Paganini Horror (1988)

...aka: Killing Violin, The

Directed by:
Luigi Cozzi

Tacky, colorful, confusing, mildly-entertaining drivel seems to be the European answer to the short-lived North American 'heavy metal horror' subgenre; films that typically revolved around Lycra-clad, big-haired rock band members being terrorized by supernatural (usually Satanic) forces. Said subgenre included the titles Rocktober Blood (1984), Monster Dog (1984), Hard Rock Zombies (1985), Trick or Treat (1986), ROCK 'N' ROLL NIGHTMARE (1987), SLAUGHTERHOUSE ROCK (1987), BLACK ROSES (1988), DEAD GIRLS (1989), Hard Rock Nightmare (1989), HEAVY METAL MASSACRE (1989; directed by David De Falco and so obscure it's currently not even listed on IMDb), SCREAM DREAM (1989), SHOCK 'EM DEAD (1990) and probably a few others I'm forgetting. This one, from the director of the usually-well-regarded giallo THE KILLER MUST KILL AGAIN (1975), the silly sci-fi adventure Starcrash (1979) and the unofficial, unauthorized Suspiria "sequel" THE BLACK CAT (1989) - amongst others - is neither the best nor the worst of the lot, though it's far from what most would consider good.

A nearly all-female rock band headed by singer/songstress Kate (Jasmine "Main" / Maimone) has hit a creative slump, as evidenced by their atrocious "You Give Love a Bad Name" opening rip-off number. To help matters, drummer Daniel (Pascal Persiano) purchases an unreleased composition written by famous Italian violinist Niccolo Paganini from Mr. Pickett (a diabolically dubbed and goofy acting Donald Pleasance). Upon hearing the track and learning of its origins, the band's bitchy, money-hungry producer Lavinia (Maria Cristina Mastrangeli) decides to hire famous horror film director Mark Singer (Pietro Genuardi) to shoot a horror-themed music video in Paganini's former home; the same place where the violinist reputedly sold his soul to Satan to become famous. It isn't long before most of the cast - which includes Daria Nicolodi as the current owner of Paganini's home and sexy guitarists Michel Klippstein and Luana Ravegnini - are facing various supernatural horrors.

For starters, there's a ghostly, echo-voiced, gold masked killer lurking around who uses a gold violin with a retractable blade. There's also an underground tunnel which leads to an alternate dimension (?!), strange shrill noises that incapacitate people and an electric forcefield which surrounds the house (?!) and is able to blow up a car. Some of the death scenes are pretty bizarre. Someone is crushed by an invisible wall; another is mutated by some kind of infectuous tree fungus (!) Oh yeah, and one of the females may be a little girl who toasted her mum in the bathtub with a hair dryer years earlier. The final scene tries to tie all the loose ends together but only succeeds in making things even more confusing than they already were.

There's some mild gore (fx are variable) and no less than three musical numbers, including a pretty funny music video. Everything is drenched in blue, red and green colors because the director is an Argento devotee (and had helped write a couple of Argento's earlier projects).

★★

Quella villa in fondo al parco (1987)

... aka: Ratman
... aka: Rat Man, The
... aka: Terror House

Directed by:
Giuliano Carnimeo

2'4" Dominican Republic native Nelson de la Rosa was certified as "the smallest man on Earth" by the Guiness Book of World Records in 1990. Several years before achieving that claim to fame, the diminuative fella had already been 'discovered' by thrifty exploitation filmmakers, who gave him the lead role as a mutant rat/monkey hybrid that runs amuck on a barely-populated Caribbean island. Hey, saves on special effects, doesn't it? Unfortunately, despite de la Rosa's presence, the film itself is something of a bore. There's a little blood, a little nudity, a few familar faces for the faithful and some decent shooting locations, but it's dark, slow-moving, flatly presented and badly-written, with lousy dialogue, a bare minimum of plot, uninteresting characters and absolutely no motivation for its mad science premise (the guy who creates "Ratman" is basically shoved off to the side). The cherry on top is that it's saddled with a groaner of an ending.

On the aforementioned island paradise, sleazy fashion photographer Mark (Werner Pochath), his assistant Monique (Anna Silvia Grullon) and two blonde models; Marilyn (Eva Grimaldi) and Peggy (Luisa Menon), are busy at work taking advantage of the beaches for a swimsuit photo shoot. Too bad for them that it's on the same island a scientist's lab experiment has escaped its cage. Equipped with oversized fangs and razor sharp claws, 'Ratman' makes short work of Peggy while she's out taking a midnight stroll. Strangely, Marilyn's sister Terry (Janet Agren) is informed that her sister has been killed and arrives to ID the body. On the way there, she bumps into mystery novelist Fred Williams (David Warbeck) and he decides to accompany her to the morgue. When Terry discovers the corpse isn't actually her sister she's called back in a second time to ID another body that turns out to not be her sister either. Oops!

