Watched recently:
A Virgin Among the Living Dead, aka Christina, Princess of Eroticism, aka any number of other titles. Ah, Jess Franco, what a guy. To be honest, I’m not that familiar with his stuff, I think this might be only the 3rd film of his that I’ve seen, after Succubus and Faceless. The history of this film is a little convoluted, but basically there seem to be 2 main versions of this out there: Christina, Princess of Eroticism is the most similar to Franco’s original cut, whereas AVATLD includes completely pointless zombie footage shot by Jean Rollin for a re-release. If you’re going to watch this, you should definitely go with Christina, as Rollin’s inserts belabor a narrative that already drags at times. Our premise here finds the frankly stunning Christina von Blanc showing up for the reading of her father’s will. She soon finds herself surrounded by various oddball family members before the ghost of her father warns that all might not be as it seems. Received wisdom suggests that Franco’s films are a love them or hate them proposition, and I have to say I definitely found myself in the former camp here. Once you’ve adjusted to the languid pacing of the film, the whole thing drifts by in a wonderfully pleasing manner. Von Blanc makes for an appealing protagonist, Bruno Nicolai’s score contains some wonderful moments and the whole thing is draped in a melancholy mood that makes sense when you find out that Franco made this while grieving for his former muse, Soledad Miranda. Barely a horror film, but if you’re new to Franco’s work, this would probably be a good place to start.
The Quatermass Xperiment. My son and I watch a lot, and I mean a lot, of 1950s American sci-fi movies. I got him a massive tome called Keep Watching The Skies a year or two back, and since then he’s dedicated himself to watching as many of the films reviewed therein as he can. Now as much as I tend to enjoy this kind of stuff, familiarity breeds contempt, and while I enjoy the classics as much as the next person, when you start to really delve into some of the more obscure films from this period, you soon realize that not everything is as good as The Day the Earth Stood Still. Which is a long-winded way of saying that I approached this with some trepidation. I needn’t have feared. This was one of Hammer’s early efforts, and as you might expect, the emphasis here is way more on the horror than in a lot of its American contemporaries. Think The Thing From Another World, or Invasion Of The Body Snatchers, for films with similar tones. The plot involves an exploratory spaceship returning to Earth. 2 of the crew have mysteriously disappeared, with the sole-surviving member acting extremely strangely and appearing to be infected by… something. I have to say, I loved this. This is probably the first British sci-fi film I’ve seen from this period, and it has a seriousness to it that a lot of its American counterparts lack. Add to that some special effects that wisely know their limitations and an interestingly morally ambiguous protagonist in the shape of Quatermass himself, and you’ve got a pretty special film. May well have to go back and check out the Nigel Kneale-scripted BBC show that this was based on, along with the film’s sequels… Recommended!
