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A Jess Franco poster I hadn't seen before.
But what film is it promoting?!
But what film is it promoting?!
BEFORE OCT 1, 2011.
21 September, 2011
14 September, 2011
From Albert Zugsmith to Jess Franco
Thanks to Robert Guest for assisting me in finally catching up with Albert Zugsmith's legendary 1962 fever dream, CONFESSIONS OF AN OPIUM EATER. This delirious mixture of slave girls in peril tropes, B movie surrealism, Tong war action and Allied Artists eroticism is presided over by a black clad Vincent Price as a relative of Thomas De Quincey, who wrote the book upon which this is supposedly based. I haven't read it but I did note that Robert Eisen is listed one of the editors. The name rang a bell and I realized that Eisen aka Robert S. Eisen is also credited as "Post Production Supervisor" of two Jess Franco-Harry Alan Towers productions, ISLAND OF DESPAIR aka 99 WOMEN (1969) and VENUS IN FURS (1970). Both films have some interesting similarities of the Zugsmith movie, especially the extended nightmare format of VENUS IN FURS, which like CONFESSIONS... features a befuddled protagonist (James Darren) wandering around in slow motion through a fragmented scenario.
Both 99 WOMEN and VENUS IN FURS appeared in America in versions fashioned for the culture of their time, the narration in VENUS is especially of its era and is charmingly dated. The director speaks of his reservations about the final cut in the Blue Underground VENUS IN FURS DVD interview with him included as an extras. It would be interesting to know Eisen's exact contribution.
Eisen also is credited as editor on INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and THE BIG COMBO, two of my favorite 1950s genre pieces, along with many other interesting films.
An interesting double bill!
01 September, 2011
LA COMTESSE PERVERSE & PLAISIR A TROIS RESTORED!
www.thelatarniaforums.yuku.com
LA COMTESSE PERVERSE & PLAISIR A TROIS restored at last!!!
[Go to The Franco Lounge for further details]
Thanks to Alain Petit for posting on The Franco Lounge at THE LATARNIA FORUMS the wonderful and long awaited news that LA COMTESSE PERVERSE and PLAISIR A TROIS, two of Jess Franco's most visually striking films, have been restored for their original negative materials. These tart black comedies were made back to back in 1973. LA COMTESSE ... has the distinction of being the first French cannibal film and PLAISIR... is one of the director's better adaptations of Sade. Both films are composed in a Cubist aesthetic reflected in the architecture of Ricardo Bofill (note the castle in the cap below) and the use of extreme wide-angle lenses.
Rader Zaroff (Howard Vernon) signals that it's dinner time on Cannibal Island!
LA COMTESSE PERVERSE & PLAISIR A TROIS restored at last!!!
[Go to The Franco Lounge for further details]
Thanks to Alain Petit for posting on The Franco Lounge at THE LATARNIA FORUMS the wonderful and long awaited news that LA COMTESSE PERVERSE and PLAISIR A TROIS, two of Jess Franco's most visually striking films, have been restored for their original negative materials. These tart black comedies were made back to back in 1973. LA COMTESSE ... has the distinction of being the first French cannibal film and PLAISIR... is one of the director's better adaptations of Sade. Both films are composed in a Cubist aesthetic reflected in the architecture of Ricardo Bofill (note the castle in the cap below) and the use of extreme wide-angle lenses.
The restoration was made by Stephane Derderian under the guidance of Alain, the noted film historian (THE MANACOA FILES), Jess Franco actor (THE MIDNIGHT PARTY, TENDER FLESH) and screenwriter. Alain wrote the script for PLAISIR... and was there as Franco was editing both films so he made sure these are the original versions as the director intended. They are presented in their OAR of 1.33:1.
I'm reposting Alain's original post below from THE FRANCO LOUNGE to help spread the good news. Thanks to Stephane, Alain and all involved as well as THE LATARNIA FORUMS for continuing to be a go-to place for Jess Franco news. I'll be adding some caps posted by Frederick Durand asap.
Hopefully these will be picked up by a reliable DVD company who can give them superior presentations with language options and All Region capability. I also hope that Alain, Jess and Lina Romay, who is featured in both films, can be gathered together to do a commentary track.
22 August, 2011
ALFRED BAILLOU Image Gallery
Noted the diminutive, magical, joyous presence of the late, great Alfred Baillou (PLAISIR A TROIS; LES CHATOUILLEUSES) appearance as one of the tableaux figures in the Raoul Ruiz masterful meditation on representation and Art Criticism, THE HYPOTHESIS OF A STOLEN PAINTING (1978). Termed an "intellectual thriller" this experimental 63 minute film was shot by the great Sacha Vierney (Belle De Jour) in exquisite, evanescent Black & White. Based on a novel by Pierre Klossowski, who also cowrote the script.
