THE VENGEANCE OF DR. MABUSE (Jess Franco, 1972) Kino Cult Blu-ray

Although the title of the new Kino Lorber Cult Blu-ray is THE VENGEANCE OF DR. MABUSE, the film contained within is not Jess Franco's LA VENGENZA DEL DR. MABUSE (1972). It's the reedited, redubbed German cut prepared by producer Artur Brauner who rejected Franco's director cut. The oncreen title of this version is DR.M STRIKES.

LA VENGANZA DEL DR MABUSE Blu-ray release: hot jazz bursts, dreamy lounge interludes, frenetic percussions written by David Khune aka Jess Franco. See the Spanish version first, if you can find it, before seeing/avoiding the recent Blu-ray, which was re-edited by the producer who hated Franco's director's cut. This version also has redubbed German dialogue which changes all of Franco's original dialogue and story. The story now takes place in America and they're talking about invading Mexico! They hired a new director to shoot additional scenes of a shoot out during a robbery and people talking in offices. All this additional footage is shot like a bland TV movie. Then they had a new editor cut it all together without Franco's involvement. This Producers cut was released in Germany . The Spanish director's cut was only briefly released in Spain and is now in the Spanish Filmoteca. I have the director's cut on video from VSOM. The Bluray has good video quality but is a mess. They should have included Franco's version as part of the release. Hopefully someone will contact a company like MONDO MACABRO or Severin to do a proper release

LA VENGANZA DEL DR. MABUSE, the original cut of this film, is a very interesting oddity, a very low budget sci-fi thriller, Jess Franco style. It opens with waves crashing onto a rocky shore (the film was shot in Alicante, Murcia and Barcelona) as lounge/jazz music, including some soft saxophone notes, vibes, lull the viewer into a receptive state until some bursts of le jazz hot sax stylings are later scored over action scenes. This score (which is altered in the Blu-ray version) was written by Jess Franco, as David Khunne, with an uncredited Daniel White (according to OBSESSION: THE FILMS OF JESS FRANCO) creates a mood unusual for a science fiction-crime film. Style usually dictates content in the filmography of Jess Franco, rather than vice-versa. The mise-en-scene of this film was affected by the low budget and initial demands of the producer, CCC CEO Artur Brauner, who presented Franco with an original treatment. Franco's response was a film which osscilates between the visual style of a B western and a Pop Art sci-fi film. I found my original review of LA VENGANZA DEL DR. MABUSE on the now defunct DARK WATERS website. It might be constructive at this point. This was written and published in 1998: -------------------------------------------------------------------- (a.k.a. DER MANN DER SICH MABUSE NANNTE; DER DOKTOR MABUSE) In a remote lighthouse lab, criminal mastermind Dr. Mabuse conducts mind control experiments on women who are kidnapped by his assistants. Mabuse uses a mineral from stolen moon rocks (!) to create a ray that turns people into obedient zombies. A stripper, a witness to one of the abductions, in turn becomes the next victim. Under Mabuse's telepathic guidance, she seduces an American diplomat. These rapidly escalating events are investigated by Thomas, the local Sheriff, who finally manages to locate the hideout. Mabuse is killed during a melee involving his brain damaged henchman, and the lab explodes. This obscure feature represents the last gasp of the long-lived Dr. Mabuse franchise, which had seen better days in the Fritz Lang thrillers of the 1920s and 30s. Franco's movie has a very rushed look, For intance, one scene is partially obscured by a section of the lens-cap which appears not to have been properly removed. Also, when the cops arrive at Dr. Mabuse's hideout, the shadow of the Manuel Merino's camera falls over the arriving police car. There's more: Some amusing touches include Mabuse's hulking henchman, Andros, who, with his sewn-up skull cap, looks like a refugee from a Hammer horror entry. The Red Garter "nightclub," which is just a parking garage with a few chairs and tables placed inside, is the setting for Ewa Stroemberg's minimalist striptease. The office of the local Sheriff (Fred Williams) looks like a leftover from some spaghetti western, and Williams appears throughout the film in a cowboy costume. Despite these curiosites -- and that Jack Taylor is miscast as Mabuse-like mad scientist -- the action is punctuated by a decent jazz music score, as well as some impressive photography. Most interesting are some extremely wide-angle compositions in Mabuse's lab and during the abduction scenes, which distort spatial relationships and employ lighting and color in a way which anticipate Kubrick's A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. .................................................................................................................

Despite some similarites between A CLOCKWORK ORANGE and LA VENGANZA's visual styles I doubt if Franco had seen a pre-release of Kubrick's film or read the original 1962 Anthony Burgess novel before making his film. Orson Welles, a Franco mentor and favorite filmmaker, used similar wide angle lensing and shock lighting in his 1958 Film Noir, TOUCH OF EVIL. That said, Franco's film is not really an adaptation of the Dr. Mabuse character created by Norbert Jacques in a 1921 novel. Fritz Lang made an epic length, two part film based on the book in the early 1920s when a dissatified character was in prison waiting to take over Germany, create the Nazi party and war machine, launch World War II and operate concentration camps where millions of Jewish people were exterminated. Lang made two more Mabuse epics, THE TESTAMENT OF DR MABUSE in 1933, which Hitler admired so much he offered Lang the leadership of the Nazi film machine. Lang declined and slipped out of Germany for a career directing Hollywood films. Lang returned to Germany in 1960 to kill of Mabuse in THE THOUSAND EYES OF DR. MABUSE. THIS film was Lang's last but producer Artur Brauner, who ran CCC Films, produced 5 more Mabuse adventures during the 1960's which unfolded in descending order of interest. Brauner also became successful producing numerous German Krimi films, gritty crime stories which became boxoffice hits in Germany and Europe.

In 1970 Brauner decided to resurrect the Dr. Mabuse character for a new generation and gave Jess Franco a treatment to direct, which he did in late February, early March, 1971. Brauner resented that the film didn't follow his treatment and hired a team of directors and editors to shoot new scenes and reedit the footage as DR. M. Strikes. That is the film presented on the KINO CULT Blu-ray. Here is the copy on the back of the slipcase: [A criminal mastermind (Jack Taylor, Female Vampire) deploys poison gas and a beautiful whip-wielding assassin (Beni Cardoso) in a plot to steal government secrets in The Vengeance of Dr Mabuse (Dr. M schlägt zu). But his elaborate schemes risk unraveling when a small-town inspector (Fred Williams) stumbles into the scene. An unauthorized entry in the Dr. Mabuse cycle, the film makes no reference to Norbert Jacques’s clairvoyant criminal (the M-word is carefully avoided). Instead, director Jess Franco used the project as a chance to revisit his own sci-fi thrillers (The Awful Dr. Orlof, The Diabolical Dr. Z). Fold in a disfigured henchman (Rocha), a striptease dancer (Ewa Strömberg, Vampyros Lesbos), and wrap it all in a feverish jazz score, and the result is a spicy cinematic mélange that could only have been concocted in the demented mind of Jess Franco.]................................................................................................................

