Hard Box Releases for Sale!

I'm digging through crates of DVDs for sale and am scanning my hardbox collection to put for auction.  Some of these are just too cool looking!
Here is BLACK DEEP THROAT with Ajita Wilson

 Last House on the Left includes the complete alternate version!

 Naked You Die from Antonio Margheriti!

The Eurocine film OASIS OF LOST GIRLS!

Orgasmo di Satana on DVD! This is the XXX version of Satan's Baby Doll.  I love the DR. PORNO title!

Thank you Jean Rollin.

Jean Rollin, Master of Erotic Terror.  1938-2010

I'm not good at eulogizing my favorite directors. At all.  On Wednesday Jean Rollin passed away and I have to say that I found the news very sad. There are many many great resources to see his work on DVD thankfully, and for those that have not I can't push you towards them enough.  Also, you can learn tons of interesting facts and luxuriate your brain in acres of gorgeous images by visiting some of the resources on the web, my favorite being FASCINATION: THE JEAN ROLLIN EXPERIENCE, which is a lovingly crafted blog on all things Rollin.
So I can only speak of what I know.  Jean Rollin had a fantastic impact on me, both as a film fan and as a moderately creative person.  After diving headfirst in to the Italian Horror and Trash cinema pool, I was hungry for something different. Rollin certainly provided me with that.  And much much more.

"The first vision I had was two clowns playing piano in a cemetery. I have never seen that in a film before and I wanted to see it, so I just wrote it in. Afterwards, I reused the image of the clowns in other films as some sort of quotation. I like that; I often make references to my earlier films. It connects dreams and stories like a construction system and the audience can make their own thing out of it." - Jean Rollin (taken from an interview here) 

Pony Castel - unforgettable.

Being deep in to the gore and splatter of Italy was most likely not the right place to begin with the cinema of Jean Rollin. Gorezone magazine couldn't prepare me, though I was lucky enough to be discovering Videooze and European Trash Cinema around this time as well. The copies of the few Rollin films I first encountered were usually poor dubs, without English dialog and touted as being violent masterworks by various catalogs. The films were frustrating and fascinating at the same time.  I never knew what to expect.  After my first viewing of an unsubtitled Night Of The Hunted I had no idea what I'd even watched.  But they were VERY different from what I'd been told.  Exciting, but I wasn't ready to really experience them they way I wanted to.  Video Search of Miami producing expensive gray market releases, with subtitles of perhaps dubious nature at best, was a bit of help...but the cost became prohibitive and I saw perhaps three of them before moving on.  But I never forgot the images, and women, of Requiem For a Vampire.  I just wasn't ready, because instead of insane thrills, easily attainable from the works of Dario Argento, Sergio Martino or Lucio Fulci...these films offered chills that poked at the brain and thrills that rubbed at the crotch with equal abandon.  Le frisson des vampires indeed.

I doubt he would like this much, but it was Jess Franco and his labyrinth of celluloid sins that brought me back to Rollin. The two don't do the same thing at all, but they are both outsiders when considered against the "mainstream" of horror and cult cinema. Smaller budgets, less interest in effects and stories and much more ambient energy.  Franco casts a strange spell of smoke and crash zoom pussy mania, regardless of genre as only he can.  Rollin weaves the same strange spell, but takes elements from a much different, perhaps more imaginative, inner ether. After exploring a lot of films and putting them in the context of Jess Franco's career, it just so happened that the Rollin catalog began to hit home video with gusto thanks to Redemption Films in the UK.  With proper translations and cleaner images than I'd encountered before things began to take shape.

The films begin, as he said in the above quote, as disconnected visual cues and weird images that you couldn't make up because they are from such a strange mind. And then, you realize you aren't watching a single film, but a page in an encyclopedia of strangeness.  A world at first alien and off putting becomes a dimension where beautiful women and traditional monsters meet in a hazy purple fog that sucks the right viewer in and leaves them feeling good to take a walk on the beach. Oh, that beach.  I knew that I was sprung for the Rollin when I started randomly jotting down not only plot elements to keep the films straight, but how it felt to hit the "fin" moment. Sometimes the same film could feel sad and depressing on one viewing, and wonderfully romantic on another. Sort of like how life can treat you.

