26 February, 2024

DRACULA, PRISONER OF FRANKENSTEIN (Jess Franco 1972) Severin Films Blu-ray Review.

DRACULA, PRISONER OF FRANKENSTEIN is 100 proof Jess Franco. It unfolds at a rapid clip thrusting the viewer into a magical dimension of Franco's creation, somewhere between a fumetti and a Gothic cartoon. The plo,t is a highly compressed fantasia of the Universal Pictures horror classics DRACULA and FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN, only shot in lurid color on a dollar store budget. Filmed in 1971, along with at least 5 other films, it attempts to cram as many classic monsters as possible into a hectic mise-en-scene. The paucity of dialoge (there isn't any for the film's first quarter hour), the rumbling Bruno Nicholai score imported from Franco's previous EL CONDE DRACULA and JUSTINE, the proliferation of zoom shots from the very first image onward, all combine to creater an overwhelmingly onieric atmosphere. Dr. Seward (Alberto Dalbes) stakes the sleeping Dracula (Sartana in the German version) turning the Count into a dead bat. Dr. Frankenstein (Dennis Price) appears with his assistant Morpho (Spaghetti Western regular Luis Barboo), revives Dracula to his original form, and also recharges the dormant Frankenstein monster. There's also a vampire woman (Britt Nichols) and a werewolf (Brandy, who would stunt double for Paul Naschy's werewolf character in THE WEREWOLF AND THE YETI) who join in the final monster bash. Dr. Seward races to Castle Dracula to stop Dr. Frankenstein's mad plan of world domination via classic monsters. The final fight between the Frankenstein monster and the wolfman owes a lot to Universal's FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN. Part of the magic of Franco's treatment of these cine-mythologies is that he adds such surreal touches as having his 19th Century villains drive around in 1970 model hearses and sedans, something that the Universal and Hammer studios would never allow. Howard Vernon's Dracula may be a long way from the the Bela Lugosi and Christoper Lee incarnations of the character and would return in the more conventional follow up, LA FILLE DE DRACULA (1972). DRACULA, PRISONER OF FRANKENSTEIN is purely Jess Franco's unapologetic take on the iconic characters. Fernando Bilbao's silver skinned Frankenstein monster would return in the outrageous 1972 EROTIC RITES OF FRANKENSTEIN.
The 2006 IMAGE DVD of Franco's minimalist monster-rally DRACULA CONTRA FRANKENSTEIN (onscreen title) was a disappointment. This no-budget 1972 French Spanish coprodcution was one of Franco's personal favorites and, depending on your critical perspective, a film you'll either embrace or be sorely disappointed with. Just compare it to his EL CONDE DRACULA, made for Harry Alan Towers with Christopher Lee in the title role, and notice the difference in treatment. Of course this isn't at adapting Bram Stoker's "Dracula", it's Franco's termite version of Universal's HOUSE OF DRACULA (1945), only in color and scope. And that's where this DVD fails both the film and the viewer. The image is consistently soft throughout, the colors murky and it's all misframed at 1.85:1. The PAL 2003 Divisa DVD is also misframed with similar color and sharpness issues. One advantage of the Divisa release is that it's the only home video release so far to include an opening text, credited to "David Klunne" (another Franco beard), which recontextualizes the monster tale into Franco's own arcane personal dimension. Franco told me when I interviewed him in 2005* that he shot this film in Techniscope to achieve a multiplane perspective, he wanted the right, left and center fields to be of equal importance and to have a flow of action within and across each area. This strategy, along with an agressive use of the telezoom, ONLY works when the film is seen in its correct 2.35:1 Techniscope ratio. Seen fullscreen or partially letterboxed it looks clumsy and compositionally confusing. And it's not. It's one of his most carefully composed and visually experimental works. Once again, comic book panels were a major inspiration while Bruno Nicolai's score (recycled from EL CONDE DRACULA-1970) along with use of animal noises (cf Luis Bunuel's THE MILKY WAY-1969) are used as much as possible to replace exposity dialogue with a completely stylized sound environment. Franco's comments were very specific, "for some films, like DRACULA CONTRA FRANKENSTEIN, I preferred Techniscope. I liked it because it literally gave you more 'scope', you can show more of the castles, the landscapes. It can be beautiful and gives a mysterious look to everything. You can show more on the sides of the [main] action. But shooting in scope can be more expensive because of the anamorphic lenses. It's more expensive to shoot and edit in scope."
The previous Blu-ray of this title, DIE NACHT DER OFFENEN SARGE from Germany's Colosseo Film, was correctly frame at 2.35:1 but had a dark, unsharp image quality with damp, desaturated colors. Severin's new 4K scan from Spanish, French and German release prints finally restores the film to what Franco intended. The 2.35:1 compositions are sharp, detailed and as color saturated as possible given the low budgeted production on Portuguese, Spanish and French locations. It's also the first disc release to allow the extended end music to fully play out rather than abruptly cut off. Special features include an interview with Franco author Stephen Thrower, Part 10 of In The Land of Franco, with Alain Petit and Thrower, the alternate Spanish opening credit sequence with the aforementioned "David Klunne" text and a deleted scene from the English language version which features a reading from Dr. Frankenstein's diary post produced by English language dubber Richard McDonald and written by David Mills. This post-production insert goes all the way back to the fullscreen WIZARD VIDEO VHS release, THE SCREAMING DEAD. A 3 minute 20 second trailer, "Master of Black Horror", is also included. *"Truth Will Out: A Final Audience With One of Cinema's Greatest Visionaries, Jess Franco." By Robert Monell ART DECADES magazine: December 2017, Issue # 13. Thanks to Kit Gavin for arranging the interview with Jess Franco. (C) Robert Monell, 2024

14 February, 2024

LILIAN ( LA VERGEN PERVERTIDA) (Clifford Brawn/Jess Franco, 1983)