Terry and Fred then set out to locate Marilyn, who has ventured inland with Mark and Monique to take more photos. After Monique is killed and her body is discovered, Mark and Marilyn take off and end up stranded at the scientist's home. Guess who else eventually shows up to terrorize them? Can Terry and Mark make it to the home in time to save the sister? I doubt you'll even care by that point.

Warbeck and Agren (previously paired in the dreary and derivative monster flick PANIC in 1982) are saddled with incredibly boring scenes and are given nothing of interest to do. Though third billed, most of the weight is actually carried by the voluptuous Grimaldi, who has to try to survive the night trapped in the house with the lethal lil monster and is also responsible for providing all of the film's nudity, including a lengthy shower scene which is probably the most memorable scene in the entire movie.

Despite the somewhat degrading nature of the role, de la Rosa is used effectively in a handful of scenes. After appearing in this and gaining the Guiness notoriety, he'd go on to become friends with Red Sox pitcher Pedro Martinez (and would frequently be seen at games), got to appear alongside Marlon Brandon in the badly received THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU (1995) and gained employ in a circus. He passed away in 1996. The director (billed as "Anthony Ascot") also made the giallo THE CASE OF THE BLOODY IRIS (1972).

Though released on VHS and DVD in many countries, this one has never been officially released in the U.S. The original title translates to something like House at the End of the Park, but was given the tongue-in-cheek RATMAN title for distribution in the UK. Other DVD's released elsewhere carry the uber generic TERROR HOUSE title.

★1/2

Il nido del ragno (1988)

... aka: Spider Labyrinth, The
... aka: Spider's Nest, The

Directed by:
Gianfranco Giagni

Dallas college professor Alan Whitmore (Roland Wybenga), who specializes in "oriental languages" and has a recurring nightmare about being trapped in a room with a spider as a child, is given an important, top-secret mission by his superiors. He has been overseeing something called "The Intextus Project;" a study of religions across the globe, and now his backers want him to travel to Budapest to check in on Leo Roth, another professor working on the project who has disappeared. Upon arriving in Budapest, Alan meets up with a sexy female contact - Genevieve Weiss (Paola Rinaldi) - who begins showing him around. He locates the missing colleague, who has been feigning mental illness and hands Alan an ancient tablet the second his stern wife Sylvia (Margareta von Krauss) turns her back. Back at his hotel, he's introduced to the proprietess, Mrs. Kuhn (Stéphane Audran), who behaves rather strangely and puts him up in a room conveniently located directly across from where Genevieve lives. And Genevieve likes to stand around topless by an open window a lot.

It isn't long before people start dying, starting with Professor Roth, who's found hanging from a chandelier. When the police investigate, Mrs. Roth is nowhere to be found and Alan is informed that the victim wasn't even married. Maid Maria (Claudia Muzi), who tells Alan he better get out while the getting is good, is next up. There's also a strange, nameless man (played by William Berger) who's lives underneath the city and has been pulling our thick hero aside and telling him he better leave because he might be "sucked into the vortex." Needless to say, Alan doesn't listen, and eventually he discovers that nearly the entire district is involved in a weird religious cult that has something to do with spiders. To be precise, they worship a mutant baby who gives birth to spiders that crawl under the skin on your arm and possess you. Also working for the baby-mutant-messiah-thingy is some kind of hissing witch (also played by von Krauss) who viciously kills whoever theatens to expose the cult.

Clearly, the director has been inspired by the films of Italian horror masters Dario Argento and Mario Bava. It's well-scored, has good cinematography, decent acting (aside from the lead, who's handsome but a bit one-note) and the supernatural scenes are colorful and stylishly done. A scene of a nightgown-clad victim being stalked between sheets blowing in the wind while bold greens and blues flash will remind one instantly of Argento's SUSPIRIA (1977) and INFERNO (1980). A shot directly down a spiral staircase and the fact the witch tosses a small ball into a room before murdering her victims are direct visual nods to Bava's KILL, BABY... KILL! (1966). Hitchcock and Polanski are also liberally sampled in both premise (oblivious man begins to slowly realize that everyone he meets is basically conspiring against him and no one can be trusted) and execution. In fact, the film references so many others that it doesn't really take on an identity of its own until near the end. It does however deserve credit for a truly bizarre finale employing stop motion special effects.

