The Casebook of Jess Franco

Robert Monell reviews the Sub Rosa DVD.

Moving in the awesome beauty of geological time, jolted now and then by the blues riffs wafting in and out amidst the Jess Franco and Daniel White cues, this is an extraordinarily calm daydream of passing lust and sudden fear. A cautionary fable of the Tourist Spain which was the thesis of a number of early 1970s Spanish horrors (cf LAS AMANTES DEL DIABLO -1971-UNA VELA PARA DEL DIABLO,1973). Seeing those films would be a good preparation for this post-post modern Franco opus but really all one has to do is have the patience to drink (I don't drink blood OR alcohol) in the seascapes and mindscapes. VAMPIRES BLUES is as much about environments of psychic escape, genre icons and musical notation .

A jaw dropping vision of the sea, looking out toward the orange horizon, centered in the endless... Squinting like tourists at the radiant solar manifestations it takes a while to get that we are seeing the earth from the Sun. Existing on the solar surface is not a comfortable task and things like acting ability, plot and conventional pacing all pale. What they didn't tell us in Catholic school was that the sun was Hell, at least as suggested in Jess Franco's post 1980 cosmology. The burning Hell of the African sun which beats down on Tara as she prays on that Canary Island dune in MACUMBA SEXUAL, perhaps the most revealing of all Jess Franco titles.

A boat bobbing on the tranquil sea as the camera pulls back to the gentle guitar tune back into a hotel, a villa, somewhere where someone twists in sexual stimulation. This is the opening here and the KEY image of Franco's most important films: FEMALE VAMPIRE, DORIANA GRAY, GEMIDOS DE PLACER (which opens exactly the same way, while the musical quote indicates that this is a specific homage), MACUMBA SEXUAL, EROTISMO, somewhere you will find it in all those and many more. The sea is a classic symbol of the Unconscious and, carrying on with Freud, the boat is the Superego of our protagonists. And since this is Jess Franco's beach it also represents our own fragile Superego which we bring along (or perhaps brings us along) as viewers.

Our heroine emerges out of the undifferentiated mass of international tourists to dream a little dream, to be lusted after and perhaps to awaken a little more alert to the disappointments of reality. And it always disappoints to return from a vacation, leaving behind sea, sun and sand for shirts, ties, dresses and offices. Who will then deny us some relaxation, sexual distraction and hallucinations of ephemeral evil? Only ourselves, which is why it is with such gratitude that we must greet the necessary psychic release which our favorite director so joyously offers. The slow motion considerations of the gnarled tropical roots and leaves gently swaying in the Mediterranean breezes, the coastal resort where every building, construction and detail appears to be a nightmare of Walt Disney, this is the environment and in Franco environment IS theme. Then there is the startling apparition of Magda (Lina Romay), the gypsy medium whose mysterious presence synopsizes Franco's career since the early 1970s period of Robert De Nesle productions and she is deliberately made up, costumed and posed to evoke characters in CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN and DRACULA PRISONER OF FRANKENSTEIN, deliriously low tech cartoon style romps lensed in a more wintry Portugal.

Absolutely nothing happens in VAMPIRE BLUES and yet it's a rapturous nothingness which only Franco can deliver as if he were a cosmic magician standing amidst the firmament, directing us into the nearest quasar. Franco may be accused of making porno-music videos by those who can't see past the tiny budgets, the nudity and the focus on pure pleasure. But this is cinephilia of a very high order. The Countess crawls around a tropical tree which may have been imported directly from Genesis. A naked musician plays the blues theme on guitar as the Countess luxuriates in solarized reds so intense they render the temperature gauges inactive. That's all I need to happen. Of course, those demanding fast paced actions, plot, realistic characters will be bored and infuriated but perhaps they can just move along to other well known venues where that type of satisfaction awaits. Here we have a languor which lulls us into a consciousness where a gently threatening voice will tell our heroine to "relax". And why is it that we can't relax? Just what is the problem? It's a question that comes in the form of Jess Franco himself as the kindly faced merchant who sells dreams. And without dreams we are doomed to the sleep of reason.

This Sub Rosa disc is a barely acceptable presentation in that the gradations of light, color, video imaging are never surely in the flux that the director must have intended. Like most Sub Rosa recent product (cf INCUBUS) it all appears overly bright, if not overexposed which seems to allow for a considerable amount of the intensity to leech from the color. A modest still gallery and since there's hardly any dialogue we don't really need a Spanish language variant, at least I don't, but the 60 something minute Export version, edited by Kevin Collins seems to more appropriate to me than the 1hr 30m plus Euro version. It's nice, though, that both are included.

Additional comments:

I rewatched the longer Euro cut of this and it is one of the most beautiful color films I have ever seen. If it didn't have the sex scenes in it it would be a candidate for Franco's best film. It's almost a silent film and Franco's best work is nearly dialogue free (cf DRACULA PRISONER OF FRANKENSTEIN) or the dialogue is used as incantation. Once again, the first very breathtaking opening shot, a gorgeous seascape with a boat being the Signifier of consciousness. This is a key image in Franco's best work: GEMIDOS DE PLACER, THE OTHER SIDE OF THE MIRROR, DORIANA GRAY, FEMALE VAMPIRE.

Of all the wondrous colors, pink is the most stunning, here. It's really like experiencing Pink for the first time, as a child.

Review by Robert Monell, copyright 2003

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