An image which sums up the hard-boiled dimension inhabited by Al Pereira (Antonio Mayans). Cigarettes, a gun, a few drinks, suggesting a minimalist pattern of a gritty life and a story which ends with Al executing the club owner (Emilio Linder) who drugged, raped, and turned out Lilian (Katja Bienert). In the opening scene of this neo-noir the young, naive Lilian opens a door to the upscale villa in which she is staying and confronts a hardcore scene between Lina Romay and Jose Llamas. That perfectly sums up the issue with this project, which began as Clasificada "S" thriller which had to be upgraded/downgraded to a hardcore feature, necessitating the removal of some 20 minutes of the original's runtime (84m). The reason was a Spanish law which had been suddenly imposed restricting the showing of "S" product in Adult houses. Jess Franco had to scramble and add this footage since his film would not be playable in more mainstream locations. I assume the film did reasonably well, probably due to those grudgingly added hardcore scenes, and may disappoint those who look for something more than another Franco hardcore. LILIAN... tells the downbeat story of a young woman (Katja Bienert) who collapses while staggering though a desert-like area. She has been drugged, held prisoner and forced to be the abused party in an S&M show staged for the edification of the local police official (Daniel J. White) who is supposed to be leading investigations. Instead he takes detective Al Pereira off the case when he gets too close to the truth.
Al has discovered the comatose Lilian, who recounts her terror in a delirium at the residence of retired cop and friend Bernardo (Jess Franco), who counsels Al to forget it. He doesn't. Corruption is endemic here as in LES EBRANLEES (1972) and BOTAS NEGRAS, LATIGO DE CUERO (Golden Films Internacional, 1982), two very similar Al Pereira episodes. As in those films, Al Pereira  is depicted as a hotheaded, high minded loser who will ultimately trigger his own exile from the human race. The villains, the drug lord (Emilio Linder) and his wife (Lina Romay). who fetches him party girls and druggies at her nightclub, are oh-so-chic, part of the local glitter scene. Franco shoots this as a 1980s Film Noir, a virtual encyclopedia of noir references and visual quotes. Using long takes and wide angle lenses in the style of Sam Fuller (UNDERWORLD USA) and Robert Aldrich (KISS ME, DEADLY), but also incorporating his personal favorites THE KILLERS (Robert Siodmak version) and Howard Hawks' THE BIG SLEEP in the flashback structure of the former and the opening credits of the latter, which are recreated in the penultimate scene when the camera lingers on a pack of cigarettes (American, of course), two whiskey glasses and a pistol on a table. The drug lord had just been sitting there having a drink when Al Pereira burst in and summarily executed him, Dirty Harry style. Al leaves his pistol as a calling card, knowing the police will trace it to him. Then he quickly hops into his car and drives away into a future life of assured damnation. One evil bastard is done away with, but the corporate  evil of the big combo will continue under the averted attention of the corrupt police official. And the principled avenger and seeker of justice Al Pereira will suffer the punishments of our sinful, fallen world. The film has a brutal, nihilistic tone which is mediated by one of Daniel J. White's most breathtaking scores, incorporating a kind of funk theme and an ethereal line. Some of these cues can also be heard in the director's 1985 Jungle adventure, L'ESCLAVA BLANCA, a Manacoa production. If one can forgive or fast forward the hardcore scenes there's a good film in there. Franco and Antonio Mayans are superb as the world weary receivers of Lilian's sad story. This element of delirious confession to authority figures evokes EUGENIE DE SADE (1970) and Sade's theater piece, DIALOGUE BETWEEN A PRIEST AND A DYING MAN (1782). The Spanish "kiosk" DVD version was screened for this review. It has very good video quality, sharp and colorful with acceptable Spanish only audio.  This version lasts approximately 73 minutes. We're left with a moral vacuum, set in the glitter scene, which is made into a sexual hell by the insertion of much routine hardcore footage, taking advantage of Spain's newly liberalized censorship. With strong performances by Lina Romay, Jess Franco as the retired cop and frequent Franco composer-actor Daniel J White as the corrupt police official. The opening escape by the delirious heroine staggering across a beach is indicative of Franco's ability to throw the viewer into a scene's atmosphere quickly, efficiently and without any dialogue or context. This was released on Spanish VHS before appearing as a "kiosk" DVD. Filmed on locations in Madrid and Huelva.

08 February, 2024

LA ESCLAVA BLANCA (1985)

la esclava blanca 1985 87 MINUTES Video Search of Miami (U.S. import) DIRECTED BY "CLIFFORD BROWN" (JESS FRANCO) WITH: JOSÉ LLAMAS, MABEL ESCAÑO, MIGUEL ROS, AUGUSTÎN GIL, LINA ROMAY, CONCHI MONTÉS --------------------------------------------------------------------
Of the eight other films Franco made in 1985 (half of them hardcore porno features), this very low budget adventure stands out because of an absorbing, multi-layered script by ace Spanish screenwriter Santiago Moncada. Besides writing Bava's HATCHET FOR THE HONEYMOON, THE BELL FROM HELL, and THE CORRUPTION OF CHRIS MILLER, Moncada has written and produced screenplays for a variety of European genre directors (Manuel Cano's SWAMP OF THE RAVENS, TARZAN'S GREATEST CHALLENGE, and VOODOO BLACK EXORCIST were all based on Moncada scripts). 牋牋 In LA ESCLAVA BLANCA, Moncada gives us three separate stories that gradually interweave and come together in the final scene. The first story seems to based on Macbeth. A weak-willed jungle guide is manipulated by his domineering wife into committing a series of crimes. During a safari, he leads a honeymoon couple (José Llamas and Conchi Montés) into a trap laid by the Tobongas, a Stone Age tribe that worships a giant lizard god. The bride is tied to a sacrificial altar for later sacrifice. 牋牋 The second story starts out in the city, where a karate student and two of her instructors accidentally discover the secret of the Tobonga. In the third story, two expeditions make their way back to the Tobonga camp. One of these groups includes the original guide, who has been abducted by the karate instructors (they have also killed his wife). The other consists of the husband of the abducted woman and the female karate student (Lina Romay) who has split off from the school. During the long trip back, the guide has a change of heart and decides to repent, turning against his captors and helping the people he originally betrayed.
牋 The climax of the film, expertly shot and edited despite the budgetary restrictions, may remind some viewers of a miniature version of the final scene in THE WILD BUNCH. The very last scene, in which the Tobonga gold is thrown away, echoes THE TREASURE OF SIERRA MADRE. Franco's film, of course, is a lot less ambitious than those two classics, but maybe that's why it works so well. The massacre at the Tobonga camp, the abduction scene, and the opening safari are as well-staged as anything Franco has ever done. There's also an amusing dose of voodoo dancing thrown in for good measure. The film has no artistic pretensions. It is simply a programmer, made for showings at Spanish grindhouses or low profile mainstream houses. The fact that it's entertaining pulp illustrates Franco's realization that he's making a film for a certain audience in a certain marketplace.
Daniel White's pulsating drum and vocal score is familiar from some of Franco's other jungle adventures, but this is by far the best of the lot. Miguel Ross and Mabel Escaño are both very effective as the safari guides from hell. With its karate scenes, voodoo rituals, adventure story, literary and film references, LA ESCLAVA BLANCA seems typical of Franco's 1980's output (minus the XXX sex material). It's good fun while it lasts. It might be compared to a Saturday afternoon adventure matinee with Franco's encyclopediac knowledge of cinema built into its unassuming, carefully crafted mise-en-scene. (C) Robert Monell 2024

