1950s Italian Horror Part One - (Mario Bava Edition)

I VAMPIRI

(1957)

Dir - Riccardo Freda/Mario Bava

Overall: MEH

Both Riccardo Freda and Mario Bava can be credited with ushering in the Italian horror movie in the sound age since I Vampiri, (The Vampire, The Devil's Commandment, Lust of the Vampire), was the first such vehicle produced at a time when the country's film industry was exponentially booming, yet genre pictures such as this were not on the menu.  Freda and Bava, (the latter who acted as cinematographer, uncredited special effects supervisor, and director on the last two days of shooting), convinced Titanus Studios executive Goffredo Lombardo to let them make a horror film in less than two weeks and on the cheap once Freda produced a script in one day.  Set in the modern era to avoid period costumes and filmed on pre-existing sets, the results show both the rushed production and lack of budget.  Still, decrepit scenery and a mad scientist laboratory are atmospheric additions, the story borrows from familiar sources such as the legend of Elizabeth Bathory, and on the make-up effects side, it utilizes some of the same camera tricks that the legendary 1931 Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde did.  A historically important milestone in European horror, but it lacks the mood and flair of the filmmaker's later works and is understandably a mediocre first attempt at Gothic Euro-horror.

THE DAY THE SKY EXPLODED

(1958)

Dir - Mario Bava/Paolo Heusch

Overall: WOOF

 

Recognized as Italy's first science fiction film, The Day the Sky Exploded, (La morte viene dallo spazio, Death Comes From Space, Death Comes From Outer Space), is essentially a stock footage montage that is interjected with characters in a control room panicking.  A precursor to Michael Bay's blockbuster turkey Armageddon, the story concerns an incoming meteor shower that threatens the entire planet, causing apocalyptic destruction before scientists and astronauts figure out a way to stop it.  Completely sterile melodrama is haphazardly tossed in to provide it with some sort of human element, but a couple's heartfelt reunion, a ladies man trying to smooth over a woman, and one guy snapping under the pressure by proclaiming that mankind has doomed itself due to our building of nuclear missiles, it all come off as an afterthought just to have some more dialog exchanges to break up the recycled disaster footage.  Though Paolo Heusch was officially credited as director, various cast and crew members proclaimed that cinematographer/special effects man Mario Bava was mainly in charge of the proceedings.  Thankfully there are a few above-average camera angles and shots that are eerily lit due to Bava's always keen eye for visuals, but this is an inconsequential saving grace to a relentlessly boring movie with no other redeemable qualities.

CALTIKI - THE IMMORTAL MONSTER

(1959)

Dir - Riccardo Freda/Mario Bava

Overall: MEH

Riccardo Freda and again cinematographer turned co-director Mario Bava join forces to unofficially remake The Quartermass Xperiment for a European audience.  Caltiki - The Immortal Monster, (Caltiki, il mostro immortale), was another historically noteworthy film in Italian cinema, being one of the country's early sci-fi outings that gave the careers of both Freda and Bava another push into genre terrain.  Unfortunately though, the film itself is dull, mundane, and derivative of its Hammer source material.  Some of the dialog and one random car crash are laughable in a way that is likely not intended, plus the American dubbing does not help the accidental awkwardness any more than bad dubbing ever does.  Bava handles a number of special effect shots and though he is clearly working with unconvincing miniatures and a Doctor Who worthy monster, these scenes are cleverly shot in heavy shadows that, (along with being in black and white), do enough to hide the budget constraints.  It is also a nice touch that a Mayan curse element is brought in as a foundation, though plenty of "superstitions natives and greedy white men on jungle expeditions resulting in their doom" cliches are also present.