The name Dr. Mabuse is not mentioned in either the German version or LA VENGANZA DEL DR. MABUSE. Instead Spanish horror regular Jack Taylor is Dr. Farkas in the latter, who stages a wild west type of robbery (helped along by toxic gas) of "moon rocks" from a delivery van from the a local scientific institute. He is "the man who would be Mabuse" as a translation of the German shooting title indicates. The German version mentions that coded plans which Taylor, renamed Dr. Cranko, is seeking to sell to international criminals in Mexico. When it is discovered that the scientific plans may be encoded, Dr.Cranko panics and sends out the thugish Andros (Moises Augusto Rocha) on a kidnapping spree to leverage some blackmail. The name Andros references Franco's 1964 THE SECRET OF DR. ORLOFF, where a radio controlled robot named Andros was the center of attention. There's also a Dr. Orloff in this film, as a legit scientist who is attacked by Cranko's staff. It should also be noted that the violent kidnappings here are staged and edited to reference Franco's first horror film, GRITOS EN LA NOCHE (1961).

The western atmosphere is established by a pan shot over a sunbaked desert plain to the Spaghetti Western style police station of the local Sheriff (Fred Williams), who is assigned by his superior, played as a cigar chomping taskmaster by Franco himself, to investigate cascading situation. Williams, who had already played the lead in Franco's previous Brauner production, THE DEVIL CAME FROM AKASAVA, an action krimi with Soledad Miranda in her final role, is not an exciting actor. Dressed in cowboy gear, inhabiting an office interior which seems out of Howard Hawks' RIO BRAVO, he's there to re-establish the Euro-Western motif. Working in the shadow of Fritz Lang and Sergio Leone may not be as much fun as it would seem. The subsequent action toggles between a B Spaghetti Western, a B minus sci-fi film and a minimalist crime-action adventure. Nontheless, Franco manages to maintain interest in the comic book proceedings via frenetic pacing, tilted, color gel lit camera set-ups and non-stop esoteric in-jokes for genre buffs and Franco fans. All of these arcane references in the Spanish dialogue are wiped in the German language dub. The improv-style jazz-lounge score helps to maintain some kind of aesthetic cohesion. As Franco himself noted, he considered himself a musician-composer who made films. The rigidity of the cast inhabiting the ramshackle sets suggest a fun visit to a cinema theme park at a run-down carnival. So, go ahead and collect this Blu-ray if you must, maybe it will hold you over until a composite or a restored double disc LE appears in the near or far future. (C) Robert Monell, 2025

DIE MARQUISE VON SADE

Enter a hushed parallel world of Sex and Death...


Strange shadows in empty rooms. A bleak mise-en-scene...


DAS BILDNIS DER DORIANA GRAY/DIE MARQUISE DE SADE/DIRTY DRACULA/EJACULATIONS:
SWITZERLAND/WG-1976, 79m.
I think this film, best known as DAS BILDNIS DER DORIANA GRAY (1976), works a whole lot better without the distraction of the closeups mechanics of hardcore sex. just as LA COMTESSE NOIRE (1973) works best without the hardcore footage, which really drags it out.

As with LA COMTESSE NOIRE, Franco made this film as a hardcore female vampire film with the main character sucking the "essential liquids" from her victims and also as a version without the XXX action inserts.Then there was a horror version where the character is sucking blood from victims, as in the novel DRACULA and all the films based on it. But I don't know of any version of DORIANA GRAY which has traditional vampire scenes of the main character sucking blood from her victims, as the EROTIKILL version of LA COMTESSE NOIRE has. This version was distributed by Force Video in the mid 1980s in the US and lasts just over 75 minutes and is cropped at 1.33:1, which takes much of its impact away.

Many critics have complained about the numerous out of focus shots and seeming technical "errors" in LA COMETESS..., like Lina Romay bumping into the camera lens during the credits sequence. But I find these moments part of the film's uniquely dreamlike quality. To paraphrase the late Henri Langlois, sometimes Franco's failings become his greatest strengths.


It opens with one of the most stunning images in Franco's extensive filmography and justs get better as it goes along. An almost dialogue-free film the impressionistic and low level sound mix is very appropriate to the theme. DORIANA GRAY tells the same story as LA COMTESSE NOIRE with the same characters but in a slightly different key. An lonely female vampire leading a life of quiet desperation in lavishly appointed isolation. Adding a Conradian "secret sharer" in Doriana's torment, her twin sister, separated at birth, who suffers hidden away in the clinic of Dr. Orloff. First seen in a mirror sing songing a macabre nursery rhyme Doriana's twin is one of Franco's most haunting creations, a pathetic creature, a sexually addicted victim of her predatory sister's erotic experiences. She thrashes about having the climaxes denied to Doriana, who telepathically, or somehow, transfers the orgasms to her imprisoned sister who is almost always seen either sexually stimulating herself in between Doriana's transmissions.

It's a world without love, only compulsive sexual behavior, frustration and screaming release for the sister. Punctuated by the cries of birds and set to the minimalist sitar score of Walter Baumgartner the film is clinical, remote and deeply disturbing. The reduced, but luminous, color scheme which lights the way to world of shadows is rigorously explored by Franco's drunken camera.

Designed in slate greys and eye popping pinks (Doriana's see-through robe), set within a castle perched above a jungle (Portugal, probably), much of the run time is taken up with Franco zooming in to study the architecture of the estate. The endless rains pour from the mouths of gargoyles onto the hard tile floors of the mansion while Doriana slowly walks through pillared patios and down long, mysterious hallways to her next deadly assignation. Like Irina Von Karlstein she dies in private bath evoking the last lines of T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land." It works as unique version of Wilde's THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY, while evoking Ingmar Bergman's THE SILENCE and Kieslowski's THE DOUBLE LIFE OF VERONIQUE.

Having re watched the 2003 VIP DVD from producer Dietrich's ELITE FILMS, taken from original camera negs and superbly restored, I find it somewhat technically flawed with some motion glitches, unless there's been a replacement transfer since then.
The English language track grates due to distracting voice casting. I do wish for a new English subtitled NTSC disc which ideally would contain both the non-hardcore version as well as the XXX one.

