jfrentzen-942-204211 Reviews

Dr. Frankenstein on Campus (1970)

Frankenstein's Mind Control Mishaps in Absurb Satire

[4/10 · 6 May 2024]

In this offbeat film set in the swingin' 1960s and barely released in 1970, Viktor Frankenstein (Robin Ward), a descendant of the infamous scientist, finds himself expelled from an Austrian university, apparently due to excessive sword fighting. He relocates to a Canadian university during the days of campus protests, free love, and counter-culture movements. In Canada, he complains that "people here expect me to have a bolt through my neck to keep my head on." His academic pursuits lead him into the realm of mind control, competing with a professor over experiments targeting the brain's trigeminal nerve, on which the use of electricity and brain implants is Viktor's main obsession.

The film, which teeters on the absurd, is laced with intentional and perhaps unintentional humor. Scenes oscillate between chaotic sequences set in a club filled with marijuana smoke, mystical discussions, and bizarre activities like hard hat head-butting; Frankenstein's faux idyllic interludes with love-interest Susan (Kathleen Sawyer), who spends most of the movie undressed; to lab-based pseudo-scientific dialogues about the problems of brain experiments.

Professor: It's all very good working with these pickled monkey brains.

Frankenstein: You mean you want to use my brain?

Professor: It's not as sinister as it sounds.

Viktor's antics, including a marijuana scandal, soon get him expelled once again. In his revenge, using a mind control device, he manipulates fellow student Tony, the nominal "Frankenstein's monster" of the piece who is also an expert in tae kwondo, to eliminate his adversaries with a single deadly kick or chop to the neck. These efforts eventually backfire on Mr. Frankenstein quite badly.

Throughout, Ward portrays Frankenstein with a staring, detached bemusement, maintaining a stoic indifference even in the most bizarre or intimate moments. A few veteran actors -- such as Austin Willis and Sean Sullivan -- admirably chew the scenery here and there, with Willis relishing an extended rant calling Frankenstein and a group of rowdy, unruly students "a morally useless collection of ne'er do-wells."

Kageki honban: Midareru (1989)

Derivative Japanese Rape Revenge Melodrama

[3/10 · 26 April 2024]

(English title: DRIFTNG INTO CHAOS) Female pinku director Sachi Hamano has constructed a rather unpleasant rape-revenge melodrama patterned after Western exploitation films like LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE and NIGHT TRAIN MURDERS, as well as similarly themed Japanese movies, such as SENKEYSU NO KIZUNA by Daisuke Yamanouchi. Two rather imbecilic young men roam the city streets looking for females to capture, while an enigmatic woman-in-black looks on, presumably encouraging them. The two women they kidnap are shuffled off to a remote house in the woods for non-stop rape and other humiliations, including sex with a wheelchair-bound maniac. The female "blank angel" participates in these nasty sex games too. Hamano takes the "captured for sex" dramatics further than most films of this type by making DRIFTING INTO CHAOS a full porno flick, though explicit scenes are rendered in pixelated, censored closeups of moving parts. The whole disorienting mess carries a certain compelling ugliness. Predictably, while the non-stop rapes are shot with great conviction, perfunctory scenes of the victims exacting murderous revenge on their captors are presented as after-thoughts.

Guests Are Coming (1962)

Leisurely Paced But Entertaining Comedy Anthology

[7/10 · 29 February 2024]

This rather slow-moving three part Polish comedy tells the stories of three Polish-Americans, arriving on the same boat, to visit their ancestral homeland for the first time. The first episode deals with the consternation caused by the arrival of their American cousin on his Polish relatives, who have taken money for an apartment from the young man's father and put the brother for whom it was intended in an old folk's home. In the second episode, a prosperous undertaker from Gary, Indiana comes to the father's village to choose a bride. The third and most entertaining deals with the adventures of a promoter from Chicago who has come to dig up dirt from famous battlefields to sell as souvenirs.

Mate doma lva? (1964)

Enchanting Czech Children's Movie

[8/10 · 29 February 2024]

Reality and fantasy are well combined in this charming Czech children's film about the adventures of two adorable young brothers. Left to amuse themselves when their class outing is canceled, the boys explore their city, encountering the true excitement that underlies the mundane surface. Their adventures include painting with a brush that colors reality, freeing enchanted jazz musicians, and a museum trip via roller skates accompanied by a talking dog. Though this is a fine entertainment for children, the surreal visions of the city plus the whimsical satire of the work-a-day world entertains on an adult level. In the U. S., this was released in 1967 as DO YOU KEEP A LION AT HOME?

