This engraving started out as a portrait of my cat (see the prep drawing) but it just became a more generic feline. After creating a quick one-off science fiction print, I thought I might continue that theme with a bunch of aliens worshipping a giant cat. Somehow that morphed into me wanting to draw a bunch of ugly brutalist buildings.
Click the thumbnails for a closer view.
Another Paul Naschy film in which all the ladies can’t resist his barrel-chested charms. This one starts off in Japan and then, rather than explore its exotic location possibilities, goes right back to a Spanish countryside manor. Naschy is a double-crossing jewel thief who is nursed to health at a family pig farm complete with a pair of farmer’s daughters vying for his interests. Eventually this becomes a black-gloved killer movie and starts to jump between elements of thriller, crime film and horror. I thought it was quite entertaining despite the lead character laying in a bed most of the time.
A prosecutor and his lady friend of the night are held captive in the house of his uncle, a prominent judge, After the bloody false opening scene not much happens action-wise. Most of the movie takes place in a single room and the bad guys, who spend most of the movie looking for old court documents, are dubbed with ridiculous cockney accents. Given the right cast, this could have been a really tense drama, but it kinda falls flat.
Gothic horror is really where Paul Naschy shines. This werewolf/vampire movie is quite fun despite the fact that a lot of the plot doesn’t make any sense and it is, for some reason, set in modern times yet is full of 19th century villagers and horse drawn carriages. You can almost skip the first quarter of the movie but it really picks up in the second half with a trio of ghostly, female vampires that plots against Naschy as the werewolf. The simple makeup effects are very effective.
I love the colorful look of these Edgar Wallace Krimi films from Germany. They really seem like live-action Scooby Doo episodes. The plotting and mystery of Hunchback of Soho isn’t really all that great. The setting of using a girl’s school as a front for an inheritance plot doesn’t make any sense but it sure lends itself to goofiness.
Giallo done Naschy style. Unfortunately that means you have to watch a pig being killed to no good reason. This has none of the visual style of an Italian giallo, but at least offers a decent story about an ex-con who ends up being a handyman for three variously disabled sisters. Of course all the women can’t resists a short barrel-chested Spaniard in Cuban heels. This is all the backdrop to a series of sadistic murders that have Naschy pegged as the prime suspect. I really liked the disjointed version of Frère Jacques that accompanied all the killings, but I think Naschy’s Gothic horrors are a much better fit for him.
Mid-century sci-fi novel about a planetary colony that goes dark. When the rescue mission arrives they find the colonists running around naked without any technology. There is a plot to arrest the colonists and the super smart “E” assigned to rescue them for indecency, of all things. The big reveal at the end is unimpressive and not worth the effort. It’s mostly just a speculation on how there could be an intelligent existence that operates outside the world of science and things.
The second movie in the Paul Naschy Collection sounds good on paper, but is ultimately a bit of a bore. An Indian mystic (played by Naschy) is at the center of a series of mysterious murders committed by a rubber-masked voodoo phantom. A the body count increases, various women are zombified to do his will. There are plenty of eye catching scenes especially a satanic dream sequence but the story didn’t grab me. There is also an unnecessary scene in which a chicken is killed. Disturbing real animal violence seems to be thing in these Naschy films.
I really enjoyed this giallo despite its lack of the more traditional motifs of black gloved killers and stylized mayhem. The Designated Victim leans heavily into character drama. Our hero wants out of his loveless marriage and gradually becomes involved with a rich thrill seeker who will gladly kill his wife in order to experience that last kick. One thing leads to another and the story quickly becomes one of a man falsely accused who is being goaded by the killer into doing their bidding. The tension and stakes are high to the very end and there is a nice philosophical undertone to whole thing.
I recently impulse bought the 5-disc Paul Naschy blu-ray collection having only seen a couple of his films (Panic Beats really impressed me). I’ll admit that the pacing and visuals don’t quite rise to Italian standards but there’s something about Naschy’s commitment to these silly roles that give his movies a certain charm. In this first movie from the collection a pair of medieval sorcerers are condemned to death but eventually return to modern day (well, 1970s modern) France to enthrall half-clothed women, eat bloody hearts, and raise the dead. This is Gothic horror almost on par with Bava.
