Jess Franco's CANNIBALS (1980): DVD

Bloody disgusting! Jess Franco's answer to Ruggero Deodato's CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST. According to Uncle Jess, who is interviewed on Blue Underground's DVD presentation of CANNIBALS, his film is better! It was banned in the UK as a Video Nasty.

Dr. Jeremy Taylor (Pier Luigi Conti aka Al Cliver) attempts to launch a rescue expedition up the Amazon years after his wife was killed and his daughter was abducted by a local cannibal tribe. Finding backing from the sexually ambiguous Mr. Fenton (Franco regular Olivier Mathot) and the wealthy Barbara Shelton (Shirley Night), who invite their idle friends along for a pleasure cruise [!], he arrives back in the South Amercian rain forest only to survive another brutal attack from the same tribe who now worship his grown daughter (Sabrina Siani) as the White Cannibal Queen.

Jess Franco has made a number of cannibal films during his highly varied directorial career. They range from the exquisite (LA COMTESSE PERVERSE) to the ridiculous (DEVIL HUNTER). CANNIBALS (aka MONDO CANNIBALE, WHITE CANNNIBAL QUEEN, LA DEESSE DES BARBARES, LA DEA CANNIBALE, MONDO CANNIBALE 3: DIE BLONDE GOTTIN, UN FILLE POUR LES CANNIBALES) is not the worst, but it's close. Dismal photography, crudely inserted stock footage, excruciatingly protracted entrails eating interludes made even more unbearable by being shot in extreme close up and slow motion, doom this film to the lower rungs of Le Bad Cinema. Al Cliver is acceptable enough as the hero but Sabrina Siani looks spaced out and in need of something or other as the White Cannibal Queen. Besides wasting such interesting performers as Antonio Mayans and Pamela Stanford the film takes forever to get to its raison de etre, the cannibal scenes, and they're way beyond disappointing. Pamela Stanford would go on to make another Eurocine backed cannibal film, the even more wretched CANNIBAL TERROR (1981), which shares some other cast members and footage with CANNIBALS.

The BU disc is an excellent transfer but would have been a whole lot better if it offered the French language track, which improves the film considerably. I've had the French language version on video for years (as MANGEURS DES HOMMES) and it's 100%more watchable if only because of the fact that the voice casting in the English language dub is laughably poor. Ms. Siani sounds like she was dubbed by a clueless New Jersey party girl. Jess Franco's Mr. Martin is supposed to be a Portuguese guide but is dubbed by some guy who sounds like a backwoods hick. The 1.66:1/16:9 transfer is sharp and colorful and it's certainly the best this film will ever look.

The best thing about this presentation is an amusing and interesting interview with Uncle Jess, who explains that he was disgusted by Deodato's 1979 CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST because of its realistic depiction of cannibal atrocities and deliberately made MONDO CANNIBALE (original title) as a kind of regressive Hollywood-style adventure- fantasy. Not a bad idea. It works for the first scene with the parents watching the child falling asleep to her music box but Franco is quickly defeated by inadequate technical resources. The original French trailer is included.


Eurotrash goddess Pamela Stanford (Monique Delaunay), behind the gas mask in the above screenshot from BLUE RITA, made her final appearance in a Jess Franco film in CANNIBALS only to get eaten alive in the opening scene (what a waste!).


Dr. Jeremy Taylor (Al Cliver) recovers with the help of his nurse (Lina Romay) after losing his wife, daughter and an arm to a cannibal tribe while on an Amazonian expedition. He should have watched CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST first!


Mr. Fenton (Oliver Mathot aka Claude Plaut) and Barbara Shelton (Shirley Night) want to turn Dr. Taylor's rescue mission into a party on the love boat!


Jess Franco's first, and best, cannibal film, LA COMTESSE PERVERSE (1973) is a jet black comedy of manners set on island ruled by upscale flesh eaters played by Franco icons Alice Arno and Howard Vernon. Avant-garde photography and music make this a must-see, one of JF's all time best. Now, let's have it on a quality R1 English friendly DVD presentation of that!


The DEVIL HUNTER (SEXO CANIBAL/JUNGFRAU UNTER KANNIBALEN/THE MAN HUNTER/MANDINGO MANHUNTER/IL CACCIATORE DI UOMINI) DVD, probably the most wretched digital presentation of any Jess Franco film so far! The only compensation is that it's dirt cheap and you get the fun VOODOO BLACK EXORCIST (in scratchy VHS quality) as a second feature. From the notorious VIDEOASIA. Type the title in the blog's search engine for my archived review.


Lurid advert for Jess Franco's other 1980 French-Italian financed, Spanish lensed cannibal epic. This one also features Italian actor Al Cliver and had some German input from Lisa Films/Munich who sent Ursula Buchfellner to get stripped, bound and abused by kidnappers and then the towering cannibal god with bugged-out eyes. An appalling racist fantasy if there ever was one. Both films are candidates for a JF's all-time worst list.

This print is introduced as A Franco Prosperi Film, Directed by Jess Franco.

(C) Robert Monell, 2008

New RICCARDO FREDA Forum!

Freda's first giant monster science fiction film. He turned over the production to Mario Bava when he found out it was really about tripe! I'll be presenting an eye-catching journey through this personal favorite Saturday matinee item illustrated with screenshots, rare posters and vintage images later on the new Riccardo Freda Forum at CINEMADROME.



ZORRO meets THE WHITE WARRIOR...


Rare Spanish poster for Riccardo Freda's LA VENDETTA DI AQUILA NERA (1951), a brief review of this visually fascinating historical adventure is now up on the new RICCARDO FREDA forum on CINEMADROME [www.cinemdrome.yuku.com] or just click on the link at the top of the sidebar at left.


I've created this forum to examine, discuss and illustrate the career and films of my favorite Italian director of genre films from 1942 to 1994. The taskmaster of Mario Bava, Dario Argento, and many more who worked with him and studied his ultra stylish synthesis of visuals, music and montage.

We'll be looking at some of his more obscure projects as well as his more well known horror films, gialli, Eurospy, and peplum titles, complete with production stills, posters and other images.

Wish I could be there....

Jean Rollin and other luminaries of cinefantastique, Eurobis, etc are going to be there.

Thanks to Nicolas...

Alain Robbe-Grillet's L'IMMORTELLE (1963)

Francoise Brion (ATTACK OF THE ROBOTS; AL OTRO LADO DEL ESPEJO) is L, the eternal feminine, the mystery woman, the angel of death in Alain Robbe-Grillet's first film as director.

N (Jacques Doniol-Valcroze) lost in the labyrinth of myth, geography, intrigue, memory and reality which is Istanbul. Valcroze, a journalist, co-founder of CAHIERS DU CINEMA in the early 1950s and later a film director, was married to the film's female lead, Francoise Brion, at the time of shooting.