The Cobra (1967)

Euro-Spy Entry Fumbles with Amateurish Execution and Predictable Plot

[4/10 · 25 February 2024]

This Italian spy film is ludicrous yet amusingly preposterous. The plot kicks off with the US Government calling back Mike Rand, described as "their best Middle East agent," to hunt down "The Cobra." Initially, G-man Dana Andrews mistakenly believes The Cobra to be either a drug cartel or a crime lord. Rand's mission weaves through a maze involving oil magnates, drug enforcement bodies, and even the United Nations, all in a bid by the US Treasury to halt opium trafficking to America. As Rand edges closer to his goal, the body count rises alarmingly.

THE COBRA is a peculiar Euro-spy flick that struggles with the motions of a thriller. The film suffers from occasionally amateurish editing and staging. While Istanbul's scenery adds interest, the film overall offers little in terms of engagement. The narrative is predictable with minimal twists and lacks ingenuity. The excessively prolonged finale, featuring endless sneaking around with minimal action, further detracts from its appeal.

Pietro Martellanza (Peter Martell), portraying Rand, displays a limited range of emotions, primarily looking gloomy, which undermines the film's impact from the start. Anita Ekberg manages to shine in a limited role, whereas Dana Andrews, in a significant part, delivers a notably poor performance, especially during a scene where he drives while clearly impaired, struggling with his lines. Elisa Montes appears briefly as a potential double agent, and her presence is a welcome, albeit small, addition.

The film's dialogue often borders on the ridiculous, highlighted by a scene where a Japanese drug lord dramatically declares, "We will send you tons of drugs! DRUGS will spread!" In another moment, Rand's request for whiskey from a waiter, followed by his demand for a funnel instead of ice and soda, exemplifies the movie's attempt at humor amidst its purported "serious" espionage theme.

Kill a Dragon (1967)

Below Average Adventure Flick Set in Hong Kong

[4/10 · 24 February 2024]

Off the coast of Hong Kong, a typhoon sweeps a shipment of nitroglycerin onto the shores of an island. The local inhabitants lay claim to the washed-up cargo, invoking maritime salvage rights. However, the local crime lord, Patrai (Fernando Lamas), demands they return the explosive material to him within three days or face annihilation. The islanders recruit soldier of fortune Rick Masters (Jack Palance), who with his team successfully fends off Patrai's agents. Lured by the promise of gold and the beautiful Tisa (Alizia Gur), Rick receives additional support from Vigo, a tourist guide (Aldo Ray).

The movie's blend of humor and action frequently falls flat, marred by the cast's overdone performances. Fernando Lamas stands out with a particularly exaggerated portrayal, his thick mustache and flamboyant attire providing unintended humor. Aldo Ray contributes to the film's oddball charm and has a scene in drag, while Jack Palance's attempt to emulate the charisma of Humphrey Bogart and the allure of James Bond is more clumsy than suave. Despite these issues, including a script laden with awkward dialogue and lackluster action, the film benefits from its vibrant Hong Kong setting and the diverse cast members, offering a few moments of enjoyment to break up the tedium.

The Fear (1966)

Ponderous, Overwrought Greek Tragedy

[4/10 · 24 February 2024]

This ponderous Greek melodrama relates the misfortunes of a Greek farm family whose basic unhappiness is unendurably intensified by the misdeeds of the sexually frustrated son. Anestis, who is in his mid-20s and is neurotically driven to voyeurism and then to the grotesque rape of the family's deaf-mute maidservant, whom he afterwards murders. Apart from the unhappily wed parents there is a pretty young sister who is confronted with the tragedy when she returns from boarding school. The contrast between the brother, who is a borderline sociopath, and the very normal sister forms a prolonged tension in the movie's second half, where her marriage, the only happy point of the film, is ultimately juxtaposed with the after effects of the murder. The movie is carefully structured to be hard-hitting but is mostly overwrought melodrama.

There Lived an Old Man and an Old Woman (1965)

Touching, At Times Provocative Russian Family Drama

[8/10 · 23 February 2024]

This touching Russian film tells of an elderly couple whose zest for life allows them to begin anew when their farm burns down. Instead of going to live in comfort with one of their sons, they choose to visit their trouble daughter, Nina. She had married a miner and settled in a hamlet above the Arctic Circle. Upon arrival, the situation they encounter is worse than expected -- Nina has run away with a lover, abandoning her husband and infant. The couple save their son-in-law from alcoholism and and remain on in the frigid climate to care for the household. Conflicts arise when their wayward daughter returns. This at times provocative movie was Russia's entry in the 1965 Cannes Film Festival.

The Vulture (1966)

Oversized, Cackling Vulture Thing Terrorizes Cornwall in Far-Fetched Absurdity

[4/10 · 23 February 2024]

Though it starts in suitably spooky fashion, this British-Canadian co-production soon flounders on its own ineptitude. A mysteriously open grave in a village on the Cornish coast is linked to an old manuscript which describes the corpse as a 16th-century Spaniard buried with a chest of coin and a pet vulture, vowing vengeance on a local family. Then strange things and deaths start to occur among the modern descendants. The husband of a young women in the family has a far-fetched theory that is so absurd to believe in this context, and the acting and dialogue deteriorate with the story. The vulture-thing flies around cackling, which gives you some idea of what passes for scares in this B-movie.

