Buenas Noches, Señor Monstruo – review

Director: Antonio Mercero

Release date: 1982

Contains spoilers

Poor, poor Paul Naschy, to think that, once upon a 1982 he ended up in this; and just to note that his wolf man in this does not use the Waldemar Daninsky name as (according to the IMDb trivia) he “detested the script”.

This had been on my radar for some time but it is only recently I got to see it with fan-subs and, whilst I was expecting a kid orientated flick I was not expecting a vehicle for Spanish kid-pop-group Regaliz, full of cheesy pop songs (with context accurate lyrics) and dance moments. That said, it does have Dracula (Luis Escobar) in it so it deserves its place here.

blowpipe

The film starts with a school trip to the lake. Jaime (Jaime Benet) and Eduardo (Eduard Navarrete) are bug hunting, keeping in touch by walkie talkie (Jaime is unsure as to why they have to use code names). Jaime reports in that he has seen a large lizard and Eduardo tells him not to let it get away. Jaime resolves to use his blowpipe (!) and Eduardo counsels to aim for the tail. Well, he’s nowhere near the tail but he does hit teacher (Rosa Redondo) in the butt. He is chased and, collecting Eduardo as they run, they become lost in the wood. Then the storm hits.

the hearse

So they think they see feet passing by and decide to leave their hidey hole/shelter and immediately run into Astrid (Astrid Fenollar) and Eva (Eva Mariol) – so that’s the members of Regaliz all together. Anyway, Jaime remembers that he has sparklers and so they light them and sing through the forest. Eventually they come to a road and a coach comes past, recognised by the kids as a hearse carrying two coffins and, apparently, driverless. They then spot a castle and go to look for shelter/help.

Luis Escobar as Dracula

In the castle the (currently human) Wolf Man (Paul Naschy) and Quasimodo (Guillermo Montesinos) are bowling with skulls. An alarm wakes Dracula, who grabs his fanged dentures as he leaves his coffin. Frankenstein (Andrés Mejuto) is still working on perfecting his Monster (Fernando Bilbao) and bemoaning that the monsters are no longer feared by the humans. When the kids turn up he decides that they should feed them, give them a bed for the night and then (at midnight) scare them. There is singing and dancing amongst all this and the kids find a surprising ally in the Son of Dracula (Miguel Ángel Valero).

dance routine

This is silly, kids’ fodder and doesn’t have a secondary adult layer to it to keep the parents entertained. The kids look to be having fun but much of the cast, including some of the kids, are dubbed. We get some nice bits, like Dracula taking his dentures out and filing his fangs sharp, and Wolf Man is a reluctant monster despite living with the other monsters. The story isn’t much to write home about – the kids are surrogate for the world the monsters want to terrify and defeat the monsters partly due to the monsters’ pratt falls and partly through the power of song and dance. When ‘rescued’ by a search party no one believes there were monsters there. You can track this down, there are fansubs out there but the DVD is not English subbed. I am sure that for some this will be a film that invokes rose-tinted glasses, for the rest of us 3 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On DVD (no subs) @ Amazon US

On DVD (no subs) @ Amazon UK

Vamp or Not? Fang

This is a 2018 film by Adam R. Steigert and is brave in the first instance as it is a budget werewolf movie. There was also a question, as I watched it, as to whether one of the main characters is actually a vampire, rather than a werewolf.


However, as the film starts, we get to see that one of the things it does well is gore as we see a man (Christopher Burns Jr.) chained to a chair covered in gore and vomiting. It’s a startling opening and the blood effects are really well done. This then moves into images of medical diagrams as credits roll, until we get into the film proper.

opening gore

Joe (Theo Kemp) is rifling through a purse and then wakes girlfriend Chloe (Melodie Roehrig). They are junkies and are out of drugs. Joe has a gun and a plan – he will rob someone and Chloe has to distract them, when she asks how he suggests by opening her legs. She acts as a prostitute and ends up in the car with a man who also has a gun. Joe shoots him in the head but the murder makes them a measly $50.