1976 was a rather amazing years for Jess Franco in that he managed to turn out three of his best films, all in different genres (erotic vampire; nunsploitation; gore/true-crime thriller) and styles: DORIANA GRAY, LOVE LETTERS OF A PORTUGUESE NUN and JACK, THE RIPPER. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Since I wrote the above text there has a been a Blu-ray release of DORIANA, with both versions on Dietrich's THE JESS FRANCO GOLDEN COLLECTION, which I haven't yet seen. I have now seen the non-hardcore version, DIE MARQUISE VON SADE, made in Southern France and in the Dietrich Studios in Switzerland, first in a XXX hardcore version, usually titled DAS BILINDAS DER DORIANA GRAY, then in a non-hardcore version with inserts shot by producer Dietrich (according to FLOWERS OF PERVERSION; THE FILMS OF JESS FRANCO). As Dietrich states in his OBSESSION interview, there were more than one version of both the non-hardcore and the hardcore produced. DIE MARQUISE... is a version I have seen on AMAZON PRIME, running approximately 69 minutes with the inserts replacing all the hardcore material. I much prefer this version as it overall plays in a quiet, daydreamy tone, which is often interrupted by graphic hardcore close-ups of genitalia and oral sex in DORIANA. It's more of a tone poem than an arty porno epic. Some references note a 74 minute version of this re-edit, and there may be more of both out there. The softcore version contains several scenes with Lina Romay, wearing a markedly different hairstyle, descending a staircase while holding a large flower, scenes of Romay smoking something from a pipe, seen through rain spattered window eating the flower. This nude descending a staircase and other footage replaces all the hardcore footage.

Here is a link to an updated article on both versions of the film, along with new interviews with actress Monica Swinn about the making of the film. Also included are research notes and bibliographical information. Written by Michael Orlando Yaccarino. https://www.dorianavilla.com/ (C) Robert Monell, 2025

Jess Franco's XXX Files: VIAJE DE NOVIOS (1956); ELLES FONT TOUT (1978); CLAIRE (1979)

ELLES FONT TOUT is not a favorite of mine and I find the 1980s remake HOTEL DE LAS LUIGES a bit easier to take, but it is preferable to this rather Keystone Cops assembly, which is nonetheless a minor curio for fans of both European Trash Cinema and Jess Franco. The fact that once again a Franco 1980s Golden Films Internacional remake is as interesting and sometimes superior to the orignal confirms Franco's creative persistence rather than a lack of new ideas since what's good about HOTEL DE LAS LUIGES is that it's smarter, funnier and more stylistically layered than ELLES FONT TOUT. Considering the French adverts and this synopsis "Trois couples séjournent dans un hôtel et tous ont des problèmes sexuels. Un jour, une star du porno professionnel (Lina Romay) enseigne à tout le monde comment faire", one might expect a sophisticated and elegant display of epicurian erotica. The French do have a way with words. Fixated on visual slapstick and oral hardcore (Lina Romay literally sucks food out of the diners) this seems like a haphazardly staged orgy for gourmands only. Romay, as the randy porn star Nini, is pretty much the whole show. A key scene has her character sneaking into the bedroom of a sexually dysfunctional couple and performing oral sex on them as they sleep. This qualifies her as a succubus, referencing Franco's 1967 NECROMONICON aka Succubus, which signaled a paradigm shift in his filmography and work arena. Filmed in Portugal, Cascais, Lisbon; Portugal (Stock shot travelling of the Bay, Estoril-Sol Hotel, and the Palácio Seixas); Boca do Inferno, Cascais; Lisbon, Portugal, according to the IMDB, in what appears to be a local hotel for interiors and some exterior stock shots. This seems to have had an unusually frenetic production, even for a filmmaker famous for frenetic productions. Some charm is exhibited by the always welcome Martine Flety (Blue Rita) and the charming sprite Touxa Beni (Eugenie in COCKTAIL SPECIAL), one of three films made back to back for ailing produced Robert De Nesle, who was to pass away in 1978, the year this, along with JE BRULE DE PARTOUT would form a desperate trilogy for the legendary moneyman. Franco, ever the salesman, visited De Nesle on his death bed, attempting to make a final deal for future productions. The producer of THE THREE FANTASTIC SUPERMEN, COPLAN Eurospy films and 1960s Peplums left this plane of existence on April 21, 1978.

First, a little known parallel film to ELLES FONT TOUT was Leon Klimovsky's 1956 HONEYMOON/VIAJE DE NOVIOS, which Franco worked on as assistant director and co-wrote some of the musical score. The plot and main characters in that film were again used in ELLES FONT TOUT without credit. In that film Aurora de Alba (FRANKENSTEIN'S BLOODY TERROR) plays the Lina Romay role of a sexy singer who comes to a vacation spa in rural Spain where she flirts with several married men and finally leaves with the couples reconciled. Filmed in candy colored hues, Franco wrote several songs de Alba performs, among them AMOR, AMOR, later to be heard in Franco's horror debut GRITOS EN LA NOCHE (1961). She also performs a Conga song which uses the word "Cucufate" repreatedly. Franco fans will recognize the word as the name of a devil cut in his wild 1980 sci-fi-sex epic, EL SEXO ESTA LOCO. Franco once again was employing his composing and directoral skills in different contexts. VIAJE DE NOVIOS is a much better resourced, directed and performed film (including future collaborator Fernando Fernan Gomez in a key role) and is well worth seeking out.

I can verify the existence of an Italian version, QUEL CERTO SAPORE (That Certain Taste) of ELLES FONT TOUT, which would appear several years after the initial release of ELLES FONT TOUT. I had it in my Jess Franco collection for decades and had never gotten around to watching it. I finally fished it out of storage and it's a sub-par dupe, but watchable. In fact, this seems to be the only way to watch ELLES FONT TOUT, which despite a release of French video seems to presently have disappeared. The best shot in the film, and only stylish one, is the final shot of Lina's character, wearing an eye-catching sun hat, exiting the hotel, script in hand for "Sucking in the Rain", her upcoming porn film.

CLAIRE (1979): Threee Jess Franco films and at least three Joe D'Amato hardcore films composited by D'Amato make up the Italian producer's second attempt to make a commercial product out of several Franco films. This is probably one of the most difficult to find of Franco-related films, with no known DVD release. Franco's 1978 Robert De Nesle funded hardcore ELLES FONT TOUT, which featured Lina Romay as a porno actress vacationing at an exclusive sex spa, was merged with footage shot by D'Amato featuring one of his favorite hardcore performers, Mark [PORNO HOLOCAUST] Shanon (aka Manlio Certosino). The pamphlet AKA Joe D'Amato (Italy, 1995) cites footage with B. Lahaie, but she is elusive to me in the blurry print which I referenced. I guess it would be Franco's JE BRULE DE PARTOUT (1978). In addition there is footage from COCKTAIL SPECIAL, and at least three D'Amato 1980s era hardcore features edited into the mix. That would be three Jess Franco's and three Joe D'Amatos for the price of one. Basically this composite is a mess of main interest to Franco and D'Amato collectors.