25 January, 2024

LOS BLUES DE LA CALLE POP-AVENTURAS DE FELIIPE MARLBORO, VOLUMEN 8

los blues de la calle pop 1983 80 MINUTES Galan Video (Spain) European Trash Cinema (U.S. import) DIRECTED BY JESUS FRANCO WITH: ROBERT FOSTER, CANDY COSTER, TRINO TRIVES, MARY SAD, JOSÉ LLAMAS --------------------------------------------------------------------
(a.k.a. AVENTURAS DE FELIPE MALBORO, VOLUMEN 8) Today it's easy to find a recent film with a popular hero/anti-hero based on a vintage comic book, cartoon, television show or film. Jess Franco beat them all out of gate with this amusing 1983 neo-noir based on one of his own creations, the hapless PI Felipe Marlboro. Franco, being a legendary smoker, not only names his lead character after a well known brand, he also shows up as Sam Chesterfield in a signficant role as the piano player in a sleazy club with punk clientele. Felipe Marlboro, gamely incarnated by Franco mainstay Antonio Mayans ("Robert Foster"), is a seedy private investigator who takes up a missing person case in punk infested Shit City. All the men seem to hang out in a smoky bar decorated with posters of Bogart and Mae West, waiting for trouble to erupt. The residents of this corrupt town all look like they base their fashion sense on MTV. The men look like either Sid Vicious or a member of A Flock of Seagulls, and the women sport the slutty attire and pouty sexuality of Robert Palmer's back-up vocalists in the music video of "Addicted to Love." Likewise, (as the visual style of the film is a whacked-out array of colors and weird camera angles. The film's stylized locale, Shit City, also anticipates Robert Rodriguez's SIN CITY.
The plot has Marlboro enlisting the aid of piano player Sam Chesterfield (played by Jess Franco himself) in an all out effort to bust the town's drug and dirty money kingpin Saul Winston (Trino Trives). This witty and visually striking neo-noir parody is one of Franco's personal favorites, and it's easy to see why. Almost every shot in the film is a loving homage to 1940s private eye cinema (such as THE MALTESE FALCON and THE BIG SLEEP) filtered through a 1980s MTV-style lens. Franco has stated that he attempted to create a sustained comic-book look, and he has totally succeeded in that while creating his most entertaining film since his amusing 1967 spy spoof LUCKY THE INSCRUTABLE. Antonio Mayans is the perfect fall guy in Franco's off balance world of pimps, whores, killers, and thugs. Sexy Analia Ivars makes for a perfect lean and mean femme fatale. Franco stages all the standard private eye cliches in his usual off-kilter fashion. For instance, when Marlboro gets a beating for asking too many questions, the guy who kicks the living daylights out of him is a flashy flamenco dancer who performs his dance steps in between each punch and kick. Most amusing of all is the twisted ending, which finds Marlboro seduced by the woman who has set him up for extinction. The a quick-paced editing style, color gel lit locations shot through diffusion lenses and a rousing New Orleans style jazz score by Fernando G. Morcillo make LA BLUES DE LA CALLE POP a continual delight to see and hear. Franco's experimental deployment of colored filters is especially interesting (as in the similar ESCLAVA DEL CRIMEN) and makes me wonder why he didn't continue in this style. (C)Robert Monell, 2024

17 January, 2024

MIDNIGHT PARTY (1975)

aka La Coccolona (Italian release), Heisse Beruhrungen (German version). LADY PORNO (Spanish version) Directed by Tawer Nero (Julio Perez Tabernero) for Titanic Films.* This is a sexy spy film once directed by Jess Franco in just a few days at a hotel in Southern France. A typical Franco strategy. Around the same time, he shot two other films there (Le Grand Motte) with the exact same rooms, casts and crews (DE SADE'S JULIETTE, SHINING SEX).
The version under consideration here has the onscreen title Lady Porno, a Spanish variant of Franco's original MIDNIGHT PARTY. Julio Perez Tabernero, an actor turned producer-director (he can be seen in Franco's own SADISTEROTICA/Two Undercover Angels)acquired it for his Titanic Films (Julio, your company needs a new handle!) and reconstructed it as an "American-Belgian" co-production. It's very amusingly redubbed and rescored with lewd comments, bawdy music and direct-to-the-viewer takes. --Sylvia is a very hot stripper who carries on an affair with a cheap detective, Al Pereira (Olivier Mathot) behind the back of her longtime squeeze Red Nicholas. This is not really another of Franco's Al Pereira episodes, as he is mainly a player in Sylvia's story.
This is kind of like a live action cartoon (cf LUCKY, THE INSCRUTABLE) with Lina Romay giving it all she has as the resourceful Sylvia. This might actually be my personal favorite of her performances, she mercilessly teases the viewer directly as the interactive approach allows her to pose, stick her tongue out, and make alluring remarks to the audience before turning back to the scene and players at hand, resuming in the traditional fourth wall mode. It's all a lot of good natured fun. Except that the subject is torture. Torture that really hurts! Sylvia is taken by Radeck/Agent 008 (Jess Franco himself), a spymaster and professional torture mogul who takes his business very seriously indeed. Look at the way he abuses poor Sylvia: after being stripped and sexually abused by henchpersons Monica Swinn and Ramon, she's poked, punched and cigarette burned by the ingrates under the very close supervision of Radeck. They take her to the "torture clinic" which, this being a Jess Franco shoot, merely means another hotel room (or the same hotel room slightly redressed and shot from a different angle). Choosing a metal tool they try pulling out her toenails, as Radeck is beginning to lose his patience. At this point one of my favorite moments in Franco's monumental filmography occurs, and it only last a few seconds--Radeck simply puts a cigarette in his mouth and lights it. That's it! The exact way which actor Jess Franco jabs the smoke into his mouth and fires it up has to be experienced first hand. It's a grand bit a business, something small made into something very special by a seasoned professional.
Radeck drops the pose at the end, as Sylvia and Al are escaping he faces the camera and admits to us that it was all an illusion. We have been spectators. But what are we doing at this venue? Of course, that question is implied rather than asked. Alain Petit is very droll as the Marxist jazz singer, Nicholas. Billed as "Charlie Christian" (cf JUSTINE, the 1979-80 Joe D'Amato composite where he is likewise billed as his footage here is rolled over with scenes from SHINING SEX into a unique reedit) he performs his infamous "La Vie est une Merde", also heard in a blues rendition during Franco's 1982 EMMANUELLE EXPOSED and in Petit's documentary THE MAKING OF TENDER FLESH (1997). The Spanish language version which was screened for this review (subtitled in English) is very much in keeping with the joker/trickster impulses which frequently bubble to the surface of Franco's work. The finale, a shootout with the cops (a minimalist debacle) followed by shots of birds flying in the distance as our couple floats away on a pleasure craft, is post-ironic in the sense that it delivers on expectations which Franco obviously considers bogus while gleefully curving past the generic demands of representational, grade B sexploitation production methodology. In other words: don't worry, be happy, it's only a movie. *The longest version of this film is the 90 English language cut, which is around 15 minutes longer than the Spanish language LADY PORNO. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (C) ROBERT MONELL (Updated 1/17/24)

16 December, 2023

BEST OF 2023: Jess Franco releases.

The Best, and most revelatory, Jess Franco related release of 2023 was Severin Films' comprehensive 4 disc, 4K UHD-Blu-ray set of Jess Franco's 1970 COUNT DRACULA, directed for Harry Alan Towers in November 1969. The world UHD premiere and the Blu-ray have spectacular video and sound quality, scanned in 4K from recently discovered, uncut camera negatives. The elements are virtually pristine. There's over 5 hours of bonus features, a highly informative commentary track by horror historian David Del Valle and Franco actress Maria Rohm, and much more.
I have to admit that I've never been a big fan of this film, either as a Dracula film or a Jess Franco film. It seemed cheap, rushed, deeply flawed and not as true to the Bram Stoker novel as it claimed to be. I had been c onditioned by the two previous Dracula features Hammer had already made with Christopher Lee in the title role, HORROR OF DRACULA and DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKENESS (1965), both more than capably directed by Terence Fisher. Of course there were the commanding presence of Lee and the magesterial musical score by Bruno Nicolai to savor. But that was not enough in my view when I first saw the film on local television broacast in the early 1970s. Something was missing, I felt. What was missing were the carefully lit compositions of exteriors and general lighting design, both restored now in 4K. The interiors, at least, look gorgeous, bathed in color gel lighting and arranged with care. Franco did his job, but it didn't turn out to be a passion project. As Maria Rohm points out in her commentary, both Franco and Towers knew the game was over and that this would be their last collaboration.