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Sadly, THE SPIDER LABYRINTH wasn't very well distributed in the United States and doesn't seem to have much of a following. I'm not aware of any legit U.S. VHS release and for years the best one could hope for was watching a bootleg copy (most of which were derived from the Japanese VHS release). In 2009, the film finally received a DVD release, though I can't vouch for its quality since I saw the video version.

★★1/2

Creature Walks Among Us, The (1956)

Directed by:
John Sherwood

Third and final of Universal's original "Gill-Man" trilogy, following CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON (1954) and REVENGE OF THE CREATURE (1955), this was the only one of the three not filmed in 3D. At the end of Revenge, the creature managed to escape captivity at a water park and make his way to the ocean. Now, eyewitness reports are placing him somewhere in the Florida Everglades. Wealthy and brilliant, but possibly insane, surgeon Dr. William Barton (Jeff Morrow) decides to organize an expedition there to locate the creature. Accompanying him on his quest are his beautiful, unhappy, much-younger wife Marcia (Leigh Snowden), nice guy geneticist Dr. Thomas Morgan (Rex Reason), lecherous "beach bum" hired hand Jed Grant (Gregg Palmer) and a few other doctors. Using sonar technology, the group manage to locate the creature, shoot it with a harpoon and then set it on fire. The injured beast is then brought on board ship, where they discover that not only has he lost his outer layer or protective skin (and is thus more vulnerable) but he's dying because of his inability to rely on its lungs alone for breathing. An operation follows to correct this and the creature goes from being a sea beast to a land one. Things come to a head at Morgan's California compound.

There's not much in the way of action here. Actually, the creature itself isn't really even really the focal point of the film. The compensation is with a decent and reasonably compelling human interest story (courtesy writers Arthur A. Ross and Harry Essex) involving the loveless marriage between jealous Dr. Barton and his sheltered wife. As far as the monster is concerned, he is not only given a new look here, but he's treated with an adequate amount of sympathy. Performances are decent, as is the underwater photography, and the ending is pretty downbeat. It's much more in the spirit of the original film than the first sequel.

Universal released a nice box set in 2004 that contains all three Creature titles.

★★1/2

Love After Death (1968)

... aka: Unsatisfied Love

Directed by:
Glauco Del Mar

Wealthy Mr. Montel (Guillermo De Córdova) suffers from some kind of cataleptic malady which renders him motionless for long periods of time. His gold-digging wife Sofia (Carmin O'Neal) decides to use his condition against him by arranging to have him buried alive. She enlists the aid of Dr. Anderson (Roberto Maurano), promising him her hand in marriage if he'll forego the autopsy, all the while messing around with the doctor's right hand man Manuel (Ángel Mario Ramírez). Somehow, despite being married to Montel for six months and managing to get two different slobbering guys to do her bidding, Sofia openly boasts about still being a virgin. After successfully pulling off both the funeral and the burial (where we get to hear the prematurely entombed's thoughts about his predicament), Mr. Montel manages to come crawling out of his grave and then hits the streets. However, it will take the entire length of the movie for him to get around to getting revenge on those who've wronged him. He keeps get distracted... by chicks... who behave like brain-dead nymphomaniacs... that enjoy strange men attacking them... and who sometimes aren't even really chicks. Read on.

Montel first encounters a blonde walking down the street. He knocks her out, drags her into an apartment, undresses her and then starts molesting her in full view of the elderly woman who lives there! When the blonde finally wakes up and acts like she's enjoying herself, Montel runs away. Then the "victim" turns to the old lady and asks if she'd like to have sex with her instead! Next up, Montel visits a nightclub and watches a sexy burlesque performer who doesn't quite strip all the way down. Because, as it turns out, she is a he. Montel again runs away in horror. Sneaking into the bedroom of two lesbians who apparently just need a good man (one is played by hardcore porn actress Jennifer Welles) and then into the bedroom of a woman and her hairy beau also bears no fruit. Finally, a gentle mod girl with some amazing eye make-up manages to give our perv-hero the reward he was looking for all along after he helps her carry a couple of boxes into her apartment. With that out of the way, Motel decides to finally kill those responsible for conspiring to kill him for his money.