"...it's all false. They're engaged in building Byzantium."


Françoise Brion is L, the Woman, the sometimes narrator, the one who observes the false surfaces of Istanbul. Jacques Doniol-Valcroze is N, the Man who we will mainly remember as a stooped-over, recessive figure in a conservative suit who makes little impression as a individual character. Ms. Brion's face is impossible to forget, while the journalist-director Robbe-Grillet settled on as his male lead (after considering Jean-Louis Trintignant) is a non-actor, a form which will fill a void, or a near-void. It's almost as if he's been projected onto the reality of Istanbul, or the unreality which is Byzantium, which is being archaeologically restored just outside of view.

M, the Stranger (Guido Celano) is the burly man who wears expensive suits, sunglasses and may or may not be the controller/pimp of L. who may or may not be a prostitute, or a candidate for a white slave opportunity. One can't critique the actors because there is no real acting, there are movements, the smile of L., the sudden withdrawl of N. from the jealousy window where which he has been observing the waterfront where M. walks his dogs. The dogs, the ones people tend to tense up around, Dobermans. The film was originally to be titled LES CHIENS. M always seems to have control of the animals which makes it all the more alarming when one of them is suddenly there, right in the middle of the dark road as your car approaches and it's too late to avoid a crash.... but we're getting ahead of ourselves.

Written before, and released after, Alain Resnais 1961 film L'ANNEE' DERNIERE A MARIENBAD, which was written by Robbe-Grillet, who shot L'IMMORTELLE on location in Turkey at the same time as the MARIENBAD shoot. MARIENBAD was nominated for a best original screenplay ACADEMY AWARD and became a famous conversation piece of the 1960's while L'IMMORTELLE, while winning the Louis Delluc prize, went on to relative obscurity.


"Beautifully photographed" according to the Leonard Maltin blurb on the US video box of LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD, something one wouldn't think to say about L'IMMORTELLE, which is stylistically conservative in comparison. It couldn't be more different than MARIENBAD while restating that film's thematic obsessions, plot outline, characters, nonlinear structure.

Leaving MARIENDBAD aside, L'IMMORTELLE is a radical experiment in alternative feature fiction film structure, a cyclical mind fuck, an endgame which plays with classical mythology in the city where FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE and a thousand and one imitations unfolded. The city of Eurospy films (COPLAN CASSE TOUT), masked super villains (KRIMINAL), KILLING ISTANBUL'DA, Jess Franco's RESEDENCIA POUR ESPIAS, THE CASTLE OF FU MANCHU and VENUS IN FURS. But before that it was Byzantium.

"...it's all false. They're engaged in building Byzantium."

The false prisons, brothels, often spoken of, are never seen, but somehow always present. The city of repetitions. The end of the Western world and the gateway to the East.

"And I don't want to be bothered with eternal complaints about inexact or contradictory details. This report is concerned with objective reality, not with some so-called historical truth," Robbe-Grillet wrote as an epigraph to his 2001 novel REPETITION, and it pertains to all his novels and films from LES GOMMES to THE MAN WHO LIES. With no one around to "report" it, is there an objective reality? It's the old question about the tree falling in the midst of a remote forest. L'IMMORTELLE takes as one of it's main subjects Robbe-Grillet's "concern" with how "reality" in fiction and film is often confused with... quoditian reality.

The Universe can be explored with mathematics as well as with sophisticated, man made crafts, and perhaps it is more practical to keep our theories statistically grounded. Roy Armes has made a case for the symmetrical structures of this and other ARG films, and I'm not going to provide my own counter calculations. My own favorite science-fiction film remains Kubrick's 2001: A SPACE ODYESSY where HAL 9000 fucks up big time and kills everybody, but it ends up being OK because it was all in the Plan. And I'm not talking PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE. In theoretical math, algebra, geometry, trignometry there are L's, N's, M's, X's, Y,s, and Z's.

Back on Earth L'IMORTELLE opens and closes with images, taken cinema-verite style from a moving car, of the crumbling walls of Byzantium. The female narrator speculates on the geographical/archaeological/mythological positioning of the city.
Both N. and L. will meet death, or what appears to be death, as they drive past these sames ruins, attempting to flee. Driving in a circle which seemed to be a straight line, they had appointments to keep. L'IMMORTELLE spends most of its run time examining every nook and cranny of Istanbul, the Golden Horn, the towers, the sinister little shops, the mosques, the side streets which all seem maddeningly similar. N. is a French professor in town to lecture but he encounters something outside of his intellectual ken, the beautiful woman with the high cheekbones and entrancing eyes who will lead him down that road where the dogs will be waiting. Twice.

Istanbul is the overwhelming presence in L'IMMORTELLE, a site which promises everything and reveals nothing. Human character is unknowable and not really dependable. There's a thousand and one plots or no plot at all. The potential to imagine intrigues is the most exciting of all intrigues. And in the end there's Death. L.'s face coming into and going out of focus. She's laughing at him, at us, as she rides on the ferry in the final image. Or maybe she's just laughing.

Given the fact that Robbe-Grillet struggled with his crew over the way the film was to be shot, the contribution of sound editor Michel Fano becomes of enormous importance. The exotic music of Georges Delerue and the wailing female vocalist present an audio scenario of equal fascination to the visual mise-en-scene: the sounds of construction, the crashes, the various narrations/voiceovers, the barking of the dogs give us an alternate scenario which can be experienced with or without reference to what one sees. It's an eerie and rewarding experience to just sit back, eyes shut, and LISTEN to this film.

Although it's related to the nouvelle vague L'IMMORTELLE is not really a New Wave film in the way Godard's A BOUT DE SOUFFLE or the debut features of Truffaut, Rivette, Chabrol and Resnais are. It occupies its own unique spatial-temporal continuum. It doesn't break away as much as it reinvents reality and cinema, offering a formal path of consciousness which one may take or leave.

Thanks to Robert Guest.

(C) Robert Monell, 2008

THE SISTER OF URSULA DVD: Review

The black gloved killer strikes again in the 1978 giallo LA SORELLA DI URSULA. This screengrab is from the Severin Films DVD which will be available on March 25th. A detailed review with more screencaps is now up on the BLOOD & BLACK LACE GIALLO FORUM of CINEMADROME. Just click on the link at the top of the sidebar at left.

CECILIA: The DVD and Spanish versions. Reviewed by Robert Monell

You just can't keep a good man down: frequent Jess Franco and Eurocine performer Olivier Mathot (left) aka Claude Plaut joins in the fun at a party in CECILIA. Plaut "directed" the French version, which means that he called the shots for the 15 minutes of extra footage which appears on the BU DVD presentation. Another frequent Jess Franco performer, Pierre Taylou (EXORCISM) is seen at the right. The scene in the above grab was directed by Mathot for the French version.