1950s Foreign Horror Part Four

ALRAUNE
(1952)
Dir - Arthur Maria Rabenalt
Overall: MEH

More of a missed opportunity snooze than a gripping melodrama, Arthur Maria Rabenalt's Alraune, (Unnatural: The Fruit of Evil), is the to-date last full cinematic adaptation of Hanns Heinz Ewers' 1911 novel of the same name.  It is notable for Erich von Stroheim's involvement, who speaks in his native tongue while making his first acting appearance after appearing in Billy Wilder's seminal Sunset Boulevard two years earlier.  Karlheinz Böhm is also on board, though his role is less showy than Stroheim's disgraced doctor who medically inseminates Hildegard Knef with the DNA of a murderer, apparently for funsies.  None of the three leads are likeable and the inherent evil of Knef's title character is never properly conveyed.  Instead, everyone seems uptight about a humdrum situation that pushes Knef to flirt with men as well as being in the vicinity of when things go wrong with people, all because Stroheim scares Böhm away from having the hots for his artificially created cousin.  On the plus side, Friedl Behn-Grund's cinematography is sufficient, yet even though it is a slick production, it fails to cast the appropriate spell.

 

EL FANTASMA DE LE OPERETA
(1955)
Dir - Enrique Carreras
Overall: MEH

Not to be confused with the 1960, Germán "Tin-Tan" Valdés-starred movie of the same name, El fantasma de le opereta, (The Phantom of the Operetta), is a horror/comedy mishmash stemming from Argentina that manages to be stupid without being insulting.  The story plays out in an opera house where a wacky group of actors convince the owner to let them rehearse there, one guy really wants to open a pizzeria, and a mad scientist keeps a slew of Universal monsters in the basement because this movie likes drugs.  In addition to said mad scientist, genre fans will appreciate the appearance of an invisible man, Dracula, two different phantoms, a wolf man, and Frankenstein's monster who eventually all run amok while a performance is unfolding on stage. People fall down, people act scared, people are smitten with pretty ladies, people chase each other around, and then the whole thing is revealed to be a dream which actually gives all of the nonsensical tomfoolery some "logical" footing to stand on.  The cast of characters are interchangeable, but the tone and plot are equally ridiculous and easy to not have to pay attention to.  Forgettable and monotonous, (as well as padded with musical numbers that are at least brief if still frequent), some of the fourth wall-breaking humor actually lands.

 

INVASION OF THE ANIMAL PEOPLE

(1959)

Dir - Virgil W. Vogel

Overall: MEH

One of the few theatrically released films from director Virgil W. Vogel who worked almost entirely in television throughout his career, Invasion of the Animal People, (Rymdinvasion i Lappland, Space Invasion of Lapland, Terror in the Midnight Sun), is a rare Swedish/American co-production that was re-edited with added and removed footage three different times over the years.  First, crap peddler Jerry Warren did his usual job of cutting the original running time down while adding newly shot scenes, including opening and closing prologues by John Carradine.  Then once that version was deemed too short for television broadcast, even more different scenes were filmed to pad it back out.  The OG Swedish cut opens with a flying orb from outer space crashing into the snowy mountains, but we do not get back to it until thirty-three minutes in.  This gives us way too much time to meet a crop of vanilla-flavored characters, some with accents and some without.  Vogel actually stages a couple of scenes with the appropriate level of menace and eventually there is a giant abominable monster and some weird aliens in robes who omit a weird piercing sound, but the trek to get there is arduous.

1950s Foreign Horror Part Three

THE WITCH

(1952)

Dir - Roland af Hällström

Overall: MEH

An odd folk horror/sex romp hybrid, The Witch, (Noita palaa elämään, Return of the Witch), is notable for being one of Finland's earliest works in the genre, as well as for its liberal nudity and risque dialog.  Director Roland af Hällström and screenwriters Viljo Hela and Kaarlo Nuorvala adapt Mika Waltari's 1947 novel of the same name, presenting it as a lighthearted fairy tale with a simple enough message that wickedness resides in all of us and to a more chauvinistic extent, that "All women are witches".  This is more ironic when viewing since the men come off the worst, with Mirja Mane's titular character effortlessly enticing every guy on the screen, all of whom cannot stop having innuendo-laced conversations and taking her in their arms as much as they condemn her for having such horny control over their genitals.  Mane spends a significant portion of the film in her birthday suit and when her clothes are kept on, she still frolics, manically amuses herself, and bites people in a playful manner, giving the movie a type of taboo-pushing glee that outshines any potential atmospheric elements.  Such things are undone by a horrendously inappropriate musical score that plays arbitrarily during scenes and seems to have been plucked out of a different film.  The plot is also monotonous and chatty, making this more of a historical curiosity than anything else.

