Black Sunday aka
La Maschera Del Demonio
Despite his efforts at great storytelling to go with the rather gory effects, the UK didn't appreciate his, um, talents and banned this film until 1968. That's only three years before his bloodbath movie Twitch Of The Death Nerve (okay it was also released as A Bay Of Blood but both the hubby and I like the first title better) so imagine the shocks that one delivered to a rather stuffy audience! This well crafted story (yeah it has problems but still...) is loosely based on a short story about a witch put to death by her own brother who comes back two centuries later for revenge. Cool. This is the type of movie to watch late at night with the lights off and the popcorn nice and hot - it's enjoyable, the special effects are impressive considering this is 1960, and the story is a good one.
So we have a beautiful witch and a vampire Asa and Javuto who are to be put to death by burning at the stake. A nice twist of the usual is that they have to have these steel masks with iron stakes in them hammered on to their faces (Hmmm, didn't a recent movie copy that one? Oh yeah, it did. I'll be nice and not mention which one.) and a cross is 'branded' onto Asa (she can't take 'em - seems witches are Catholic as well as vampires). However, when the fires are lit, a sudden storm rises up, it pours down rain which scares everyone off. Duh.
So the witch is put in a crypt in a special coffin with a window and a Moldavian cross (A window in the 1600's? Really? I had to look that up and I'm a dummy, glass has been around since about 3000 BC.) so that she constantly is in view of the cross to hold her down in the coffin (in case being dead and having a mask nailed on her face wasn't enough). The 'vampire' was buried in unconsecrated ground (with his own mask) and it was all considered 'good enough'. Skip ahead 200 years.
Two docs are on their way to a medical conference (Six versts away? Had to look that up, hey I'm just curious - and ignorant - it's an obsolete Russian unit of length. Six versts is roughly four miles.) in Moldavia. Their carriage loses a wheel right by an old crypt so of course they explore. They find Asa's coffin with it's cross and window. These crosses were a bit different too - there were two cross pieces instead of one. I tried to look that up, I'll have to keep looking.
They then discover Katia, daughter of Prince Vajda along with her brother Constantine. She's kind of ditzy but beautiful and, what do you know, the spitting image of Asa. The two docs continue on to their inn. Asa, who's got enough consciousness to contact her lover telepathically wakes him up and he digs himself out of his grave. No really, that's what happens. Javuto appears to Prince Vajda who holds up one of those groovy crosses which of course makes him run away and the Prince to have conniptions (remember in these movies everybody's pretty fragile - they swoon, faint, get sick over the silliest things, no wonder they didn't live long) and they call for one of the docs. Javuto kills who they send and picks up the doc himself - soon enough Asa turns him into a, uh, vampire zombie? He's dead by day, alive by night, sucks blood but... it's not quite clear what he's supposed to be. I do like that they didn't attempt to put on some weird makeup - to me that made the effect better. Now Asa and Javuto have to look gross, they've been dead a long time but the newly dead... it was a nice change.
Okay, this is going to be a novel if I don't speed it up. The Prince is murdered, becomes a vampire, the doggies are killed (don't worry, there's no wounds the doggies were fine) the daughter is attacked but her cross saves her, the servant is hanged, Constantine meets his end and a little girl tells the young doc Andre who she saw driving the older doc and he goes to the priest who determines that okay, these are the monsters from before. Now to get rid of these vampires is a whole lot simpler - 'brand' them with a cross then shove a stick in their left eye. That's it. No melting, no bursting into flame, no screaming. Nice and simple. I liked that. Now we need to save Katia from Ava and Javuto.
When Andre dispatches Javuto with Constantine's help (not yet dead, but dies during fight) he next runs to Katia's side who is standing beside Asa on her broken apart coffin. He's about to 'eye stake' the body when he notices it is still wearing Katia's cross (normal, weird). Since that can't happen, he knows the one standing is really Asa and she has killed Katia. He turns to Asa and opens her robe, revealing a fleshless skeletal frame. The priest then arrives with numerous torch-carrying villagers (a concrete requirement in any monster/horror film of this era), and they burn Asa to death, finally. Katia awakens from her stupor having not been totally dead (Only mostly dead?), her life and beauty restored. She and Andre embrace. No twists, no weird stuff, just a good ending to a pretty good story.
(The Mask Of Satan) (1960) Italian
Since I enjoyed Mario Bava's early entry in the genre of the slasher flick I decided to watch the movie that is his directorial debut and is credited with the start of both his and actress Barbara Steele's very successful careers. And of course I knew there would probably be more than one title - that seems to be a Bava type thing. Check his wiki page and on his rather long list of movies, most of them have alternate titles. Why not? They're all good ones - the ones he comes up with anyway. This is a classic black and white gothic type of story with witches, vampires, demons and of course a lady fair and a handsome hero. It is wonderfully shot with a terrific sound score. Usually if you've noticed older movies they play heavy with violins and cellos and not to good effect - they're jarring in a lot of cases. This has a beautiful piano score (yes other instruments too) that helped the movie along and added to it without making you want to turn the sound down.
Since I enjoyed Mario Bava's early entry in the genre of the slasher flick I decided to watch the movie that is his directorial debut and is credited with the start of both his and actress Barbara Steele's very successful careers. And of course I knew there would probably be more than one title - that seems to be a Bava type thing. Check his wiki page and on his rather long list of movies, most of them have alternate titles. Why not? They're all good ones - the ones he comes up with anyway. This is a classic black and white gothic type of story with witches, vampires, demons and of course a lady fair and a handsome hero. It is wonderfully shot with a terrific sound score. Usually if you've noticed older movies they play heavy with violins and cellos and not to good effect - they're jarring in a lot of cases. This has a beautiful piano score (yes other instruments too) that helped the movie along and added to it without making you want to turn the sound down.