Note that even though she is prominently credited, Franco icon Pamela Stanford [aka Monique Delaunay] is not present in this print version. CLAIRE seems to have been put together circa 1979 but wasn't until several years later that it was released in Italy. The print referenced was a poor video dupe in Italian. Thanks to Nzoog for alerting me to the Franco connections in LUNA DE MIEL and finding a print for me to reference. [74m 30s] (C) Robert Monell, 2025

THE GIRL FROM RIO/LA CIUDAD SIN HOMBRES/DIE SIEBEN MANNER DER SUMURU (1969)

THE GIRL FROM RIO aka FUTURE WOMEN aka La Ciudad sin Hombres aka Die Sieben Männer der Sumuru - Jess Franco, 1968 Espagne/Allemagne/États Unis

Many thanks to Uwe Huber for contributing this image [which hopefully will stay up here] of the poster prepared for the US theatrical release of Jess Franco's THE GIRL FROM RIO. This "Daring Motion Picture" was never exhibited theatrically under this title in the US as far as I know.

For me, this delightfully tacky advert beats the stylish Jano poster for the Spanish version, LA CIUDAD SIN HOMBRES, which was my favorite up to this point. Note that Georges Sanders billing font is twice the size of Shirley Eaton's and Richard Wyler's. BTW, look for a future blog on the career slide of Sanders following his encounter with Jess Franco, including some behind the scenes glimpses of the actor from my interview with Richard Wyler. But what exactly is GIGANTIC SCREENOVISION: THE 4th DIMENSION?!

The wealthy father of a missing girl (Marta Reves) dispatches a Private Investigator to Brazil to rescue her from the all female city of Femina, presided over by the Supercriminal, Sumanda (Shirley Eaton). Our hero travels undercover as a fugitive bank robber. He finds more than he bargained for when he himself is captured and tortured by the outrageously clad female soldiers of the archvillainess. Even more trouble arises when crime lord Masius (George Sanders) sends his henchmen to collect the cool millions of the absconding Wyler and the fortune in gold bars in Sumanda's treasury.

The Pop-Art/dominatrix style black and red leathers costumes of Sumanda's army of sadistic seducers and the frequent changes of outre fashions by Shirley Eaton steal the show from the rather befuddled looking Richard Wyler, who told me when I interview him that he hated making this film and thought that Jess Franco was a "terrible" director who he claimed spent most of his time during production reading pornography, delegating production tasks to his nephew, Ricardo Franco. The fact that Wyler wasn't fully paid may explain his sour expression throughout. George Sanders looks almost dead, although it's fun to see him reading a POPEYE comic while directing the torture of an employee. Lots of foxy ladies here, none moreso than the always scantily clad Eliza Montes, who had hypnotic cat eyes. Another ultradimensional, jarring score from the great Daniel White (who claimed producer Towers never paid him for his work) puts the frosting on the dessert, and that's just what this delightful Eurospy trifle qualifies as: fascinating, silly entertainment which allows Franco fans to gorge on his hastily prepared, delicious eye candy. Note that the torture ray which Sumanda (who is called Sumitra and Sumuru in alternate versions) uses on prisoners is actually a dental X Ray machine (take that, Ed Wood)! Colorful exoticia with a bit higher budget than the usual Franco product, thanks to the dubious Harry Alan Towers. This first came out on home video via a sparkling new DVD from Blue Underground with an extensive poster and still gallery along with interviews featuring Franco and Ms Eaton. This version lacks the opening armoured car robbery which can be seen in the German language alternate, DIE SEIBEN MANNER DER SUMURU. It has since been issued on Blu-ray with some scenes from the German language version included as Special Features. The German version also drops much of Daniel White's original score, replacing it with music previously heard in the 1964 German Krimi, THE MONSTER OF LONDON CITY.

Then there's the Harry Alan Towers produced prequel, THE MILLION EYES OF SUMURU (1967), also starring Ms. Eaton in the title role and featuring Maria Rohm, George Nader as an American secret agent, and Klaus Kinski. That one is directed by Lindsay Shonteff and is on a Blue Underground Blu-ray along with THE GIRL FROM RIO. A more action packed and legitimately resourced film than GIRL, it was filmed on location Hong Kong. Both Maria Rohm, who plays Wyler's love interest, and Wyler told me the sets on which THE GIRL FROM RIO was shot did not have air conditioning, making the shoot very uncomfortable in the sweltering Brazilan heat. Yet another version of THE GIRL FROM RIO appeared under the title FUTURE WOMEN, which doesn't even carry a director's credit. This iteration was reedited to include stock footage from the action film, SINAI COMMANDOS, a 1968 war film shot in Israel. (C) Robert Monell, 2025 (C) Robert Monell

LE SOMBRA DEL JUDOKA CONTRA EL DOCTOR WONG: Jess Franco's Martial Arts Holocaust.

Anyone viewing the 1985 Jess Franco crime/martial arts epic LE SOMBRA DE JUDOKA CONTRA DR. WONG 40 years after it was filmed on Canary Island locations will be confronted by a very curious spectacle. The shadow of judo refers to Bruce, the main charater who works to bust drug smugglers in his tropical city. It was one of the first "martial arts" films made in the 1980s, a series of crime-action films made with sparse resources for Emilio Larraga's Golden Films Internactional. The martial arts action performed by "Bruce Lyn" aka actor Jose Llamas is not impressive and is mostly rendered in Lo-Fi B-movie style slow motion. But Llamas was not the only actor performing martial arts in the film. First, a bit about the late Jose Llamas from a post created by Nzoog here some time ago: "[In his work in Jess Franco films] Llamas was assigned anything from minor roles to leads, sometimes on the heroic side, as in Viaje a Bangkok, ataúd incluido (1985) and several antagonists, such as his “Macho Jim” in Los blues de la calle Pop (1983). Strangest of all was Franco’s decision that he fill in the shoes of Bruce Lee in some of the pseudo-martial arts features the director was occasionally and inexplicably turning out in the eighties despite an absolute lack of demand in Spain for homegrown product of this kind, not to mention Llamas’s lack of an appropriate background. The actor certainly looked athletic, had black hair and, as Mayans has said, could dance, but in the words of David Domingo “he’s hopelessly clueless about martial arts” (2). These words are in reference to La sombra del judoka contra el doctor Wong (1982-85), with Llamas credited as “Bruce Lyn” and the real Bruce Lee featuring on the film’s poster!"

There were numerous Bruce Lee clones appearing in a variety of 1970s and beyond would-be martial arts films. Bruce Li, Bruce K.L. Lea are just a few of the immitators Then there's the odd spectacle of Jess Franco himself playing the titular Doctor Wong with oriental eye make-up and speaking in a very high pitched variant of his real voice. Of course such esteemed actors as Boris Karloff and Christopher Lee had already played the oriental villain Fu Manchu in THE MASK OF FU MANCHU (1932) and Franco's own Fu Manchu entries. Butt his 1982 oriental villain romp is decades beyond those and approaches high camp levels of absurdity.

Beside scenes of "Bruce" battling local drug smugglers and teaming up with dubious CIA agents played by Franco regulars Lina Romay and Daniel Katz, Franco goes Godfrey Ho and inserts footage from at least two Asian martial arts epics to pad out the runtime and provide extra action. One of these is the 1973 SEVEN TO ONE/Nu ying xiong fei che duo bao, a Taiwan production starring Polly Kuan as a high kicking female martial artist, the other inserts seem to be from a typical Shaolin Temple style period piece from the same era.

