Witchcraft (1961) [short]

... aka: Witchcraft: The Doll in Brambles

Directed by:

Harold Young

Though no one seems to know the first thing about this particular production, it was a TV pilot (running just short of 26 minutes) for a proposed series to be titled Witchcraft that was never picked up. The only available print (culled from a Sinister Cinema release) seems to have been taken from a VHS source, which suggests this may have been shown on television (or at least re-run) at some point much later than the 1961 production date. This first episode, “The Doll in Brambles,” was going to be one of many adaptations of the works of William Buehler Seabrook, who was apparently better known back then than he is today.

Born in 1884, Seabrook was a war vet, journalist, newspaper editor, advertising executive, novelist and extensive world traveler. He gained fame not only through his books but also through his interest in occultism and his admittance to consuming human flesh (!!), which he described as being "a little stringy" yet "mild, good meat," comparing it to "good, fully-developed veal." Did I mention this guy was also a painfully-insecure alcoholic, a sexual sadist into kinky photography (he commissioned an S&M-themed photo series that would later be dubbed "The Fantasies of Mr. Seabrook" at one point), conducted bondage "experiments" in a barn and spent some time locked away in a mental institution, plus wrote a book about that, too?

It's amazing that hardly anyone, perhaps most especially horror fans, even know who Seabrook is. His 1929 book The Magic Island is usually credited for introducing the Western world to the term "zombie" (back then, a voodoo-entranced 'living corpse,' not the post-Romero ones). It became a best-seller that led to a stage play called Zombie in 1932 and was the inspiration behind the Bela Lugosi film White Zombie from the same year. Seabrook's fascination with the supernatural led him to numerous countries to investigate their spiritual beliefs and customs, which he recapped in his 1940 book Witchcraft: Its Power in the World Today. He ultimately drew the conclusion that there wasn't anything that couldn't be somehow explained through either psychology or science. The fact that a TV series could have existed about this guy's work but never happened feels like a missed opportunity if there ever was one.

There are a couple of names attached to provide some additional interest. Director Young had prior experience in the genre having made a trio of horror films as a contract director for Universal: The Mummy's Tomb (1942) and The Frozen Ghost (1945), both starring Lon Chaney Jr., and The Jungle Captive (1945), the third and final entry in their oft-ignored Ape Woman series. This appears to have been the last thing he ever worked on after leaving the studio system well over a decade prior.

Perhaps an even bigger draw for genre fans is Frank De Felitta, who adapted a portion of the first chapter in Seabrook's Witchcraft book titled "Sawdust Doll in Brambles." De Felitta was a horror / suspense novelist, screenwriter and eventual filmmaker known for his best-selling novels Audrey Rose and The Entity, both of which sold millions of copies and were adapted for the screen as major studio films by the author himself. He also stepped into the director's chair to make the made-for-TV killer dog movie Doberman Patrol aka Trapped (1973), which he also wrote, and the still-popular DARK NIGHT OF THE SCARECROW (1981), which he did not write. He closed out his Hollywood career directing and writing Scissors (1991), which was a flop in theaters but did well on home video because its lead - Sharon Stone - would became a huge star (for two other films) shortly after filming it.

Former Oscar nominee Franchot Tone's (Mutiny on the Bounty) long career was winding down when he accepted the bookmarking gig on this low budget proposed series. Though billed as "Your Host," Tone never introduces himself by name and instead claims he was a friend of the late William Seabrook, who passed away in 1945. The general premise here is that Seabrook's study and many of his findings have been kept sealed until recently as outlined in his will, and are only now going to be revealed to the general public for the first time.

Tone picks up a copy of the Witchcraft book and notes that, through his decades of research, Seabrook came to the conclusion that belief in the supernatural can be chalked up to what he calls "induced autosuggestion," which our host elaborates is "...a recurring thought in the mind placed there by some outside agent through some outside force." He then turns to the camera and assures us that what we're about to see "is not a fantasy," that it "actually happened" and is based on "a true story."

