The
Mondo Macabro retro-DVD distributor may have come late to the game in
the Blu-ray arena, but when they arrived, it was with fanfare and
fireworks for fans of the nearly ultra-niche genre film world.
Knocking it out of the park with their The Fan and
Symptoms blu-rays and
their Greek-giallo double DVD releases, lately, Mondo Macabro have
gone back to focus on a pair of utterly epitomic Euroshock filmmakers
– I'm (obviously) talking about Paul Naschy and Jess Franco. For
the latter, Mondo Macabro released onto blu-ray one of his
lesser-known 80s sleaze-thrillers entitled The Night Has a
Thousand Desires, which stars
Franco's then-aging starlet-wife as a psychic who through several
sexual encounters is the erotic and fetishistic vehicle for a story
involving an elaborate con/scam that ultimately winds up being
incredibly cheesy, although not for lack of trying – one can
clearly see Franco's passion for telling this heist-sex-comedy story
(perhaps unintentionally comic?) even though really, and in true
Franco fashion, none of these thematic expectations, other than the
sex, pays off successfully, and the whole affair ends up culminating
in a barely-more-than-amusing conclusion. While it's clearly evident
that Franco had loftier ideas for the film and the story, the
gorgeous cinematography and Franco's affection for kitschy and
vibrant set designs, and his hardwired knack for filming his muses in
sexually explicit situations, all contribute to the memorable visual
content of this nearly-lost minor gem. Overall, it's a
curio-run-amuck in Franco's immense catalogue of films, and despite
the fact that it's no Female Vampire, it's
well worth checking out, especially for die-hard fans of the lovely
Lina Romay.
Following
this release, Mondo Macabro also saw fit to unleash a film from
another prolific Spanish filmmaker, Paul Naschy – Inquisition
– to my knowledge, this had
been one of Naschy's harder-to-come-by films with an early DVD
release relegated to the country of origin, Spain, and some evidence
of an earlier European box-set release. But Naschy's 1976 film holds
the same engaging tributes of his (in my opinion) most successful
films, like Panic Beats
and Dracula's Great Love – which
is to say that Inquisition is
brimming with unfolding plot and story elements, creating a twisty
maze of double-crosses and doublebacks as it goes along, and hence
elevating what could have been a generic revenge-scenario plot by
placing it in the politically volatile world of religion and
leadership politics of the Spanish Inquisition. Exploitation soars
(with loads of nudity with women at the peril of the tortuous
witch-hunt inquisition) while the movie's plot twists and an inspired
defiance of genre convention and expectation propel one of Naschy's
most under-appreciated genre films to the top of his prolific canon.
Huge kudos to Mondo Macabro for digging this one up and unleashing it
(and The Night Has a Thousand Desires)
out into the sadly diminishing hardcopy jungle of North America.
* * *
Check out CINEMAFANTASTIQUE 3 - The international genre film festival in Vancouver on Saturday, August 26th, 2017! Many special guests in attendance! See the FB EVENT PAGE
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