One of a constant flow of Juan Cozar's lush compositions which capture the gorgeous locations near Sintra, Portugal. This minor softcore programmer is nonetheless a visual feast.


Una Mujer Casada/Cecilia/Emma Fargas, depending on what version you see, played by the luminous Muriel Montossey aka Victoria Adams [a lot of names to remember!] seen in a typical Franco rack focus shot.


Two years before the mast? No, it was two years after the 1980 Spanish financed ABERACCIONES SEXUALES DE UNA MUJUER CASADA that Eurocine turned it into CECILIA, "directed" by Claude Plaut (seen at the top of the blog). Franco's name as it appears in the new BU DVD presentation. This is certainly the best ever DVD presentation of what is known as a "Eurocine composite."

Thanks to Eric Cotenas for the screengrabs, more of which will be appearing over at THE WORLD OF JESS FRANCO folder on CINEMADROME soon



The Spanish version/The real deal...

I recently revisited the original Spanish version of CECILIA, which Eurocine expanded and reedited. Lensed on the same Sintra, Portugal locations as A VIRGIN AMONG THE LIVING DEAD (1971), I noted that the location of the title character's (Muriel Montossey aka Vicky Adams) nude swim is the same as the nude swim which Christina Von Blanc took in VIRGIN... nine years earlier. This time I noticed that the camera angles are also the same! Some would criticize this as laziness or unimaginative repetition. For me it creates a welcome sense of obsessive (mine) deja vu.

There's an excellent review [in Spanish] by Alex on his essential Jess Franco blog, EL FRANCONOMICON of the original 1980 Spanish version of what later became CECILIA when Eurocine took over and had actor-director Olivier Mathot film about twenty minutes of inserts shot in France. Mathot aka Cole Polly/Claude Plaut, is a better actor (a Franco icon in EXORCISM/THE SADIST OF NOTRE DAME and a number of his 70s French films) than director. The inserts are rather bland, silly and add nothing, but disrupt the mood of hermetic eroticism of the original. As Jess Franco insists on the CECILIA DVD interview featurette, "There is no Cecilia!" The Mathot footage features the actor at a party with some upscale hedonists who have nothing to do with the main plot and some tourist views of Emmanuelle/Cecilia in Paris.

CECILIA runs about 105m and is out on an excellent BU DVD with a French language track as well as in English. Aberraciones is in Spanish only on the 85m print I have [thanks to ECC], shorter than the 98m print reviewed by Alex. But it's far superior in terms of a mood of exotic, humid fantasy. It all takes place in the lush tropical gardens near Sintra, Portugal, and, as pointed out above, the location itself acts as Franco's commentary and allows him to create his personal environment for his take on the EMMANUELLE franchise.


The Eurocine-Mathot shot inserts are glossy sleaze, Franco's film is pulp poetry. There's a difference. You don't need to understand Spanish to understand that the film's focus is on female degradation/humiliation/rape fantasies within the structure of an open, "romantic" marriage. At the end, Franco seems to lean toward heterosexual monogamy as a nesting preference, after bursts of dangerous sexual experimentation.

Tropical plants and wild flowers abound from the opening credit sequence to the final image of a floral arrangement, a Buddha like ceramic and a tray of long stemmed glasses. Pull focus. Fin.

In between are long, languorous strolls by the characters and Soler's very mobile camera, slowly tracking past the tropical vegetation decorating the fantasy villa, a castle of erotic hallucinations.

If you've only seen CECILIA it's worth giving Aberraciones sexuales de una mujer casada a look. It's shorter, more to-the-point, plays best in Spanish and is 100% Jess Franco....

Thanks to Alex for the image.

Thanks to Eric Cotenas for helping me see ABERACCIONES SEXUALES DE UNA MUJER CASADA.

(C) Robert Monell, New Version-2020

THE SISTER OF URSULA DVD: PREVIEW!

They sure don't make them like this one anymore!



He Came, He Saw, He did What?! LA SORELLA DI URSULA writer-director Enzo Milioni discusses his outrageous giallo in THE FATHER OF URSULA.

I've just sampled THE SISTER OF URSULA DVD presentation which will coming from Severin Films on March 25.

For a brief preview of what looks like another excellent Severin presentation go to BLOOD & BLACK LACE: GIALLO NOTES, a new forum on my CINEMADROME board, by clicking on the link at the top of the sidebar at left. A full review will be up soon.

Notes on the CECILIA DVD

Don't mess with Claude Plaut aka Olivier Mathot! He had the final cut on CECILIA, the Eurocine composite version of a Jess Franco film...

Until I get the Spanish version of CECILIA (Aberacciones Sexuales de una mujer Casada) I won't be able to do a detailed comparison with the recent BU DVD, but I do have some interesting notes on my CINEMADROME board in the meantime. Click on the link at the top of the sidebar at left.

Warren Kiefer's JULIETTE DE SADE (1968)

Directed by Warren Kiefer
Cast: Maria Pia Conte, Christine Delit, Angela de Leo
Rating: NR
"Juliette (Maria Pia Conte) is a schoolgirl expelled from the convent for engaging in autoerotic activity. She travels to Rome where she vows to fulfill her wild sexual fantasies. There she has some conventional affairs before encountering an older man who is a proponent of the Marquis de Sade. She also falls for a lecherous lesbian and takes an LSD trip in this mild exploitation feature." ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide*

Has anyone seen this 1968 Italian-Swedish co-production? Or does anyone have a video copy? There is a German video according to the IMDB review. The story seems to predate Franco's modern Sade adaptations: EUGENIE, HER JOURNEY...; EUGENIE DE SADE (both 1970). I might be interested to consult for background. Warren Kiefer is a beard for Lorenzo Sabatini who also directed CASTLE OF THE LIVING DEAD (1964) and one other feature. I have no record of any directorial activity for him after 1970.

If anyone has seen it please comment below, and if anyone has any video version or the CD listed below please contact me.

It may have had a US release in the late 1960s through distributor Paul Maslansky, who also produced Kiefer's CASTLE OF THE LIVING DEAD. Presumably, it would have played the Adult theater circuit. Interesting to note that Jess Franco writer/actor/associate Alain Petit (author of the essential MANACOA FILES) is listed as a member of the supporting cast. Petit also appeared in Jess Franco's 1975 DE SADE'S JULIETTE, which is presently MIA.

*The plot summary/review is from ALL MOVIE GUIDE.

On the CD:
Music by Bill Conti [!]
Sade E I Suoi Vizi (Juliette De Sade / Hetrosexual)

Composer : Bill Conti

Conductor : Bill Conti

Label / No. : Cam Original Soundtracks CAM 508951-2

Year of release : 1968

CD release: 2003

Thanks to Mirek for the image.

