AL PEREIRA VS. THE ALLIGATOR WOMEN (2012) Jess Franco

CINEMADROME - THE WORLD OF JESS FRANCO FORUM - AL PEREIRA VS. THE ALLIGATOR LADIES (2012) Jess Franco

Antonio Mayans and Jess Franco (at far left) on the set of their new film collaboration. Thanks to Alex Mendibil.

los violadores del amanecer cine kinki Ignacio F. Iquino 1978

A Cathoic Noir by Ignacio Iquino which incorpoates rape, murder and street crime into a CLOCKWORK ORANGE scenario. Very disturbing...

THE FREEDOM GAME (1973)

THE FREEDOM GAME (1973): Directed by Jess Franco. Screenplay by Robert Woods. Producer: Harry Alan Towers. Cast: Robert Woods. Filming location: Canary Islands.

Here's another never-filmed Jess Franco project brought to my attention by Robert Woods, who wrote this Western for producer Towers. Jess was going to direct in the Canary Islands with Robert (a veteran of numerous Spaghetti Westerns) in the lead.. Robert and Jess went to the Canaries from Madiera, after shooting the two MACISTE films together there, to scout locations. But the money never came through from Towers and this Jess Franco Eurowestern never happened.

Franco came close to the western genre with EL LLANERO (1963) and Les Chatouilleuses (1974) but never quite got around to making one. Thanks to Robert Woods.
Image: Roquenublo Gran Canarias

FEMALE VAMPIRE (1973) EXORCISM (1974): COMING ON BLU-RAY from REDEMPTION October!

NOTE: The above clip is not from the actual coming Blu-ray which will have HD image quality. 2 bonus versions, EROTIKILL (the shorter horror alternate and a 104 "Erotic" version), of  LA COMTESSE NOIRE are reportedly going to be available along with the uncut version with English and French tracks w/ English subtitles. Other bonus materials will be included. EXORCISM reportedly will also have the French track, which features Jess Franco's actual voice. Thanks to Bruce Holecheck for publishing these links on The Latarnia Forums' THE FRANCO LOUNGE.

Exorcism:DVD:  http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008N2Z1B0/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=cinema09-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B008N2Z1B0
Blu:  http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008N2Z1GA/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=cinema09-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B008N2Z1GA

The Female Vampire:DVD:  http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008N2Z16A/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=cinema09-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B008N2Z16A
Blu:  http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008N2Z1JC/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=cinema09-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B008N2Z1JC

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=9146

Maciste contre la Reine des Amazones-trailer

Maciste contre la Reine des Amazones - trailer

Thanks to Lucas Balbo

www.youtube.com

Jess Franco at rest after completing two new films!

Thanks to Alex Mendibil for this image of Jess Franco taken yesterday just after our favorite auteur completed two new feature film adventures of his favorite PI, Al Pereira. Antonio Mayans once again plays the beleaguered investigator. According to Alex one of the films is in the Erotic genre, while the other is more or less straight up... Also coming is a new Jess Franco documentary which Alex and Ferran Herranz are presently involved in producing!

LA CINEMATHEQUE FRANCAISE: HOMMAGE TO LINA ROMAY

2. Thanks to Lucas Balbo for alerting me to this. Wish I could be there.

   

   Cinéma bis : Hommage à Lina Romay - La Cinémathèque française

   www.cinematheque.fr

   Cinéma bis : Hommage à Lina Romay - La Comtesse aux seins nus / Les Avaleuses de J.P. Johnson (Jess Franco) Belgique-France/1973/83'/VF/35mm Avec Lina Romay, Jack Taylor, Monica Swinn. Une comtesse muette, en villégiature à Madère, absorbe l'énergie sexuelle de ses victim...

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La Chica de las bragas transparentes / PICK-UP GIRLS (1980)

A Luz Internacional Films S.A. Production 

Filmed in the Canary Islands

Al Crosby (Antonio Mayans, here credited as "Robert Foster") is a sleazy private eye (cf Franco's Al Pereira) who is hired by a hood to meet up with another hood but ends up getting involved with two stripper-hookers (Lina Romay and Doris Regina) who take compromising photos of him. Rosa Valenty, playing the sex change Robert Bressac, who keeps his/her member in a jar for nostalgia sake, enters the muddy picture, getting Al further involved with blackmail, murder, political corruption and more. It's a lot of fun for the audience, but not for the PI.

A loose remake of the director's 1972 LES EBRANLEES, a  Robert De Nesle produced sexy mystery in which Howard Vernon played the sleazy PI Al Pereia, this one of the director's 1980s Classificada S films which features a familiar Pablo Villa (Franco and Daniel J. White) hot jazz score. It's a toss up if this is more explicit than the 72 film but times have changed as it relates a twisting tale of white slavery, personal corruption and sexual identity. It's really about audience expectations and how Franco approaches the Spanish Adult film market which was a good decade behind the French market. Just look at the very first image: a small panel opens within a door to a secret casino/bar/strip club. We see the framed face (and he will indeed be framed) of Al reciting the pass code. He's facing the camera, the viewer, the focal plane, looking into what should be the "fourth wall." In effect he's asking our permission to enter our space, our consciousness. Entering the club, which features tropical plants and tree branches amid lounge furniture against a black background, it appears we are in an interior which wants to be an exterior , much like the plot which is reluctant to clarify,  proceed or reveal character's intentions.  This offers a more shifting, interactive matrix than the 1972 film. The opening set-up already places us in the casino interior, we become implicated in the "plot," part of the lie, part of the deception. The dancing girls are placed so it's not clear if they are really there or mirror reflections. Spatial integrity is immediately subverted. Somehow we feel involved in something more than just another sexy thriller. It's not just about the fate of Al Crosby. It's also about our position as the prejudiced, awaiting audience, after all. 

The English dub PICK-UP GIRLS deploys "Americanisms" and a New Jersey Gangster delivery while attempting to mask the Canary Island settings with references to the US. But it's obviously not the States. It's an 1980s approximation of Film Noir with lurid colors and full nudity in a tropical surreality. Mayans looks the part with his off-the-rack wardrobe, burnt-out demeanor and regulation mustache while Rosa Valenty conveys a magnificently bitchy mystique as the sex change, the girl with the not-so-transparent sexual identity.

The English language version is missing about 5 minutes of (sexual?) footage according to the review in OBSESSION. THE FILMS OF JESS FRANCO.

(C) Robert Monell - 2012