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Filmed entirely in the Canary Islands, using a
resort hotel and a nearby 18th Century monastery as locations, this is
not connected to the BLIND DEAD series of zombie films from the 1970s,
although it is often compared to de Ossorio's films. The killer monks in
Franco's film seem to be spirits who take possession of some of the
hotel staff to perform sadistic rites. It is one of many 1980s titles
produced by Emilio Larraga for his Golden Film Company, a producer who
apparently gave Franco complete artistic freedom if he brought the
production in on time and budget.
If Franco was influenced by the BLIND DEAD series it was in having
sexually active and attractive young people pursued by the Templars
(although it's unclear here if the original monks were of that sect) for
some kind of historical revenge. As I wrote in my ETC #13 review of this
some years ago, the film is difficult for non-Spanish speakers to make
sense out of since it is constructed of extended dialogue passages
alternating with long, non-dialogue atmospheric sequences.
My feelings have evolved somewhat since first reviewing this film. I now
see it in a more positive light as a kind of crazy Franco experiment,
mixing lesbian sex interludes, extreme sadism, a critique of the BLIND
DEAD series, with effective horror scenes. Lina Romay is featured in her
Candy Coster persona, which means a blonde wig and some extra pounds.
This can either be very distracting or very amusing, depending on the
viewer's mood. Candy and her friends arrive at the
Tropicana hotel singing the Ode to Joy from Beethoven's 9th,
underlining, I guess, the very unjoyous events they are to experience
there. Examining the credit sequence reveals Franco at his best: the
camera zooms back from a close-up of a crucifix to the monks filing out
the wind-blown monastery at night, a bell tolls, their chants seem to
carry on the hot midnight breeze. Unfortunately, overlong lesbian
encounters seem to interest Franco in this film as much as the
atmospherics. I wrote in my ETC review: "Why, for instance, begin
this supposed horror film with twenty or so minutes of the four heroines
(lesbian barmaids on a sun and sex excursion to the Canary Islands)
indulging in increasingly ridiculous and tedious bouts of ass-slapping
and tit-jiggling?"
Seeing the film again recently I was surprised at the explicitness of
the lesbian sex scenes, Lina going down on her partner and later picking
a hair out of her teeth! I guess it's meant to be erotic-comedic, but it
still didn't strike me as either, only way out of synch with the rest of
the film.
The most successful attempt at black comedy is in the scenes between Eva
Leon (a marvelous actress) and Antonio Mayans. Leon plays her role nude
and chained to the wall by her neck while Mayans sadistically taunts
her, starves the poor woman and finally feeds her a last supper laced
with insecticide and rat poison. I wrote in my original review,
"Leon brings real pathos and humor to these hard to watch
scenes" and I still feel that way. Mayans is absolutely demonic as
"Carlos Savanorola," the Norman Bates type hotel clerk who is
also one of the murdering monks.
The treatment the women lured into the monastery get includes gang rape
and genital mutilation with a dagger. I find these scenes very
disturbing, even more than the blood drenched ministrations of the
"Blind Dead." For comparisons sake it's not even clear if
Franco's monks are dead and they certainly don't seem blind. The make-up
ranks with the worst I have ever encountered in a zombie film, or a
would-be zombie film. I guess the very worst would be the green painted
Nazi faces in ZOMBIE LAKE . The worm infested masks in Franco's own LA
TUMBA DE LOS MUERTOS VIVIENTES are also a contender.
-- Reviewed by Robert Monell
Inquiries about a video of the above film can be
sent to
info@latarnia.com
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