La morte vivante (1982)

... aka: Lady Dracula

... aka: Living Dead, The

... aka: Living Dead Girl, The

... aka: Scare: Dead or Alive?

Directed by:

Jean Rollin

It's been a few years since I last logged a Jean Rollin movie here and I now remember why it's taken me so long to get back around to him again. My last Rollin ftv, FASCINATION (1979), which is widely considered one of his best films, left me completely bewildered as to how something so aimless, plot-less, blandly presented and poorly-made could be viewed by anyone as good let alone great. It did get me some hilarious hate mail from admirers of the director, though, informing me that I had terrible taste, was a moron and had no appreciation for art, so there's at least that. Admittedly, the movie wasn't without some merit. Yes, the house they shot it at was kind of cool. Unfortunately, this isn't HG-Fucking-TV here. I could also say a redeeming feature was the hot-bodied Brigitte Lahaie frequently naked, but there are a hundred other films providing the same exact thing and a lot of those feature much more of Lahaie with the added bonus of being generally better-made. So seeing how Rollin's supposed "masterpiece" did not do much for me, and the fact he's never been accused of being a "substance director" anyway (which actually made Fascination's minimalist visual merit feel almost depressing), I wasn't in a big hurry to see a generally-consensus'd "lesser" film of his.

However, I'm also aware by now that I'm simply not a fan of one type of Rollin film. His meandering and near plot-less vamp-erotic flicks do nothing for me. That said, I do enjoy some of his other work. He's proven he could deliver his usual exploitative and erotic elements while also making an otherwise decent genre film. Where I really conflict with a lot of others is that the films I prefer also happen to be the films the director's more hardcore fans usually slag off as being "too commercial." The Living Dead Girl is generally considered one of these "commercial" (i.e. coherent) efforts so I'm not one bit surprised that I enjoyed this a bit more than his usual. 

Three sleazy men are hired to find a place to dump some drums of chemical waste and choose a series of catacombs underneath an old home. Hey, it's dark, cold, forgotten and, while they're down there, they can do a little grave robbing. After cracking a couple of caskets and snatching a few pieces of jewelry off one corpse, a tremor and rock slide overturn one of the drums. Chemicals leak into the ground, fumes are released into the air and the amazing well preserved (consider she's been dead for two years!) corpse Catherine Valmont (Françoise Blanchard) is resurrected. After poking out the men's eyeballs and ripping out their throats, Catherine wanders above ground and makes her way to her former castle home, which is now in the process of being sold.

Even though she's a hot blonde, Catherine is basically a "creature" in the same spirit as the ghouls that usually populated 1930s creature features, believe it or not. She has a history and a tragedy about her and views her renewed life and bloodlust as a curse. In her teen years, Catherine was in love with her best friend Hélène. Whether that was platonic or romantic love and, if the latter, whether or not that was reciprocated love on both ends, is left unclear. The two close "friends" even made a blood pact that whomever of the two died first, the other would take their own life to join them. Of course, the now-grown Hélène (Marina Pierro), though heartbroken over her friend's passing several years earlier, did not hold down her end of the bargain and moved on with her life. Still, her heart has always remained with her late friend. That's why when she calls the castle to talk to Catherine's mother, unaware that she had recently passed away herself, and hears a familiar music box melody, she rushes to the castle.

Upon arriving, Hélène is greeted by the bloodied, nude corpses of both a Realtor (played by Patricia Besnard-Rousseau, who was also a hardcore porn actress under the name Patricia Bouvier) and the woman's lover. She then finds her bloody friend sitting nude playing the piano. You know, the same one who should be dead and buried. Inspecting the underground crypt, Hélène puts two and two together after discovering the corpses of the three slain grave robbers as well as Catherine's open casket. He beloved gal pal is actually a LiViNg DeAd GiRl! And like any good lover or friend, when you discover your amore has turned into a tormented vampire-zombie thingy with a thirst for blood, you're going to put them out of their misery as soon as possible, right? Right? Apparently not if you're Hélène, who cleans up the murder scene, hides the bodies and then offers up her own blood to Catherine.