Claude Chabrol's LA RUPTURE (1970)

The balloon man at the site of the psychedelic climax of LA RUPTURE.



"What an utter darkness suddenly surrounds me!" from PHAEDRA by Jean Racine

Darkness is not only visible in Claude Chabrol's LA RUPTURE, it's the seemingly normal state of being in the land of the European bourgeoisie... yes, it's the bourgeoisie again.

The camera is pressed up against the bark of a tree in a middle class area of Brussels, a quick movement to the right reveals the modest house in which Helene (Stephane Audran) and her family live. A scene of appalling domestic violence which develops with very disturbing rapidity leaves Helene's young son with a severe head trauma. She proceeds to beat the child's assailant, her troubled husband, senseless with an iron skillet. A sudden bloodbath in a neat kitchen. As Helene rushes the boy to the hospital, the camera is directed out the car's window recording the quiet, ordered streets and tranquil vistas of Brussels, a quaint, elegant city which is cleverly used as the ironic stage for this increasingly unhinged melodrama.

Ludovic Reigner, the wealthy and powerful father of Helene's husband, hires a sleazy agent (Jean-Pierre Cassel) to prevent Helene from taking the boy away from her husband's family. Michel Bouquet delivers one of his subtly menacing performances (cf LA FEMME INFIDELE) as Reigner, who seems to want to destroy his daughter-in-law as much for her past as a stripper on top of the fact that she's from a "lower" social class. The discreet charm of the bourgeoisie. In fact, this pitch black comedy of manners very much anticipates that Luis Bunuel film as well as certain aspects of Kubrick's THE SHINING.

It's really tempting to describe what happens in terms of outrageous plot points throughout but in the end the fascination which LA RUPTURE manages to exert is due to its style, which is is unnervingly unpredictable, bordering on surrealism at times, theatre of cruelty, subtle, poetic and finally completely over the top in the final reel in which Helene is given a psychedelic drug for breakfast by the ruthless agent who wants to prove to the world she's a drug addict as well as sexually dangerous woman. She goes out and re-images the world while her reality is brutally exterminated. Paul, the amoral fixer, seems to redefine evil as a laugh riot in which his level of fun is as important as the incredibly complicated web he spins for Helene. He and his girlfriend just want to have fun as they move on up into the next social class. The fact that he destroys lives doesn't seem to be a problem for him. It's just something he does remarkably well.

Paul's incrementally revealed evil makes us reconsider the husband's madness and violence which is demonstrated in the precredits sequence. LA RUPTURE is about, among other things, the dangers of moral relativism in the modern world, specifically in the late 1960s and early 1970s. And the perhaps equal dangers of moral rigidity. There are only victims and predators in Chabrol's worldview and a possibility of redemption which nevertheless is often undone by cowardice, brain chemistry and that most clever card player, Fate.

In the end LA RUPTURE is not really about Helene's personal hell as much as it is about the negative capacity of the desperate souls who desire her destruction. Helene is destroyed but so is Ludovic, who has generated the action against her. The final horrifying (is it a horror film?) tableau redefines the meaning of "family." All that's left are the balloons hovering in the sky, a pastel canvas over hell on earth. There's even a classical chorus of well dressed crones to witness the descent. The fixer Paul evokes Macbeth in his final bloody fury and seems to disappear into a mirror at the end (cf Chabrol's elusive 1977 ALICE). Transgressive (one scene cannot be described here), pitiless, brutal, unpredictable and finally moving, LA RUPTURE is worth seeking out for adventurous viewers. Be warned, it's not a pleasant film to watch.

Chabrol had directed three masterful thrillers which made his name in the late 60s, LES BICHES (1968), LA FEMME INFIDELE (1969) and LE BOUCHER (1969), the last is, in my opinion, a masterwork. Even Pauline Kael, who rejected Chabrol's subtly finessed style, acknowledged him as a master. The director of LE BEAU SERBE (1958), the first feature film of the French Nouvelle Vague, he had been a film critic for Cahiers du Cinema and was one of the founders of the auteur theory (along with Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut) and published a study of Hitchcock nearly a decade before Truffaut's book on the great director. But one doesn't want to take the Chabrol-Hitchcock connection too far. His career has been quite uneven and he's probably made too many ill-considered films. Besides the above mentioned titles, I would also recommend NADA (1974), the early A DOUBLE TOUR (1960) and would love to locate ALICE. He also made several Eurospy romps with titles like MARIE CHANTAL CONTRA DR. KHA!

Adapted from Charlotte Armstrong's THE BALLOON MAN, the Chabrol who directed LA RUPTURE was near the top of his form. It's pulp fiction reborn as tragedy amidst Eurotrash. The most memorable sequence is perhaps Helene's tram ride through Brussels, a sad, beautiful journey which is exquisitely defined by Jean Rabier's delicate palette and sensitive film editing. Pierre Jansen's score evokes certain Bartok and Schoenberg string quartets and provides an uneasy, somewhat atonal sound environment. Stephane Audran (although probably miscast) gives a courageous performance as the prey while Cassel seems to perfectly understand the nature of the beast he is playing, a force who cuts through all social classes; an amused, self satisfied agent of destruction who thoroughly enjoys blackmail, kidnapping, slander, sexual perversion and getting well paid for conceiving nasty plots.

Fans of the 1971 Belgian vampire film DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS will notice the director of that film, Harry Kumel, in the small role of a suspicious taxi driver.

[Note that the 2003 PATHFINDER DVD has some minor print damage, doesn't really adequately reproduce the film's unique color schemes and appears to be nearly 5 minutes shorter than the reported uncut run time of 125m-. I've seen the film in 35mm and it's a much more eye-drugging experience than suggested by the DVD.]

(C) Robert Monell, 2008

The Stone Killers

The original stone killer...*




Javier Bardem as the stone killer in the multiple Academy Award winning NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN. I didn't watch the show, haven't since the turn of the 21st century. I just don't go to see that many mainstream movies anymore. But I was a regular watcher of the broadcast from 1968 until about 1998. So I can't comment on the field since I only saw one nominated movie. Maybe if they brought Bob Hope back from the dead I'd appreciate the show more...

Still, I was pleased Bardem won. He was just perfectly menacing, and not in a way you'd expect, in the role. And he knew how to carry that air cylinder in a way that made it seem like a natural thing to do. I like the Coen brothers approach to genre films, and I like it when they defy gravity as in BARTON FINK and THE BIG LEBOWSKI.

Incidentally, Bardem recently mentioned a Jess Franco related title when he listed among his favorite Spanish films the 1955 MUERTE DU UN CICLISTA, a film which Franco worked as assistant to Bardem's uncle, the late Juan Antonio Bardem. He praised it in a national newspaper for illustrating the underside of daily life during that era.