The Cat in the Bag (1964)

Tedious Sketch of Politically Naive Youth in 1960s French Canada

[3/10 · 23 February 2024]

With Jean-Luc Godard as his guide, French-Canadian filmmaker Gilles Groux has put together an improvised, episodic film of a young French-Canadian nationalist in search of himself. He has an affair with a young actress to whom he is drawn because she is Jewish, and he expects her to understand and sympathize with the difficulties of minority groups, but they gradually drift apart. As the movie amounts to a character sketch of a youth who is neither particularly sympathetic or interesting, it soon becomes tedious. Canadian cineastes point to this film as a breakthrough documentary-styled political tract styled after the French New Wave; however, in retrospect the movie is shallow imitation Godard. Viewed under the title CAT IN THE SACK.

Banning (1967)

Well-Made But Banal, Unimpressive

[5/10 · 23 February 2024]

This banal melodrama tees off with Mike Banning (Robert Wagner) hired as assistant golf pro at an exclusive country club in New Mexico. The film swings into a full course of complications, which includes unrequited love, seduction, blackmail, excessive drinking, gambling, adultery, and extortion. The characters and plot are stock soap opera, but the film is well made. The most interesting part involves a playoff of an illegal golf competition called a Calcutta, which Banning organizes to raise money for a blackmail debt he's forced to pay. The locations and upper middle class trappings are authentic enough, and the petty and/or alcoholic clashes among the golfers reveal characters whose lives are essentially barren off the course. The female characters, especially those played by Jill St. John and Anjanette Comer, are ridiculous but decorative, like the bright wallpaper and overdone Sixties hairdos. The dialogue never rises above such bromides as, "Good, you're greedy," "One romantic fantasy, coming up," and "So, you do have an automatic garbage disposal."

Run Like a Thief (1967)

Basis for an Exciting Crime Drama Sunk By Inane Script, Lackluster Direction

[5/10 · 23 February 2024]

A Brazilian diamond robbery masterminded by Keenan Wynn is upset by the untimely appearance of fellow thief Kieron Moore in this routine crime film. After the robbers and guards have shot it out in violent battle, Moore, who has been secretly casing the situation, manages to grab the diamonds and get away undetected. He is, however, the obvious suspect. The remainder of the movie concerns his efforts to get away from both Wynn and the law. Wynn's girl (Ina Balin) is supposed to trick him into giving up the diamonds but instead falls in love with him. Bernard Glassner's workman-like direction sinks what could have been a fairly exciting melodrama. The screenplay doesn't help matters, and includes inane lines like, "It's not unusual to be loved by anyone," "Pet the monkey!" and "Can you suck in your cheekbones like the first picture? I mean the other cheekbones." The decent cast includes Fernando Rey. The photography of the Brazilian hinterlands adds some interest.

Barbara (1970)

Early Adult Film Revels in Pretentious Free Love Twaddle

[3/10 · 11 February 2024]

It's the Year of the Cock, 1969, an opening title card proclaims. Set on Fire Island, New York, free love reigns in BARBARA, as couples disrobe, fornicate, and talk about sex incessantly. This is an early semi-pornographic film shot in a documentary style that is intended to illustrate and explain the sexual revolution and youth rebellion ideologies of the era.

BARBARA attempts to navigate the complexities of coming of age, societal critique, and the pursuit of sexual expression through a myriad of partnerships. A motley crew of young people gathers around Max (Jack Rader), an older island inhabitant who positions himself as a kind of guru of sexual liberation, advocating for a lifestyle of unrestricted sexual encounters as a path to freedom.

The weak narrative weaves through the superficial relationships between Max, his shallow girlfriend Barbara, and a visiting couple, Leslie and Tom, serving primarily as a backdrop for the actors' unabashed nudity and combination of simulated and unsimulated sex. The dialogue, seemingly improvised, is laden with the era's counter-culture clichés, exploring themes of sexual liberation, the intertwining of sex and spirituality, and even touching upon anti-Vietnam War sentiments, all under the guise of expanding the characters' emotional and physical experiences.

Influenced by the French New Wave of the Sixties, BARBARA is stylistically ambitious, employing grainy black-and-white cinematography and occasional inter-titles to convey characters' thoughts or narrative progression, though its artistic endeavors often obscure the on-screen action. The film also draws from the "roughies" genre prevalent in adult cinemas of the 1960s, incorporating elements of non-consensual sex and a suggestion of bestiality.