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In most ways, this film is very typical late 60s New York City-shot soft-core porn product. The majority of things one associates with quality filmmaking; pacing, plot, dialogue, sound, editing, etc., are all forsaken for trying to cram in as much nudity as possible. What makes this is a little different is that it's from a Puerto Rican director shooting a mostly Spanish-speaking cast in the United States. The movie was clearly filmed with no audio. All that was horribly dubbed in later and if the dialogue ever happens to match the lips its by sheer coincidence. Sometimes there is narration to try to make sense of it all and sometimes people fire guns or scream and no sound at all is heard at all. The music score is canned. The film's saving grace, aside from the nudity, is the camerawork. Aside from being attractively filmed (in b/w), the director sometimes employs creative camera placement, jittery POV shots and zoom work. Strangley, there are also quite a few close-up shots of facial features and various body parts (including feet walking), which might remind one of the work or Doris Wishman.

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Something Weird offers this film on triple-bill DVD, along with THE INCREDIBLE PETRIFIED WORLD (1957) and THE ATOMIC BRAIN (1964).

★1/2

Additions to the Index, Part 2

They just keep on a-coming (180 for this particular update) and there are no doubt more where these came from. The majority are foreign-language films, many of them have never been released in America and a good deal were never dubbed or released with English subtitles, so I may have a difficult time either finding or understanding the films listed here but I'll try my best with what I have to work with. There are a couple of obscure American and British films listed as well, but the majority are from non-English speaking countries, such as Brazil, China (namely Hong Kong), France, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Philippines, Poland, Spain, Sweden and Turkey. In addition to making this list, I've been working on the year overviews and they've been a lot of fun (and interesting) to research. 1953, 1954, 1955 and 1956 are now done and up.