On the subject of stone killers: Does anyone remember the 1973 Charles Bronson vehicle seen at the top of the blog? I remember when I saw it at a downtown grindhouse back then it seemed to really kick butt. I'd like to see it again sometime soon. Anyone know of a good DVD presentation? Thanks.

*http://youtube.com/watch?v=pxv-kgJ_DOI [THE STONE KILLER video on YouTube]

(C) Robert Monell, 2008

New VIDEOS and SLIDESHOWS Added

The colorful array of images seen above are from Jean Rollin's JEUNES FILLES IMPUDIQUES (1973), a pseudonymous "roughie" crime film he directed under the name Michel Gentil appeared on US DVD last year as part of THE GRINDHOUSE EXPERIENCE 20 movie-multiple DVD set. Images from more Rollin films can be see on our new sidebar slideshow. [Thanks to Adam Williams]

New Videos: Please go to our sidebar at left and page down to view four new videos from You Tube re Alain Robbe-Grillet: 3 interviews and a short film. Our special coverage of the legacy of Robbe-Grillet in the wake of his Feb. 18th passing will continue with more reviews and information on his films, videos and literary works both here and on my CINEMADROME message board [see link at top left of sidebar].

Also added, two new slideshows: the aforementioned tribute to Jean Rollin and an homage to the late actor-director Ray Danton, with images from his 1973 Spanish-Turkish lensed vampire movie CRYPT OF THE LIVING DEAD and the Jess Franco-directed LUCKY, THE INSCRUTABLE...

Robert Monell

Who is this actress?

And in what Alain Robbe-Grillet film did she appear? And where is she now?

THE WORLD OF ALAIN ROBBE-GRILLET: IMAGES

The Angel of Death and her minions confront the protagonist of LA BELLE CAPTIVE, the first Alain Robbe-Grillet directed film to make it onto US DVD. Hopefully, the rest will follow sooner than later.


GRADIVA is an erotic/archaeological thriller featuring an elusive woman in white. Alain Robbe-Grillet's 2006 film was not well received by French critics and audiences.


The heroine (Catherine Jourdan) of EDEN AND AFTER (1970) is guided on a journey into the land of the Unconscious by a mysterious stranger. Filmed in a Mondrian labyrinth and Tunisia this was ARG's first color film. I was lucky enough to see this via a pristine 35mm print in a New York City cinema with Alain Robbe-Grillet in attendance.


The New Wave meets the Nouveau Roman. Alan Resnais' LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD was a glossy, funereal evocation of Alain Robbe-Grillet's film script, which was nominated for an Academy Award. If you're lucky you may be able to see the new 35mm scope print. Perhaps the quintessential 1960's Art Film.

ON ALAIN ROBBE-GRILLET

The film he could never live down, or up to, in some critic's eyes; Alain Robbe-Grillet was still angry with director Alain Resnais in recent interviews. The critically praised LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD was one of the iconic films of the 1960s; it confounded mainstream critics and audiences at the time, and still does. This famous image will create a sense of deja vu even if you've never seen the film.


He was also a painter and worked images of other painters into both his novels and films; the novel and film LA BELLE CAPTIVE were generated by a series of Rene Magritte canvases...


At work on his most recent film, the much criticized GRADIVA. In a recent interview he struck out at French audiences, critics and his old colleague Alain Resnais..


Rather than write a smug, reductive obit I'll present some impressions upon learning of the death today in France of Alain Robbe-Grillet (from cardiac failure according to reports), who may have been the most important writer of the second half of the 20th century and one of its most radical, innovative filmmakers. Still producing new films and literature into his mid 80's he was restless, angry, intellectually stimulating, artistically courageous and uncompromising.


"In the dimness of the cafe', the manager is arranging the table and chairs, the ashtrays, the siphons of soda water; it is six in the morning."
In the first sentence of his first novel LES GOMMES (1953) the former agronomist calmly, obsessively presents his revolution. Present tense, unadorned description of seemingly banal actions which will define the modern world as a quoditian myth cycle without clear meanings or direction.


"I must return to that delicate girl who is still languishing in her cage, for M, The Vampire, and Doctor Morgan are now returning to the little white room in order to continue the interrogation, after having gone out for a sandwich to the drugstore in the nearby station."
When was the last time you read Sade, or saw a Jean Rollin vampire film? Just two names which come to mind when reading this (writing professors would say run-on) sentence from his 1972 novel PROJECT FOR A REVOLUTION IN NEW YORK.

Given his novels, filmscripts, stories, films, paintings, acting appearances, lectures, essays (his most important text may prove to be the 1964 POUR UN NOUVEAU ROMAN) he was omnipresent in academia and film culture of the 1960s and continued on with ever more difficult novels, films, collaborations with visual artists and several volumes of autobiography.*

One of his films (GLISSEMENTS PROGRESSIFS DU PLAISIR) was once ordered burned in public. One of the books which most influenced him was Michelet's "La Sorciere" and the many images of sadomasochism found in his novels and films caused him to be compared to another French rebel, Sade. His films influenced many other filmmakers including Sam Peckinpah, Jess Franco, Monte Hellman, Dario Argento and Paul Schrader. Novelist-screenwriter Richard Matheson (I AM LEGEND) once said he wrote the script for DE SADE (1969) deliberately in the nonlinear style of LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD.

His first film L'IMMORTELLE (1963) was filmed at the same time Alain Resnais was shooting Robbe-Grillet's script for MARIENBAD. It was shot under protest by its cinematographer who disagreed with all of Robbe-Grillet's aesthetic choices. I'll be reviewing L'IMMORTELLE and other ARG titles in coming blogs and I'm considering pushing all other planned blog events of the next week or so back to cover his film legacy.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said today that Robbe-Grillet was the most "rebellious" members of the presitgious and highly exclusive Academie Francaise. That he was.

LA BELLE CAPTIVE was finally released on a welcome, if basic, US DVD presentation last year. Let's hope that his other films follow in the Criterion style editions they deserve.

I feel grateful to have been able to meet him at a 1976 showing of EDEN AND AFTER and SLOW SLIDINGS INTO PLEASURE in New York City. He was a disarmingly humble, gentle and witty individual. A unique figure who will be impossible to replace.

To read my other posts on the works and career of Alain Robbe-Grillet just type his name into the search engine at the top of the blog.

I recommend the excellent chapter on the films of Alain Robbe-Grillet in Pete Tombs' and Cahtal Tohill's essential "Immoral Tales."

Thanks to Kimberly Lindbergs.