Released in theaters in August 1970, BARBARA stands among the pioneering films of its time that ventured into the realm of explicit sexual content, alongside early adult films like MONA THE VIRGIN NYMPH and ANDY WARHOL'S BLUE MOVIE. Director Walter Burns sought to advance the cinematic portrayal of sexuality, amalgamating various contemporary themes in an attempt to resonate with the intended audience. However, the film's effort to align with the progressive attitudes of its time ultimately falls short, rendering it pretentious and more superficial than insightful.

Voodoo Heartbeat (1973)

Low-Grade Vampire Opus Has No Pulse

[2/10 · 10 February 2024]

This strange, forgotten exploitation film has surfaced after 60 years under the title THE SEX SERUM OF DR. BLAKE. Dr. Grant (Era Dugo) returns from Africa after "risking his life" to obtain a specimen of the "serum of youth," which he describes as the "most unbelievable chemical formula ever to appear on the face of this Earth." In a lengthy flashback, while in Africa he spied on hooded, torch-bearing "African natives" in furry bikinis wandering around what looks suspiciously like the Nevada desert. These women drop trow at a stage bound altar to have group sex with a dying man before they cut out his heart.

Back in the present, Dr. Grant postulates the serum could be used as a powerful pain killer for wounded soldiers in battle, but admit an human experiment is fraught with risks. "Many men have died in the name of science," is the rationale for proceeding. Before he can find out, Grant is intercepted by spies who kill him, steal the serum, but they in turn die. Abortionist Dr. Blake (Ray Molina) just happens along the scene of the crime and takes the serum home with him and inexplicably injects himself. He visits a girlfriend and grows violent, beating her and drinking her blood. "You've got a phagocytosis of the red cells with the white cells," says another doctor, who diagnoses Dr. Blake with vampirism over the phone, and then proceeds to explain how to be a vampire without realizing he's describing a vampire. Dr. Blake kills a few more people before he is chased down by the police. Needless to say, things end badly for the doctor.

Originally released as VOODOO HEARTBEAT, writer-director Charles Nizet clocks a lot of time with scenes of people eating, the aforementioned African flashback, a three-way sex scene that borders on pornographic, people listening on phone calls with no cutaways and lengthy pauses, a dull boat chase, etc. In other words, despite plenty of incident the movie is drawn out and boring, as well as badly acted by a cast of non-actors.

Thriller: A Cruel Picture (1973)

Doesn't So Much Thrill as Repulse

[5/10 · 10 February 2024]

Originally banned in its home country, Sweden, this is a gut-wrenching rape-revenge melodrama distributed by AIP in the U. S. in 1974, in expurgated form, as THEY CALL HER ONE EYE. The shortened version was widely criticized by the bourgeois press for extreme violence. The uncut version is no less grim, but with the dubious addition of hardcore sex scenes and a more detailed staging of violence.

Frigga (Christina Lindberg), the heroine, is raped as a child, which renders her mute. As a teenager, she lives on a farm with her parents. One day, she misses the bus and gets a ride from Tony, who takes her to his apartment, gets her hooked on heroin, and puts her to work in his whorehouse. At first, Frigga refuses to work, so Tony holds her down and cuts her eye out with a scalpel. A letter he sends to Frigga's parents drives them to suicide. Devastated and now sporting an eye-patch, Frigga spends her off hours in karate, firearms, hand-to-hand combat, and racing lessons. Armed with a sawed-off shotgun and other weapons, she kills those who abused her, and beats up two cops

As one can gather from this synopsis, THRILLER doesn't so much thrill as repulse. The film's subtitle, "A Cruel Picture," is most appropriate. Writer-director Vibelius creates an intense atmosphere in early scenes and the ending. The elongated middle section -- of Frigga's victimization and her training for revenge -- is less accomplished, with Vibelius occasionally interrupting rude sex and subjugation scenes with Bergman-esque monologues and overstated closeups of actress Christina Lindberg.

The Sinister Monk (1965)

Fast-Paced Krimi is Mildly Entertaining

[7/10 · 10 February 2024]

Immediately before his death, the wealthy patriarch of the Darkwood Manor modifies his will, leaving his entire fortune to his granddaughter Gwendoline (Karin Dor). This upsets the plans of the dead man's greedy relatives, which includes Patricia (Ilse Steppat), who needs the money to finance the girl's school she operates at the manor, brother Richard (Siegfried Lowitz), and her son William (Dieter Eppler). William is the kind of fellow you wouldn't want anywhere near your daughter, and Richard doesn't balk at killing the family lawyer by forcing his car off the road, and stealing the will.

Into this den of malefactors comes Gwendoline, unaware of the events swirling around her. The malice continues: A student is murdered; a mysterious monk stalks the manor, strangling people with a whip; and Gwendoline is sexually harassed by William, whose earlier murder of a school girl was hushed-up by the family. Mr. Short, an oddball character sequestered in the manor's attic, raises carrier pigeons and has made plaster life masks of locals who recently died.