It all ends with Bruce foiling the devious hijacking plans of the tourists and Doctor Wong attempting to escape only be intercepted by Kuan's character in an inserted car chase. An oddity to be sure, but Franco's Doctor Wong would return in his Digital era. Bangkok provides the backdrop for another Franco martial arts actioner, BANGKOK, CITA CON LA MUERTE (1985), credited to Cliffor Brawm! BANGKOK, CITA CON LA MUERTE is fascinating to the serious Jess Franco student but may not engage interest as a serious action film with Jess Franco-style martial arts interludes included. The formulaic plot combines drug running, Thai pirates (led by Lina Romay), karate fighting, kidnapping, comic relief and tourist footage which on first viewing looks cribbed from an unknown source.*  [Update: the DoP of this film, Juan Soler Cozar, read this review and kindly informed me that he was actually sent to Bangkok to shoot some street footage, and that it does appear in the film. I was very surprised that they went to the expense and trouble to do this, especially considering the production’s obvious micro-budget.] The yacht-going daughter of a millionaire is kidnapped by pirates. Her father (Eduardo Fajardo) hires a bumbling private eye named Panama Joe (Bork Gordon) to locate her. The daughter’s boyfriend is also on the kidnappers’ trail. Panama Joe discovers the crooks are led by a drug smuggler (Antonio Mayans), who is in turn being double crossed by Queen Amania (Lina Romay). The detective roams around the faux Asian locations, tries to play both sides against the other, while uncovering deeper layers of corruption and double dealing. BANGKOK... is dialogue and plot heavy to no good end, and Gordon’s imitation Inspector Columbo ramblings just do not spark enough interest. The characters are shown talking in cartoon dialog balloons during the opening credits a la LUCKY THE INSCRUTABLE (1967), but Franco unaccountably drops this unusual device immediately and never picks it up again. What’s left is a C-minus adventure with some comic relief and hastily staged karate stand-offs, in which the participants miss each other by miles. Then again, given the budget and assumed rushed shooting schedule this could be understandable. It also could indicate the director's disdain for those perfectly choreographed martial arts films of Chuck Norris, Jackie Chan, Sonny Chiba, etc. Gordon (Christian Borck) just seems a disheveled guy, actually a German comedian/television actor, who wandered in. Like the karate stuff, comedy-parody needs timing. The lines and martial arts blows rarely connect. Actually, I managed to find some amusement in the martial arts showdowns where the fighters miss contact with each other by such obvious distances that it looks like children playing at karate fighting. This is all likely due to a crushing schedule/lack of budget. Nonetheless the colorful cinematography frames the locations with skill and makes the Canary Islands seem like Southeast Asia, at least for 90 minutes. BANGKOK, APPOINTMENT WITH DEATH (VSOM dupe from Spanish television broadcast), ends up as a colorful, amusing mix of Kung Fu fighting, faux Asian aesthetics, modern day pirates, BANGKOK, APPOINTMENT WITH DEATH (1985) mixes comic book-style imagery with crime film elements, some self parody and a adventure plot with a not-so-happy ending. Franco has tried this before, notably in the delightful LOS BLUES CALLE POP…. (1983) and the above mentioned La sombra del judoka contra el doctor Wong (1982). Lina Romay has a few touching moments as the aggresive pirate leader. In one embarrassing scene, shes dances around in a tight swimsuit accompanied by a mechanical band. The result might been cute in 1973, but at this late date it is unflattering to the talented Ms. Romay. Veteran character actor Fajardo (DJANGO)  turns in a professional but unexceptional performance as the millionaire.

The movie benefits from its luminous cinematography and occasionally hectic energy but needs a more interesting focal point.. The Far Eastern locations, represented via the aforementioned stock footage are given an atmospheric boost by Pablo Villa’s (Franco and Daniel White) brassy score, some of which recalls music heard in Franco’s earlier FU MANCHU AND THE KISS OF DEATH/KISS AND KILL (1967). Given the negatives I’m at the stage where I can still engage with and enjoy even an understandably flawed genre mashup such as this one. It’s obvious that Jess Franco took it serious enough to attempt to deliver a multi-faced entertainment package under impossible circumstances. As he told me when I interviewed him on his Golden Films Internacional period, these productions were “poor”, i.e. made at very low coast, with little or no resources and rushed out to theaters or hidden away in the offices of producer Emilio Larraga to be lost forever. I had some fun watching it but have no idea where one could see it outside of fan websites. I am not aware of any DVD release, although it may have appeared on Spanish VHS.

The version I saw was from the wretchedly unreliable VSOM and had no English subtitles. A good quality HD transfer from a print or negative with  language options is required for a more in-depth consideration, but it’s an example of Franco’s 1980s exotica.

*Thanks again to Juan Cozar for additional information on the production of this film. Given the furious production pace of Franco's GOLDEN FILMS INTERNACIONAL period EN BUSCA DEL DRAGON DORADO, another Franco martial arts adventure, this time casted and shot as a children's film of all things, may have been shot back-to-back with LA SOMBRA DEL JUKODA CONTRA DOCTOR WONG. This time the featured martial artist was "Li Yung", no clones of "Bruce Lee" this time around. Presented as a daydream of Almond Eyes it could have been a delightful lark.

EN BUSCA DEL DRAGON DORADO (James P. Johnson, 1983): Yes, Jess Franco also made children's films. This one features several pre teen friends who are led to a hidden treasure by friendly jungle animals, including a cute chimp, a helpful tortoise, a convenient elephant and several talkative parrots. It also features lots of martial arts displays to exploit the then popular craze in Spain. Supernatural martial artist Li Yung demonstrates the dragon claws style of combat and also helps the curious kids defeat greedy villains. Franco directed under a beard and has a role as a kindly blind guide. It all ends up being a daydream of one of sleepy kids. Based on Edgar Allan Poe's story THE GOLD BUG. Franco would make another adaptation of this story a decade later, JUNGLE OF FEAR, dropping the kids and the martial arts content, featuring Lina Romay, some American actors, and William Berger in his final role.

(C) Robert Monell, 2025

Exclusive new Interviews with Jess Franco stars Pamela Stanford and Monica Swinn!

DELIRIUM #40 features exclusive new interviews with Jess Franco femmes fatales Pamela Stanford and Monica Swinn, conducted by Michael Orlando Yaccarino. These actresses lit up the screen in a number of 1970s Jess Franco films such as LORNA,THE EXORICST, BLUE RITA, FEMALE VAMPIRE and DORIANA GRAY.