"The Doll in Brambles" takes place near the rocky coasts of Brittany, France. It's a dark and stormy night when visiting American Fred Hunter (Darren McGavin, of Kolchak: The Night Stalker fame) arrives at an inn to visit his French buddy, Louis Bausset (John Baragrey), whom be met and befriending during World War II. The original plan was for Fred to meet his beautiful fiancée, Marie (Annemarie Roussel), and serve as best man in his upcoming wedding, but things have been put on hold for the time being. Not that Louis and Marie aren't in love and don't want to be married, it's just that Marie's evil, abusive step-grandmother, Madame Tirelou (Blanche Yurka), hates Louis and has forbidden the two to see one another. While you may be thinking, "Well, who the hell cares what granny wants?," Mme. Tirelou is rumored to be a witch and has threatened to place a curse upon Louis if he disobeys her orders.

Skeptical Fred laughs off the witchcraft claims and sets out to help, informing his friend, "I just came halfway around the world to see you get married and, by golly I'm not going home until you are!" He visits the cliffside home shared by Marie and her grand-mère, manages to secretly slip Marie a note from Louis and is then kicked out once the hostile Madame finds out who he's friends with. She claims she'd rather be dead than let them marry, vows to outlive Louis one way or another and has made a voodoo doll in his likeness that can be wrapped in thorny branches (the "brambles" of the title) at any time...

I read the story immediately after viewing (found here on Internet Archive) and this is a near pinpoint accurate retelling, laying out the events almost identically to how they're described and even carrying over identical passages of dialogue. The only major changes are the "Fred Hunter" character is actually Seabrook himself, he and Louis weren't war buddies, there's some bat torture and the grandmother gets punished for what she does. Not only pretty faithful to the events of the text, this also honors Seabrook's viewpoint by grounding the supernatural in realty. It neither confirms nor discounts witchcraft per se, though it certainly leans in the latter direction in this case. A doctor shows up at one point claiming a sudden paralysis we're led to believe was brought on by the voodoo doll isn't a physical malady at all, but a mental / psychosomatic one (called "compulsion neurosis" in the story).

What's truly surprising is that this 1961 production also includes a "witch's cradle" that granny uses to restrain her granddaughter so she can be tortured! It's described in the book as "an obscure sadistic-masochistic" piece of equipment with chains and leather straps that's "as perverse a device as twisted human ingenuity ever invented." The granddaughter tries to keep Seabrook from even seeing this contraption, and feels deep shame when does, in the book, which heavily implies it was used for, a-hem, other purposes, though that's obviously downplayed here. Naturally, this is also something that would have greatly appealed to the source author given his sexual proclivities, so him just randomly happening upon an elderly witch living in the remote French countryside with a bondage table in her cellar is quite the coincidence, ain't it?

To be perfectly honest, had I not researched all of this or read the story itself, I probably wouldn't have walked away from this too horribly impressed. It's clearly cheap, set-bound, talky and not exactly scary, action-packed or exciting. The acting is mostly OK (with veteran stage actress Yurka fairing the best and McGavin his usual likable self) and the few scenes actually filmed outdoors do cut down on the staginess a little bit, but it's really the stuff surrounding the production that makes it fascinating. That, and the care taken trying to capture the essence of Seabrook; at least as much as they reasonably could in a mainstream production intended for mass consumption in the early 60s.

★★1/2

Meiji · Taishô · Shôwa: Ryôki onna hanzai-shi (1969)

... aka: 明治・大正・昭和 猟奇女犯罪史

... aka: Criminal History of Bizarre Women

... aka: History of Bizarre Crimes by Women in the Meiji, Taisho and Showa Eras

... aka: Love and Crime

... aka: Meiji, Taisho, and Showa Eras: Grotesque Cases of Cruelty by Woman

Directed by:

Teruo Ishii

True crime and "poison woman" films featuring treacherous and usually murderous femme fatales were very popular in Japan at the time so why not combine both? That's precisely what we have here with this particular production, which was actually a rather ingenuous concoction for its time. What better way to get asses into theater seats than the promise of gory, titillating and lurid reenactments of famous crimes? Interesting too is that this is an anthology film featuring four separate tales along with a framing story, which makes it one of the earliest omnibus-style films to tackle multiple true crime stories. A similar concept was later employed by Hong Kong's Shaw Brothers for their five part Criminals series in the late 70s and, of course, these can be seen as precursors to any true crime TV show featuring reenactments. Also making this unique is that the director sought out, and actually got an interview with, one of the reclusive subjects, who gets to tell her side of her own story as a dramatization of it plays out.