Chloe and Joe

They go to see dealer Christmas (Sean C. Sanders) who, despite misgivings, hands over some junk. They go home, Chloe shows her regrets first and in the morning Joe is down too, wondering how his life has hit rock bottom. Chloe mentions an Aunt and Uncle (Doris (Melantha Blackthorne) and Roy Crowley (Patrick Mallette)) that they could visit – she hasn’t seen them since she was a kid and Joe’s ears are pricked when she mentions they are rich.

family home

So, we see them travelling (and scoring) and eventually they come across a broken down car and driver Chris (Jason John Beebe) and his girlfriend Shelly ( Jennie Russo, Hi-8 (Horror Independent 8)). There is no cell reception and Joe suggests they go with them to Chloe’s Aunt’s house, which isn’t far. They get there and meet creepy grounds/housekeeper Harold (Gregory Blair).

dinner party

The Aunt and Uncle are away to lunch but he lets the visitors in, locking the door. Apparently, they like all the doors to be locked (and mention has to be made of the miming of doors being locked without keyholes, using one of the keys from his large bunch). Anyway, soon Aunt and Uncle appear and they are weird and the guests feel trapped. Meanwhile, a local Sheriff (Steve Losey), has found the ID that Chloe (unbeknownst to herself) has dropped at the scene of the murder and gets dying (of cancer) ex-officer William Sanders (Michael O'Hear, Dry Bones, Red Scream Nosferatu & Mostly Dead) to go with him over the county line to look for her.

wolf form

Of course, Aunt and Uncle are monsters and things get weirder and weirder until blood begins to flow. Now they never mention what they actually are, except referring to themselves as monsters, but Aunty is definitely a werewolf. Uncle Roy, however, is perhaps not as easily classified. He suggests that they have been around for some time, the Crowley’s found them in tombs and they took their forms – whether they stole their faces, shape-shifted into their forms or possessed them is not actually answered.

eyes carved out

“Uncle” Roy wears dark glasses and when they are removed, we see his eyes are carved out, the wounds raw looking. Both hide away during the day and both eat raw looking meat. He does produce fangs (top and bottom) but we do not see him turn hairy like Doris and, when he bites Sanders, he says his blood is poisonous due to the cancer. Later they discover Sanders' blood is actively debilitating and beheading kills, that said, all the house residents get up after bullets and so, later, silver bullets are suggested. They don’t actually seem to work on Roy, though he implies this is due to his longevity. However, a face full of holy water burns Roy and that is not normal werewolf behaviour/reaction.

holy water

It is the holy water and the not turning hairy (that we see) that makes me question whether Roy is actually a vampire. He is from the tomb (but so is Doris and, actually, so is Paul Naschy's werewolf in at least one of his classic films), avoids the sun (though we don’t know if he needs to) and is killed by beheading. This makes him feel vampiric to me and I’m going down that line – though it could just be an adoption of tropes thing. The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Short Film: Ghost Bride of Dracula

It is perhaps lucky that I changed the policy on short films and stopped rating them as this would have scored very low indeed...

A little background to this would be useful, I feel. In 2014 there was a softcore porn film by Jake Kane entitled An Erotic Tale of Ms. Dracula. This has then been taken by director David Zani, the softcore sex firmly expunged and made into a short film. It has then found its way onto Amazon Prime.

The film comes in at 33 minutes but there really wasn’t 33 minutes of footage and what Zani has done becomes evident in the title sequence as the camera roams over a large house that would appear to be (firstly stock footage, but secondly) a manor house in Britain, complete with overcast skies. The title sequence had a horrible, unsuitable electronica piece over it but also some very interesting dialogue (and I’ll come to the source of that soon enough).