*Recommended books and films by Alain Robbe-Grillet:
L'HOMME QUI MENT/THE MAN WHO LIES (1968): this 1968 war film was his last b&w feature and discerning critics consider it one of his best.
TRANS-EUROP-EXPRESS (1966): a director (Alain Robbe-Grillet) constructs the life and death of a drug smuggler (Jean Louis Trintignant) during a train-ride between Antwerp and Paris.
REFLECTIONS OF THE GOLDEN TRIANGLE: An intricate fantasy about an international crime cartel. One of his most accessible and entertaining novels.
L'IMMORTELLE: a cine-novel.
[You'll have to go gray-market for the films]


(C) Robert Monell, 2008

DIARY OF THE DEAD on CINEMADROME

Maverick director George A. Romero



A zombie holocaust is uploaded onto the internet in DIARY OF THE DEAD...


the topic of my WEEKEND MOVIE DIARY on ROBERT MONELL'S CINEMADROME. Click on the link at the top of the sidebar at left to read about my four decades of personal history with George A. Romero's horror films and reflections on his career in anticipation of his newest zombie epic.

TOSHIBA TO END HD DVD...

production according to reports coming out of Tokyo, Japan today. This should bring an end to the format war of the last several years if this indeed plays out. I've always preferred Blu-ray, which will obviously get a huge boost from this and the fact that Netflix is also going Blu-ray along with Time-Warner and Wal Mart, nobody wants the cost and hassle of stocking the present two HD formats along with regular DVDs. NHK broadcasting reports Toshiba will lose hundreds of millions of dollars on its investment in the format.

But will consumers during a possibly protracted world wide recession want to pay the extra cost for the enhanced video quality of Blu-ray? Could Blu-ray also eventually go the way of Laser Discs? Stay tuned and check out reuters.com for details.

NEW JESS FRANCO FILMS...

Producer Kike Mesa (left) has made a documentary on the life of Jess Franco [MANERA DE VIVIR-2007] and will produce his next film.

The Latarnia Forum's Franco Lounge and the Spanish Bloody Planet site have both published information and provided this link www.malagahoy.es/article/...langa.html concerning a film project which Jess Franco will reportedly be directing later this year, LOS CASPOSOS. The article brings up a number of questions. Will this be shot on film or will it be another shot on Hi-Def video project? This is being described as a comedy and will feature SNAKEWOMAN's Fata Morgana. Shooting is planned to commence this September in Malaga, Spain. A release is planned for sometime in 2009. The story is about of group of "losers" and it is planned to be in the style of former Jess Franco colleague, Luis Garcia Berlanga, who produced Franco's debut feature TENEMOS 18 ANOS in 1959 and was a popular director of Spanish comedies.

The site also states that Franco has completed LA CRIPTA DE LA MUJERES MALDITAS. It sounds like a horror film. Could this be LA CASA ENCIMA DEL CEMENTERIO which he apparently shot back-to-back with SNAKEWOMAN and was supposed to be based on a Nathaniel Hawthorne story? Or is it a different project? If it isn't, then what happened to LA CASA...? I spoke with Jess just before he began filming it and he was very enthusiastic, describing it as a "surreal" tale which would move freely through time and space. So, we seem to have at least three (and maybe four) new Jess Franco-related films in the pipeline.

Exactly when MANERA DE VIVIR and these other two titles will be available on Spanish or US home video is another question.

TRAGIC CEREMONY: DVD Review

Riccardo Freda's penultimate film is a fascinating mess... but where's Dr. Hichcock?!


It begins with a group of outcasts from society taking a boat trip in the Mediterranean. On shore and out of provisions they are directed to the forbidding castle of a witch whom is slain by the group's troubled leader who only wants to get back home. This causes the stranded mariners to be pursued by a curse which threatens to destroy them. That's the basic plot of Riccardo Freda's TRAGICA CEREMONIA EN VILLA ALEXANDER (Spanish title), right? Technically correct. But I was thinking about a much superior Freda directed title, the 1960 mythological fantasy GIANTS OF THESSALY (see the image above).



In one of the film's most memorable scenes the heroine, about to stumble into a chamber of horrors, explores a darkened passage. I'm describing the scene in TRAGIC CEREMONY (the title of the new DARK SKY FILMS DVD preseentation of the 1972 film) where Camille Keaton walks down that atmospherically photographed staircase toward the satanic ceremony, right? Actually, I was thinking of the scene where Barbara Steele explores the tunnels below the manse of the horrible Dr. Hichcock in L'ORRIBLE SEGRETO DEL DR HICHCOCK (seen in the above image) Freda's 1962 classic horror film. Now let's have deluxe North American DVD presentations of those films!

All the above is a way of admitting that my mind kept drifting away from the very predictable action of ESTRATTO DAGLI ARCHIVI SEGRETI DELLA POLIZIA DI UNA CAPITALE EUROPEA (the title of the Italian version which is presented on the DVD), toward the far more compelling treatments and images of these two earlier films. Of course, there is no film entitled TRAGIC CEREMONY, but the English language contraction of the Spanish title is an obviously useful handle when it comes to presenting and discussing the film itself. Given that it was a Spanish-Italian coproduction and in such enterprises it was common that cast and crew members were often assigned for tax shelter/quota reasons (Carla Mancini CSC, credited on the Italian print, never materializes) the entire thing looks like it may have been a write-off intended for limited playoff. The Spanish version was finally released in 1974.

Released in Italy at the end of 1972, it's instructive to look at the Italian version first. The story and screenplay are credited to the happy hack Mario Bianchi, whose 1982 directorial effort LA BIMBA DI SATANA has some similar thematic and visual elements and is a lot more fun. As a scenarist ten years earlier he seems to have bypassed screenwriting 101. It's bascially a compilation of ideas and situations from previous horror films including Edgar G. Ulmer's 1934 THE BLACK CAT (the black mass as Rotary Club function), the 1944 Bela Lugosi Monogram programmer THE VOODOO MAN (never trust a gas station attendant to give you directions), Jacques Tourneur's NIGHT OF THE DEMON (don't accept gifts from anyone!), Mario Bava's TWITCH OF THE DEATH NERVE (worthless hippies in dune buggies had better not stray off the main road), the aforementioned Riccardo Freda titles and the Manson gang's massacre of actress Sharon Tate and her friends in 1969 (the writer even has the bad taste to mention Ms. Tate by name).

The first act of the film is bloated with banal dialogue between the youthful protagonists and introduces an awkward flashback to telegraph the dysfunctional relationship (possibly undermined with a twisted sexual dynamic) between Bill (Tony Isbert) a withdrawn young man and his wealthy, manipulative mother (Irina Demick). What connects this opening with the remainder is the cursed neclace given to Jane (Camille Keaton) after it has been rejected by the mother. It seems that the object has been contamined by the evil force exorcised from its original owner. Whoever holds it will suffer the fate of the exorcist. There's a lot more plot, including the appearance of a man the local police suggest is the devil himself or at least a reasonable facsimile. This character is played by Pepe Calvo, most recognizable as Clint Eastwood's only friend in the hostile village from FISTFUL OF DOLLARS. You see, Satan is operating undercover in this region as the local gas station owner. And that's about as far as I'm willing to go in describing the increasingly ridiculous plot.