At the Tokyo Forensic Institute, police forensics examiner Dr. Murase (Teruo Yoshida) gets the surprise of his life when the latest corpse to show up on his slab is Yukiko - his wife! After performing the gory autopsy over the opening credits, Murase discovers Yukiko had sex prior to committing suicide... and it clearly wasn't with him. Hoping to gain some insight into what may have happened, he gathers together old criminal case files involving female murderers, and these are what comprise the bulk of the running time. The film sporadically returns to Murase and he also narrates portions of the stories.

First up is "Toyokaku Inn Case," which is based on a 1961 incident that led to the first woman being sentenced to death in Japan after the war. Chiyu Saito (Mitsuko Aoi) owns a hotel with her husband, Kosuke (Kenjirô Ishiyama), whom she suspects is having an affair since he disappears so frequently. She's correct in her assumption. Hubby has grown sick of, in his own words, his "old hag of a wife" and has been sleeping with a beautiful younger woman instead. Chiyu has been voicing her suspicions about his adultery to her assistant, Kinue Munakata (Rika Fujie), all this time, as well as relaying her future plans for the hotel; namely her plans on selling it and opening up a brothel instead.

Unbeknownst to Chiyu, her friend and confidant Kinue is her husband's secret mistress and she's been using some of the things Chiyu has told her to further drive a wedge between the couple. While Kosuke is planning on leaving his wife and kicking her out, Kinue suggests they murder her instead. In fact, she promises to help him. With help from gigolo Shibuya (Takashi Fujiki), Kinue does the deed and then the two reveal to Kosuke that they are lovers. Blackmailing the new widower, they're able to get their hands on some money to build an expansion onto the hotel. As the business increases in value, the cold-blooded Kinue decides she wants it all to herself, leading to several more murders.

Though a full length expansion on this case would no doubt be a lot more interesting (same can be said for all of the other featured stories), there's plenty to keep one's interest here, including lots of nudity, sex, sex right next to a decomposing body, a topless cat fight, a poisoning, a bloody axe murder and a maggoty corpse plastered up behind a wall. There's quite a lot packed into just 20 minutes!

In 1936, Sada Abe, a former prostitute then employed as a restaurant apprentice, strangled her married boss / lover to death in bed during an erotic asphyxiation session. She then carved her name on his arm, removed his genitals and carried them around with her for days until she was tracked down and arrested by the police. A nationwide media circus and trial followed, and she was eventually convicted of murder and mutilation of a corpse and sentenced to ten years in prison. After serving six, she was released and capitalized on the public's interest by penning an autobiography and appearing in a one woman stage show. She then was able to blend back into society using an alias and lived out the remainder of her days mostly in anonymity, becoming the subject of many best-selling books and popular movies along the way.

"Sada Abe Incident" features a multiple flashback structure and very scrambled time frame, cutting between a courtroom scene where a pitiable Sada (Yukie Kagawa) recounts her bizarre tale and a series of flashbacks showing her at various stages in her life. She became an out-of-control teen after being raped, was sent to a geisha house to work as a servant at age 16 by her father, where she was raped yet again by a sweaty old pervert (who was nice enough to at least get his wife's permission first), and then became a sex worker being used and discarded by various men while she herself used and discarded various men. Hey, it's a dog eat dog world out there.

We also get reenactments of her intense relationship with restaurant owner Kichizo Ishisa (Eiji Wakasugi), the man she'd later murder, as well as the murder itself ("No one will touch him anymore!"), which isn't as grisly as it could have been all things considered. In its brief time, this segment does both a good job relaying the main facts in the case as well as capturing the insane passion shared by the couple prior to the murder, which began with nonstop sex marathons lasting days before descending into kinkier stuff. That's followed by several vignettes of other disgruntled women, perhaps "inspired" by Abe, who remove their lover's junk with scissors.

This segment is especially noteworthy in that the director managed to track Abe herself down and has the Dr. Murase character conduct a brief interview with her (shot on a bridge from across a busy road), which is edited in with the other footage. In her interview, Abe claims her lover wanted to die, asked her to kill him and died happy, insists she did nothing wrong, doesn't understand the public's fascination with her and says that we only fall in love - truly fall in love - with a single person in our entire life and Kichizo was that person to her. Abe disappeared shortly after filming this interview and her whereabouts remained unknown, though it's reported that she passed away sometime in the early to mid 70s.

