Paul Naschy's Waldemar Daninsky wolf-man movies were a howling success in Japan, which explains this unusual Japanese/Spanish co-production in which the cursed Count Daninsky heads East to try and find a cure for his lycanthropy.
The film starts in the year 938 A. D., with Irineus Daninsky (Nashy) defeating Hungarian warrior Vulko (José Luis Chinchilla) in a duel to the death, much to the annoyance of the witch Amese (Sara Mora), who curses the Daninsky bloodline. Centuries later, and descendent Waldemar Daninsky (Naschy again) searches for an answer to his problem, his quest leading him to 'the land of the rising sun', where samurai/sorcerer Kian (Shigeru Amachi) tries to lift the curse; in doing so, he angers a rival samurai and an evil sorceress, Satomi (Junko Asahina).
Combining two of my favourite genres - the Euro-horror and the samurai movie - I had high hopes for The Beast and The Magic Sword, but even though the film does deliver several enjoyable scenes, there's also a fair amount of tedium, and with the film clocking in at a massive 115 minutes, it's far from the fast-paced, consistently entertaining genre mash-up I dearly wanted it to be.
While the lupine Daninsky's attacks are schlocky fun (I bet his victims regret having paper walls and doors), the monster's outdated appearance is a massive disappointment: considering this film was made after The Howling and An American Werewolf in London, the design and execution of the wolf-man make-up is very poor, and there's no attempt at a transformation scene (not even a time-lapse effect). To compensate, Naschy provides some exploitative nudity by tearing open the tops of his female victims before chomping on their throats. There's also a ridiculous wolfman vs. Tiger fight that is satisfyingly silly (the tiger is called Shere Khan!), plus an entertaining bath attack on Daninsky and Kian by a topless female ninja.
Unfortunately, the many unspectacular sword fights soon become very repetitive, and the story loses all momentum with a good half-an-hour still to go; by the time Kian locates the magic silver sword that can end Waldemar's curse, I had pretty much lost interest.
4.5/10, rounded up to 5 for the novelty of seeing Japanese actors dubbed into Spanish, and for having the cajones to kill off both of Waldemar's female travelling companions, Kinga (Beatriz Escudero) and blind girl Esther (Violeta Cela).
The film starts in the year 938 A. D., with Irineus Daninsky (Nashy) defeating Hungarian warrior Vulko (José Luis Chinchilla) in a duel to the death, much to the annoyance of the witch Amese (Sara Mora), who curses the Daninsky bloodline. Centuries later, and descendent Waldemar Daninsky (Naschy again) searches for an answer to his problem, his quest leading him to 'the land of the rising sun', where samurai/sorcerer Kian (Shigeru Amachi) tries to lift the curse; in doing so, he angers a rival samurai and an evil sorceress, Satomi (Junko Asahina).
Combining two of my favourite genres - the Euro-horror and the samurai movie - I had high hopes for The Beast and The Magic Sword, but even though the film does deliver several enjoyable scenes, there's also a fair amount of tedium, and with the film clocking in at a massive 115 minutes, it's far from the fast-paced, consistently entertaining genre mash-up I dearly wanted it to be.
While the lupine Daninsky's attacks are schlocky fun (I bet his victims regret having paper walls and doors), the monster's outdated appearance is a massive disappointment: considering this film was made after The Howling and An American Werewolf in London, the design and execution of the wolf-man make-up is very poor, and there's no attempt at a transformation scene (not even a time-lapse effect). To compensate, Naschy provides some exploitative nudity by tearing open the tops of his female victims before chomping on their throats. There's also a ridiculous wolfman vs. Tiger fight that is satisfyingly silly (the tiger is called Shere Khan!), plus an entertaining bath attack on Daninsky and Kian by a topless female ninja.
Unfortunately, the many unspectacular sword fights soon become very repetitive, and the story loses all momentum with a good half-an-hour still to go; by the time Kian locates the magic silver sword that can end Waldemar's curse, I had pretty much lost interest.
4.5/10, rounded up to 5 for the novelty of seeing Japanese actors dubbed into Spanish, and for having the cajones to kill off both of Waldemar's female travelling companions, Kinga (Beatriz Escudero) and blind girl Esther (Violeta Cela).