Not LA

He has then cut in footage of the house as establishing footage. However the main film looks like it has been shot in Los Angeles. Certainly, the exterior shots have that sharp LA sunshine, which jars against the overcast establishing shots. The vegetation turns from atypically English to palm trees. It is simply a mess. He has then also cut in scenes, showing on a flat screen TV, from the Paul Naschy film Count Dracula’s Great Love. This is the source of the initial voice overs and presumably included because some of the dialogue talks about Dracula searching for a virgin who will fall for him and one of the characters, Ashley (Allie James), doesn’t want to die a virgin. There is also at least one scene lifted from The Devil’s Wedding Night.

the brides

So, story… very little really when your story scenes are the wraparound for a porn film but, such as it is... Ms Dracula (Alexis Texas) lives in a mansion with Renfield (Romeo Price) and three vampire brides and has kidnapped Ashley. Renfield has created a potion that allows them to walk in daylight and has made them more powerful. Van Helsing (Chad White) has put a reward of $1M for Ashley’s rescue. This has led husband and wife Jonathan Harker (Billy Chappell) and Meena (Anna Morna) – yes they spelt it incorrectly – to infiltrate the mansion, posing as masseuses, and sexual shenanigans follows.

fangs on show

It’s as thin as tissue and the acting… well it’s a wraparound for a porn film, what do you think? I suspect the original version had more integrity in its absolute honesty (it is what it is). This was almost recycling at its worst until I realised that the distributors had gone on to recycle the whole of this version into the 56 minute long anthology film (and for anthology read mess) Halloween Horror at Midnight. The imdb page for Ghost Bride of Dracula is here.

Honourable Mention: Curse of the Devil

Regular readers will know that we do like a Paul Naschy film here at TMtV, so when friend of the blog Ville contacted me and suggested I looked at this 1973 Carlos Aured directed movie starring the Spanish horror movie great I was a tad confused as to why I hadn’t already looked at it.

Checking it made it very clear that I had seen the film and, as Ville points out, it does feature María Silva as Elizabeth Báthory and that would normally guarantee a feature. All I can think is that her role was so very small in the film that I then overlooked posting – a terrible omission and one that is being rectified with this post.

Bathory's head

It begins with two knights facing off, one a Báthory and the other Irineus Daninsky (Paul Naschy). Irineus states that the magic that Báthory is known for will not aid him against Daninsky’s sword and this proves to be true. Watched in secret by Elizabeth and her companion, Daninsky fairly and squarely beats Báthory and then cuts off his head. Elizabeth heads back to the castle, though she knows that Daninsky will come for her.

Drinking blood

At the castle she indulges in a black magic rite that involves blood sacrifice and drinking of said blood. Just as she’s taking a gulp from the goblet one of her guards comes in, an arrow in his back, closely followed by Daninsky and his men. The companion escapes but Báthory and her handmaidens are captured and executed – they by hanging, her by being burnt at the stake. Before she dies she offers one of those convoluted curses to the effect that when one of Daninsky’s descendants draws blood from the firstborn of one of her descendants then that Daninsky and all his issue will be cursed.

The wolfman

That is the last we see of Báthory but when, centuries later, Waldemar Daninsky (also Paul Naschy) shoots at a wolf (with a silver cartridge his servant puts into the gun) but finds the body of a gypsy, he sets the curse into motion. The gypsies ensure that Waldemar is cursed to live the living death of the werewolf. However we don’t get the ghost or revenant of Báthory showing up and hence she has only a fleeting visitation in the film and this is the honourable mention of that visitation.

There

The Borgo Pass

is another aspect that genre fans will like, however, and that is the proximity of Daninsky’s estate, in this, to the Borgo Pass – highlighted only by a road sign to that effect. There is also a scene of the corpses of victims being treated and about to be cremated to prevent a possible return – but they don’t return and so whether this would have been as werewolves, vampires or zombies is not actually touched upon in any meaningful way. However, standard werewolf myth be that only survivors become werewolves in turn.

The imdb page is here.