My introduction to the film was via a local television broadcast in the mid 1970s. I was a confirmed fan of the Hammer Dracula's, especially HORROR OF DRACULA (1958) and DRACULA PRINCE OF DARKNESS (1965), which also featured Lee as a much more athletic Count than he is in Franco's film. I had already heard of Jess Franco by reading a men's magazine article in the late 1960s about his notorious X rated (in America) SUCCUBUS [NECRONOMICON] (1969). But it would be at least another decade before I would see that on a poor VHS dupe. After viewing COUNT DRACULA I wasn't anxious to see another Jess Franco film any time soon. It started with those damn German Shepherds standing in for wolves of Transylvania, first seen during the coach ride where Dracula drives Jonathan Harker (Fred Williams) to his castle. That everything was painfully out of focus didn't help. It seemed a poorly photographed, rushed, cheap production, carelessly planned and, at best, routinely directed. And it didn't follow the promise of the title card that the story would be told exactly as Stoker did. Sometimes exact faithfulness is not the way to go. NOSFERATU (1922), the classic silent version directed by F.W. Murnau, is most interesting in the way it departs from the novel. Max Schreck as Count Orlok looks nothing like the king vampire described in Stoker's prose. Orlok resembles a rodent which has someone taken on human shape. That look is continued with the appearance of Klaus Kinski in Werner Herzog's 1979 remake, although the actor adds considerable pathos to the character. The full title of the Murnau film, NOSFERATU: A SYMPHONY OF HORROR correctly states its tone, pacing and texture. It's a  piece of melancholy music suffused with dread, illustrated by Expressionist compositions. Tod Browning's 1931 DRACULA, based on the hit stage play, is as static as an over rehearsed theater piece, but Bela Lugosi is hypnotic in the lead, even though the second half trails off into soporific dialogue scenes. It too has a musical quality, struck in the opening strains from Tchaikovsky's SWAN LAKE. Browning may have had a more suggestive, subtle cinematic work in mind if one considers some of his later statements, and Universal recut the picture, shortening it. Jess Franco, working with Lee in the title role, worked with producer Towers, to stay with the novel's description of the Count, and he's a rather sad antique, albeit a deadly one, who talks nostalgically of the history of his family and homeland. His white hair and moustache in the early scenes conform closely to Stoker's original description and as the film proceeds the hair turns black as he gorges on a series of victims. The blood is the life and reverses the aging process. But he's never as menacing as
Schrek, Lugosi or the swashbuckling Dracula in the Hammer films starring Lee. Severin's HD presentation gives the film greater sharpness and more enriched color than all previous home video releases. The high definition detail is extraordinary and focuses attention on the very artificial looking cobwebs seen throughout the castle, the overhead wire mechanism which drives the bats and makes the suddenly revived stuffed animals which the heroes encounter at one point seem less menacing than ever.

Franco's famous crash zooms seem to be utilized for mere convenience, to avoid the time it would take to do additional set-ups, rather than the space-collapsing devices which give such films as DRACULA CONTRA FRANKENSTEIN a compellingly abstract, almost post-modern quality.The jarring telezooms into coffins, landscapes and objects seem to announce a personal stylistic choice in that film rather than a cost and time saving measure, although they probably were also used for that reason. Hammer's Dracula films always looked lush and more well resourced than they actually were, EL CONDE DRACULA looks rather tattered in comparison. The obviously fake boulders thrown onto the gypsy caravan and the burning of Dracula in his coffin throw us out of the movie at a crucial moment. The film ends in a flurry of more shaky telezooms.

The brooding, symphonic, urgent Bruno Nicolai score creates most of the atmosphere throughout and makes up for the visual awkwardness of many key scenes. The living dead girl manner of Soledad Miranda is electrifying in the scenes she shares with Lee and provide memorable frissons. Franco himself seems rather dispirited in his appearance as the clinic employee. Perhaps that's because the director himself was becoming deeply disillusioned with his work for Towers, the film's co-writer and co-producer. Franco was obviously becoming frustrated and bored as an employee of the Towers film factory. Just compare his energized presence as the inquisitive writer in EUGENIE DE SADE (1970), made just after this film and without Towers overseeing the production as writer-producer. It comes as no surprise that COUNT DRACULA would be Franco's final directing job for Towers.

The factory process of commercial filmmaking in Spain during the horror boom would become an even more interesting subtext in Portabella's intriguing experimental documentary on the making of EL CONDE DRACULA.