Seeing how there's only so much blood in one human body, Hélène then tries to give her friend a dead bird to feast upon, but she refuses. Only human blood will suffice so the human half of the duo sets about procuring victims to satiate Catherine's blood hunger, starting with a motorist (Fanny Magier) who gets her guts ripped out after being lured into the crypt. Meanwhile, a couple consisting of American writer Greg (Mike Marshall) and his (English-speaking) French girlfriend Barbara (Carina Barone) are visiting the area. The dissatisfied Barbara wants to be an actress but has been roped into doing photography work by Greg, who - for some reason - is portrayed as being a complete douchebag. Barbara snaps a photo of Catherine wandering around in a field, becomes fascinated with her, discovers from locals that the girl in her photos died two years earlier and then sets about investigating the matter.

Can't say this film did anything to sell me on Rollin's rep as one of the genre's top visual artists. I've no clue why he even has that reputation in the first place to be perfectly honest! Like most of his other efforts I've seen, this is neither heavy on directorial flair nor visual imagination. Not that this looks bad or anything. It actually looks quite nice and is technically well-photographed (by Max Monteillet) and lit, plus benefits from good shooting locations and interior art direction. It's just that discernibly creative or artistic presentation of the material isn't something that just leaps out at you like it does with other notable horror stylists.

What is most surprising is that it takes the director almost 30 minutes before he gets around to squeezing in the first gratuitous nude scene. And, while there's ample nudity on display from there on out, it's incorporated into the film in a way where it never brings the story to a screeching halt like in many of his other films. While fairly amateurish (you can even see the tubes pumping out blood at one point!), the gore fx are adequately grisly and there are plenty of them. These were done by a 17-year-old Benoît Lestang, who'd move on to bigger films like The City of Lost Children (1995), Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001) and Martyrs (2008). Sadly, Lestang took his own life in 2008 at the age of just 43. Though the acting is highly variable, Blanchard (who starts out as a passive, aloof mute but eventually gains a more aggressive voice and presence) easily makes the strongest impression.

Though I've never even seen this pointed out before, LDG is actually a French / U.S. co-production produced by American Sam Selsky, who also appears in a cameo as a potential home buyer alongside another older lady who may have been his real-life wife. That probably explains why a number of the characters are American and also why a number of the actors also speak English. Supposedly, an entirely English-language version was simultaneously made by director Gregory Heller, who is only credited as a writer on the French version, but it was never released as is now presumed lost.

Despite the American connections and despite the fact his received a video release nearly everywhere else, the film completely bypassed the VHS era here and wasn't released until Image put it out on DVD in 1999. There has since been a number of other releases (including a Blu-ray) from companies like Redemption / Salvation and Kino Lorber.

★★1/2

Le lac des morts vivants (1981)

... aka: Lake of the Living Dead
... aka: Lake of the Zombies
... aka: Nazi Zombies: Terror from Below
... aka: Sumpf der lebenden Toten (Swamp of the Living Dead)
... aka: Zombie Lake
... aka: Zombies Lake

Directed by:
"J.A. Laser" (Jean Rollin)

Ever since Romero redefined the zombie as reanimated flesh-eating corpses in 1968, some of our more ambitious directors have sought to either elaborate on his creation or to explore all of the metaphorical possibilities inherent in creatures that are, at the end of the day, essentially just reflections of ourselves. And then you have directors like Jean Rollin, who utilizes the zombie as a excuse to show naked girls swimming and thrashing around in the water to give viewers as many spread eagle shots as possible. Sorry to sound so crude, but it is what it is, folks! Zombie Lake frequently tops lists of "Worst Zombie Movie of All Time" and, while it truly is bad, it probably no longer deserves to be on such a list thanks to all of the no budget digital crap being made nowadays. At least this was shot on film in a nice-looking French village instead of being "filmed" with someone's iPhone in their backyard. Hey, I'm grasping at straws here!

 

The entire tone for Lake is set in the opening few minutes as a young lady strips to sunbathe nude as the camera slowly pans up the entire length of her body. Now the poor thing is all hot and sweaty. What's a girl to do? Well, if you're this girl, you're going to take a refreshing dip in the lake... and you're not going to let some stupid warning sign featuring the drawing of a swimmer next to a skull and crossbones deter you either! Needless to say, that turns out to be a mistake as she's attacked and pulled under by a green-faced, one-eyed zombie. Having not had his fill, the same ghoul decides to kill a woman doing her laundry, which proves that, yes, these zombies will also attack women wearing clothes. Townspeople find the second victim's body and leave it on the doorstep of the Mayor (Howard Vernon) as a none-too-subtle way to say "Uh, would you please do something about this?" He promises help is on its way.