Honourable Mention: La Herencia Valdemar

I picked up the Spanish Blu-Ray of La Herencia Valdemar, or the Valdemar Inheritance, not thinking that there would be a post here. The set has this 2010 film and the sequel. La Sombra Prohibida (the Forbidden Shadow), in it and my reason for getting it was that it was a known Lovecraft orientated film and the films were amongst the last that Paul Naschy made. The films haven’t been released in the UK as of yet, but the Spanish set has English subtitles. Because it is Blu-ray I couldn’t get a screen capture and so the screenshots below are the best I could muster from the trailer.

The José Luis Alemán directed film is set in the present and the nineteenth century, the modern storyline follows Luisa Llorente (Silvia Abascal) as she goes to value a decaying Gothic mansion in the Montenegro region, and the subsequent attempts to find her when she goes missing. The story flows over the two films making them a part one and part two more properly (though the “previously on” actually didn’t seem to accurately match what had happened!)

the Dunwich Rite

It is the story in the past that interests us. It follows the couple Lázaro Valdemar (Daniele Liotti) and his wife Leonor (Laia Marull). She runs an orphanage, he conducts séances and takes spirit photography. It is, however, a scam and he is arrested after refusing to bribe a newspaper reporter. His release is achieved by Aleister Crowley (Francisco Maestre), who then uses the house to perform the Dunwich Rite – which goes wrong.

Bram Stoker on the left

At the rite are various personages, including the reason for the Honourable Mention. Bram Stoker (Lino Braxe) is there. All the attendees have asked for a boon from the rite. Bram’s is inspiration for his literary affairs. I should also mention that the rite allows a demonic force to escape its dimension and inhabit a corpse. It uses the lifeforce of the worms to recompose the body, eats flesh and looks ghoulish. More revenant, perhaps, than anything else – in the next film it is referred to as an incubus.

The mention, though, is for the appearance of Bram Stoker. The imdb page is here.

Honourable Mention: the Beast and the Magic Sword

It feels sometimes that I will forever be finding "just one more" Paul Naschy film to feature on TMtV. The truth is, of course, that it can’t be... but, for now, turning over the cinematographic rocks and finding these euro-horror films amounts to little bubbles of joy in my life (even if the films aren’t that great sometimes).

The Beast and the magic Sword was a Japanese/Spanish co-production from 1983 and was written and directed by Naschy. In truth, though it was the V word that brought it to my attention, it nearly didn’t qualify for even an honourable mention. Vampires are literally mentioned in passing and their mention is at the head of the film.

Paul Naschy as Irineus Daninsky

The king Otton the Great (Gérard Tichy) is in a quandary. He has defeated the Hungarians and captured their leader Bhulcho. However, despite the fact that they died like any other men, the people believe that Hungarians are “Devils – insatiable vampires who seek out victims to steal away their blood and souls.” They are thought to bring plague and ruined harvests. Indeed if Bhulcho is executed, rather than die in single combat, it is believed he will return from the dead, as will all the Hungarian soldiers who have been killed. To solve this thorny problem, Otton invites the Polish knight Irineus Daninsky (Paul Naschy) to challenge the Magyar to single combat.

defeating Bhulcho 

The fight happens and Daninsky wins. To make absolutely sure, Otton orders the Magyar’s heart to be pierced by a silver cross and his remains burned. However Bhulcho’s mistress is a witch and curses Daninsky’s pregnant wife so that all their descendants will become beasts if born the seventh son on the full moon (and it did strike me that such curses are a bit too specific to be overly effective). Thus it takes six hundred years for one of the line, Waldermer (again, Paul Naschy), to become so cursed. He goes to a wise man for help but when the inquisition’s thugs kill said sage as a heretic, Waldemar is forced to seek help from a Japanese wise man called Kian (Shigeru Amachi, Onna kyûketsuki).

wolfman

So it is a werewolf in feudal Japan and vampires are never mentioned again. I did learn, however, that if a woman is pierced in the breast by a shuriken she will immediately die and we do get a fight between a wolfman and a tiger – filmed using real tigers. The imdb page is here.