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- Accident, The (Blood of the Black Dog; Car Spirit; Che wan) (1983; Biu Lun Liu)
- Akelarre (1984; Pedro Olea)
- All the Horrors of Satan (Satanás de todos los horrores) (1974; Julián Soler)
- Bad Seed, The (Kötü Tohum) (1963; Nevzat Pesen)
- Bedeviled, The (Sam moh; Xin mo) (1975; Wei Lo)
- Bewitched (Gu) (1981; Chih-Hung Kuei)
- Beyond (Oltretomba) (1987; Fabio Salerno)
- Birth in the Tomb (Beranak dalam kubur) (1972; Awaludin and Ali Shahab)
- Black Temple, The (Kaala mandir) (1987; Hemant Kamal)
- Blood Ritual (Xie luo ji) (1988; Yuen Ching Lee)
- Bloody Ghost (Funny Ghost; Meng gui zhuang gui) (1989; Jeffrey Lau)
- Bloody Ravine, The (La barranca sangrienta) (1962; Federico Curiel)
- Blue Snake Bath (Ao hebi buro) (1959; Mitsuo Hirotsu)
- Brainblast (1987)
- Brutal Storm (Vahset kasirgasi) (1985; Kadir Akgün)
- But You Were Dead (La lunga notte di Veronique) (1966; Gianni Vernuccio)
- Calon Arang the Powerful Queen (Ratu Sakti Calon Arang) (1985; Sisworo Gautama Putra)
- Canterville Ghost, The (Duch z Canterville) (1967; Ewa Petelska)
- Caruncula (1990; Mariano Baino)
- Cask of Amontillado, The (Beczka Amontillado) (1971; Leon Jeannot)
- Chanoc and the Son of Santo vs. the Vampire Killers (Chanoc y el hijo del Santo contra los vampiros asesinos) (1981; Rafael Pérez Grovas)
- Child's Play (1980; Amy Rose Bloch)
- Claws of Iron (Tetsu no tsume) (1951; Shinsei Adachi)
- Closed Door, The (Bandh Darwaza) (1990; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- Corpse Master (Magic City) (1987)
- Crazy Monk, The (El monje loco) (1984; Julio Aldama)
- Criminals, The (Xianggang qi an) (1976)
- Criminals 2 - Homicides, The (Xiang Gang qi an zhi er: Xiong sha) (1976)
- Criminals 3 - Arson, The (Xiang Gang qi an zhi san lao ye che zong huo mou sha an) (1977)
- Criminals 4 - Assault, The (Xiang Gang qi an zhi si Miao Jie huang hou) (1977)
- Criminals 5 - Teenager's Nightmare, The (Xiang Gang qi an wu zhi: Jian mo) (1977)
- Crocodile Evil (198?; unknown)
- Crocodile Fury (1988; Ted Kingsbrook)
- Dance of Death, The (Le Saint mène la danse) (1960; Jacques Nahum)
- Dead Silence (1989; Hugh Gallagher)
- Dead-Time Stories - Vol. 1 (1986; Phillip Noyce and Carl Schenkel)
- Dead-Time Stories - Vol. 2 (1986; Ivan Nagy and Richard Rothstein)
- Dead-Time Stories - Vol. 3 (Dead Even) (1986; David Wickes and Paul Verhoeven)
- Devil's Child (Akuma-kun) (1966; Akira Kajima, Tsuneo Kobayashi, Hajime Sato, Koichi Takemoto and Minoru Yamada)
- Devil's Due, The (Giving the Devil His Due) (1973; Ernest Danna)
- Devil's Horse, The (El caballo del diablo; The Horse of the Devil) (1975; Federico Curiel)
- Diabolic Game (Juego diabólico) (1961; Fernando Fernández)
- Dismembered Ghost, The (Kaidan barabara yurei) (1968; Kinya Ogawa)
- Diva In The Netherworld (Utahime makai o yuku) (1980; Takafumi Nagamine)
- Door, The (Darwaza) (1978; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- Dungeon, The (Tahkhana) (1986; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- Enigma for Devils (Enigma para Demônios) (1975; Carlos Hugo Christensen)
- Erotic Witchcraft (La goulve) (1972; Mario Mercier and Bepi Fontana)
- Escapees, The (Les paumées du petit matin; The Runaways) (1981; Jean Rollin)
- Flower with Petals of Steel, The (Il fiore dai petali d'acciaio) (1973; Gianfranco Piccioli)
- Fogbrook Thing, The (The Berko Brothers) (1985; Mark Osborn)
- Fragments of Terror (1985; Craig Lahiff and others)
- Ghost-Cat of Gojusan-Tsugi (Kaibyo Gojusan-tsugi) (1956; Bin Kado)
- Ghost Fever (Gui gou ren) (1989; Sze Yu Lau and Jing Wong)
- Ghost Hospital (Ghost's Hospital; Mong gwai yee yuen) (1988)
- Ghost of Gojusan-Tsugi (Ghost of Gojusan-Tsugi; Yurei 53 Tsugi) (1960; Kokichi Uchide)
- Ghost Nursing (Yang gui) (1982; Wilson Tong)
- Ghost Story: Crying in the Night Lantern (Kaidan yonaki-doro) (1962; Katsuhiko Tasaka)
- Giant Gila Monster, The (1959; Ray Kellogg)
- Guest House (1980; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- Guzoo (Girl Trap; Guzoo: Kami ni misuterareshi mono; Life After Death) (1986; Kazuo 'Gaira' Komizu)
