VAYA LUNA DE MIEL--Reviewed by Francesco Cesari
[NOTE: This is the first-ever review of this recently recovered film to appear anywhere in any language. Thanks to Francesco Cesari for covering the showing in Madrid--Robert Monell, editor]
The world premiere of Vaya
luna de miel (Wow, what a
honeymoon) at Cine Doré in Madrid,
on February 28th, was definitely a major Jess Franco event.
Previously known under the shooting-title El escarabajo de oro (The Gold-Bug), the film was
considered lost or unfinished. At
least until, last year, Franco scholar Álex Mendíbil discovered the original
negative in the Filmoteca Española archive. The plot tells the adventures of
Yolanda and Simón (Lina Romay and Emilio Álvarez), a couple spending their
honeymoon in the imaginary tropical Isle of Bananas. Simón is mistaken for a spy and given
a sheet which hides the secret to access a gold mine. Once again, a sort of
hermetic code in a Jess Franco film. Coming into the sights of a sadistic
couple (Craig and Greta, played by Max-B and Susy Boulais), the newlyweds are
protected by a band of Orientals. Until the real Simón pops out … actually a
Matt Simón, played by Franco’s regular and right-hand man Antonio Mayans, who
introduced the film at Cine Doré together with Mendíbil.
Before talking about the movie, let’s try to clarify, as far as
possible, its adventurous genesis. On 3 September 1979, José Luis Martin
Berzal, the manager of Magna Films S.A., a well-known Spanish sound Company,
announces the oncoming production of El
escarabajo de oro, passing it off as a cinematic reduction of the famous
story by Edgar Allan Poe. Filming
should start on September 10th, but the cast is still incomplete.
The male protagonist and Antonio Mayans are missing. At this time the character
of Craig is assigned to Eurociné’s regular Olivier Mathot, for the stated
purpose of selling the movie in France.
Franco scholar Lucas Balbo found some documents that confirm the indirect
involvement of the Parisian company, who as usual intended to re-edit the
Franco footage: «Apparently Eurociné wanted to release it, re-edited with a
pirate prolog and more special effects in a project titled Trilogie fantastique.»
Soon, however, things took a different turn. On October 1st, Mathot was
replaced by Antonio De Cabo, and the filming locations were moved from Las
Palmas de Gran Canaria and Madeira to the province of Alicante (Elche,
Benidorm, Alicante – even if a minor part of the footage seems to be shot in
Portugal). Considering that on December 6th Magna and Eurociné
signed the contract for La
diosa de los caníbales (White
Cannibal Queen), the filming of which would start next January, Vaya luna de miel’s was likely
shot in autumn 1979.
Shooting had already started when Max-B (aka Max-Henri Boulois) and his
wife Susy Boulais (aka María Gonzales) came into play, probably still in order
to sell the film to Eurociné. The
actor was a black French singer who in '70s had some success with the song Bananaticoco.
As Craig and Greta, the couple took over from Antonio De Cabo and Ana
María Rosier, a Spanish revue actress. In
return, Franco assigned her the role of an oriental female-spy by fusing three
different characters from the original script: a male spy and two female agents
– Olga and Paula – in the pay of Craig. The only problem was that Antonio De
Cabo had already played Craig in the scenes set in the fair. In Franco’s
philosophy, repeating the shooting meant only wasting money and time. So, he
kept the old footage and found the way of inserting new takes with Max-B. As
strange as it may seem, the final editing works, except that the viewer will
never know who the classy boss played by De Cabo is and why he later disappears
into nothingness. The script describes Craig as «a kind of Peter Lorre,
elegantly dressed»: certainly not the portrait of the gigantic Max-B, who looks
rather like somebody halfway between Bud Spencer and Mr. T.
Editing and dubbing were efficiently completed, but Magna Films didn’t
ask for the distribution license and the film was never released in Spain.
According to Mendíbil, the negative found at the Madrid Filmoteca «comes from
Fotofilm, where sometimes Franco left the laboratory expenses unpaid. Maybe the
reels were confiscated until the debt would be paid, which never happened. We
have found an invoice stating that the film was sent to a cinema in Barcelona, but it wasn’t
given any screening.» Until
proven otherwise, Vaya luna de miel was
not even sold to Eurociné. Nonetheless, the same year, interviewed by Augusto
M. Torres, Franco included it among his best works.
We don’t know why the producer renounced the distribution. Maybe the
answer lies in the anomaly of a sound company which suddenly became a
production company. Magna wasn’t even listed in the register of film production
companies. Its position was normalized only on December 12th, 1979,
at the request of the Ministry. Moreover, Joaquin Dominguez, the production
manager of Vaya luna de miel, was the director and the owner of Triton
Films, the label that produced the four previous Franco films, entrusting the
sound to Magna. So, it’s possible that Magna acted on behalf of Triton (maybe
to recover some credit?). The fact is that, shortly thereafter, the newborn
producer moved away also from La
diosa de los canibales, which was converted into a Franco-Italian
co-production.
The change of title was surely decided in
extremis and was never
communicated to the Ministry. The 91-page script still bears the title El escarabajo de oro, the only
one used by the director when interviewed. However, that of Vaya luna de miel was surely Franco’s idea, as it quotes
the Spanish title of a 1947 U.S. movie (William Keighley’s Honeymoon) featuring the “original” Lina Romay, whose name he used
as nom de plume for his muse and partner Rosa María
Almirall.