Scotland Yard inspector Bratt (Harald Leipnitz) attempts to clarify the mystery when the monk kills one of his men. After some school girls disappear without trace, he tracks one of Mr. Short's pigeons and discovers a ring of white slave traders, led by the monk. Gwendoline is abducted and brought to Richard, who explains the history of her grandfather's will and attempts to blackmail her. He is interrupted and strangled by the monk, who then dies from his wounds. Bratt arrives too late to do anything other than reveal the monk's identity.

Filmed as part of the Edgar Wallace series of krimis produced by Berlin's Rialto Films, this mildly entertaining thriller was the last black-and-white film of the successful crime series. It was very successful during its initial release, and holds up well more than 30 years later.

Director Harald Reinl, then husband of the film's star Karin Dor, moves things at a fast pace. Though it's not too difficult to guess which character plays the monk, there are numerous red herrings and distractions, and THE SINISTER MONK boasts a high body count overall. The film's "deadly accoutrements" include the whip, which is modified to break one's neck in an instant, and a water pistol that fires sulfuric acid.

The movie is an adaptation of Edgar Wallace's novel "The Terror," which had previously been offered as a stage play in London in the 1920s, followed by three forgotten film versions in 1928, 1934 (as RETURN OF THE TERROR), and 1938. THE SINISTER MONK was itself remade two years later, as DER MÖNCH MIT DER PEITSCHE (1967), directed by Alfred Vohrer.

Blood Tracks (1985)

Swedish Slasher Movie is Diverting Enough

[6/10 · 10 February 2024]

In the snowy hinterlands of what is presumably the U. S. Rocky Mountains (but is in reality Sweden), a drunken father bullishly intimidates and threatens his wife and children. The wife retaliates by knifing and leaving him with the kids in tow. Many years later, a film crew looking for an atmospheric location stumbles upon an abandoned factory, which is the hidden home for the wife and children, now living like wild animals, with scabby, yellow faces and bug eyes.

The film crew includes a real-life heavy metal rock band, Easy Action, brought on location with a group of models to shoot a music video. When an avalanche isolates the crew from civilization, the scary-looking family in the factory goes on the hunt.

For a simple stalk-'n-slash type gore movie, BLOOD TRACKS is pretty good. In 1985, it probably stood out amid the FRIDAY THE 13TH clones that proliferated. Though BLOOD TRACKS resembles THE HILLS HAVE EYES and DEATHLINE, in this case the social-outcast mutants are not cannibalistic but kill only to keep knowledge of their existence a secret. At least that's how it seems at first.

The makers of BLOOD TRACKS tried to make each successive murder sequence more elaborate and horrible than the last, so in the end whatever sympathy one has for the outcast family is long gone. The film crew members are not just killed, they are dismembered or burned alive in sophisticated traps. The murderous family acts so witless and undisciplined, though, these spectacles seem far beyond their abilities.

Despite the large number of inconsistencies and coincidences that pile up by the movie's end, BLOOD TRACKS is diverting enough to deserve a slightly dismembered thumbs-up.

The Devil with Seven Faces (1971)

Series of False Scares and Woman-in-Peril Cliches Makes a Suspense Film, Not

[4/10 · 10 February 2024]

Julie Harrison (Carroll Baker) leaves a dinner party alone and notices someone is following her. She runs to unlock her car's door, panics, and goes to the nearest house. The person chasing her catches up . . . It's merely a photographer, who snaps a few pictures. Julie faints. The next false scare involves a man dressed in a gorilla suit, who scares Julie at her office.

THE DEVIL WITH SEVEN FACES doesn't quite live up to the promise of these scenes, which are unrelated to the rest of the movie. The story proper, set in Amsterdam, has Julie visit a friend, attorney Dave Barton (Stephen Boyd), to ask him to protect her from people she thinks are spying on her. Then Barton's race-car driver buddy Tony (George Hilton) saves Julie from being kidnapped. Julie's twin sister, Mary lives in London and is apparently a target of gangsters looking for a stolen $1 million diamond.

The remainder of the movie is a cat-and-mouse game between Julie and the gangsters, with Barton and Tony rescuing her from time to time. The title apparently refers to the diamond. It's one of those movies in which most of the characters double-cross one another.

Thankfully, the acting is a little better than most time-wasters of this type. Baker is good at playing the kind of character she perfected in similar melodramas, such as PARANOIA (1969). In THE DEVIL WITH SEVEN FACES, she is (for once) photographed well and looks great in a short blonde wig. Lucretia Love, a mainstay in 1970s Italian genre movies, plays Barton's secretary. She also looks great in a wig (red). A subplot focuses on her attempts to romance Barton, but all the men in the story are smitten by Julie.

It's all slow going and kind of unexciting, except for a hilarious car chase, in which the camera under-cranks so badly the scene looks like stop-motion animation. The final revelation of who's who is also mildly amusing. The rest is forgettable.