The interviews take us behind the scenes of such Franco titles as LORNA...THE EXORCIST, DAS FRAUENHAUS (BLUE RITA) and DORIANA GRAY. These are in- depth interviews about the making of these films, the actresses' accounts of being directed by Franco, stories about on-set memories about the actors, producers, locations of each of the films. Highly recommended reading. A longer version of this article with additional comments, information and notes will be avaiable this summer. More information can be found here: https://www.dorianavilla.com/

NOTE: Here is a link to the updated, expanded version of the interviews with Pamela Stanford and Monica Swinn by Micheal Orlando Yaccarino. Also included is an essay on Jess Franco's connection with Cinema Fantastique, along with some further informative notes and bibliographical information. It's all a must-read for Jess Franco explorers and historians. https://www.dorianavilla.com/library

Jess Franco Europsy Files # 69

29 April, 2025 I love costumed superhero films (especially with spy and science fiction twists) from the 1960s from Gianfranco Parolini's THREE FANTASTIC SUPERMEN to the Japanese giant, ULTRAMAN. Jess Franco's 1967 Eurospy spoof LUCKY, EL INTREPIDO featuring Ray Danton (along with Jess Franco in two amusing cameos). Beside the non-stop quips, delivered in high style by Danton, the element I like most in LUCKY is the typically quirky, high-spirited Bruno Nicolai score (see if you can find it on CD). The main theme, with its crazy vocals and thumping two note refrain is great fun and I never get tired of revisiting it.

Preceded by the frenetic, some might say silly, monochrome spoof, ATTACK OF THE ROBOTS, Franco's second Al Pereira feature, and the somber, underestimated RESEDENCIA PARA ESPIAS, LUCKY is stuffed with visual and verbal gags, and the secret agent protagonist seems in on the joke this time, whereas Eddie Constantine/the characters he plays in ATTACK... and RESDENCIA... seemes baffled by the action and ambiguity surrounding him. Constantine does well with double takes in ATTACK but seems less comfortable with the numerous pratfalls, including the final backward fall off of small fishing boat which ends the film. Godard keeps him straight and sober throughout ALPHAVILLE, except for a few bursts in sudden laughter. When you're a spy in a dystopia you don't have much to smile about.

Franco's first Eurospy thriller, DEATH WHISTLES THE BLUES (1962), is an immersion into a jazz milieu in which the director himself plays the saxophone with the Whisky Jazz band. The nightclub is the site where the musical code, Terrado Blues, is transmitted to those in the know, first by Julius Smith and then by Moira Santos (Danick Pattison), the latter on a secret mission of vengeance. Betrayal of friendship here, as in RESIDENCIA PARA ESPIAS, trumps betrayal of country. The spy spoof sub genre would be a default which Franco would employ into such 1980s efforts as UNA RAJITA PARA DOS (within a hardcore context), SANGRE EN MIS ZAPATOS (1983) and CUANTO COBRA UN ESPIAS? (1984).

Franco himself appears as a spymaster, Agent 008/Radeck, in the minimalist 1975 spy spoof MIDNIGHT PARTY aka LA COCCOLONA/LADY PORNO, who directs the torture of kidnapped stripper Lina Romay by Monica Swinn and Ramon Ardid. Shot in several hotel rooms at Le Grande Motte, the film is so threadbare that the fact that it's also interactive, at least in it's complete 90 minute version, that the fact that both Romay and Franco break the fourth wall and speak directly to the viewer becomes its most interesting aspect. One can imagine Franco writing down the synopsis on a napkin during a meal at the casino. It opens with the stripteaser Sylvia rolling around naked and taunting the viewer and ends, after interruptions by her hippie boyfriend (Alain Petit) and Franco's favorite detective Al Pereira (Olivier Mathot), with Agent 008 taking off his glasses, turning to camera, and informing the viewer that he is not a spy, but merely an actor in a film.

LADY PORNO [Porno Dama], 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 company (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 more direct-to-the-viewer takes. Sylvia is a very hot stripper who is introduced dancing in a glittering silver costume. Off stage she carries on an affair with a cheap detective, Al Pereira (Olivier Mathot) behind the back of her longtime squeeze Red Nicholas, a Communist musician frenetically embodied by French film historian and Jess Franco friend, Alain Petit . 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 a lot of good natured fun. Except that the subject is torture. Torture that doesn’t draw blood but 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 henchmen 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 pliers 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 suddenly jabs the cigarette 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. It will bring a smile to the face of all Franco enthusiasts. Franco drops the Radeck pose at the end, as Sylvia and Al are escaping he faces the camera and admits to us that it was all an illusion, only a movie. It is Jess Franco talking to us now. 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. Billed as «Charlie Christian» (cf JUSTINE, the 1979-80 Joe D’Amato composite where he is likewise billed. His footage in that and MIDNIGHT PARTY 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. Tabernero seems to have simply reedited, cut down, dubbed/ rescored the director’s cut. There is also the 90m THE MIDNIGHT PARTY, in English, which may be the best way to ascertain the director’s intent since it includes the interactive opening in which Lina Romay frolics on a queen size bed while she lasciviously addresses the viewer. The longer version does stretch the very broad humor to its absolute limits. But at least it never crosses over into hardcore terrain. The gangling Tabernero can be seeAn as a supporting plalyer in such 1960s Eurowesterns as FURY OF THE APACHES (1964), SEVEN GUNS FOR THE MACKENNAS(1965) and in Eurospy titles such as RIFIFI IN AMSTERDAM (1966) as well as in his own SEXY CAT (1972), his best film as a director , a highly entertaining Spanish giallo done in the style of cine-comic strip complete with a black clad villain who kills with long, razor ship fingernails a la Franco’s MISS MUERTE (1965). Private Investigator Al Pereira would appear in more Jess Franco directed features, including his final completed film, AL PEREIRA VS. THE ALLIGATOR LADIES, his ultimate interactive experiment, with the director himself placed at the center of the action. An equally interactive spy spoof, LES GRANDES EMMERDEUSES (1974), is even more outrageously outre, opening with Lina Romay and Pamela Standford (Monique Delauney) romping around totally naked on queen sized beds in some hotel room, identifying themselves as Interpol agents. Franco's obsession with the "Red Lips", a team of sexy female detectives/secret agents goes all the way back to his second feature film, LABIOS ROJOS (1960). Here they're no longer identified as the Red Lips and they are involved in criminal smuggling of diamonds (guess where they hide them) as they encounter other smugglers, a mad scientist and a grotesque, hairy creature called the Durenstein monster. Filmed in Paris and Portugal, standing in for Istanbul, it's all good fun with Franco returning as another spy master.

There are even spy movie references in the 1980 surreal sex comedy EL SEXO ESTA LOCO, in which sex club performer Lina Romay is questioned about missing plans for an "air-submarine" (a reference to Ishiro Honda's 1963 ATRAGON?). Spy movie formats continue in the Franco-verse with CUANTO COBRA UN ESPIA? (1984) and several supposed Edgar Wallace adaptations including SANGRE EN MIS ZAPATOS (1983) and VIAJE A BANGKOK ATAUD INCLUIDO (1985), along with his straight and sober DARK MISSION (OPERACION COCAINA) (1987), the later starring Christoper Lee, Brigitte Lahie and Chris Mitchum as a CIA agent. I'll be discussing these in a future blog, along with the 1970 THE DEVIL CAME FROM AKASAVA, starring Soledad Miranda as a secret agent in her final film before her untimely death.