I realized Rollin was providing the headspace, and I was letting his work affect me however it would at the given moment. I remember many viewings by where I was, what was happening, who I was with...even if I got laid! On the rarest occasion you too could score a fine nights fun thanks to Rollin.  Well, I'd like to think it was me, but I know that Jean Rollin flicks are made for the lovin' baby!
This destroys my ability to critique his films.  And that is fine by me because I am content to love them instead. 

So, I've followed the films through different paths and there are a few things that I've learned.  Vampires are cool. Twins are hot. Vampire twins are hot and cool.  Clowns rule, especially when they don't belong in the scene.  Bats love blood. Movies can open your mind to itself. I don't have a favorite Rollin film, they all inform the one just watched. Bats love pussy.  Childhood is a wonderful place. Never losing your imagination is important.  Zombie Lake, and Eurocine's strange idea of what is good, are never endingly entertaining for me.  Creating art is great, creating your own is better because it holds up better.  I never had dinner with Jean Rollin, I wish I had the opportunity. And yes...Jean Rollin could shoot a mean sex film.  He could also make films that were thrilling. Chilling. Romantic. Sad. Funny. Wild. Weird. Sexy.  Sexy Sexy Sexy. And most importantly of all, they will always entertain me.  Jean Rollin was a gift I found thanks to those cinema fanatics that gave me the signposts to begin to appreciate him.  I'm glad I opened the present and then made the films my own.
We all have the work of Jean Rollin now and I hope everyone that reads this has their own little vision of the place his movies came from, it is a rich wonderworld that will find you looking around every headstone hoping to find a naked clown, or at the least a long toothed vampire nurse.  You never know what hides behind a hood in a Jean Rollin film.

Thank you Jean Rollin, my imagination is that much brighter from your being here. I hope your family can take comfort in knowing how far and wide you were admired.  I know I'll be seeing you and your world for the rest of my days.  I hope everyone reading this will take a trip there, even for an hour.

"During one screening, I sat in the audience to listen to what the people said about it. Some just came because of the nudity, some came because it was a vampire film, and others came because they wanted to see something unusual and bizarre. There is no typical audience for my films, and this leaves me in a kind of vacuum. Do you know what I mean? I often had the impression that I did what I was doing solely for myself." Jean Rollin

Jiboa--Sleazzzzzzzy Action!

Jiboa / Jiboa, il sentiero dei diamanti

1989-CB Productions

Directed by Mario Bianchi as Stuart Murphy

Starring Rick Dean and Bobby Rhodes

“If you let it rip her mouth apart you’re an egg sucking asshole!”

What happens when you take a host of Tough To Kill stalwarts such as Luigi Ciccaresse, Ernesto Gastaldi and Paolo Rustichelli and hand them off to sleazemaster Mario Bianchi and say to him “make an action film?” A jungle adventure with murky underside of slimy sexploitation is what…and a damned good one bit of junk at that. Jiboa is about as reclusive a film as any in this book, but as a cross pollination of trash and action-it succeeds on every level to which it aspires. Of course that is gutter level, an aspiration I'm totally fine with!

Mark Frasier wakes up in an Indio village and can’t remember how he got there…but he sure likes LoLoLai who aids him to health with her topless magic. When a helicopter comes and attacks the village Frasier runs into the jungle and treks through all the waterfalls you could want to see before falling off one. He washes up to the shore and is picked up by Tony Marcucci, who claims to want to help him. Before he even gets started in penetrating his fog of amnesia, Frasier is snagged by some baddies and brought back to the Amazon to find “it!” It being a city of emerald of course-and these scumbags will stop at nothing to find it. Led by Sewer Rat (“In fact everybody called me sewer rat, I’m just plain Rat to my friends.”), the gang torment and torture our hero and an unlikely heroine-slash-love interest going so far as to break out the rat in the cage strapped to the girls face trick. As things progress and our band get closer to the emerald city, we have killer piranha attacks, lots of outrageous Indio battles, face smashing spiders and thousands of syllables forming unbelievably vulgar language. Good nasty fun… When another group of even more psychotic treasure hunters arrive its all out war as Frasier, Rat and the girl try to survive endless obstacles and perhaps more than a fair share of time filling walking through the jungle.