Empusa – review

Director: Jacinto Molina

Release date: 2010

Contains spoilers

For those not in the know, Jacinto Molina are the forenames of Spanish horror legend Paul Naschy. I mentioned back in 2007 the fact that the film was being worked on, following Naschy’s death in 2009 I suspected that the film might be lost to the mists of time. I was pleased, therefore, to discover that it has become available for download.

The premise of the film always promised to be a little strange, an empusa is said to be a “cross between a vampire, a snake and a seagull”. Actually that belies the lore connections. Empusa was the name of the ship that transported Orlock in the original German intertitles of Nosferatu. More so Bane tells us (in the Vampire Encyclopaedia, p60) that Empusa is a variant of Empouse, a type of Greek demon often classed as a vampire who were attendants to and daughters of Hecate. The director Emilio Vieyra used a seagull motif, as opposed to bats, in the film Blood of the Virgins. Incidentally the film Stardust has three witches, Lamia, Empusa and Mormo… Mormo, like Empusa is a variant of Empouse. However, we will look at lore again later… onwards with the film…

find a hand

It begins in black and white and on a beach walk old friends Abel (Paul Naschy) and Victor (Antonio Mayans, Revenge in the House of Usher & Snakewoman). They bicker, both Abel’s lost fame (it later turns out he used to be an actor, he now makes a living as an occult researcher/tarot reader) and his lover Natalia (María Jesús Solina) are mentioned. Indeed, through the film these two bicker and at first it is fun, lively dialogue but it quickly wears thin and we wonder why they are actually friends. Be that as it may, they find a hand and severed forearm in the sand. Victor wants to go to the police but Abel argues he should take the arm home (along with its strange tattoo) for two days and do research on it, then they will return it and call the police. They leave and the film melts into colour as a topless girl, Cristabel (Cristina Carrión), emerges from the sea.

examine the mark

At home Abel receives a phone call from Natalia and his dialogue reveals him to be an old letch who consumes a diet of coffee, pills and absinthe. Be that as it may, his research has led him to the empusa. The empusa is a witch that destroys their victim and leaves upon them the mark of Lilith (the tattoo), worships the goddess Isathar (or so the subtitles said, I assume that they meant Ishtar) and enter the land of the dead. He also mentions Necurat – the accursed name, but this isn’t mentioned again. A quick look at the Urban Dictionary tells us: “Ancient romanian origin. Necurat means "dirty soul" and was used as euphemism to avoid words as "vampire" or "witch" -or any other supernatural or evil creature- which was belived (sic) you'd run into if you name 'em”.

Abel and Cristabel

Okay, I could go on but I won’t do so in great detail. There is an unbelievable amount of dead wood in the script, including a sub-story about a dangerous Baron (Paco Racionero) who is murdered, which goes nowhere. There is the meeting of Abel and Cristabel (presumably named for the Samuel Taylor Colleridge poem) who claims she is from Greece – who is an empusa – and then with Justine De Winter (Paco Racionero) who is credited as Lilith, who appears to be a vampire at war with the empusa.

Victor being grabbed

In the town there are many killings, the victims all have their right arms cut off, and also an attack on tourists by vicious seagulls. Abel is captured by Cristabel (via the medium of eye mojo) but then released unscathed (and manages to change clothes twice, between being caught, waking and then waking on release). Victor himself is grabbed by a taloned hand and then has his arm cut off (as well as his privates) and is fed upon. His rotting shade (think Jack from American Werewolf in London) then visits Abel and helps him by possessing his printer and printing out a map to the empusa lair and giving him a musical score that, if played, causes the vampires pain.

blood at mouth

We get three types of vampire. The police lieutenant (Saturnino García), commissary (Marco Sanz) and priest (Alfonso Dorbe) all indulge with Cristabel (off screen) and become second-class vampires. These are sensitive to light and more like your a-typical vampires. A stake through the heart would kill. It has to be said that it seems (given the use of comedy soundtrack) that the scenes with these characters were meant to be comedic relief – though they weren’t that funny. The priest had also given Abel the 7 daggers of Zion.