- Hard Times for Dracula (Tiempos duros para Drácula) (1976; Jorge Darnell)
- Haunted Cop Shop, The (Meng gui cha guan) (1987; Jeffrey Lau)
- Haunted Cop Shop II, The (Meng gui xue tang) (1988; Jeffrey Lau)
- Haunted House Elf (1990; unknown)
- Hellish Spiders (Arañas infernales; Aranhas Infernais) (1968; Federico Curiel)
- Hong Kong Butcher (1985; Jeffrey Lau)
- Hooded Men from Hell, The (Los encapuchados del infierno) (1962; Federico Curiel)
- Horror Effects (Horror F/X) (1989; John A. Russo)
- Hotel (1981; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- House of Terror (The Ghost of the Hunchback; Kaidan semushi otoko; Il pozzo di Satana) (1965)
- Inappropriate Behaviour (1986; ?)
- Infernal Coffin, The (El ataúd infernal) (1962; Fernando Fernández)
- Invasion of the Girl Snatchers (The Hidan of Maukbeiangjow) (1973; Lee Jones)
- I, the Body (Morianerna; Morianna) (1965; Arne Mattson)
- Kaibyo omagatsuji (1954; unknown)
- Kamillions (The Wingates) (1989; Mike B. Anderson)
- Khamosh (1985; Vidhu Vinod Chopra)
- Kiss, The (Il bacio; The Kiss of Death) (1974; Mario Lanfranchi)
- Laboratory of Anguish, The (Le laboratoire de l'angoisse) (197; Patrice Leconte)
- Labyrinth of Death (Chess Boxing Matrix; Jiang shi zhuo yao) (1988; Ricky Lau)
- Ladies Hostel (1990; unknown)
- Lady of Poison, The (La dama dei veleni) (1978; Silverio Blasi)
- Last Theft, The (Posledni lup) (1987; Jirí Barta)
- Legend of the White Snake (Baek sajeon) (1978)
- Litan (Litan ou les messagers de l'au-delà) (1982; Jean-Pierre Mocky)
- Little Vampire (Bübchen; Buebchen) (1986; Roland Klick)
- Lost Souls (Da she) (1980)
- Love Foolery Case for a Severed Head (Namakubi jochi jiken) (1967; Kinya Ogawa)
- Man and the Snake, The (1972; Sture Rydman)
- Mansion, The (Haveli) (1985; Keshu Ramsay)
- Mansion of Evil (Purani Haveli) (1989; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- Man to Destroy, The (Covjek koga treba ubiti; The Man to Kill) (1979; Veljko Bulajic)
- Medium (1985; Jacek Koprowicz)
- Money Trip, The (1979; Chui Dai-Chuen)
- Monster in a Jar (Halimaw; Halimaw sa banga) (1986; Christopher De Leon and Mario O'Hara)
- Mortuary Blues (Shi jia zhong di; Si ga jung dei) (1990; Jeffrey Lau)
- Music of Erich Zann, The (1980; John Strysik)
- My Cousin, the Ghost (Biao ge dao) (1987; Ma Wu)
- Mystical World of Elias Paniki, The (Ang mahiwagang daigdig ni Elias paniki) (1989; Carlo J. Caparas)
- Night Evil Soul (1988; George Leung)
- Nightmare Man, The (1981; Douglas Camfield) (TV)
- Night of Terror, The (Gabi ng lagim) (1960; Tommy C. David, Larry Santiago, Pablo Santiago and Felix Villar)
- Night of the Living Bread (1990; Kevin S. O'Brien)
- Night Shadow (1989; Randolph Cohlan)
- Open Window, The (1972; Richard Patterson)
- Painted Skin, The (Hua pi) (1966; Fong Pao)
- Pattern of Roses, A (1983; Lawrence Gordon Clark) (TV)
- Phantom Lute, The (1975; Larry Tu Chong-Hsun)
- Professor, The (1958; Tom McCain)
- Professor Problemat Czelawy (Problemat profesora Czelawy) (1986; Zygmunt Lech)
- Przerazliwe loze (1968; Witold Lesiewicz)
- Rest House, The (Dak bangla) (1987; Keshu Ramsay)
- Return, The (1973; Sture Rydman)
- Return to the Beyond (Regreso del más allá) (1982; Juan José Porto)
- Return of the Evil Fox (Meng gui hu li jing) (1989; George Leung)
- Return of the Wolf (Powrót wilczycy) (1990; Marek Piestrak)
- Revenge of the Corpse (The Bloodthirsty Dead; Fei shi; Flying Corpse) (1981; Chung Sun)
- Revenge of the Revived One, The (La venganza del resucitado) (1962; Federico Curiel)
- Rock-A-Die Baby (1989; Bob Cook)
- Santo and Blue Demon vs. Doctor Frankenstein (Santo y Blue Demon contra el doctor Frankenstein) (1974; Miguel M. Delgado)
- Santo and Blue Demon vs. Dracula and the Wolf Man (Santo y Blue Demon vs Drácula y el Hombre Lobo) (1973; Miguel M. Delgado)
- Santo and Blue Demon vs. the Monsters (Santo el enmascarado de plata y Blue Demon contra los monstruos) (1970; Gilberto Martínez Solares)
- Santo Faces Death (Santo frente a la muerte) (1969; Fernando Orozco)
- Santo in 'The Border of Terror' (Santo en la frontera del terror) (1969; Rafael Pérez Grovas)