THE BLACK VAMPIRE

(1953)

Dir - Román Viñoly Barreto

Overall: GOOD

 

Equipped with one of the most misleading titles imaginable, The Black Vampire, (El vampiro negro), features neither any members of the undead nor any black people, and is instead an Argentinian film noir reworking of Fritz Lang's seminal M.  Though more pathetic than menacing, Nathán Pinzón makes a fittingly eerie Peter Lorre stand-in, still managing to look like a beaten down puppy even when going into a rage.  Though it keeps the angle of the killer targeting children, the blind beggar recognizing his whistling, and his capture by way of the city's underbelly citizens, every other plot aspect is unique to this version and it adds more dynamics to the murder's persona, as well as a sexually frustrated police detective and a working girl whose daughter is Pinzón's would-be final victim, both of whom take up the majority of the narrative.  Though it is not paced as compellingly as Lang's original and is nowhere near as suspenseful, director Román Viñoly Barreto pulls off an agreeably dark final act.  The real star of the show though is Aníbal González Paz' expressive cinematography, lighting prominent eye lines and casting sinister shadows in every frame.

JOURNEY TO THE BEGINNING OF TIME 

(1955)
Dir - Karel Zeman
Overall: MEH

A notable fusing of 2D and 3D model animation with live action, Journey to the Beginning of Time, (Cesta do pravěku), serves its purpose as a lightweight educational film for its era.  Director Karel Zemun had and would continue to make a number of movies that relied heavily on special effects and animation, and this one takes its narrative cue from two novels, Vladimir Obruchev's Plutonia from 1915 and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World from 1912.  Throwing four jolly-wiz teenagers into a raft where they inexplicably end up in and innocently explore Earth's bygone, pre-human eras is dopey stuff, but it works fine in the context of a documentary where the kids constantly notify the audience as to the specifics of their findings.  The American re-edited throws in bookending segments at the American Museum of Natural History in New York that "explain" the movie's events as an elaborate dream, but the bulk of the film was shot at a Czech nature reserve, two different rivers, and conventional studio sets.  The prehistoric beast shots are noticeably smoother than Ray Harryhausen's stop-motion and blend with the young actors as well as any from the time period, but there are also puppets utilized as well as a convincing, life-sized model of a defunct Stegosaurus.

1950s Mexican Horror Part Two

EL MONSTRUO RESUCITADO

(1953)

Dir - Chano Urueta

Overall: MEH

 

A mad scientist who lives in a mansion behind a cemetery, likes to dress up like the Phantom of the Opera, play the piano like the Phantom of the Opera, and have a liking towards wax statures, El Monstruo resucitado, (The Revived Monster), throws as many ingredients as it can muster into its main bad guy, played in an expressionless monster mask by José María Linares-Rivas.  One of the earliest Mexican horror films to usher in a boom of them that took direct inspiration from Universal's classic output, director Chano Urueta handles the material with a heavy atmospheric hand.  The sets are appropriately dreary, especially the Gothic abode of Linares-Rivas whose main mannequin-decorated chamber room, expansive laboratory, graveyard front lawn, and dungeon area where he keeps a caged up brute all manage to exceed the low-budget.  Unfortunately, the pacing is disastrously slack as the movie bounces between about three locations and follows just as many characters who say little to advance the plot, though say a lot they certainly do.  Talky and bland despite its silly premise, it merely stands as a historically important genre film from its era and country.