stabbed by a dagger of Zion

Abel uses these to kill female vampires in the lair that are described as vricolacas (according to to the subtitles, presumably a misspelling of the Greek vrykolaka). There is nothing remarkable about these except to say that a dagger of Zion in the heart will kill. One vampire killed like this comes back as she was not actually vrykolaka but empusa. Lilith, who takes the form (unseen) of a panther, is killed by heaving the pendant she wears thrust in both her eyes. That action seems to burn them and makes her vanish into smoke.

stake in the forehead

As for the empusa it seems that a stake into the forehead is the order of the day. Yes it’s all jolly japes but Abel is the saviour of the day… or is he… with a false ending that is cheese itself and then another ending, which is even cheesier it is not the greatest cinematic event ever. A shame really as it is Naschy’s last outing (there was also a two part Lovecraftian film he had worked on, that I have not seen, which I trust is better than this.)

the bottom line... its a Naschy film

Other than Victor and Abel (whose bickering eventually grates) there isn’t a single piece of decent acting in this. The comedy pieces are just not funny (or at least not intentionally so) and the filming looked cheap and actually reminded me of some of the later Franco films – not a good thing, believe me. And yet… it is Naschy and it has to be watched for that reason if no other. There are plenty of pert breasts on show, some outrageously bad plotting and effects and a barrel-ful of unusual lore, mostly used out of context. Oh. And the movie poster is nice. 3.5 out of 10 – go and get it anyway.

The imdb page is here.

Honourable Mention: the Werewolf and the Yeti

Known, domestically, as La Maldición de la Bestia and directed by Miguel Iglesias in 1975, this is a Paul Naschy vehicle in which he once again dons the persona of Waldemar Daninsky. "Who?" you might ask, if you have not come across Naschy’s body of work before. Think of a Spanish Larry Talbot, though in Waldemar’s case each film outing tends to be a separate incarnation of the character.

This is also one of the films still on the BBFC banned list from the days of the, so called, “video nasties” – clearly because it has never been re-submitted for UK classification as it is mild compared to other Naschy outings (or indeed compared to a large majority of horror films). As a result, your best chance to see it is on a fuzzy, dubbed VHS rip to DVD-R – apologies, therefore, for the quality of the screenshots.

Sylvia and Waldemar

In this flick Waldemar is an anthropologist and Psychologist who knows the region of Tibet and speaks Nepalese (!!!) who is asked by one Professor Lacombe (Josep Castillo Escalona) to accompany him and his daughter Sylvia (Mercedes Molina) on an expedition to capture the yeti. A previous expedition had taken pictures of the beast and got a genuine Yeti scalp from a monastery before they were all killed (by the yeti). Waldermar agrees to go.

Paul Naschy reprisesWaldemar 

When they arrive at Kathmandu they discover that inclement weather will stop them using the pass they wish to take. There is another pass known only by a junkie explorer called Joel (Víctor Israel). A base camp is set up and Waldermar has gone ahead with Joel to scout the pass (a place local Sherpa are unwilling to go as it is cursed). They are overdue and Joel (as a non-character) quickly vanishes down a crevasse). Waldermar finds a cave and goes in looking for shelter. There is a statue within and a couple of women – they tell him the cave is dedicated to a God (I didn’t catch the name) who in turn is dedicated to Kali. He passes out.

fanged corpse

The girls, who have said he will make a good companion and passionate lover, tend to Waldemar, nursing him to health. They also make sure he indulges in some three-way action. When he is recovered (on what happens to be the night of a full moon) he starts checking out the caves. He sees the girls eating human flesh and also finds a locked gate now covers the cave entrance. He gets to a room with a sarcophagus, on which lies the desiccated remains of a fanged creature. One of the girls attacks him, he pulls a dagger (it looked like) from the corpse (which doesn’t regenerate – and in other Waldermar stories even a werewolf would regenerate should the silver blade be removed from its heart) and stabs her – she rapidly decays.

vampire woman

He moves on and is attacked by the second girl and she clearly has fangs. She too decays when stabbed but she manages to get at his chest. Video fuzziness meant that I couldn’t clearly see if she bit him but she leaves the pentagon mark (in Waldermar films the pentagram is replaced by the pentagon) and he is now cursed to be a wolfman. Unusually, this is a film where Waldermar can be cured (rather than just killed) but if you want some werewolf on yeti action I am afraid you will have to wait to the very end of the film.