Kiss of the Tarantula (1975)

A Supreme Gross-Out For Spider Haters; For the Rest of Us It's Tame

[4/10 · 10 February 2024]

KISS OF THE TARANTULA, filmed in ten days in Columbus, Georgia, followed invisibly in the wake of WILLARD, substituting spiders for rats.

Susan (Suzanna Ling), who as a little girl unleashed a deadly pet spider on her vain mother, lives a sequestered life with her mortician father. She thwarts three teenage hoodlums who attempt to steal a casket from her father's basement workshop; they terrorize her a bit and kill some of her spiders. In response, she tracks them down and lets the furry eight-leggers loose on them, gradually feeling less guilty with each killing. One victim is trapped in an air duct with a dozen creepy bugs marching toward him.

KISS OF THE TARANTULA is a supreme gross-out for spider-haters, though for the rest of us the action will seem tame. Though mostly undistinguished, the movie contain an alarming bit of typecasting for actor Eric Mason, who believably portrays Susan's sleazy, serpentine uncle. In the end, the uncle is rewarded for his lewd behavior in a buried-alive scene that is much scarier than any of the spider sequences.

Lemora: A Child's Tale of the Supernatural (1973)

Atmospheric But Tedious Scary Story as Told by a Child

[7/10 · 10 February 2024]

Alvin Lee (William Whitton) is a notorious 1930s gangster first seen kicking down doors and shotgunning people in their beds. During his flight from the law, he takes the wrong road and finds himself in Asteroth, a netherworld kind of place populated with diseased, monstrous people and presided over by the mysterious Lemora.

Lemora is also glimpsed sitting among an all-female congregation in a church, gathered to listen to fire-and-brimstone admonitions by a preacher (played by director Richard Blackburn) and the angelic singing of Lila Lee (Cheryl Smith), daughter of the aforementioned gangster. Lila Lee receives a heartfelt letter explaining her father is dying and wants to see her one last time. She boards a rickety bus for Asteroth. The animal-like denizens of Asteroth attack the bus, drag off its driver, and somehow Lila Lee pilots it to Lemora's creepy mansion. She discovers her father has turned into a monster, and he chases her around the mansion. Lemora is revealed to be a vampire who preys on children.

LEMORA, which is subtitled "a child's tale of the supernatural," fulfills its promises to show spooky events through the eyes of a child. And several horror movie guides have commented on this obscure flick, calling it a gem and worth catching. I thought there were a couple of spooky moments, and Lila Lee's night-time bus ride through the swmpy forest is a highlight. But the rest of it struck me as tedious and confusing, sort of like what it would really be like to listen to an over-imaginative child tell a scary story.

The Mad Love Life of a Hot Vampire (1971)

Las Vegas Vampire Flick That Defies Rational Explanation

[3/10 · 10 February 2024]

The wife of Count Dracula narrates this amateur movie created by Las Vegas-based filmmaker Ray Dennis Steckler (credited here as Sven Christian). As she explains, "The film you are about to see took place a very short time ago." Slapstick humor punctuates the scenario, which has Dracula sending three vampire girls into Vegas night life to have sex with men and collect their "vile red blood."

Meanwhile, Dr. Van Helsing (played by a pot-bellied buffoon with a Southern twang) helps his friend Bill find the cause of his sister's mysterious death, in which her blood was drained. In the process, he and Bill (who wears a shiny gold polyester shirt) discover Dracula's hide-out.

That's the plot, but some of this movie defies rational description. In place of the film director's credit, there appears a title card that reads, "suck". After the count is killed, his spastic hunchback assistant cries and uses the vampire's cloak to blow his nose, as well as give the audience the finger. Three prolonged hardcore sex scenes interrupt what there is of a story line. One features a vampire girl who takes great pleasure in slapping her lover and pulling on his leg hairs and really hurting him, which only seems to excite him more.

Jim Parker, who plays Dracula in a wildly exaggerated, circus-barker style, constantly looks at the camera and improvises lines like, "You must immediately bend over, forward and backward....all of you, you're entire....parts....of your body ....make ....love! LOVE! Do it!" Apropos of the film's ridiculous tone, some of the actors are unable to keep straight faces.

Frankenstein's Bloody Terror (1968)

Overproduced Spanish Mix of Werewolf and Vampire Cliches

[4/10 · 10 February 2024]

At a costume party, Rudolph Weissman (Manuel Manzaneque) dances with Countess Janice von Aarenberg (Dianik Zurakowska). A mystery man in a red costume arrives and sweeps the Countess off her feet, much to Rudolph's dismay. The man in red, Waldemar Daninsky (Paul Naschy), is an outcast, being related to Irme Wolfstein, a werewolf who rests eternal in a crypt, impaled on a silver cross.