 

EL CASTILLO DE LOS MONSTRUOS

(1958)

Dir - Julián Soler

Overall: MEH

 

Another dopey Mexican horror comedy from an era that had a particular penchant for them, El castillo de los monstruos, (The Castle of the Monsters), stems from director Julián Soler and throws every classic monster available on the screen for a small handful of minutes while padding ninety percent of the running time with the unfunny antics of Antonio "Clavillazo" Espino.  To be fair, Espino is less grating than your Germán "Tin-Tan" Valdéses and Manuel "Loco" Valdéses, but while likeable, he still ends up doing nothing remotely funny besides wearing clothes that are too big for him and falling down a set of stairs to cartoon sound effects.  As far as the ghoulish personnel, we have a mad scientist, a Neanderthal-esque brute, a gill man, a Frankenstein monster butler, a deformed lab assistant henchman, a mummy, a werewolf, and Mexico's favorite on-screen vampire Germán Robles reprising his undead foe in a non-speaking part that is only a notch above a cameo.  The burgeoning romance story is nothing worth paying attention to, which is a problem since we are stuck with it until the last act which is finally when the movie remembers that it was supposed to have monsters in it.

THE MAN AND THE MONSTER

(1958)

Dir - Rafael Baledón

Overall: MEH

 

Fusing the Faust legend in with a little Phantom of the Opera and Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, (and all with a monster that looks like a werewolf), The Man and the Monster, (El hombre y el monstruo), was the first of several horror films from director Rafael Baledón.  Arriving at the cusp of the genre's boom in Mexico, it throws back to Universal's 1930s and 40s output with some well-established tropes at its disposal, plus Raúl Martínez Solares' shadow-heavy cinematography creates the right macabre mood.  Besides the story itself which is borderline ridiculous, there are a few unintentionally funny moments like when a journalist arrives at a house that all of the villagers are afraid of and tries to use the phone, only for the cold woman at the door to merely "Nnnnnope" her head back 'n forth before nonchalantly closing it.  Enrique Rambal narrating his own backstory to absolutely no one just so the viewers can be brought up to speed is silly, plus he looks more goofy than menacing in his Mr. Hyde bestial form that only comes out when either he plays the piano or someone else does, depending on what the plot needs to happen.  Far from a classic, but not without some charm.

1950s Fernando Méndez Part Two

THE BLACK PIT OF DR. M
(1959)
Overall: GOOD

 

One of the more singular entries in Mexico's golden age of horror, The Black Pit of Dr. M, (Misterios de ultratumba, Mysteries from Beyond the Grave), throws together Gothic cinematography, melodramatic performances, seances, an insane asylum, ghosts, and a little bit of Faustian "Be careful what you wish for" warnings from the afterlife.  Screenwriter Ramón Obón was and would continue to be as versed in the macabre as director Fernando Méndez was for yet another pairing between the two, crafting something that stylistically is in keeping with Universal's 1930s and 40s output, yet unique in its narrative.  Mankind's curiosity for what lies beyond is at the heart of Rafael Bertrand obsession, which grows to include his dead colleague's daughter Mapita Cortés who has eyes for a more age-appropriate man.  Yet the intermingling of violent tragedy and the supernatural is wonderfully realized by Méndez and Víctor Herrera's camerawork, which is endlessly atmospheric in a traditional dark and spooky sense.  Throw in Gastón Santos going for gusto in the final act with deformed make-up on, and the film provides a little bit of a lot of things with a more sincere tone than most unintentionally silly Mexican genre exports from the era allowed.

LOS DIABLOS DEL TERROR
(1959)
Overall: MEH

 

A Western with a mysterious horseback cult wearing luchador masks because Mexico, Los diablos del terror, (Night Riders), does not properly convey any horror atmosphere despite its catchy title.  Like most south of the border filmmakers, Fernando Méndez had made his share of low-rent Westerns as much as he had made anything in any other genre and he utilizes the usual array of clean, eye-catching costumes and fist-fights in place of pistol shoot-outs because apparently the prop gun department was low on blanks.  Though the day for night scenes are as pathetic as any that were ever filmed, Méndez and cinematographer Victor Herrera manage to get a lot of mileage out of colorful backlighting that make the otherwise cheap sets pop off the screen better than they have any business to, especially in some underground cave sequences.  There is also a bumbling comic relief cohort who gets fly paper stuck to him over and over again while having a terrible time remembering that he can just use his hands to take it off, plus we have a ridiculous prison escape where a horse and a flimsy piece of rope manages to rip an entire cell wall off within a few seconds.  Harmlessly silly, but too sluggish and cheap to be of much interest.