The vampire women (and I am classing them as such due to the fangs and rapid decay on death, not to mention the penchant for human flesh) are only briefly in the film, hence the honourable mention. The imdb page is here.

Assignment Terror – review

Directed by: Tulio Demicheli*

Release date: 1970

Contains spoilers

Assignment Terror, or Dracula vs Frankenstein as it was erroneously titled in the US, was a monster mash type of affair. You’ll see I have asterisked the director. Whilst Tulio Demicheli was listed as director, IMDb suggest to us that Hugo Fregonese and Eberhard Meuchsner also had uncredited hands in the direction. Too many cooks spoiling the broth? It couldn’t help when it came to making this pretty darn awful movie.

In an opening that owes its very existence, one feels, to Ed Wood and Plan 9 from Outer Space, we get a message sent to alien agent Dr Odo Warnoff (Michael Rennie). He is told that two dead scientists, Maleva Kerstein (Karin Dor, Blood Demon) and Dr Kirian (Ángel del Pozo) have been revived via possession by alien agents. Their world is dying and they must prepare the way for colonisation of earth.

staked vampire

How do they intend to do this? By playing on our superstitions. Now, you’d be forgiven for thinking that this meant creating false monsters… Oh no, they are really real monsters… At which point don’t they cease to be products of superstition? Oh well... At a fair there is a gypsy fortune teller who has the bones (with stake) of a vampire (Manuel de Blas) – not Dracula, despite the credits but I didn’t catch the name they gave him. They have Kerstein sleep with the gypsy, un-stake the vampire and kill the gypsy with it and then kidnap the gypsy’s assistant. The removal of the stake causes the vampire to reform.

brainwashing

They will brainwash the assistant to make her part of an army of beautiful agents – praying on the lusts of mankind. You see the agents believe themselves superior to humanity as they have no emotions. They are, however, inhabiting human bodies so that begins to go horribly wrong. They also insist on unearthing other monsters including a mummy called Pha-ho-tep (Genes Reyes) and the Farancksalan Monster (Ferdinando Murolo) – yes, the Frankenstein Monster by any other name, who they make nuclear powered!

hirsute fellow

They also dig up the preserved corpse of Waldermer Daninsky (Paul Naschy, who wrote the damn thing). They remove the silver bullet from his heart – a thing that only paralysed him because it wasn’t fired by a woman who would die for him. They then give him a serum to prevent him becoming a Wolfman (making you wonder why they bothered) but he turns anyway and escapes – becoming an enemy of the aliens.

fangs a lot

His first near victim is Ilse (Patty Shepard, Young Hannah, Queen of the Vampires) who gets away and becomes involved with inspector Tobermann (Craig Hill), who is investigating various murders. Ilse nearly ends up as vampire chow but Tobermann stakes him.

Other than that it is a mismatch of poor-dubbing and ludicrous storyline. Yes the monsters fight and yes humanity wins – mainly due to the Wolfman. However it really isn’t worth the effort of sitting through it. 2 out of 10 is more than it deserves and is for the sheer cheek.

The imdb page is here.

Countess Dracula’s Orgy of Blood – review

Director: Donald F Glut

Release date: 2004

Contains spoilers

Allegedly Countess Dracula’s Orgy of Blood is a sequel to The Erotic Rites of Countess Dracula. I say allegedly because, other than a location (the castle), Del Howison reprising his Renfield role (in cameo it would seem) and the appearance of a character purporting to be Dracula – this time played by Tony Clay – this has precious little to do with the first film, no Scarlet Countess appears (or is the name of a club) in this little movie.

It does, however, share a need to have naked ladies and girl on girl action. Fair enough, it is a Glut production and at this point it meant softcore with an attempt at story.