This cheap effort would seem to be more at home in the library of French producers Eurocine and their nasty adventure output such as Diamonds of Kilamanjaro really, but uses so many Italian personnel that it certainly fits in our lists. Bianchi built his reputation on groovy sleaze and porn, but manages to pull together the elements of Ernesto Gastaldi’s script to make an entertaining little action flick in the same flat exploitative style. While not exactly a hutbuster of giant action sequences there are some good fight scenes and enough unpleasant jungle antics from the Indios to leave the viewer with a solid rainy days entertainment. The final trippy sequence that leaps out of nowhere is worth any price it may take for you to find the film as well…weird stuff!

Rick Dean has appeared in tons of exploitation films you may have seen including some Cirio Santiago movies, but this is by far his most appealing work-he gets to crack jokes and heads at every turn. The great Bobby Rhodes plays Rat with gusto, chokeslamming his foes into an unconscious blob whenever the opportunity arises. You can’t go wrong with Rhodes…ever.  ALL HAIL BOBBY RHODES!!

Decently scored with Rustichelli music and decidedly nastier than most, Jiboa is action of a different, more virulent, strain.

Favorite European Trash Cinema Images - Exorcism / Sadist of Notre Dame

The filmography of Jess Franco could provide plenty of favorite European Trash Cinema images, but one of my favorite of his films features the director himself as a troubled (alright, that may put it mildly) excommunicated priest acting out his bizarre and sadistic fantasies entitled Exorcism (and later re-edited in to The Sadist of Notre Dame / Demoniac).  A look both backwards and forwards for Franco, this was where his work with Robert De Nesle ended and he returned to Eurocine full of the kind of piss and vinegar that would spark an incredibly rampant period of production that would have Franco going from leather clubs to women's prisons (where shirts are not allowed!), in to the wilds of The Most Dangerous Game and much much more!
Sometimes weird, sometimes groovy and more than a little bizarre, this image of Jess Franco as Vogel  and Monica Swinn is a perfect encapsulation of one of Franco's most re-edited film, and one of his best.

 

 

 

Favorite European Trash Cinema Images - Orloff and the Invisible APE??

Many moons ago I put together a little free server site called SadoManiacs in an attempt to pay tribute to the French production house Eurocine.  They gave us some amazing Jess Franco productions, they have released movies of all kinds...but nothing can rival this Pierre Chevalier entry in to the saga of Doctor Orloff for sheer jaw dropping thrills.  Loaded with pubic hair that could scrub your kitchen floor clean, catacomb creeping and good old Howard Vernon as the Doc, you just can't deny that you won't see the "invisible man" being exposed for what he is as a "simple" plot twist!  A vision of true European Trash Cinema, I proudly share my big furry friend...
INVISO-APE!!
Damn, I love him.

Halloween Horrors 9 - Devil's Kiss

One of the very first things I did on the web was create a little free server site praising the films of Eurocine, and I'm sure I would have lost my mind if I'd had the DVD of DEVIL'S KISS on hand at the time. While the company is best known for releasing some of my favorite Jess Franco films and the international hit Zombie Lake (seriously, how much money do you think that film made in licensing rights alone??)...I'm totally taken by the other films they had their hands in, such as Orloff Against The Invisible Man, Maniac Killer and Men For Rent. Devil's Kiss is now added to that list and unearths one obscure bit of French trash cinema that I'll be hard pressed to forget. With an outstanding cast, a crazy mixture of super science and satanic shenanigans and a monster you'll gawk at with genuine awe the first time he S L O W L Y goes in to "action" this is an uneven but enjoyable film that battles any doldrums with monster madness.