THE LIVING COFFIN
(1959)
Overall: MEH

 

The sequel to the same year's Los diablos del terror, The Living Coffin, (El grito de la muerte, Scream of Death), is another horror/Western hybrid that comparatively adheres closer to the former genre than its companion film does.  Actor's Gastón Santos and Pedro de Aguillón reunite as the dashing gunslinger hero and his bumbling sidekick, both of whom square off against La Llorona herself.  The Western elements are mitigated to two fistfights amongst cowboys who forget that they have guns and Santos' apparently human-brained horse being able to save him from drowning in quicksand with a lasso, with the emphasis being on people who are convinced that "The Crying Woman" is behind a series of town murders.  Director Fernando Méndez keeps the lights down low for most of the alleged specter's appearances, framing some atmospheric shots of quiet alleyways and a candlelit house where family members jump at the sound of a ringing bell.  It all ends up being nothing more than a Scooby-Doo worthy ruse though and once again Aguillón's doofy mannerisms are completely out of place with the otherwise sincere and eerie tone.

1950s Fernando Méndez Part One

THE BODY SNATCHER
(1957)
Overall: MEH

Released the same year as El vampiro, The Body Snatcher, (Ladrón de Cadáveres, Corpse Thief), stands as director Fernando Méndez' contemporary Frankenstein update, except with wrestlers because Mexico loves them some wrestlers.  The ratio of shirtless men throwing each other around and/or training in a gym compared to anything that moves an already cumbersome plot forward is unbalanced at best, but that is only one aspect that makes this such a sluggish watch.  Every scene, (wrestlers or not), goes on several minutes longer than agreeable, an unnecessary love angle is thrown in, there is no revived corpse monster until we reach the sixty minute point, and the film never leans into its goofy-on-paper aspects.  Instead, it plays its cockamamie story straight, even when Wolf Ruvinskis's creature spontaneously grows monstrous fangs and Robin Williams chest hair in the middle of Carlos Riquelme waving a torch in front of him.  Also, said monster uses the name "El vampiro" for the ring because apparently Mexico loves them some vampires too.

EL VAMPIRO
(1957)
Overall: MEH

A historically important work in Gothic horror that was pivotal in influencing a slew of Mexican genre films, El vampiro, (The Vampire), lacks much of the singular goofiness of later horror movies from the country and instead goes for a traditional Universal monsters vibe.  Both Ariadne Welter and Germán Robles would appear in a handful of such movies, (the latter playing a member of the undead numerous times throughout his early career), but the latter unfortunately makes a lackluster impression here as he is granted little screen time and does not come off as either fascinating or menacing.  Director Fernando Méndez keeps the humor at a bare minimum while emphasizing a dreary atmosphere full of sincere performances, persistent and overbearing music, much fog, much cobwebs, and the dashing vampire who stares menacingly, turns into a bat, spontaneously appears, and sports actual fangs.  The later motif had only recently become the norm after pointy incisors had been routinely omitted from on-screen blood-suckers, though this was not technically the first movie to portray them.  Yet for all of its gloomy aesthetic and strict cliche-adherence, the pacing leaves much to be desired, struggling along its predictable conclusion without any memorable moments or unique details to single it out amongst so many others of its kind.