Franco struggled to make a personal film while remaining true to the source material, but Portabella's unique film deconstructs both the final product and workaday production of it. Franco did bring considerable artistry to the final product but CUADECUC-VAMPIR, opens up the actual shoot, infuses it with an eerie, abstract poetry and provides another subtext, that of making a commercial horror film on an iconic subject in late 1960s Spain still ruled by the dictator Francisco Franco. Spain welcomed international film productions in the 1960s as a way of increasing cultural exchange, boosting an uncertain economy and bringing foreign investment in the national coffers. Parts of DR. ZHIVAGO and Sergio Leone's wildly successful Spaghetti Westerns used Spain's desert and mountain regions as a ready made exotic backdrop. Costs were low there and the locals were grateful to get steady work on US, Italian and other co-productions. Portabella, who had produced Bunuel's notoriously banned (in Spain) VIRIDIANA (1961) had already rattled the authorities there, and he was much more subversive in every regard than EL CONDE DRACULA's director at the that time, although when Franco later cut himself loose he would evolve into a master of subversive genre cinema from the 1970s onward.
Portabella shot his film in high contrast black and white, sometimes the image goes into negative, creating a further sense of unreality, projecting the footage of the shoot into an alternate dimension. It chronicles the shoot in roughly sequential order but selects key scenes and then shoots them simultaneously to the actual production from different camera angles, sometimes revealing the cast and crew (including Jess Franco) as they go about their work. Soledad Miranda looks directly into Portabella's camera and flashes a demure, somewhat chilling smile. Christopher Lee mugs for the camera and seems to be having a good time on the set as he reaches out toward Portabella's camera as if to grab it while a jarring sound is heard on the soundtrack. Most importantly, Portabella, like Murnau, understood that the story of Dracula was best told without words, the stumbling block in the Lugosi version. The best moments in the Hammer Dracula's were the wordless moments of menace just before and during the appearances of Lee's Count. It should be noted that Franco's DRACULA CONTRA FRANKENSTEIN contains no dialogue during its opening scenes and most of of its runtime. What dialogue there is is functional, delivered with dispatch and minimized by the director and actors. Of course, the big difference there is that Franco cast longtime collaborator Howard Vernon as a very unique, fumetti style Count Dracula.
The use of sound is quite unusual and distinctive. Most of the footage is either silent or appears with music, loud crashing sounds, creating a soundscape which operates in counterpoint to the images. Footsteps are heard but they don't quite synch up with the footfalls in the scene, a train is heard but it doesn't seem to be the modern one seen suddenly cutting across the screen. The arrival of Harker by coach in Transylvania is here scored with disturbing crashing sounds while the arrival a 1960a black American sedan, delivering Maria Rohm on set clad in a stylish floppy hat, leopard skin coat and movie star sunglasses is accompanied by dreamy jazz.
The black and white images have a very grainy texture, enhanced by the 1080 HD resolution. A very different version of the novel unfolds in Portabella's footage, one which somehow is much closer to the tone of the original prose than Jess Franco's finished version. Capturing a sense of dread between the shots of the actors in informal groupings or preparing for an imminent shot. The final scene bursts into synchronized sound as Lee reads the final lines of the novel, in which the destruction of Dracula is described. Set in the actor's dressing room, he addresses the audience directly, speaking of the economy of the prose and notes some of the descriptive details. The destruction of Dracula in the is, of course, quite different, replacing it with the burning of the Count in his coffin after which the body is dumped over the castle walls. The staging, shooting and editing of the scene leave much to be desired and one is struck by how simple and superior the actual ending is as Lee reads them in his resonant voice. He then closes the book and stares into camera for an unnervingly long time before Portabella is heard calling, "cut!". Those few lines are really all that is needed to make an effective closing scene.  Lee and Portabella obviously had a much better sense of the what made the novel so haunting and memorable than did the writer and director of EL CONDE DRACULA. That's why these new HD release of both films is so essential for those interested in the novel, the history of Dracula films, Spanish horror, experimental cinema and the career of Jess Franco.
This fully loaded package also has two discs of Special Features, some ported over from the previous Severin Blu-ray. Probably the most interesting of the new features is a 90 minute 2017 Documentary on the making of both COUNT DRACULA and CUADECUC-VAMPIR, with Dr. Alex Mendibil. The inclusion of the full Bruno Nicolai's magesterial score should please both fans of the composer and European cult movie scores. It adds tremendously to what impact the finished product has both as a horror film and a Jess Franco film. (C) Robert Monell, 2023****
BLUE RITA/DAS FRAUENHAUS Blu-ray; 2 Disc SE DANCE, GAS, KIDNAP, TORTURE... REPEAT.>
BLUE RITA SE: Full Moon. This kinky, visually dazzling Eurospy fantasia is one of Franco's most unique films and a personal favorite of the features he made for Erwin C. Dietrich. 2 Disc- Blu-ray+DVD. BLUE RITA/DAS FRAUENHAUS, filmed in Paris and featuring Martine Flety (COCKTAIL SPECIAL) and Pamela Stanford (LORNA, THE EXORCIST) as leaders of a criminal organization of female seductresses and spies. The visual style of this Erwin Dietrich-Robert De Nesle production, deploys a lot of colorful costumes, color gel lighting, dutch camera angles, smoke, mirrors and eye catching filter effects. The women are a bisexual, sadistic, and exhibitionist lot who make a lot of trouble for a Russian spy (Eric Falk) and an undercover female Interpol agent sent to break up the operation, hidden behind a high class stripi club in Paris. Opening with a strip performance lit by a crimson spotlight the performance scenes give Franco ample oppurtunity to display his fetish stylistics with full aesthetic splendor.
This all plays as a more stylish reconsideration of the plot and style of Franco's Harry Alan Tower's produced THE GIRL FROM RIO (1969); a turnaround from his Captive Women portofoio of Women-in Prison/Peril epics. It's much less conventional and more infused with Franco's unique personal style than Towers allowed. Dietrich was a more supportive producer who gave Franco permission to be himself. That means what we have here is a wild eyed action painting, a million light years from a tepid Bond imitation. The Paris exteriors and sci-fi interiors give the film a look and vibe quite different from the other Erwin Dietrich productions. The much less supportive Robert De Nesle was co-producer and was very much in attendance during the Parisian shooting according to an interview I did with Pamela Stanford on her work with Franco. She remembered De Nesle literally rushing the cast from location to location between scenes and making sure no time was wasted. He always considered Franco a reliable employee who would deliver a profitable product. Dietrich respected Franco as an artist who would deliver a personalized work in his own time so didn't bother interfering. The French language track here, with English subtitles included, give the proceedings an Art-Exploitation q along; the English dub is included on the DVD disc and unfortunateAly gooes against the film's aesthetic grain. Also included on the Blu-ray is a photo gallery and an interview with Franco enthusiast-director Peter Strickland. The color gel lighting effects and fetishistic props really pop, shimmer and shake in HD and the more appropriate French soundtrack make this a much more enjoyable experience than FULL MOON'S previous DVD release. (C) Robert Monell, 2023 Product details Product Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.48 x 5.31 x 1.18 inches Director ‏ : ‎ Jess Franco, Jesus Franco Media Format ‏ : ‎ Anamorphic, NTSC, Widescreen Run time ‏ : ‎ 1 hour and 15 minutes Release date ‏ : ‎ December 12, 2023 Actors ‏ : ‎ Esther Moser, Olivier Mathot, Erik Falk, Pamela Stanford, Sarah Strasberg Studio ‏ : ‎ Full Moon Features ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0CF39WB42 Number of discs ‏ : ‎ 2 Best Sellers Rank: #15,181 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV) #1,669 in Action & Adventure Blu-ray Discs

05 December, 2023

SEXUAL STORY OF O (Jess Franco, 1981)

Historia Sexual de O 1981 86 MINUTES European Trash Cinema and Video Search of Miami (U.S. import)/Severin Films Blu-ray. DIRECTED BY JESS FRANCO WITH: ALICIA PRINCIPE, CARMEN CARRION, DANIEL KATZ, MAMIE KAPLAN, MAURO RIVERA ======================================= Features Reviews* One might think of another S&M tinged Franco film while watching SEXUAL STORY OF O. That would be the 1982 BLACK BOOTS, LEATHER WHIPS. Both films deal with sadomasochism gone beyond a recreational form of sex. That film was a Jess Franco Neo-Noir with a downbeat ending. SEXUAL STORY OF O is even more downbeat and nihilistic.
Odile (Alicia Principe), a beautiful but naive young woman vacationing in Spain, attracts the attentions of a voyeuristic couple who live across from her hotel. The couple spy on her as she lounges around naked, and when they invite her over for a session of grou sex, Odile gives in immediately. Odile's fate is telegraphed with reading from Norman Mailer's downbeat war novel, THE NAKED AND THE DEAD. After spending days enjoying this menage a trois, the couple take Odile to the villa of the wealthy Wanda Von Karlstein (Carmen Carrion), where the sex continues. Wanda's sadistic husband (Daniel Katz) drugs Odile's drink and rapes her. When she awakens, Odile is chained to a bed, and her captors have sado-erotic torture and death in mind. One of her abductors has a sudden attack of remorse after finding her mutilated body, murders the Von Karlsteins, and walks into the ocean carrying Odile's dead body, shades of the ending of the Val Lewton-Jaques Tourneur masterwork, I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE.
HISTORIA SEXUAL DE O is quite a bit better than some of Franco's rather tedious sex-a-thons of the 1980s. The flowery, tropical locations and gorgeous cinematography offers a counterpoint to the downbeat melodrama. A melancholy female vocal sets a sombre tone throughout, which Franco maintains until the very last shot of the blazing sun beating down on the aftermath of violence and death. There are many effective visual and aural touches throughout, which amplify the theme of corrupted innocence. For instance, Odile is first seen wandering in an idyllic garden reading excepts from Norman Mailer's gritty World War II novel, "The Naked and the Dead," literally foreshadowing her own fate. It is also significant that her voyeuristic abductors use Beethoven's famous chorus from his Ninth Symphony to seduce her attention, underscoring the theme of Old World decadence preying on Odile's gullibility. As Odile, Alicia Principe (a.k.a. Alicia Pedreira) offers sensuality and modernity with a tragic ignorance of the brutal ways of the world. Exotic looking Carmen Carrion and the gaunt, sinister Daniel Katz are well-cast as the wealthy tormentors. Katz's impotent freak-out while raping Odile is especially blood-curdling. There is also a subtle sociological subtext similiar to the situation in Franco's 1973 THE PERVERSE COUNTESS, wherein upper caste villains use a financially struggling lower-class couple to provide victims for their bloodlust. This inequity creates a further irony in which a henchman turns on his vicious employers. The final sequence is shot with filters which spectacular light halations, colorful erutions of primary color patterns over images of torture and murder. With the players masked up and costumed for predatory S&M, it moves the action into a surreal plane, a taboo dimension as in a sequence from Sade's writing. If it uses the context of a snuff film, it's one made by a poet, elegantly shot, edited and scored, with a palpable emotional impact. Franco had blended S&M imagery with horror as far back as his early 1960's Gothics such as THE AWFUL DR. ORLOFF and THE SADISTIC BARON VON KLAUS and he would continue into his post 1990s digital era, with films such as FLOWERS OF PERVERSION.
Scenes and images from earlier Franco films are recycled throughout but in altered contexts, such as the scene in which the only survivor of the massacre carries Odile's body into the ocean, reenacting the end of THE PERVERSE COUNTESS. The long, excruciating sequence detailing Odile's torture and death is painful to watch, as chains, whips, and studded medieval-style weapons are used. Franco encourages us to become emotionally engaged with Odile, often taking her point of view, which ratchets the level of intensity even higher. The stuff of a sex tourist's nightmares, HISTORIA SEXUAL DE O is highly recommended. (C) Robert Monell 2023 =======================================