Claire Grandier (Silvia Solar) and Professor Gruber (Olivier Mathot) attend a completely ridiculous fashion show at a villa owned by the De Hassenmont family-though each for their own obscure reasons. Claire is working as a medium and is there to entertain the show goers with a seance. Of course, things go wrong and the host steps in. He knows that Ms. Grandier is ticked off, because she can't let go of the fact that her husband committed suicide-and she blames the De Hassenmonts. Luckily, Baron De Hassenmont is interested not only in the occult, but also in the psuedo necroscience that Doctor Gruber is an expert in...and he also specializes in Telepathy. I'd love to see his degree!


Now that they are in, the master plans unfold. After Claire recruits a sex mad dwarf, of course) the dynamic duo use some mystic mumbo jumbo ("Lucibel"?) and the telepathic powers of the doctor to construct a Frankenstein Mosiac Man that makes Frankenstein '80 look good. The doctor must control the creature, but unfortunately he has a bad heart.... Random violence occurs as neither the doctor nor the medium seem to have any villainous competence at all. Luckily for us, the gentle viewer, the plot serves no purpose as the monster strides about killing everyone he can. The doctor tries his best to conquer the creature telepathically, but it doesn't work out. Ah well...better for us monster fans.

Sure it isn't much, but Devil's Kiss is an entertaining film for fans of EurObscure films if for no other reason than to watch the cast try to salvage what they can. Mathot is one of my favorite faces in all of Eurocine and he is great as he huffs and puffs his way through the role of Professor Gruber. He acts menacing. He acts exhausted. He rubs his head and does telepathic battle with the soul of a freakish stitched together maniac! Silvia Solar is also charming as the dressed in black medium on a mission of vengeance. I've never found her particularly attractive, but her face has a lot of expression and she really does try her best in every role I've seen her take on. But the fun doesn't stop there. Of special note is Evelyne Scott's chest which has a co-starring role as the pretty maid Loretta. Things don't go well for her character, but she is good at appearing frightened and wearing a very low cut top. Also making the time go by is an appearance by Naschy/Ossorio alumni Maria Silva as a fashion model that ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time. Carlos Otero, a familiar actor from spaghetti westerns and notably Crimson with Paul Naschy is GREAT as the creepy butler as well. But the most amusing appearance is by Victor Isreal (who recently passed away). He shows up at the bizarre fashion show and says "Spiritism in this day and age? I prefer the fashion show!" And then he vanishes from the rest of the movie. Weird, but perfectly Eurocine.


A strange little film, Devil's Kiss is exactly what this Eurocine fan enjoys about the studio films. It is cheap, but shot in that specific style I love-one that seems to leak out of the Franco productions and in to these quick and naughty films. Crusty castle walls, cheap monsters and rampant nudity are all the production values you could ask for. A nifty music score of bleeping booping sounds and lilting symphonic sounds pushe things along nicely as well. If you venture into this film, I can not recommend the amazing English language dub of this film more. It is a must for anyone that likes wacked out dialogue. You can pick a great line out of every 5 I'd wager. It is just weird how many bizarre concepts are smashed in to this dub script...too many is never enough really.

This is a film I would have wondered about for many years if I'd only seen the title and artwork-the original "Perverse Carresses of Satan" is just the kind of thing that makes me get all heated up and ready to pounce on damn near any film really. Thankfully, it did not disappoint! Special credit must be given to one time director Jordi Gigo who not only brought this oddity to life, but also plays "The Annunciator" according to the credits. It took me a while to figure out that meant The Announcer and he is presenting the bizarre fashion show in the opening sequence. WOW...what a credit!!

Fly Me The French Way

I'll be strapping on my world traveler badge tomorrow and will be having a brief, yet intriguing, trip to France for the weekend. Ah France... so many national treasures. Brigitte Lahie! Eurocine! Jean Rollin! White Slavery in St. Tropez / Police des Moeurs and The Executor (I just love Michel Caputo)!!!
Have a great weekend, I'm hoping to walk on a beach and find a grandfather clock just there on the sand for no reason....aiieee...VAMPIRES!!