THE VAMPIRE'S COFFIN
(1958)
Overall: MEH

Many of the on and behind the screen personnel return with The Vampire's Coffin, (El ataúd del vampiro); a sequel to the previous year's El vampiro.  Though he portrays the same hero character, Abel Salazar makes more of a dopey and comic relief presence, trying to convince the authorities that vampires are real while simultaneously protecting his love interest Ariadne Welter, (now a professional dancer), from Germán Robles' hypnotic medallion which is too sparkly to resits for the dimwit who pulls the stake out of his heart.  Salazar also contributed to the screenplay along with Ramón Obón and Raúl Zenteno and compared to the previous film, the plot is more overstuffed and the tone more goofy.  Instead of merely rehashing Universal monster tropes, (which it still does mind you), it adds Phantom of the Opera and House of Wax angles as well, but Robles still goes through the undead motions as opposed to making the on-screen blood sucker his own.  Fernando Méndez' direction is likewise still trudging even if the modest Gothic set design and Víctor Herrera's cinematography remains atmospheric.  The whole thing is no more or less forgettable than its predecessor, yet fans of Mexico's more straight-faced variations of horror films from Hollywood's black and white Golden Era may find it agreeable.

1950s British Horror Part Seven

THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER

(1950)

Dir - Ivan Barnett

Overall: MEH

 

The only existing full-length to be directed by cinematographer Ivan Barnett, The Fall of the House of Usher is also notable as the first sound adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe's story of the same name, as well as the screen debut for English actor Gwen Watford.  Filmed in 1948 on a low budget, it has curious, modern day bookending segments where some blokes at a gentleman's club share their fondness for Poe and one of them proceeds to tell the tale proper.  This is hardly necessary, but there is a more significant tweak to the source material in that the Usher twin's now crazed, deformed, and super strong mother is shown to be living just outside of the infamous house yet on the same grounds, who guards a severed head of another Usher family member.  Such ghastly new details differentiate this from other versions that were various levels of faithful to Poe's initial story, but the finished product here is a mixed bag.  Barnett maintains a consistent atmosphere of Gothic doom and gloom, but the performances are uninspired and the editing is often clunky.  There is also stock music playing throughout practically the whole thing, which undermines several moments that would have benefited from a more subdued approach.

DEVIL GIRL FROM MARS

(1954)

Dir - David MacDonald

Overall: MEH

 

In general, British B-genre movies had an aura of sophistication over their many, many American counterparts and Devil Girl from Mars has all of the ingredients to be a laughably camp anti-classic even if its sincere presentation undermines such inherent silliness.  American-born producers Edward J. and Harry Lee Danzinger allegedly got the film made to take advantage of their television series Calling Scotland Yard wrapping up ahead of schedule, utilizing the remaining time that was booked at Shepperton Studios to churn out a second feature on the cheap.  The shooting apparently went so quickly that single takes were all that was allowed, with a costume for Patricia Laffan's title character, her companion robot, and a spaceship all being cobbled together in break-neck time.  In this respect, it is an impressive production and the cast breezes through the goofy material as if this is on par with the more legitimate The Day the Earth Stood Still, which it serves as a more malevolent answer to.  Set at a single location, it runs out of steam quick, becoming nothing more than Laffan's alien lady telling everyone that they are doomed over and over again while taking breaks in her spaceship in order for the characters to be worried and argue over who is going to sacrifice themselves.

 

FIRST MAN INTO SPACE

(1959)

Dir - Robert Day

Overall: MEH

An American/British co-production that takes its cue from 1955's big screen The Quatermass Xperiment adaptation, First Man into Space dilly-dallies for too long to recommend, but it delivers some effective monster mayhem eventually.  The script is a combination of two different ones by Charles F. Vetter and Wyott Ordung, putting a cocksure pilot into orbit for the first time, only for him to encounter a mysterious meteorite that transforms him into a slimy brute.  It takes forty-four minutes until we get a good look at Bill Edwards in his Toxic Avenger make-up and he makes a startling appearance; a filthy and charred abomination that slashes people up out of crazed confusion with his body no longer able to sustain itself on Earth's climate.  The last act is the only one worth paying attention to which is obviously a problem since the bulk of the story concerns military people, scientists, and bureaucrats trying to figure out what the audience already knows.  Marshall Thompson is logically cast as Edwards' army Commander brother who is in a constant state of talking to people and then getting rung up to go into another room and talk to some more people.  At least Doctor Who's Roger Delgado makes a cameo as a Mexican consul and does an exaggerated foreign accent as well as any English thespian would.