While I believe this is the first film to tackle Abe's story, it's also one of the least watched. The Nikkatsu production A Woman Called Sada Abe (1975) and the infamous In the Realm of the Senses (1976) are both much better known and more popular. The latter, directed by Nagisa Ôshima, became a notorious, oft-banned film due to its inclusion of explicit sex, and was an art house hit around much of the world upon release. There were numerous later Abe films as well, including ones produced in 1998, 1999 and 2011, as well as a French-produced documentary about her in 2017.

Next, in an ill-conceived break from the female-centered murderers, we take a look at a male one: little-known Japanese serial killer Yoshio Kodaira. After having served in the Japanese military, where he reportedly engaged in various war crimes (including raping and murdering Chinese civilians), Kodaira returned to Japan, where he raped and murdered at least seven women between 1946 and 1947, and also engaged in necrophilia with some of the corpses. The victims were mostly impoverished young women who were lured into the woods with promises of jobs / food. After his apprehension and trial, Kodaira was sentenced to death and was hanged in 1949.

As this segment opens, a sweaty and grotesque Kodaira (Asao Koike) has already been apprehended and is recounting his crimes to police during his interrogation. His first murder occurs at a military factory in Kanto, where he uses a bombing as an opportunity to get a young woman alone, then rips off her clothes and strangles her to death. Next up is a starving woman he lures into the country and yanks into the woods. To try to avoid being killed, she offers herself up to him willingly, but he strangles her until she passes out and has sex with her unconscious body. When she wakes up and wants to leave, he kills her and goes in for round two. A third victim is also shown being killed during a rainstorm.

After a steady stream of brief murders, the next is shown in greater detail as Kodaira befriends and grooms a poor, fatherless teen named Ryuko (Yumiko Katayama). He gives her food, promises her work and even goes home with her to meet her mother but, despite developing a relationship with her over the course of a few months, she's eventually lured into the woods and beaten, raped and killed just like any other random victim. This murder was to be his ultimate undoing, as Ryuko's mother knew his identity and was able to report him to the police.

Stylistically, this is perfectly fine. Ishii shot it in grainy black-and-white; an apt choice to make this resemble b/w newsreel footage indicative of the WWII era, some of which is also edited into the segment. This also sticks fairly close to the real case, though it's too short to cover all of the crimes and a few other details, namely Kodaira's first victim actually being his father-in-law over a decade earlier, have been altered. With that said, thematically this feels sorely out of place. Despite the narrator's silly attempt to find a connection between it and the other stories ("Do women's bodies turn men into madmen?"), this doesn't really have any business being in a film about murderous women.

Finally, we return to the killer female theme in a segment set during the mid-19th century that covers murderess Takahashi Oden, who was the last woman in Japan to be executed by beheading. Against her wishes, Oden (Teruko Yumi) is set up in an arranged marriage to Naminosuke (Shin'ichirô Hayashi), whom she doesn't love. To make matters worse, her new husband is struck down with leprosy and becomes hideously deformed. Despite that, he can't keep his hands off of his beautiful bride and keeps forcing himself on her. She eventually takes on another lover, a criminal named Tomekichi, who murders Naminosuke after he catches the two of them together.

The lovers then flee to the city where Tomekicki continues on in his criminal ways and sells Oden to a brothel. There, she meets another man and plots to run off with him. A series of murders and betrayals follow until Oden is finally captured and beheaded. There are some very gruesome moments in this one plus a generous helping of nudity from the lead but it tries to cover too much ground in too little time (just 10 minutes!) so we never can get a handle on any of the characters. A feature length version of this same story had been filmed back in 1958 as Dokufu Takahashi Oden (titled Wicked Woman in English) by Nobuo Nakagawa, and would be retold yet again in the 1983 softcore film Koyamu / Crimson Night Dream.

While this certainly has its problems with pacing and the script, as 99% of all anthologies do, good production values, competent acting, some clever directorial and aesthetic choices, nearly nonstop sex and violence and plentiful eye candy provided by at least a dozen gorgeous Japanese actresses keep things highly entertaining throughout. If you're wanting more in-depth versions of any of the true stories, you can always check out one of the other film versions or, better yet, read up on them. However, if you can accept this on its own terms, as being the exploitation film it clearly is intended to be, it delivers in spades for its target audience.

Unlike with many of the director's other films, I couldn't find evidence this was ever officially released outside of its home country. Toei gave it at least one VHS and one DVD release in Japan, which are the only releases that I'm aware of.

★★★