- Santo in 'The Hotel of Death' (Santo en el hotel de la muerte) (1961; Federico Curiel)
- Santo in 'The Treasure of Dracula' (Santo en El tesoro de Drácula) (1969; René Cardona)
- Santo in 'The Vengeance of the Mummy' (Santo en la venganza de la momia) (1971; René Cardona)
- Santo in 'The Witches Attack' (Atacan las brujas) (1968; José Díaz Morales)
- Santo in the Wax Museum (Santo en el museo de cera) (1963; Alfonso Corona Blake and Manuel San Fernando)
- Santo vs. Baron Brakola (El barón Brakola) (1967; José Díaz Morales)
- Santo vs. Black Magic Woman (Santo contra la magia negra) (1973; Alfredo B. Crevenna)
- Santo vs. the Diabolical Hatchet (El hacha diabólica) (1965; José Díaz Morales)
- Santo vs. the Evil Brain (Brain of Evil; Santo contra cerebro del mal) (1961; Joselito Rodríguez)
- Santo vs. the Ghost of the Strangler (Espectro del estrangulador) (1966; René Cardona)
- Santo vs. the Headhunters (Santo contra los cazadores de cabezas) (1971; René Cardona)
- Santo vs. the Infernal Brain (Santo contra hombres infernales) (1962; Joselito Rodríguez)
- Santo vs. the Martian Invasion (Santo el Enmascarado de Plata vs 'La invasión de los marcianos') (1966; Alfredo B. Crevenna)
- Santo vs. the Murderer of TV (Santo contra el asesino de televisión) (1981; Rafael Pérez Grovas)
- Santo vs. the Riders of Terror (Santo contra los jinetes del terror) (1970; René Cardona)
- Santo vs. the She-Wolves (Santo vs. las lobas) (1976; Rubén Galindo and Jaime Jiménez Pons)
- Santo vs. the Strangler (Santo vs el estrangulador) (1965; René Cardona)
- Santo vs. the Vampire Women (Santo vs. las mujeres vampiro) (1962; Alfonso Corona Blake)
- Satan (3D Saamri) (1985; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- Savage Hunt of King Stakh, The (Dikaya okhota korolya Stakha) (1979; Valeri Rubinchik)
- Shadows (Ombre) (1980; Mario Caiano and Giorgio Cavedon)
- Shake, Rattle & Roll (1984; Ishmael Bernal, Emmanuel H. Borlaza and Peque Gallaga)
- Shake, Rattle and Rock 2 (1990; Peque Gallaga and Lore Reyes)
- Shriek of Terror (Alarido del terror) (1990; René Cardona III)
- Snake Girl and the Silver-Haired Witch, The (Hebi musume to hakuhatsuma) (1968; Noriaki Yuasa)
- Strange Regression (Extraña Regresión) (1985; Jairo Pinilla)
- Talisman, The (al-Tawiza; Altawiza) (1987; Mohammed Shebl)
- Terrible Snow Giant, The (El terrible gigante de las nieves) (1963; Jaime Salvador)
- Terrifying Tales (1989; Paul Bunnell, Armand Garabidian and Ephraim Schwartz)
- Terror (Dahshat) (1981; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- Thirsty Devil (Pyasa Shaitan) (1984; Joginder Shelly)
- Thirteenth Day of Christmas, The (Time for Murder: The Thirteenth Day of Christmas) (1985)
- Tiyanak (1988; Peque Gallaga and Lore Reyes)
- Tomb of Dracula, The (Yami no Teiô Kyûketsuki Dorakyura) (1980; Akinori Nagaoka and Minoru Okazaki)
- Toyol (1980; Malik Selamat)
- Trapped by Fear (Atrapados en el miedo) (1983; Carlos Aured)
- Turkish Jaws (Çöl; The Desert) (1983; Çetin Inanç)
- Turkish Young Frankenstein (Frankenstein; Sevimli Frankestayn) (1975; Nejat Saydam)
- Turn of the Screw (Otra vuelta de tuerca) (1985; Eloy de la Iglesia)
- 27 Hours with Death (27 horas con la muerte) (1981; Jairo Pinilla)
- Uncle Was a Vampire (My Uncle, the Vampire; Tempi duri per i vampiri) (1959; Steno)
- Vampire Girls, The (Las vampiras; The Vampires) (1969; Federico Curiel)
- Vampire vs. Vampire (Yi mei dao ren) (1989; Ching-Ying Lam)
- Vengeance of the Crying Woman (La venganza de la llorona) (1974; Miguel M. Delgado)
- Vengeance of the Vampire (Veerana; The Wilderness) (1988; Shyam Ramsay and Tulsi Ramsay)
- Vindictive Snake (Shuunen no hebi) (1958; Kenji Misumi)
- Weasels Rip My Flesh (1979; Nathan Schiff)
- White Snake Girl (Hakuja komachi) (1958; Mitsuo Hirotsu)
- Wicked Wife (Curse of the Wicked Wife) (1981; King-Fang Wong)
- Woman of Desire, The (A Mulher do Desejo; House of Shades) (1975; Carlos Hugo Christensen)
- Woman with Knife (1980; Cheung Chi-Chiu)
- Working Stiffs (1989; Michael Legge)
- Yellow Wallpaper, The (1989; John Clive) (TV)
- Zombies Invade Pittsburg (1988; Jess Turner)
- Zuma (1985; Jun Raquiza)