The "tragic ceremony" ends with the wealthy and powerful participants (they arrive in Rolls Royces) suddenly turning on each other with swords, pistols and medieval implements. The subsequent impalings, head splittings and other Fulci-esque spurtings are courtesy of the great Carlo Rambaldi, who is only credited on the present Italian print. This is where the variances between the two versions becomes interesting. Spanish makeup technicians are credited on the TRAGICA CEREMONIA... print, whom are left off, along with most of the other Spanish production personnel, from the Italian credits seen here, as are the names of the Spanish coproducer, Tecisa Executive Jose G. Maesso and Leonardo Martin, whom are credited as co-writers, along with Bianchi. The Spanish version's final credit roll is simply eliminated on the Italian print when it fades to black after crediting the haunting theme song to Stelvio Ciprian (music) and Freda (lyrics) along with the vocalist.

Seen for the first time on this DVD presentation are several images of topless nudity from Ms. Keaton and a final scene where a clinical psychiatrist (Paul Muller) didactically, and implausibly, explains that the events of the film's second half were the result of the soul migration (metempsychosis) of the cult leader Lady Alexander (Luciana Paluzzi). How did he figure it all out since everyone who was there is dead?! Jose Maesso wisely cut this scene for the Spanish version but it's nice to have it here for the sake of comparison. Muller and Fulvio Mingozzi (as the local police official) are always reliable Eurogenre character actors but they are totally wasted here as are Luigi Pistilli and the stunningly beautiful Ms. Paluzzi.

Freda would later disown this film and it's easy to see why. There have even been persistent unverified reports that parts of the film were directed by Gianna Maria Canale (Freda's wife) or the director's daughter! It wouldn't be the first time that the volatile titan walked and left someone else holding the bag (cf Mario Bava having to complete the Freda initiated I VAMPIRI and CALTIKI... in the late 1950s), and one can't really blame him if he did. The film's main defects, the lack of a coherent script and the inability of his lead actress to deliver an acceptable performance, were beyond his control. Tony Isbert, a good actor, is left without any playable scenes or any support from his colleagues.

Rambaldi's visual effects (I assume he designed the bloodbath) are graphic but unimpressive when considering the arrestingly gruesome make-up work Mario Bava provided for Freda's CALTIKI and his own TWITCH OF THE DEATH NERVE. The massacre is repeatedly intercut into the final third of the film, in what seems a rather desperate attempt to ramp up the downward spiral. It doesn't work.

The proceedings may have an edge if you are an auteurist steeped in the works of Riccardo Freda. As in the director's previous project, the underrated 1971 giallo THE IGUANA WITH THE TONGUE OF FIRE (how I wish they had dug up an equally good print of THAT and gave it a much needed US DVD presentation), both the contemporary counterculture of long haired, lazy young people who spend their elder's money on Carnaby Street fashions, and the older, conservative generation, are equally depraved. In TRAGIC CEREMONY the young protagonists are pathetic victims of an degenerate order which hides behind wealth and appearances. Perhaps that element is what drew the director to the project.

Freda improves upon Francisco Friale's bascially mediocre cinematography by setting up a few interestingly lit compositions, deploying some stylish dolly shots and applying an extreme wide angle lens to the aforementioned scenes with Ms. Keaton and the satanists. But it's not enough. The real value of this film is a historical record of the attempts of a prodigiously talented director to stay afloat in a rapidly changing industry where the demand for graphic violence and explicit sex overshadowed any artistic considerations. Freda would return with a vengeance with the excellent and similarly themed MURDER OBSESSION in 1980, yet another film long overdue for a decent North Amercian digital presentation.

Deservedly obscure, TRAGIC CEREMONY, can best be appreciated as an interesting, unintentionally amusing example of Le Bad Cinema. Or as a party film to be enjoyed with friends for a good laugh with the proper refreshments. That's if you have the money and time to expend and absolutely need to see each and every Riccardo Freda effort no matter how dire. This nice DVD presentation also contains an interview with Camille Keaton, who seems a rather pleasant lady and a trouper who speaks in more detail about her other 1970's exploitation films than TRAGIC CERMEMONY. But this rare, complete Italian language print, presented in Anamorphic widescreen 1.85:1aspect ratio, from decent elements, is a welcome R1 transfer, especially if one has only been able to access the film via the inferior Spanish language bootleg which has been circulating for years. The original Italian trailer is also included.

Finally, one is left wondering about the typically long winded Italian title, which evokes a mid-1970's Maurizio Merli action vehicle. Another signal that times had changed. The stylish, bloody gialli of Fulci and Argento were the rage of the day and the kind of gothic horror which ruled over the Italian Golden Age of horror was a thing of the past.

Thanks to Kit Gavin for providing information and discussion about this film.

(C) Robert Monell, 2008

BIRTHDAY GREETINGS TO AN ARTIST...

The painter at his canvas. He also created 12 very strange, singular Italian westerns, the most prolific contributor to that genre.


The Spiritualist....

On Feb. 8, 1914 Demofilo Fidani*, writer, actor, set designer, medium, friend of Gordon Mitchell, film director and one of my spiritual Godfathers, was born in in Caligari, Sardinia. He is now immortal.

We all know a true artist never dies.

Some favorite Fidani scenes:
STRANIERO...FATTI IL SEGNO DELLA CROCE: Future director Joe D'Amato appearing as the bandit who enjoys throwing eggs up in the air and letting them smash on his face!

GIU LA TESTA...HOMBRE: The tribute to Shakespeare's MACBERTH before the final shootout.

Era Sam Wallach... lo chiamavano 'così sia': the delirious flashback to the childhood trauma which provoked the protagonist's fear of doors swinging open.

ONE DAMN DAY AT DAWN...DJANGO MEETS SARTANA!: The fact that Sartana (Fabio Testi) acts and is costumed like Franco Nero in Sergio Corbucci's original DJANGO while Django (Hunt Powers) acts and is costumed exactly like Gianni Garko's Sartana in that series.

I've never encountered anyone who has seen all of Fidani's Spaghetti Westerns, it would probably be too much for one lifetime...

*aka Slim Alone / Danilo Dani / Nedo De Fida / Miles Deem / Lucky Dickinson / Dino Fidani / Nedo Fidano / Dennis Ford / Sean O'Neal / Demos Philos / Dick Spitfire / Nedo de Fida

(C) Robert Monell, 2008

MARIO BAVA'S EVIL TWIN

Read my upcoming review to find out why director Riccardo Freda was not a happy camper on the set of TRAGICA CEREMONIA EN VILLA ALEXANDER, his unfortunate but not uninteresting 1972 Italian-Spanish coproduction now out on R1 DVD under the title TRAGIC CEREMONY. I've just seen the DARK SKY FILMS disc and it's a good DVD presentation of the great director's worst horror film. It's the rare Italian version, which is very welcome, but that doesn't mean the film itself is any better (hey, it was written by the notorious hack Mario Bianchi!).