The production history may make one think of a marginal, minor work in
the huge Jess Franco filmography; a hypothesis partly supported by the original
script, with its fresh but light comedy tone. But the result on the screen is
very different. The rhythm of the editing and the freshness of the shots make
the difference. Give a child a basket full of bizarre puppets, toy cars,
monsters, strange objects, and be sure he will build a crazy, thrilling story.
Franco does the same. He takes what he has at his fingertips: first of all his
puppets-actors, all strongly characterized as in a comic-book, then a small
golden scarab, a sunny fair full of merry-go-rounds, some funny toy-monsters, a
cheap ferris-wheel, a petulant robot-bonsai, some “exotic” guys taken from the
road (the grotesque “Barbudo” – the Oriental head-honcho – is really extraordinary),
brand new plastic-skeletons, hot lingerie and kinky dresses, a tiny magic
flute, some 1970s automobiles … and he makes all of them interact with one
another as in a daring bumper car ride. Even the Daniel White prerecorded
music, heard in other Franco films, tends to break into the story to change the
"point of view", to displace the viewer (most memorably with the
romantic cello solo while “sweet” Craig takes away his treacherous half by
clasping and lifting her like a pile of twigs).
The fair scene – filmed with his restless hand-camera and edited with great
sense of rhythm – is the peak of the movie. Yolanda and Simón flee from the
bandits by climbing on a ferris-wheel, while the crowd gathers to observe them
as if watching a movie. Actors and passers-by merge. The effect, realistic and estranging
at the same time, is typical of Franco at his best. Similar scenes can be found in Le journal intime d’une nymphomane (1973) and Las chicas del tanga (1984).
The spirit of the fair is the spirit of Vaya luna de miel. The
pleasant comedy background (a mischievous one, “à la Billy Wilder”) works
pretty well, mainly thanks to Lina Romay, wilder, hotter, and more charming
than ever; but it is the surprises, the syncopations that make the film alive.
When the viewer begins to relax, suddenly Franco takes him off guard. You can
have fun like crazy (the arrival of the robot-bonsai is perhaps the drollest
scene in Franco’s cinema), get mad by some unsuccessful gags (Craig's death,
for instance) or by a gold mine made of aluminum foil, and wonder where and why
Antonio De Cabo vanished, but you are always forced to interact with the
screen, to leave your comfortable seat and enter inside the film to play with
Jess and his puppets.
This is the very heart of Franco’s anarchic cinema. Even though its plot
seems to refer mainly to the later ¿Cuanto
cobra una espía? (1984 – another honeymoon couple surrounded with spies)
and En busca del dragon dorado (1983 – still another fake
transposition of the Poe's tale), Vaja
luna de miel must be placed
among his most crazy works – in the same spirit of his debut feature film, Tenemos 18 años (1959), Sex Charade (1969 – of which only the script
remains), El sexo está loco (1980), the brilliant early 1960s
script Sangre en mis zapatos,
alas yielded to Tulio Demicheli (Misión Lisboa) who destroyed it like Vaya luna de miel’s toy-robot
destroys everybody.
Well supported by the Filmoteca Española’s team and managers, Álex Mendíbil
had the job of identifying the film and advocating its cause. Thanks to his
passion and perseverance, more unknown Franco titles could surface. Mendíbil
had also the idea of projecting two trailers after the film. One of them was Fu Manchú y el beso de la muerte,
the Spanish version of Franco's The
Blood of Fu Manchu (1968).
Fresh from the vision of Vaya
luna de miel, also the images of this mainstream work, acted out by
Christopher Lee and other “classical” actors, assumed in my eyes a completely
new meaning, I believe a more authentic one: the fake-Chinese actors, the
poisonous snakes, the caves, the explorer hats, the bad guy’s size are the same
as in Vaya luna de miel,
as well as the director’s playful attitude.
The February 28th evening celebrated the 30th anniversary of the
Filmoteca Española in the presence of José Guirao, the Spanish Minister of
Culture and Sport. No doubt that the decision of associating this prestigious
event with a work by Jesús Franco, a long-ostracized Spanish filmmaker, and in
particular with a disengaged film such as Vaja
luna de miel would have made
him smile with a mixture of joy and mischievous irony. The original script, in this regard, foresaw a
gag in three chapters and three cartels dedicated to the film classification
system in post-Francoist Spain, which is absent in the film. Maybe Franco
renounced it, but as you will see, the cartels couldn’t be inserted before the
film classification, which never happened. The first cartel was supposed to
appear while Yolanda and Simón are going to make love in their hotel room:
WE REMIND YOU THAT THIS MOVIE IS CLASSIFIED AS SUITABLE FOR ALL AGES –
GEE!
The second appears after a passionate kiss between Craig and Greta:
WE WARN YOU THAT IF YOU CONTINUE SO, THIS FILM WILL BE AUTHORIZED ONLY
FOR THOSE OVER FOURTEEN YEARS OLD – DAMN!!
The third pops up toward the end, when the sadistic Greta bites Simón on
his lips:
YOU ARE GOING TOO FAR. WE'LL
AUTHORIZE THE MOVIE FOR OVER 18 YEARS OLD ONLY.
It’s at this point that the producer – «a man of humble appearance,
crestfallen» – enters the image to beg the censor: «Authorize it at least for
18 y.o. and 14 y.o. accompanied». But «a hand
with a big cigar and a big ring» appears and a voice off replays with the most
sadistic pleasure: «No! ha,
haha, hahaha ... NO!!»
© 2019 Francesco Cesari
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