25 November, 2023

LES DEMONS: X RATED KULT

This 2004 R2 two-disc set was for its time, now 20 years ago, the best ever presentation of a Jess Franco project, the 1972 French Spanish co production, LES DEMONS
Three different international versions 114 m, longest vintage version.

101m, "Director's cut" this is the 2003 Jess Franco remix.

85m, the vintage German language version [looks about 2.50:1].

16:9 anamorphic 2.35:1; DD 2.0: Code 2.
An elderly woman tortured and burned as a witch hurls a curse at Lord Jeffreys (Cihangir Gaffari) promising that she will be avenged by her daughters. Kathleen (Anne Libert) and Margaret (Britt Nichols) are convent bound young women whom Lord Jeffreys is informed are the spawn of the exectuted witch. He sends out Lady de Winter (Karin Field) and Renfield (Alberto Dalbes), the girl's real father, to find them and bring them back to face the Inquistion. More nudity, lesbian interludes and torture than Franco's first film about Lord Jeffreys, THE BLOODY JUDGE, LES DEMONS is now available on an essential 2 disc box set from X RATED KULT DVD. Disc 1 contains the longest 114 minute version with German and French language options, original trailer, alternate scenes and other bonus materials. This version, presented in a colorful 2.35:1 transfer finally reveals the films as the Sadean epic that it is: post-modern erotic Fantastique which comments on the Inquisition and nunsploitation genres of that era (cf THE DEVILS). Franco's use of the widescreen ratio is simply stunning, with an impressive use of multiple fields of action and the colors are gorgeous. All the sex, nudity and violence is present in this uncut print.
In a way, THE DEMONS could be considered a remake of Jess Franco's 1970 THE BLOODY JUDGE, also featuring a witchburning judge played by a very different actor, Cihangir Gaffari, here credited as John Foster, whose interpretation of the role. In an inteviewed included on the 2023 Mondo Macabro disc of THE WITCHES MOUNTAIN, Gaffari complains that Franco, as Spanish co-producer of the film just disappeared at the end of shooting, forgetting to pay the actor for his performance. This was after Gaffari had already donated some of his own money to the film's production! Disc 2 contians a new "Director's Cut", reedited and rescored by Franco in 2003. He replaces the t Franco himself dubbing Howard Vernon's character! At 101 minutes it cuts Doris Thomas' masturbation scene in the long verions (over 3 mn!) to 1mn and also loses some expository scenes but still has an epic scope. The print looks slightly crisper and more colorful than the longer 114 mn version but the Spanish dubbing is technically limited and somewhat hollow with a "studio" ambiance. As with many Franco "alternates", it consistutes a separate new film in itself. Onscreen title: LAS POSEIDAS DEL DEMONIO. Finally, there is the Original German 85 minute version, which censors some of the sex, nudity and torture. English language option included. This is the only version with the original credit sequence intact, the other two have new video generated fonts. The video quality of this print can only be described as "Grindhouse" and the directed is credited to Franco's "Clifford Brown" beard. As noted above the aspect ratio appears to be closer to 2.50:1 on playback. The score by Jean Bernard Raiteux can only be described as early 1970s "prog rock" in style and is perfectly anachronistic and likely the idea of post production editor Gerard Kikoine. Franco would criticize this score in later interviews, missing the point. All three versions are letterboxed at 2.35:1 and have multiple language options. The oversized box is lavishly and lasciviously illustrated with four potential covers. "The X-Rated Nunsploitation Series 5" Available from Xploited Cinema. "Sex und Gewalt hinter Klostermauern" is emblazoned on the back cover over a close-up of a male nipple being clipped off and full frontal nude shots of female characters masturbating and stretched out on a torture rack. I guess one would term this 2004 release a collectors item. R2 (C) Robert Monell: New Version.

19 November, 2023

WOMEN BEHIND BARS (1975)