Templar tableau in THE HYPOTHESIS OF THE STOLEN PAINTING
Alfred Baillou
There are a number of interesting parallels and connections between the careers of the recently deceased Ruiz and Jess Franco which I'll be examining here and on www.cinemadrome.yuku.com on the Raoul Ruiz thread theres.http://www.cinemadrome.yuku.com/
Baillou was in over 40 films and his career from the 1940s to the 1980s.
13 August, 2011
Franco's 80s actors: DANIEL KATZ
It was through Carmen Carrión, his partner at the time, that this Argentinean actor gained access to Franco’s cinema. If not much of an actor, at least he looked good, what with his gaunt face, long jaw, high forehead and green eyes – occasionally and perhaps significantly seen in tight close-up.
Katz’s placement in Franco’s casts was changeable, ranging from minor roles to prominent supporting ones, especially villains, for whom his appearance seemed particularly suited. On the odd occasion, as in Mil sexos tiene la noche (1984), he would be entrusted with the male lead, apparently on account of Antonio Mayans’s inability at the moment to leave Madrid and accompany Franco to the director’s favoured Andalusian or Canarian locations. It makes sense, in this respect, that he should sometimes be dubbed by Mayans.
Katz remained with Franco for long, sometimes performing other duties than that of performer. In the 1989 La bahía esmeralda, he is billed as actor (in which capacity I have not been able to recognise him there) and also credited with the wardrobe; some time later, in 1994, he acted in Downtown Heat (1994), as well as being placed in charge of the art direction.
Sangre en mis zapatos (1983)
La tumba de los muertos vivientes (1983)
El tesoro de la diosa blanca (1983)
Historia sexual de O (1984)
Mil sexos tiene la noche (1984)
Dark Mission: Flowers of Evil (1988)
Downtown Heat (1994)
On only one occasion, Katz took leave of his association with Franco. He can be seen as the sinister gardener in José Ramón Larraz’s Rest in Pieces (1987)
Daniel Katz in Larraz’s Rest in Pieces
Text by Nzoog Wahrlfhehen
20 July, 2011
Franco's Spanish voices: MATILDE CONESA
The beginning of yet another new series! Now, I know you guys have mostly heard Franco movies dubbed into English, but recent DVD releases in the Anglophone world, regardless of region, either contain a Spanish option or, whenever an English-language soundtrack was unavailable, just the Spanish soundtrack, duly subtitled. In other words, many of you have been exposed to the vocal efforts of vintage Spanish dubbing actors.
Now, some background explanation may be necessary for the present series. Until quite recently, Spanish films, like their Italian counterpart, have been shot MOS (without sound) and then had a soundtrack added later on in a sound studio – indeed, only in the mid-eighties did the use of direct sound start to attain a certain regularity until evolving towards its dominance in the present day, when it has finally become the rule rather than the exception. Back in the days of post-synched Spanish soundtracks, the performers heard were sometimes the same as those seen onscreen, sometimes not. There were various reasons for two actors being used for the same role: the onscreen player not knowing Spanish or speaking the language with an accent; the actor in question having limited vocal skills; a lack of ease with the dubbing process (which even afflicted experienced stage performers); just plain unavailability… Only the latter would explain that even some career dubbers, whenever given visual roles, would find themselves with somebody else’s voice in the final film.
Jess Franco’s Spanish films were almost invariably sound recorded in Madrid: some rare exceptions include Lucky, el intrépido and The Castle of Fu Manchu, both given sound in Barcelona. Among the sound studios employed for Franco’s films we find Magna, Roma, Cinearte, Exa, more rarely Sincronía or Sago-Exa, but most commonly, especially with the passing years, the now-defunct Arcofón.
And now to the artiste of this entry, the still-active Matilde Conesa Valls, born in Madrid on 13 April 1928.A leading radio actress from 1947, she took up dubbing in 1951 and became identified, by dint of her deep voice, with strong, domineering actresses, most notably Bette Davis, but also Lauren Bacall and Anne Bancroft, not to mention Jane Wyman in the TV series Falcon Crest, Stella Stevens in Flamingo Road and Nancy Marchand’s Livia Soprano in The Sopranos. It seems inevitable that, in the context of Franco movies, she should voice prison governors in WIP flicks. Outside Franco, she also supplied the voice of the mother in Miguel Madrid’s Necrophagus (1971) and that of Paul Naschy’s formidable wife in The Devil’s Possessed. What follows is a gallery, probably incomplete, of her Franco roles.
