical sluggish, Euro-horror pacing.  The production is decent enough with some effective Egyptian sets and Naschy's Amenhotep makeup is rather excellent.  You also cannot say that the movie does not deliver when it comes to gore, with one hilarious scene in particular sticking out where Naschy's title character literally smashes a bunch of women's faces into bloody goo with his bare hands.  Everything else here is a drag, particularly in the Americanized version.  While Naschy plays two different characters well enough, the dubbing on Amenhotep is laughably atrocious.  When not sounding like a parody of a cartoon villain, he is grunting like an ape which is made all the more odd since his mummy has no problem speaking words yet because monster movies, they also wanted him to behave like a mindless brute as well.  The story is exactly what you think it is, (evil Egyptian comes back to life to be evil while finding his bride's doppelgänger), and scene after scene go on with him murdering women in the most boring of ways while other characters stand around and talk in rooms.  Also the clumsy ending will probably have you laughing out loud, which was probably not intentional.

BLUE EYES OF A BROKEN DOLL
(1974)
Dir - Carlos Aured
Overall: MEH

Credit where it is do, Paul Naschy and director Carlos Aured's script for Blue Eyes of a Broken Doll, (Los Ojos Azules de la Muñeca Rota, House of Psychotic Women, House of Doom), is certainly worthy of the most ridiculous of giallos.  Whether that is a good or bad thing depends on how silly one likes there Italian-styled slashers where the reveal of the killer cannot help but to come equipped with an audible groan from the audience who can barely keep up with all the red herrings thrown their way.  It would be incorrect to call it a masterpiece, but the simple fact that this is one of the rare, non-supernatural horror films from Naschy alone makes it rather intriguing and Aured's direction is fittingly stylized for such an affair.  The blood flows frequently and brightly, there are inventive camera angles galore, and Francisco Sánchez' cinematography is often pretty good, making wonderful, wide framed use out of shadows and whatnot.  The problems then mostly lie with the derivative, stylistic genre choices such as inappropriate jazz music in nearly every scene and more plot holes than you can begin to wrap your brain around.  Also Naschy's character is confusingly handled as he seems to be a tragic figure yet also a convicted rapist who cannot help but to be violent towards women, has no problem boning one sister after the other, and eye-humps any other girl he sees.  Also he has one of those pistols that magically holds forty-seven bullets without re-loading.