A gypsy woman (Rosanna Yanni) steals the cross and the werewolf is unleashed. Before he and Rudolph kill the beast, Waldemar is bitten and sure enough during the full moon he transforms into a wolf man. The Countess -- who has fallen in love with Waldemar -- and Rudolph intervene. They chain Waldemar against a wall in the decrepit Wolfstein mansion.

In this film, lycantropy is treated as an incurable disease. Despite this, Rudy and the Countess hire a doctor to cure Waldemar. However, the doctor and his wife are vampires who enslave them! There are soap-opera horror cliches on a large scale. This is also the movie that, for better or worse, kicked off actor-writer Paul Naschy's reign as the king of 1970s Spanish horror. In Europe, it was treated as a true "roadshow" event, filmed in 70mm, stereo sound, and 3-D.

In the U. S., it was released under the title FRANKENSTEIN'S BLOODY TERROR, shorn of its first reel, and became an instant obscurity. Paul Naschy fans claim it's a cult classic, but only handful of people even remember this very seriously-played, pallid reinvention of cliches from old Universal monster movies.

Naschy's interpretation of the wolfman character has its moments, but he borrows heavily from Lon Chaney Jr. And the original WOLF MAN (1941). On the other hand, the art direction is excellent, the acting is above the norm, and there's one outstanding sequence in which the doctor and the vampirized Countess escape from the wolfman by ballet-dancing across the fog-shrouded hills of Madrid.

Night of the Witches (1970)

Unfunny Comedy that Also Tries to Be a Horror Movie

[2/10 · 10 February 2024]

Sporting a movie-western badman's black hat, a Bible-beating preacher (Keith Erik Burt, a.k.a. The movie's director, Keith Larsen) interrupts a fisherman and his girlfriend during their ocean-side picnic. After instructing the boyfriend to catch another fish for him, the preacher seduces the girl and steals their jalopy. A pair of cops chase the preacher, who eludes them in a dirt-and-mud town. In his flight, the preacher stumbles upon a house of vaguely Satanic witches, led by the astrology-spouting Cassandra (Kathryn Loder).

In a concurrent development, a real estate salesman named Frank (Ron Taft) investigates the disappearance of his middle-aged boss, who earlier had infiltrated the witches' domain and was last seen as a willing participant in one of their demonic dance parties.

Frank and the preacher arrive at Cassandra's abode around the same time. Frank falls in love with one of Cassandra's dippy followers and ends up protecting the witches from the encroaching police. The preacher attempts to blackmail the witches, which as you might guess is a mistake.

A frequent denizen of the late-late-late show during the early years of Turner Broadcasting's Superstation, NIGHT OF THE WITCHES is an unfunny comedy that also tries to be a horror movie and a mild sex romp. In its favor, NIGHT OF THE WITCHES is ripe with snatches of psychedelic hippie dialog, a baffling mixture of sets and costumes from different eras (from the Old West to modern-day gangsters), and a car-chase first, in which a Model T outruns a big General Motors V-8 sedan.

Psycho Girls (1986)

Disturbing and Brutal But Trivial Maniac Revenge Opus

[5/10 · 10 February 2024]

Long-suppressed in the United States, PSYCHO GIRLS deserves some recognition as one of the more brutal films I've seen. In 1966, a young girl poisons her parents after giving them a greeting card covered with happy valentine's hearts. Years later, Victoria (Agi Gallus), works as a housekeeper and cook for the Fosters, (John Haslett Cutt and Rose Graham), a wealthy city couple. Her sister, Sarah (Darlene Mignacco), phones to tell her she has been released from the Lakeview mental hospital. Even though Victoria was the one who killed the parents, Sarah was incarcerated.

Victoria agrees to meet Sarah at the long-shuttered sanitarium. However, Sarah, now completely insane and vengeful, kills her sister and journeys to the Fosters home, where she assumes the role of cook. The Fosters are thrilled -- to them, Victoria deserted them on the eve of a big dinner party. Sarah cooks and serves her sister as the main course, drugs the Fosters and their bourgeois guests (which includes a pompous psychologist), ties them up and takes them to Lakeview hospital, where she plans to murder them. Sarah joins with two henchmen, who crack jokes as they stab, impale, electrocute, slice, and pull out the toenails of their victims.

PSYCHO GIRLS is leaden at first, with campy scenes that tease the viewer about where the story is going. For example, there's a slapstick sex scene that turns incredibly violent, and the opening murder scene provides a bit of "arsenic and old lace"-style humor. The black humor extends into the concluding massacre sequence, but the film works better as an attack on Reagan-era affluence and questions the usefulness of psychology to cure maniacs.

A systematic put-down of the latter subject forms the movie's main theme -- in the opening sequence (Victoria convinces Sarah's doctor to keep her in the hospital indefinitely); the Foster's dinner scene, which features an extended philosophical debate on science versus the soul; and the massacre sequence, in which Sarah sarcastically interviews and then murders the psychologist. In Ciccoritti's vision, it doesn't pay to be a mental health professional (two of them are killed here).