Rosanna Yanni in Kiss Me, Monster (1969)
Rosanna Yanni in Two Undercover Angels (1969)
Mercedes McCambridge in 99 Women (1969)
Beni Cardoso in La venganza del doctor Mabuse (1972)
Rosa Palomares in Devil’s Island Lovers (1972)
Yelena Samarina in Night of the Skull (1973)
France Nicolas in El sádico de Notre Dame (1979)
Ajita Wilson in Sadomania (1981)
Sample of Matilde Conesa’s voice, dubbing Rosanna Yanni in Kiss Me, Monster:
http://www.4shared.com/audio/uiDUGHXn/besame-yanni.html?
Sample of Matilde Conesa’s voice, dubbing Rosa Palomares in Devil’s Island Lovers:
http://www.4shared.com/audio/P0qgJINE/amantesdiablo-conesa.html?
Other, non-Franco vocal roles essayed by Ms. Conesa for Spanish soundtracks include that of Jeannine Mestre in Grau’s No profanar el sueño de los muertos, Miriam Karlin's Catwoman in A Clockwork Orange, Maria Pia Conte in Merino’s Orgía de los muertos, María Kosty in Night of the Seagulls, Shelley Winters in Tentacles, the medium in Fulci’s Paura nella città dei morti viventi, Mary Freudstein at the end of the same director’s House by the Cemetery, Louise Fletcher in Flowers in the Attic and the character of Mrs. Fortune in Piquer Simón’s Slugs. In addition, she has often been heard in TV redubs of old films: Joan Crawford in Johnny Guitar, Jacqueline Pierreux in Black Sabbath, Maria Ouspenskaya in Universal horror movies, Margaret Rutherford in Blithe Spirit…
A very young Matilde Conesa (right), with Rafael Rivelles and Julia Lajos in Rafael Gil’s version of Don Quijote de la Mancha (1947).
Link to a partial list of Conesa’s films as a voice actress:
http://www.eldoblaje.com/datos/FichaActorDoblaje.asp?id=240
Text by Nzoog Wahrlfhehen
Franco's 80s actors: ALBINO GRAZIANI
Franco’s apparent fondness for shooting on location in the Canary Islands (usually Gran Canaria) inevitably brought him in contact with local talent, including Albino Graziani, whose craggy face (sometimes with, sometimes without a scraggly beard) obviously appealed to the director. His film experience at the time seems to have been confined to appearing in a little-known German film called Alcaptar (1978).
At the very beginning of his Franco filmography, in 1980, Graziani was offered the sole sympathetic male part in Sinfonía erotica, as well as a tough-guy coin-juggling act (inspired by George Raft?) in Ópalo de fuego. Other roles: the professor in Oasis of the Zombies (1981), the dying general in La noche de los sexos abiertos and the eccentric hotel waiter in Mansion of the Living Dead. In the latter role, he is clearly dubbed by Jess Franco himself, affecting a Canarian accent.
Sinfonía erotica (1980)
Two Female Spies with Flowered Panties (1980)
Pick-Up Girls (1981)
La noche de los sexos abiertos (1983)
El tesoro de la diosa blanca (1983)
Mil sexos tiene la noche (1984)
Mansion of the Living Dead (1985)
A link to Graziani’s imdb entry:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0337167/
09 July, 2011
07 July, 2011
Franco's occasional actors: ELENA MARÍA TEJEIRO
Remember Jess Franco as the fey witness in El siniestro Doctor Orloff (1984)? Well, this very same role had been played by a woman in the same film’s prototype of over two decades earlier, The Awful Dr. Orloff (1961) The woman in question was María Elena Mellado del Hoyo, better known as Elena María Tejeiro, basically a TV and theatre actress.
Born in Murcia on 25 October 1939, she was among the very first actresses to appear on Spanish TV and in was a prominent actress in the sixties, as well as the recipient of three acting awards. The noted film directors she worked for include Fernán-Gómez, José Luis Sáenz de Heredia and Roberto Bodegas, not to mention Antoni Ribas, whose first wife she was. Ribas, in fact, was to direct her in the comedy-drama De picos pardos a la ciudad (1969, see cap below), produced by Ignacio F. Iquino, but he soon left the project and Iquino himself took over as director, showing as much of Tejeiro’s anatomy as was possible in a Spanish film of the time.
For the purposes of the present blog, it is worth noting that in 1975 , Tejeiro starred in a TV sitcom called Pili, secretaria ideal, alongside José María Prada (who was Palafox in Franco’s Night of the Blood Monster of 1969) and Venancio Muro (Janot “The Tanker” in, once again, The Awful Dr. Orloff).
Elena María Tejeiro’s TV and film work dwindled progressively in the eighties. Her last recorded appearance seems to have been her brief role in Pedro Costa Musté political thriller Redondela (1987), from which the image below is taken.
Text by Nzoog Wahrlfhehen
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