BLUE UNDERGROUND DVD: "BAD GIRLS BEHIND BARS" 5 Women-in-Prison film set.
Directed by Jess Franco (credited to Rick DeConninck). Cast: Lina Romay (Shirley Fields), Roger Darton (Milton Warren), Martine Stedil, Ronald Weiss, Ramon Ardid(Perry Mendoza), Denis Torre, Jess Franco (Bill, a hitman). aka: UNA SECONDINA IN UNA CARCERE FEMMINILE (Italian version). --Perry Mendoza, a smalltime hood, orders a raid on the yacht of millionaire Rufus Hackerman. His men escape with a cache of diamonds. Mendoza eliminates his associates and keeps the diamonds for himself. When he returns to his club, girlfriend Shirley Fields (Romay) summarily executes him and immediately turns herself in to the police.
This is a legendary Franco title, not so much for what it is, but for how it supposedlycame into being. While shooting FRAUENGEFANGNIS (BARBED WIRE DOLLS) for Swiss producer Erwin C. Dietrich's Elite Film, Franco decided to clandestinely shoot another WIP film simultaneously utilizing some of the same cast members and sets. The story was that he simply shot the alternate film as slightly different takes, using short ends and leftovers of the film he had been allotted. He then cut it together and sold it to Italian producers to whom he owed money behind Dietrich's back. What actually happened was Franco shot a totally different film, using some cast members from FRAUENGEFANGNIS, which was a considerable success for Dietrich. When the producer discovered Franco's subterfuge he managed to forgive him, while deciding to keep a closer eye on the wayward director during future shoots. However, both films have totally different stories and characters. Also there are no alternate takes or short ends or footage from BARBED WIRE DOLLS. The main location was down the coast from the fort where FRAUENGEFANGNIS was shot. A small town on the Southern coast of France where people who can't afford Nice congregate. A number of exposition scenes are set in the low rent Hotel De Gregorio, which was obviously a convenient production center for this termite Women-in-Prison affair.
WOMEN BEHIND BARS is as amusing as the tale behind its production. A kinder, gentler version of Franco's previous WIP formulae; it's a breezy parody of Euro grade Z crime films. The opening raid on the Chinese junk by masked gunmen is indicative of what is to come-- a wild montage of fitful zoom shots of the bandits running in and out of compact cars, down stone steps onto a beach where a hastily staged shootout occurs. Everything looks like it was filmed in single takes, and probably was. The prison sequences mostly consist of sado-sexual encounters between Lina Romay (looking trim and tricky here), the catlike Martine Stedil, and the oafish Ronald Weiss (the philosophical warden who ends up getting shot by Franco himself, appearing as a nervous hitman). There are all kinds of odd visual details here which continue to register after viewing, like an oversized telephone in Weiss'office, or the electric torture device used on Romay, which looks like a soundboard hijacked from the editing studio. Roger Darton turns in a droll performance as Milton Warren, a corrupt insurance investigator sent to get back the diamonds. His dry narration gives the rather predicatable storyline a much needed ironic spin.
My favorite sequence is a minimalist prison break which begins with Romay teasing Weiss to distraction, then marching him out past his heavily armed guards with his own gun pointed at his head. It's a sexual variation on the classic breakout scenes from the old Warners prison dramas. Daniel J White's elegant, modulated piano and organ score (which was recycled for some 1980's Franco productions) keeps the action percolating, providing atmosphere and versimultitude to a venture which seems mostly have been shot in a hotel room and a prison cafeteria set. Nonetheless, this is an enjoyable trifle which may actually make you want to rush off and check in at the Hotel Don Gregorio. Note that prolific English language dubber and Rome based dubbing director Richard McNamara voices the hit man played by Jess Franco. McNamara was also responsible for the English language dub of Franco's 1971 DRACULA PRISONER OF FRANKENSTEIN> Reviewed by Robert Monell (New Version: 2023)

15 November, 2023

The Sinister Dr.Orloff --Blu-ray

This 1982 Golden Films Internacional Production is my personal favorite of Jess Franco's Dr. Orloff series. It replaces the heavy Gothic look of GRITOS EN LA NOCHE (1961) (the Spanish version) with a glittering, full color semi sci-fi look. EL SECRETO DEL DR. ORLOFF (1964) looks more like an Alfred Vohrer Krimi and the Gothic element is more reserved. THE EYES OF DR ORLOFF (1972), the first in color, totally eliminates the Gothic look and has a much more realistic look and feel, sort of more like a typical 1970s Spanish Giallo. By the early 1980s Franco's style has again morphed into something quite different than those monochrome thrillers of the early 1960s.
The new Blu-ray from MONDO MACABRO further enhances those colors and aesthetic choices of Franco which distinguish this from all his previous Dr. Orloff (Orlof, with one f, in GRITOS EN LA NOCHE) films. SINISTER could be titled The Son of Dr. Orloff. Antonio Mayans plays the mad doctor's biologist son as a sexual psychopath who kidnaps local women in Alicante, Spain to restore the comatose body of his mother through an electronic form of soul transfer. His brother (Raf Smog) is a blind beast with skin grown over his eyes, a victim of young Orloff's unethical experiments.The film details the monstrous looking hulk stalking and kidnapping young, attractive women for the macabre expriments of Alfred Orloff. This iteration of a favorite Franco character definitely earns its Classification "S" rating.
Some of the stalk and kidnap sequences are shot-by-shot reconstructions of similar scenes in GRITOS EN LA NOCHE. The final experiment of young Orloff is sabotaged by Orloff Sr. (Howard Vernon), repeating his role in GRITOS EN LA NOCHE, only playing a wheelchair bound, elderly version of the mad scientist, now wiser and reprentant for his sins. He is aware of Alfred's sexual sadism and questions his scientific motives. It all ends in complete scientific and criminal disaster with everyone either dematerialized or the wrong soul going into the wrong body. Only the sarcastic laugh of the senior Orloff resonates as the end credits roll.
Or is that Jess Franco laughing?
ABOVE: Frequent Jess Franco composer and actor, Daniel White.**** BONUS/VIDEO/AUDIO: Beside the audio commentary (see below) and a Stephen Thrower talk on the film, a visit with frequent Franco collaborator Antonio Mayans is included. He speaks fondly of his experiences on this film and other Franco productions over the four decades they worked together, depicting the director as a trickster who would complete two films in four weeks alloted for one film and flee shooting locations just ahead of the landlord. The film is a revelation in HD, with bold colors and layered reflections which give it a cyber-punk aesthetic at times. With a fascinating soundscape by Jess Franco himself, wildly interpreting the Pablo Villa score on a Profeta-5 synthesizer, a versitale five-voice polyphonic synth, used by Kraftwerk and other popular bands in the 1980s to create unique sounds. It's a film with a unique soundscape and look, which at times recalls his futurist styled BLUE RITA (1976) or the ultra- dimensionality of his sci-fi-sex-satanic-spy fantasia, EL SEXO ESTA LOCO (1980).
We should also consider in future blogs such Orloff related films as ALONE AGAINST THE TERROR (1983) and FACELESS (1988), both of which have a Dr. Orloff character and deal with psychological and scientific transgressions. This region free release is the US premiere of the film and its worldwide Blu-ray debut. DISC FEATURES Region free 1080p presentation from a new 4K restoration of the film In Spanish with optional English subtitles Brand new interview with Antonio Mayans Brand new interview with author Stephen Thrower Brand new audio commentary by Troy Howarth and Nathaniel Thompson LIMITED EDITION FEATURES 20 page full color booklet by Francesco Cesari and Roberto Curti; reversible sleeve with new and original art; 1500 numbered copies in the usual red case (C) Robert Monell,2023