Despite some disturbing violence, PSYCHO GIRLS pulls some punches. As we learn of the injustices heaped upon Sarah, we are expected to side with her because the Fosters are pompous and vain. Yet, when Sarah kicks off her gory retribution, she becomes a wide-eyed monstrosity. Ciccoritti apparently doesn't want us to identify with any of the characters, and puts us off by having them recite lengthy diatribes that inexorably lead back to Freud, the nature of the human brain, or mental health.

Ciccoritti employs numerous Brechtian devices to keep us emotionally distant. For instance, every so often a narrator intrudes on the action; and the actors playing Sarah's henchmen are instructed to act giggly-mad, their wacky behavior adding a cartoonish spin on the death scenes. The Grand Guignol finale, presided over by Sarah in a fright wig and carried out in front of a shrine containing a large photo of Freud, documents the characters' protracted death throes through further Brechtian applications, such as a distorted lens, whirling camera angles, and staging that approximates a theatrical play. Although these scenes are pushed at us as The Ultimate Horror, we aren't allowed to identify with the characters enough so as to care.

The Multivision release of PSYCHO GIRLS reviewed here, an Italian-language video, is probably the most complete version around. The MGM video release is missing almost all of the violent scenes and seriously hurting the film's impact.

The Witchmaker (1969)

Slow Moving Florida Witch Movie Offers a Few Good Ideas

[6/10 · 10 February 2024]

A pretty girl swims in a dirty-looking Louisiana swamp. Her fun is spoiled by Luther (John Lodge), a murderous warlock with bushy eyebrows. He attacks her, strings up her naked corpse, slashes her throat with a knife, and collects her blood in an urn.

THE WITCHMAKER places psychic researcher Dr. Hayes (Alvy Moore, of GREEN ACRES fame), a handful of his students, and magazine reporter Vic (Anthony Eisley) in Luther's swampy homeland, just as a new spate of killings terrorizes the area. One of Hayes' charges, Tasha (Thordis Brandt), is soon Luther's target -- he wants her to join his witch's coven.

Hayes and Vic argue a lot. The latter makes some good points; namely, how could Hayes justify risking the lives of his students by entering the swamp? When this happens, Hayes constantly reminds Vic who's in charge. However, one by one the students turn up dead, fodder for Luther's blood ceremony. During a fire-and-brimstone ceremonies, Luther conjures a female witch with the power to manipulate Tasha telepathically, forcing her to commit crimes. Other witches and warlocks are brought into the proceedings, resulting in a few mild PG-rated orgies and bacchanals.

Interesting ideas pop up here and there. For instance, in a unique turn the script explains mysticism and witchcraft in scientific terms. The witch ceremonies are staged with an unusually authentic eye for detail. The death scenes of some major characters are also a big surprise.

Mediating against these elements: A gimmick in which a person who wears a garlic wreath is invisible to witches, and terrible electronic "spooky music." score. Hayes and Vic spend a lot of time with their hands in their pockets, theorizing about what might be going on around them. In the unexpectedly exciting finale, our heroes ruin the witches blood ceremony. THE WITCHMAKER is different and interesting in spots, but the pace is slow.

Producers L. Q. Jones and Alvy Moore followed THE WITCHMAKER with two outstanding and strange efforts, BROTHERHOOD OF SATAN (1971) and A BOY AND HIS DOG (1975). In interviews, Jones has dismissed THE WITCHMAKER somewhat, implying the results were interesting but disappointing. By and large, his script is more intelligent than I expected. Technically, though, THE WITCHMAKER suffers from B-movie acting.

On the lighter side, some scenes are infected by a serious love of caffeine. Everyone drinks a lot of coffee, or responds to danger and death by desiring more cups of coffee. The more Hayes and Vic drink it, the more bizarre the dialog becomes:

HAYES: I think our friend Luther is a berserk.

VIC: A berserk? Since when is berserk a noun?

HAYES: Not for hundreds of years.

In addition, a lot of effort was made to keep THE WITCHMAKER away from an R rating, as in one amusing scene meant to be played topless, in which actress Thordis Brandt is directed to run across deserted terrain, awkwardly covering her breasts with her hands.

Completists will note Luther's orgiastic coven includes Sue Bernard, who played the bikini-clad bimbo in Russ Meyer's FASTER PUSSYCAT, KILL! KILL!, and some may recognize the belly dancer as Diane Webber, a former Playboy bunny and the lead in John Lamb's MERMAID OF TIBURON. And Warrene Ott, here playing the leader of the blood ceremony who is splashed with pig's blood in a shocking moment, was the heroine in THE UNDERTAKER AND HIS PALS, an early gore movie.