We start in 1897 and a man (Jason Peters) cleans his gun in the living room of a ranch as his sister Roxanne (Danielle Petty, Tomb of the Werewolf) sleeps in another room. We get some mist (or dry ice) and the vampire Diana (Glori-Anne Gilbert, Blood Sisters: Vamps 2) appears and they get down to some naked rumpy… Couple of points here. Ms Petty was very pale of skin, whereas the vampire was tanned, with tan lines! Our vampire also clearly had been surgically enhanced and wore footwear boasting Perspex heels – in 1897… Now I know that Bram Stoker pushed the boundaries with his scientific inclusions when Dracula was published in 1897 but these were idiosyncrasies too far! Anyway, in the heat of passion Roxanne knocks a perfume bottle over and her brother comes in to find her missing… off he goes to enlist the help of Padre Jacinto (Paul Naschy).

Yes, the iconic Mr Naschy cameos in this movie – and his talents are unfortunately squandered by the filmmakers. As it is he plays a monk looking for a sign from God. He speaks in Spanish through his scenes and goes, with the brother, a-hunting vampires. They get to the lair and open up a coffin, containing a male vampire (Arthur Roberts, Not of this Earth (1988) and the Lair – season 1). Diana comes in and has a stake thrust through her for her troubles (and her unnecessary posturing, which included having to get her boobs out when faced with vampire hunters - so there is a salutary lesson for all vampires, concentrate on killing the hunters and not disrobing!) The male has not moved and gets a silver dagger through the heart. Jacinto prays to God that he might never rest until the evil is finally defeated… One questions why he doesn’t find a final solution (such as head off and cremation) for the now skeletal vampires, but his plea to God means that Naschy will appear, spirit like, later in the film!

Modern day and Martine (Eyana Barksy) summons Renfield (who was watching Count Gore De Vol on TV) as Dracula – her father – has summoned her. Dracula (who actually looks like a low rent Gore De Vol imposter) is watching the vampire Valerie (Jana Thompson) dance for him. When Martine arrives he sends her to resurrect his old English drinking buddy, the letch Lord Ruthven. Yes, despite mispronouncing his name (for the record Ruthven is pronounced Riven) the male vampire we saw destroyed is Ruthven – as in the character invented by Polidori in the first English language vampire story the Vampyre.

Things, therefore, could have been rather interesting. The Vampyre is not often used as an inspiration for films and there is a plethora of things that could be done with the character and pre-Stoker lore. Dracula tells them to resurect him whilst the moon is full – reminiscent of the way Ruthven was revived in the original story except… it was a cosmetic moment only, it seems. Later Ruthven quotes the Byron poem, She Walks in Beauty and this was interesting as the Ruthven character was a thinly veiled parody of Byron but when it is repeated a second time it becomes a quote too far. Anyway, when Ruthven tries to drink he is pained and his eyes stream with blood. Jacinto appears before him calling him cursed.

It appears that – new lore alert – if a vampire is staked with silver, said silver gets into the blood stream and poisons them. They cannot feed on humans and must filter their blood through another vampire. Rather than asking Dracula for help he resurrects his sister Diana (who he clearly dislikes). Thus the title of the film is a misnomer as the “Orgy of Blood” is instigated by Diana who is not Countess Dracula! She goes on a drinking frenzy, sating her lesbian lusts en route and healing her brother to boot. However both can feel Roxanne’s reincarnated presence in the city and both want her. He for love, she for lust (and, for the record, Roxanne is reincarnated as a lesbian).

This might have been an interesting twist on the reincarnation theme had it been explored, unfortunately it was less a part of the story and more an after-thought. Over all there was a barebones story that could have been interesting but it got lost in nudity. Most of the acting is poor, though Roberts is great as Ruthven. Idiosyncrasies in respect of historic details were blatant and the Dracula bits were simply silly add-ons adding an unnecessary (and unfunny) comedy.

Better than its predecessor, though, 3 out of 10. The imdb page is here.