(C) Robert Monell 2025

PHOLLASTIA (1987) (original title) Phollastía France Fellations sauvages(new title) Spain Phollastía

Directed by "Betty Carter" [Jess Franco & Lina Romay]/Screenplay by Chuck Evans [Jess Franco], Lulu Lavere [Lina Romay]/DP: Terry De Corsia [Jess Franco]/Music: Daniel J. White/Editor: Jess Franco/83m 15s/Video: Fil a' Films [France] Additional cast: Carlos Quiroga, Bruce Leduc-rn A. Bartolos Velasco, Rex Robinson-rn C. Gonzalez Ordi, Traci King-rn Elisa Mateo, John Olms-rn Saez Montoro. [Credits from OBSESSION: THE FILMS OF JESS FRANCO which also lists an alternate French video title, Fellations Sauvages]

Produced by "Phalos Films", Madrid, this is rather upscale for a Jess Franco hardcore. Hiring a cast of experienced Spanish hardcore professionals and featuring some gleaming, mirrored sets, this shot-in-Benidorm sex comedy parody of the 1980s ABC primetime soap opera, DYNASTY (1981-1989),  has some interesting images and is staged with the kind of care a slightly more than average budget allow The Carrington family, including the cheating husband Blake and his scheming wife, are at odds over cosmetic expenditures. In the meantime their dysfunctional spawn go their own sex soaked ways. It's wall-to-wall hardcore orgies of handjobs, blowjobs, group sex and more sex. Franco pulls his camera back more than usual but some of the clever verbal puns were lost on me since my French is nil and I only had access to a poor dub of the ancient French video. It all suggests that by the late 1980s the hardcore novelty was beginning to wear on Spanish clientele as well as Jess Franco. Sarcastically referencing DYNASTY's Joan Collins, Lina Romay isbilled as "Jean Collins" and along with Jose Miguel Garcia Marfa (EL MIRON Y LA EXHIBICIONISTA-1985) are the only faces familiar to me in this show. But this is a film not really interested in..... faces. The costumes look surprising upscale given the genre. Apparently, the money spent on the cast and production made sure that it wasn't profitable after the box-office was exhausted.*

Treating this as a full feature production with a higher budget and pro porn players to be paid backfired on Franco according to Antonio Mayans, who declined to be in this film and FALOCREST, another hardcore parody shot back-to-back in Benidorm, but acted as the film's sales agent in the Barcelona market. According to Mayans, in an interview in the defunct FRANCOMANIA WEBSITE, "I wasn't around when Jess made them. He went to Benidorm and shot them there. It's different if you happen to be making a movie and - say, after lunch - you start filming a little porn film as well with the same available technicians, the same available actresses. It's a matter of shooting some porn footage, editing it and then selling iit. Fernando Vidal would put up some money and then he'd do the selling. But to go to Benidorm to make two porn movies, with people, with the structure of a real movie - that simply doesn't work out and I told him."**

Also, Franco scholar Francesco Cesari points out that Follar in Spanish = "to fuck" and the Ph, as in Phollastia = F. Yet another subterranean Jess Franco linguistic "joke" buried beneath the layers of hardcore action. Speaking of linguistic jokes and references, PHOLLASTIA and other 1980s Franco hardcores can be considered the director's own Lingua Franco. A lingua franca, also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, link language or language of wider communication here takes the form of films which are often classified and rejected by Franco critics as only ways open to the director to remain active and generate income. But being a director who imbues everything he films with his own personal magic one has to look at them and scrutinize them as "Jess Franco" films, projects which did indeed generate income and did keep him active while forcing him to translate his visions and obsessions into the language and structures of commercial pornography. The orthological games, the ditzy (even for Franco) photography, the frenetic attempts at Bunuel type comedy, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeiosie meets DYNASTY or FALCON CREST, all exmplify this.

*Spanish ticket sales amounted to  29,693, not enough to show a real profit after productions costs are factored into the equation.  [Thanks to Francesco Cesari] ** Thanks to Nzoog for the translation of this interview, conducted by "Chus" and "Al Pereira" Reference print: XHAMSTER video This is part of a continuing series on Jess Franco's 1980s hardcore record. FALOCREST (1987), made at the same time and on the same locations as this film, will be covered next. (C)Robert Monell 2025

LA CRIPTA DE LAS CONDENADAS-- Jess Franco, 2012

LA CRIPTA DE LAS CONDENADAS

LA CRIPTA DE LOS CONDENADAS (2012) When I interviewed Jess Franco in 2005 he described this video project as being inspired by the writing of Nathaniel Hawthorne and was to be titled THE HOUSE NEXT TO THE CEMETERY. It obviously evolved unyil it finally appeared on Spanish DVD* as LA CRIPTA DE LOS CONDENADOS. Here is an except from Alex Mendibil’s essay on the film, written in 2008, which appears in another blog post here. It also appears in Alain Petit’s essential critical study: Ou les prospérités du bis. “The 80's Golden Films productions showed how the Franco universe could rid itself of some of its essential elements without losing its essence. In films such as MACUMBA SEXUAL (1981) or EL SINIESTRO DR. ORLOFF (1982), we deal with familiar themes and classic gothic characters like the vampire or the mad scientist but without all the acting, set-ups or typical wardrobes. Castles, candles, crucifixes, cemeteries and sci-fi lab equipment were replaced by extravagant beach houses, fashionable clothing and everyday objects. The result was disconcerting, but somehow managed to articulate a less figurative and more abstract language in which the renewed versions of Orloff, Al Pereira, Radek or Red Lips still made sense. With the shift to video in the late 90's, the destruction of the traditional cinematic codes was definitive: no set-ups at all or overtly fake sets, natural lighting, direct sound, video distortion effects, and above all, non-professional actors hamming it up or, on the other hand, a very naturalistic, almost cinéma vérité feel. Any device used to maintain the illusion of cinema is removed or deformed to the point of parody, as if Franco wanted to emphasize the death of that former cinema and suggest an unrepresentative cinema, a cinema abstract (*), if you will. In LA CRIPTA DE LAS MUJERES MALDITAS, the rupture with mainstream cinema is complete. The film takes place in closed-off rooms, half-empty and white, and the only things we are allowed to see are a few looped images of a cemetery, and the blurred image of an angel shaped statue that illustrates the final battle against the cursed women. We know about that battle only through the voice- over since the images are only abstract and difficult to decipher at times. Adding to all of the above (lack of set-ups, costumes, performances, video effects, etc), Franco finally gets rid of the last two pillars of classic cinema: the director and the screenplay. As stated above, this is a story without story but Jess Franco goes even further and invents a funny trick to show that he too disappears from the set, letting the characters shoot the film with video cameras and, thanks to some strategically placed mirrors, discovering that nobody is directing them on the set. Fata Morgana, the real protagonist of the film, assistant director and cinematographer, directs the film literally in front of our eyes, shooting it while playing one of the cursed women at the same time. Nothing is hidden, everything is shown: lightning, cables, the boom mic and even the back of the camera. It is not a video documentary, no video-creation, no experimental video, it is something that still has no name. The only overbearance to the genre resembles a William Castle-style joke: at the half point, there is a "To be continued…" title card, then a fade to black, and then the movie starts up again with a “Part 2” title card on screen. According to Jess Franco, this is his own version of the double-bill features in the GRINDHOUSE (2007) style. Despite being shot on video, SNAKEWOMAN was an exception to this trend since it was made following the traditional cinematic standards.