I'll try to have an in-depth look at this up within a few days.

CARLOS AURED: 1937-2008

Born Carlos Aured Alonso in Los Alcazares, Murcia on 22 January 1937, the Spanish director of some 14 films, including four Paul Naschy titles, died last Sunday, Feb. 3 in Denia Spain of unspecified causes, according to a post on the Spanish Bloody Planet site. Thanks to the Spanish blog QUE NO SE CULPE A NADIE for the still of Aured at work earlier this year with Naschy on the fantasy film EMPUSA. Aured reportedly left the production and Naschy finished directing the film, which also features Jess Franco regular Antonio Mayans.

Aured's last feature before that was Atrapados en el miedo (1985). He also directed the hardcore feature APOCALIPSIS SEXUAL (1981), with Lina Romay and Ajita Wilson.

Other notable films include:

Noche de la furia, La (1974) Espanto surge de la tumba, El (1972); Ojos azules de la muñeca rota, Los (1973); Retorno de Walpurgis, El (1973); Venganza de la momia, La (1973).

My favorite of his films will remain OJOS AZULES DE LA MUNECA ROTA (1973) and HORROR RISES FROM THE TOMB (1972), which was released in 2007 on US DVD by BCI with a commentary by Aured and Paul Naschy, that commentary should be worth revisiting in light of this news.. BLUE EYES OF BROKEN DOLLS will be released this year on DVD, also with an Aured commentary.

All the Aured films I've seen are notable for their highly atmospheric visual style and macabre details.

He was kind enough to take time to help me out with a project I was working on a few years ago. I exchanged a few communications with him and wished I had the time to get to know him better. Unlike some other film directors I've encountered he seemed like a generous, unpretentious individual.

EMPUSA should be interesting both as the return of Paul Naschy to the director's chair and as Aured's last collaboration with the writer-actor.


For information on EMPUSA visit www.empusafilm.blogspot.com/

Thanks to The Latarnia Forums, Que No Se Culpe a Nadie and Bloody Planet.

(C) Robert Monell, 2007

Visit CINEMADROME!

Read About The Tranquilizing Female Vampires!

We begin with my weekend movie diary where I finally get a chance to explain why I always fall asleep when I attempt to watch Joseph Sarno's arty, ridiculous 1973 VEIL OF BLOOD!
[use link on top of the sidebar at left]

WANTED: VOODOO MAN

Would I rather watch the Superbowl or William Beaudine's 1944 B masterwork VOODOO MAN? Bring back the 1970's Steelers and I might reconsider but I'll take "One Shot" Bill's delightful Bela-makes-female-somnambulists-for-Monogram item, thank you. The mere sight of John Carradine's voodoo drum playing delirium seals it for me, not to mention Bela Lugosi's voodoo ceremony get-up and the truly out of this world dialogue, "Emotion to Emotion!" Don't let the postage stamp budget fool you, I would even praise Beaudine's always dismissed abilities as a director. Some of the shots of the zombie girls walking about the Marlowe estate are nicely atmospheric. It's not on any home video or DVD presentation I know of outside of that CREEPY CLASSICS DVD R. It would be nice to have it on a good quality DVD. Not that it's an IMPORTANT discovery, but I like it. Beaudine also directed the pioneer sexploitation epic MOM AND DAD and the non expliotation LASSIE TV series! Not to mention hundreds of other B movies and TV shows, he's even more prolific than Jess Franco! I'll be doing a longer blog on "One Shot" in the future...

I made a call.... but couldn't get any answers! Maybe Ramboona will hear me: Where's my VOODOO MAN?! Or is it THE VOODOO MAN? Or does it really matter?

LORNA'S LANDSLIDE!

The ultra bizarre music for LES POSSEDEES DU DIABLE was composed by Jazz Bach guitarist Andre Benichou. It really gets under your skin. Once you hear you won't forget it...




Rare advert for English language version....


The results of our most recent reader's poll, asking which Jess Franco films were the most wanted on DVD, and LES POSSEDEES DU DIABLE (LORNA, THE EXORCIST) wins by a landslide with 64% of the vote. That doesn't really surprise me since it's one of the director's most sought after films, especially in its elusive complete form. This 1974 Robert de Nesle production has never surfaced complete on any video format as far as I know.

Video Distributors: C.V.D.; VIP; MPM Production [Here are some French distributors whom may figure in the right's chain, according to one site]

The last I heard was that a rights holder had been located in Europe and that a DVD company was in negotiations. That was last year. If quality, complete elements are discovered we could all be in for the most important discovery since EUGENIE...HER JOURNEY INTO PERVERSION and NIGHTMARES COME AT NIGHT surfaced several years ago. They had been MIA for decades, so anything is possible. This hypnotic, transgressive (see the still on p. 110 of OBSESSION: THE FILMS OF JESS FRANCO) Faustian tale certainly deserves the deluxe treatment. It always makes my often changing Jess Franco 10 Best list.


Thanks to everyone who voted!

POLL RESULTS:
LORNA, THE EXORCIST: 61 votes
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE MIRROR;-34 votes: The Spanish version of this Robert de Nesle/Spanish coproduction. The French version is THE OBSCENE MIRROR, which has a different soundtrack by Andre Benichou. It also has more explicit sexual inserts acted out by Lina Romay and Ramon Ardid among others. It's much less interesting than the Spanish version which was released by Q video.
PLAISIR A TROIS-32 votes: Yet another version of PHILOSOPHY IN THE BEDROOM which is envlined by Alain Petit's sharp dialogue, a bizarre music score and a cubist mise en scene. Some hardcore moments may make this a difficult DVD release.
GEMIDOS DE PLACER-26 votes: A 1980s remake of PLAISIR A TROIS filmed in long plan- sequences. One of Franco's most structurally interesting films. Write to Severin Films if you want this on DVD. They have already released several other Golden Films Internacional titles.
THE SADIST OF NOTRE DAME-25 votes: A composite of 1974's EXORCISM with 1979 footage. A Spanish-Eurocine coproduction. A key Franco title.
THE SINISTER DR ORLOFF-22 votes: Jess Franco's fourth Dr. Orloff feature and my favorite of the series. Very sadistic and visually interesting Golden Films production.
THE MIDNIGHT PARTY-17 votes: A minor, amusing sexy spy-comedy with Jess Franco as a torture specialist.

We'll have a follow up poll soon in which a number of other Jess Franco titles will be presented as DVD candidates.


(C) Robert Monell, 2008