Despite his efforts at great storytelling to go with the rather gory effects, the UK didn't appreciate his, um, talents and banned this film until 1968. That's only three years before his bloodbath movie Twitch Of The Death Nerve (okay it was also released as A Bay Of Blood but both the hubby and I like the first title better) so imagine the shocks that one delivered to a rather stuffy audience! This well crafted story (yeah it has problems but still...) is loosely based on a short story about a witch put to death by her own brother who comes back two centuries later for revenge. Cool. This is the type of movie to watch late at night with the lights off and the popcorn nice and hot - it's enjoyable, the special effects are impressive considering this is 1960, and the story is a good one.
So we have a beautiful witch and a vampire Asa and Javuto who are to be put to death by burning at the stake. A nice twist of the usual is that they have to have these steel masks with iron stakes in them hammered on to their faces (Hmmm, didn't a recent movie copy that one? Oh yeah, it did. I'll be nice and not mention which one.) and a cross is 'branded' onto Asa (she can't take 'em - seems witches are Catholic as well as vampires). However, when the fires are lit, a sudden storm rises up, it pours down rain which scares everyone off. Duh. 
So the witch is put in a crypt in a special coffin with a window and a Moldavian cross (A window in the 1600's? Really? I had to look that up and I'm a dummy, glass has been around since about 3000 BC.) so that she constantly is in view of the cross to hold her down in the coffin (in case being dead and having a mask nailed on her face wasn't enough). The 'vampire' was buried in unconsecrated ground (with his own mask) and it was all considered 'good enough'. Skip ahead 200 years.
Two docs are on their way to a medical conference (Six versts away? Had to look that up, hey I'm just curious - and ignorant - it's an obsolete Russian unit of length. Six versts is roughly four miles.) in Moldavia. Their carriage loses a wheel right by an old crypt so of course they explore. They find Asa's coffin with it's cross and window. These crosses were a bit different too - there were two cross pieces instead of one. I tried to look that up, I'll have to keep looking.
Anyway, being movie-stupid, these two not only manage to break both the cross and the window on the coffin, but the older one bleeds from the broken glass, which drips on Asa, 'waking' her up. Okay this isn't perfect but it's still pretty good. Why a witch and a vampire? Why a witch who IS a vampire? Why not - shows that there's more imagination in this story than in your average monster movie.
They then discover Katia, daughter of Prince Vajda along with her brother Constantine. She's kind of ditzy but beautiful and, what do you know, the spitting image of Asa. The two docs continue on to their inn. Asa, who's got enough consciousness to contact her lover telepathically wakes him up and he digs himself out of his grave. No really, that's what happens. Javuto appears to Prince Vajda who holds up one of those groovy crosses which of course makes him run away and the Prince to have conniptions (remember in these movies everybody's pretty fragile - they swoon, faint, get sick over the silliest things, no wonder they didn't live long) and they call for one of the docs. Javuto kills who they send and picks up the doc himself - soon enough Asa turns him into a, uh, vampire zombie? He's dead by day, alive by night, sucks blood but... it's not quite clear what he's supposed to be. I do like that they didn't attempt to put on some weird makeup - to me that made the effect better. Now Asa and Javuto have to look gross, they've been dead a long time but the newly dead... it was a nice change.
Okay, this is going to be a novel if I don't speed it up. The Prince is murdered, becomes a vampire, the doggies are killed (don't worry, there's no wounds the doggies were fine) the daughter is attacked but her cross saves her, the servant is hanged, Constantine meets his end and a little girl tells the young doc Andre who she saw driving the older doc and he goes to the priest who determines that okay, these are the monsters from before. Now to get rid of these vampires is a whole lot simpler - 'brand' them with a cross then shove a stick in their left eye. That's it. No melting, no bursting into flame, no screaming. Nice and simple. I liked that. Now we need to save Katia from Ava and Javuto.
When Andre dispatches Javuto with Constantine's help (not yet dead, but dies during fight) he next runs to Katia's side who is standing beside Asa on her broken apart coffin. He's about to 'eye stake' the body when he notices it is still wearing Katia's cross (normal, weird). Since that can't happen, he knows the one standing is really Asa and she has killed Katia. He turns to Asa and opens her robe, revealing a fleshless skeletal frame. The priest then arrives with numerous torch-carrying villagers (a concrete requirement in any monster/horror film of this era), and they burn Asa to death, finally. Katia awakens from her stupor having not been totally dead (Only mostly dead?), her life and beauty restored. She and Andre embrace. No twists, no weird stuff, just a good ending to a pretty good story.
The special effects were pretty good too - and I can understand why some would be revolted - we have corpses rising with slime and maggots all over, when Asa first starts 'coming to' she is pretty messed up with no eyes - at one point you see, uh, something bulging up from her sockets - the best way to explain it is a couple of egg yolks bulge up - sorry, that's the only way I can describe it. Later she has eyes like lit marbles, then they're normal but, eww. You have hangings, people burning, horrible skin conditions, and oh yeah, the violence of having a mask full of spikes hammered onto your face. Pretty horrorshow stuff... for that era. We might not flinch, but it was enough to keep this movie off an entire continent for eight years.
No comments:
Post a Comment