Alex Mendibil (2008) Dr. Mendibil’s observations are well taken in this context. Some may see the film as a plotless porn epic wallowing in nudity and lesbian sexual activity. Franco has gotten to the point here where plot is of no interest, as his article points out, there is only a seemingly eternal present. This seemingly eternal present is populated by several nude women, some seen via carefully placed mirrors, taping the action/non-action with cameras. As Mendibil notes, plot is irrelevant here, as is the concept of director. The performers are the directors, the auteurs, a concept which will be unsettling to some viewers and critics. One immediately thinks of Warhol’s experimental features of the mid 1960s, or the jarring moments of naked human interaction in various films of John Cassavettes. But Franco goes even further, there are no dialogues here, no tortured monologues or confrontations as in the cinema of Cassavettes.

Here is what I thought of the film in 2015. Since then my thoughts have evolved: "Bless you, tremulous, throbbing flesh» a female narrator intones over a sensual interlude between several women in a room flushed with orange light. Yes, we are in the realm of Jess Franco and this is just one interlude in a two part 150 minute epic poem of joyous, mysterious, interactive, nonstop sensuality and erotic sensation. One doesn’t want to call it Sex, at least not of the traditional sort. It’s more a display of erotic signs and motifs in the cinema. Once again, as Mendibil points out, there are no "performances", no male authoritarian director and no screenplay outside of a general outline or notes Franco may have used as a starting point. It's something unnamable and might be titled, apologies to Samuel Beckett and HP Lovecraft, The Unnamable. As I wrote in my infamous review of Franco's following film, AL PEREIRA VS THE ALLIGATOR LADIES, it's an anti-masterpiece of anti-cinema. It occupies a space between eroticism and pornography, without being particularly erotic and not including hardcore footage. We watch the film as it watches us. A nude actress points a video camera at the camera shooting the scene, breaking through the «fourth wall» of cinema. The group of Sapphic lovers often look at the camera, the viewer, who becomes part of the «action» or matrix of figures pleasuring each other in a no-budget labyrinth of mirrors, wicker chairs and television monitors on which the encounters are caught from other angles and reflected in strategically placed mirrors. One is reminded of Dr. Jacques Lacan's famous mirror stage.

The interiors are obviously someone’s (Franco's?) apartment in Malaga, but it represents the crypt of our Lesbos lovers obsessively, and with obvious joy, loving each other in lieu of the Exterminating Angel (Bunuel’s?) who will arrive for the judgement which makes up LA CRIPTA DE LAS CONDENADAS II. LA CRIPTA... is illustrated by the music of Bach, Hindemith, Ravel and Stan Kenton. Additional music by Daniel J. White. Originally scored and edited as films made in 2007 and screened at the 2008 Cinematheque Francais Jess Franco retrospective under the title A BAD DAY AT THE CEMETERY aka La Cripta de las mujeres malditas, an earlier two part version with somewhat different music and editing. It should be noted that this experimental epic, which uses the erotic cinema format as a commercial handle, is as obsessively personal and unapologetically expansive as the cinema of 1960s LBGT auteur Jack Smith (Flaming Creatures), more New York Underground than Los Angeles porn. A totally immersive experience which imposes alternate spatial-temporal coordinates on the viewer. There is no There there, as Gertrude Stein famously wrote of a storied city. Now available on 2 DVDs with English, French, Italian and German subtitle options. Bonus features include a Jess Franco interview, 3 short films including Lina Romay tras la camara and more. PAL, will play ALL REGIONS. Widescreen Anamorphic 1.78:1/Audio DD 2.0 Spanish. From VIAL OF DELICATESSENS. http://www.vialofdelicatessens.blogspot.com.es"

But that was then. This is now, 2025, and I have watched the film a number of times since finding further layers in a film which at first seem no deeper than the tender flesh of its actresses. The action, or non-action, unfolds in a timeless place, several rooms with shag carpeted floors and fitted with numerous mirrors and several television monitors. Time has stopped. The 150m runtime of both parts could take place in a split second or over a long night or a thousand and one nights. Aside for the opening shot of a large rock being battered by the surrounding sea and several shots of a generic cemetery exterior, the actresses are trapped (or liberated) in a hermetically sealed space, represented perhaps by the director's apartment. There is very little movement by players. It is like watching the gradual melting of a long frozen world.

Although it is a plotless, non linear, non representational film there is a narrative spoken by a male narrator on the soundtrack. The narrator is the only male actor in the film. The narative will be familiar from Franco's 1967 masterpiece NECRONOMICON/SUCCUBUS, where it is told to the female lead Lorna by the character played by Jack Taylor, her lover and ultimate victim. The narrative tells of a wealthy prince who marries a beautiful young woman who has no memory of her past. After a year of being happily married the wife stabs her husband to death in a garden. When the dying prince asks her why she has done this his wife speaks of a castle in the depths of Hell. Although the story pertains to the characters and narrative of that film it is heard several times in La Cripta... as kind of a counterpoint/backstory to the action, adding another layer of context to the matrix. It is crucial to remember that the 1967 NECRONOMICON became the way in which Franco escaped the prison of being a commercial director operating within the boundaries of 1960s Spanish cinema and its censorship. It garnered the positive attention of Fritz Lang, AIP Pictures and, most importantly, producer-writer Happy Alan Towers who would contract Franco to direct a series of international co-productions for the next several years. These co-productions would give him access to such world renowned actors as Christopher Lee, Jack Palance, Klaus Kinski and take him to such locations as Brazil and Istanbul with larger budgets and resources never before available to him. NECRONOMICON resulted in a paradigm shift in his life and career and LA CRIPTA... executes another paradigm shift, albeit one at the very end of his career. It's very instructive to watch both films back to back for these reasons. La Cripta, however has never gained a wide release out of showing at the Cinemateque Francaise retrospective and a limited edition Spanish DVD. What we are left with is something without a comfortable focal plane, no breakaway scenes, no compass to guide us, there is only the fascinating X ray of what was once the cinema of Jess Franco.