02 November, 2023

HOW TO SEDUCE A VIRGIN (PLAISIR A TROIS) 1973

Plaisir a trois 1973 85 MINUTES: MONDO MACABRO (Blu-ray; Jess Franco Triple Bill); European Trash Cinema (U.S. import) DIRECTED BY "CLIFFORD BROWN" (JESS FRANCO) WITH: ROBERT WOODS, ALICE ARNO, TANIA BUSSELIER, HOWARD VERNON, ALFRED BAILLOU, LINA ROMAY --------------------------------------------------------------------
(a.k.a. HOW TO SEDUCE A VIRGIN) In 1973, Jesus Franco directed at least 12 movies. PLAISIR A TROIS stands out for its clever plotting, above-average performances, and carefully constructed visual style that takes an almost Cubist approach to imagery. For instance, in the first scene Alice Arno's character, Martine Bressac, departs from a mental hospital. As she is debriefed by the head psychiatrist note how her bright green bandana and rectangular shapes of the windows behind her head result in a disturbingly, off balance cubist composition which subtly signals us of the woman's dangerous tendencies and mental imbalance. These type of compostions recur throughout the film.
There's a game going in throughout the course of this film. A game created by the Marquis de Sade, played by the four main characters. It's kind of a 3D chess game, a game of Life and Death. The winners take all, the loser dies a horrible, extended death. Who is the loser? Who are the winners? They won't be who you think they are. The plotline here, adapted from a story in Sade's Philosophy in the Boudior, has been used in many other Franco projects. Martine is an artist who paints impressionist style nudes. Her hidden occupation, though, combines art, perversion, murder and a secret torture chamber underneath her villa. Women she has seduced, tortured, and murdered are arranged in sado-erotic poses as living dead sculptures. Arno's spine-chilling performance give this "horrors in the wax museum" scenario considerable psychological depth. She is the embodiment of pure, selfish lust. Arno (real name: Marie-France Broquet) was one of Franco's best performers, but she disappeared from the Euro-exploitation scene sometime in the mid 1970s. Robert Woods, veteran of countless spaghetti westerns, has a good role here as Arno's double-dealing husband. Howard Vernon is amusing as a smug chauffeur, and diminutive Alfred Baillou plays a snooping gardener who seems somewhat deranged.
ABOVE:Producer Robert De Nesle C.F.F.P. Paris**** PLAISIR A TROIS does not concentrate on the story's horror element. The basement of women frozen in poses of death has been done in such films as MYSTERY IN THE WAX MUSEUM, HOUSE OF WAX and MILL OF STONE WOMEN (1960), it instead follows a potential victim (Tania Busselier) into Arno's unholy lair. A handful of stylized sex scenes between Busselier, Arno, Woods, and Lina Romay (as Arno's slightly deranged slave) sets up a surprising twist (but very Sadean) ending, in which Martine becomes a victim of her own sick escapades. Once again a hermetically sealed world is created by the use of an 18mm lens range to shoot the interiors of the villa which the scheming protagonists inhabit. This lens was often used by Orson Welles to open up claustrobic spaces in such films as TOUCHE OF EVIL and THE TRIAL. He also uses some fairly elaborate lateral tracking shots, as when the basement chamber of horrors is first introduced or to subtly distort the distances between characters. After all, Franco himself has said his films are about the distances between people.
In addition, Franco offers a consistently perverse and obsessive world within Arno's villa -- Rooms bathed in red light, strip teases using mannikins, slow-moving sex action, and his trademark voyeuristic motifs. Busselier's midnight bedroom antics (spied on by Arno and Woods through a telescope) are some of the most erotic scenes Franco has filmed, without becoming overly explicit.
The reveiwed print contains some very brief XXX shots, but they are handled with an unusual grace and discretion, considering Franco's more graphic forays into hardcore sex movie terrain. The Franco biography, Obsession: The Films of Jess Franco, lists the running time of this film as 80 minutes, but some U.S. mail order companies offer a French language version which runs approx 87 minutes, as does the highly recommended MONDO MACABRO Blu-ray. The colors, seen in HD, are richly saturated and often display clashing, but gorgeous, patterns. The color of the 1950s melodramas Douglas Sirk directed at Universal come to mind.**** BELOW: Douglas Sirk's IMITATION OF LIFE (1959)****
****ABOVE: Clifford Brown (1930-1956)**** Given the number of versions Franco made of this story, this once again underlines that the style he uses to tell the same stories over and over is always completely different than the previous iterations. His style is constantly, gradually evolving as he moves on to different locations, casts and budgets. He's like a pianist or a jazz trumpeteer usuing different keys, notes and tempos to play the same tune, each time renewing it for his audience. Clifford Brown, the jazz trumpet stylist used a specific "approach pattern" on the notes he played to arrive at his unique sound. It's no accident that this film, as many other Franco films, is credited to "Clifford Brown", one of the director's favorite beards and musicians. (C) Robert Monell, New Version--2023

12 October, 2023

I'M IN A JESS FRANCO STATE OF MIND: Women In Peril: JE BRULE DE PARTOUT

I'M IN A JESS FRANCO STATE OF MIND: Women In Peril: JE BRULE DE PARTOUT: Happy Birthday to Brigitte Lahaie! I was lucky enough to score one of now OOP LE Blu-rays of Jess Franco's rarely seen crime drama, [Click above to continue]

28 September, 2023

BLUE RITA/DAS FRAUENHAUS Blu-ray; 2 Disc SE

DANCE, GAS, KIDNAP, TORTURE... REPEAT.
BLUE RITA SE: Full Moon. This kinky, visually dazzling Eurospy fantasia is one of Franco's most unique films and a personal favorite of the features he made for Erwin C. Dietrich. 2 Disc- Blu-ray+DVD. BLUE RITA/DAS FRAUENHAUS, filmed in Paris and featuring Martine Flety (COCKTAIL SPECIAL) and Pamela Stanford (LORNA, THE EXORCIST) as leaders of a criminal organization of female seductresses and spies. The visual style of this Erwin Dietrich-Robert De Nesle production, deploys a lot of colorful costumes, color gel lighting, dutch camera angles, smoke, mirrors and eye catching filter effects. The women are a bisexual, sadistic, and exhibitionist lot who make a lot of trouble for a Russian spy (Eric Falk) and an undercover female Interpol agent sent to break up the operation, hidden behind a high class stripi club in Paris. Opening with a strip performance lit by a crimson spotlight the performance scenes give Franco ample oppurtunity to display his fetish stylistics with full aesthetic splendor.
This all plays as a more stylish reconsideration of the plot and style of Franco's Harry Alan Tower's produced THE GIRL FROM RIO (1969). It's much less conventional and more infused with Franco's unique personal style than Towers allowed. Dietrich was a more supportive producer who gave Franco permission to be himself. That means what we have here is a wild eyed action painting, a million light years from a tepid Bond imitation. The Paris exteriors and sci-fi interiors give the film a look and vibe quite different from the other Erwin Dietrich productions.
The much less supportive Robert De Nesle was co-producer and was very much in attendance during the Parisian shooting according to an interview I did with Pamela Stanford on her work with Franco. She remembered De Nesle literally rushing the cast from location to location between scenes and making sure no time was wasted. He always considered Franco a reliable employee who would deliver a profitable product. Dietrich respected Franco as an artist who would deliver a personalized work in his own time so didn't bother interfering. The French language track here, with English subtitles included, give the proceedings an Art-Exploitation q along; the English dub is included on the DVD disc and unfortunateAly gooes against the film's aesthetic grain. Also included on the Blu-ray is a photo gallery and an interview with Franco enthusiast-director Peter Strickland. The color gel lighting effects and fetishistic props really pop, shimmer and shake in HD and the more appropriate French soundtrack make this a much more enjoyable experience than FULL MOON'S previous DVD release.
(C) Robert Monell, 2023 Product details Product Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.48 x 5.31 x 1.18 inches Director ‏ : ‎ Jess Franco, Jesus Franco Media Format ‏ : ‎ Anamorphic, NTSC, Widescreen Run time ‏ : ‎ 1 hour and 15 minutes Release date ‏ : ‎ December 12, 2023 Actors ‏ : ‎ Esther Moser, Olivier Mathot, Erik Falk, Pamela Stanford, Sarah Strasberg Studio ‏ : ‎ Full Moon Features ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0CF39WB42 Number of discs ‏ : ‎ 2 Best Sellers Rank: #15,181 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV) #1,669 in Action & Adventure Blu-ray Discs