I, Monster (1970)

...aka: Monster, The

...aka: Monster of London, The

...aka: True Story of Doctor Jekyll, The

Directed by:

Stephen Weeks

Most of the names have been changed, but the story remains the same in yet another version of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic 1886 horror tale Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. The novella had previously been filmed in 1908, 1910, 1912, 1913 (twice), 1915, 1920 (three times; including one with John Barrymore and one with Conrad Veidt), 1931 (which is often considered the definitive version and boasts an Oscar-winning performance by Fredric March), 1932, 1941 (a lavish MGM production starring Spencer Tracy, Ingrid Bergman and Lana Turner), 1950 (made for BBC TV), 1951 (an Argentinian production re-titled THE MAN AND THE BEAST), 1953 (the horror-comedy ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE, starring Boris Karloff), 1959 (the well-regarded French version THE TESTAMENT OF DOCTOR CORDELIER), 1960 (the Hammer production THE TWO FACES OF DR. JEKYLL, with Paul Massie in the title role), 1964 (an Italian TV movie), 1968 (a Canadian TV movie starring Jack Palance) and likely others.

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In addition to the film versions listed above, the story made its way into several cartoon shorts (featuring Mighty Mouse, Bugs Bunny, Tom & Jerry and others), was a featured episode on a handful of television shows (Suspense, Climax!, Matinee Theatre, etc.), spawned a two-part ITV series starring Dennis Price and was a long-running and very popular stage production (which began production shortly after the original story was published). It was so frequently filmed that I, MONSTER wasn't even the only Jekyll/Hyde release of its year. Hammer did a second spin-off themselves (DR. JEKYLL & SISTER HYDE starring Ralph Bates and the sulty Martine Beswick as his evil - and murderous - alter ego) and there was the more obscure American soft porn THE JEKYLL AND HYDE PORTFOLIO. So how does this version (an Amicus production) stand up amongst the other versions? Not too well, I fear.

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In turn of the century London (1906 to be precise), scientist and Freudian psychologist Dr. Charles Marlowe (Christopher Lee, who had already played a supporting role in Hammer's 1960 version) concocts a serum he believes will help "break down the barriers of the subconscious." He first tests it on a common housecat, which instantly goes berserk and must be killed. After a few alterations and concocting a back-up antidote in case things get out of control, Marlowe decides to test it on a few of his patients... without their knowledge, naturally. Prim, proper and repressed Diane (Susan Jameson) ends up stripping off her clothes and tries to seduce the doctor, while a loud brute named Mr. Deane (Kenneth J. Warren) turns into a wimpering child. Since Marlowe's antidote seems to work on both, he decides to start testing the serum on himself. It isn't long until his evil (and murderous) alternate personality, Edward Blake, is hanging out in the pubs, alleyways and cobblestone streets late into the night.

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One major problem is that Lee looks exactly the same before and after his big "transformation." It's asking far too much of the viewer to accept that several of Marlowe's close friends see 'Edward Blake' and automatically think it's a completely different person. Lee does what he can with his face and body language but is given an impossible task here. As Blake he gets to wear a tophat and cape, has messy hair with the hat off, possibly a whiter complexion and is asked to try to maintain a ridiculous-looking and forced toothy grin. He's supposed to get progressively uglier with each injection, though the make-up is so minimal that he's never quite the monstrous being he should be. Lee is also given nothing interesting to do as either Charles or Edward. Aside from getting in a razor/scalpel fight with a punk in an alleyway and beating a tart (Marjie Lawrence) who embarrasses him to death with a cane, there's no action, no surprises and no real sense of terror. The film also lacks tension and there's no dramatic push to move the scenes along. The film almost seems D.O.A. right out of the gate.

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Second-billed Peter Cushing has a minor co-starring role as Frederick Utterson, a colleague of Marlowe's, who questions both his friend's ethics and his association with Blake. Cushing doesn't have much screen time here and mostly hangs out at a gentleman's club talking with a couple of other very dull doctors, played by Mike Raven and Richard Hurndall. In a faint echo of the finale of HORROR OF DRACULA, Cushing does get a hand in the demise of Marlowe/Blake/Lee, but it's about as exciting to watch as the rest of the film. Meaning, not at all. Production values, sets and costumes are all OK, and if scenes of Lee thrusting a bunson burner or carrying a mouse directly toward the camera seem odd, it's because this was originally planned as a 3D release; a plan that was abandoned midway through production. Michael Des Barres and Ian McCulloch (from Lucio Fulci's cult hit ZOMBIE) have small roles. Milton Subotsky (who also scripted) and Max Rosenberg were the producers. Director Weeks also made MADHOUSE MANSION (1974) with Marianne Faithful.

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First distributed by Sinister Cinema on VHS, the R1 DVD (which isn't in the best of condition. so beware) is from Retromedia. Supposedly the British DVD release (from Optimum) is of much better quality.

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★★