Chatty reporter Katya Muse (Marcia Sharif) shows up in town to do some research in hopes of writing "an unusual little yarn about that weird lake of yours." Local Mr. Chanac (Youri Radionow) takes her to visit the Mayor, who relates a flashback that explains the local legend. During WWII, a blonde-haired German soldier (Pierre-Marie Escourrou) was injured saving a female villager (Nadine Pascal) from a bomb. Eager to reward him for saving her life, the girl took him to a barn for a literal roll in the hay. She became pregnant, gave birth to a girl she named Helena and then died shortly thereafter. The soldier was then killed himself after his platoon was ambushed by villagers. In lieu of proper burial, the bodies were just sunk in the lake and the lake has been haunted by them ever since.

A very confused girl's sporting team, who arrive in a van with "Basket" written on the side then hop out and start hitting a volleyball around, provide both a full course meal for the zombies and a veritable beaver buffet via pervy underwater camera shots when they go skinny dipping. One lucky blonde (Gilda Arancio) manages to escape and runs back into town topless. Due to all the recent murders, disappearances and zombie sightings, the Mayor finally calls for police reinforcement but is sent two rude dimwits; Inspectors Moran ("Burt Altman" / Bertrand Altmann) and Spitz (the director), who tell him "murder is our business, not fairy tales" before going to the tavern to disregard the locals as a "heap of hicks." By the time they actually start believing the townsfolk, they're already dead.

After taking care of the inspectors, the zombies emerge to paint the village red during a mini rampage that includes killing a woman and her boyfriend as they're getting ready to bonk in the barn, a topless girl bathing outside in a tub and a woman walking down the sidewalk who stops to adjust her stocking. Despite now being a zombie, the blonde Nazi seen in the flashback manages to hunt down his daughter Helena, who's now about 12, being raised by her granny (Yvonne Dany) and is played by producer Daniel Lesoeur's daughter, Anouchka. The zombie dad gives her a necklace that belonged to her late mother and has such a soft spot for his girl that he protects her from the other zombies. When the Mayor pressures her to help, Helena decides to exploit her father's emotional attachment to lure the zombies to their napalm / flamethrower demise.

We'd be here all day if I did a detailed break down of all the continuity errors, flubs, extras looking at the camera and glimpses of crew and equipment that made their way into the finished product that is Zombie Lake. It would likewise take an eternity to accurately describe the ever-changing and decidedly non-water resistant green finger paint makeup that changes from shot to shot. This is a film where virtually everything - the direction, acting, editing, writing, fx - is on the same plane of terrible so it's difficult to concentrate on just one area. And to make matters worse, its shortcomings are further exacerbated by a cringe-worthy English dub more interested in matching lips than making sense.

But the real question is: Is this a good bad movie? To that I can only say, I once found this utterly boring but its sheer awfulness has grown on me a bit over the years and every now and then I actually find myself in the mood to watch this horrid thing again. That's more than I can say for many of the same director's meandering "arty" vampire movies that have gained him a small cult following over the years. I suppose I should be embarrassed to admit that but, hey, I'm pretty much way past that point now.

Jesus Franco gets a co-writer credit and was supposed to direct it too but dropped out at the last minute. But don't feel cheated. He later got to direct his own awful zombie movie for Eurociné called Oasis of the Zombies. And despite not technically directing, a lot of other Franco world connections still remain. The war footage used in the flashbacks is pilfered from the Franco co-directed Convoy of Girls (1978), the Daniel White score has been swiped from Franco's Female Vampire (1973) and regular rotation Franco movie actors Vernon and "Robert Foster" / Antonio Mayans (playing a Nazi general and the zombie missing an eye; not the inspector as IMDb incorrectly states) both have prominent roles.

 

Throughout the video era, Zombie Lake was the easiest Rollin film to find here in America as it received a well-circulated 1985 VHS release from Wizard in one of their trademark eye-catching big boxes. Since then it's received a number of DVD releases (Image, Sinister and others) and, in 2013, made its Blu-ray debut on the Redemption label out of the UK. Alternate scenes of the female victims frolicking in their underwear instead of naked were used for release in more restrictive markets. Rollin himself hated the film and felt it an embarrassment.

SBIG