Last week the Nikkatsu Action Film Series made its way to San Francisco and the nice guys over at the Outcast Cinema site who manage the event were kind enough to remind me with a friendly email. Unfortunately due to my current work schedule, ongoing apartment maintenance and various family obligations, which are leaving me with very little free time lately, I wasn’t able to see any of the films scheduled to play. I rarely make it into the city for film events anymore due to the high cost of gas, bridge fares, parking fees and ticket prices. A night out at the movies with my guy in the Bay Area can easily cost us $50, but I had really hoped to see two of the Toshio Masuda films that were scheduled to show at the Nikkatsu Action series (Gangster V.I.P. and Red Handkerchief) since they were two films I’d never seen before and I’ve become fascinated with the director’s work over the last couple of years.
Last year I picked up a copy of a wonderful Japanese book called Toshio Masuda - Films - Complete Guide which contains over 500 pages covering the director’s long career and accomplishments. It’s an amazing looking book obviously packed with many details about the director’s 80+ films and it also includes lots of lovely still shots from various productions. Naturally it’s written in Japanese and since I can barely read a word of Japanese myself and often have to rely on family and friends for minimal translations, I haven’t been able to fully appreciate the book. I highly doubt that there will ever be an English translation of the entire text made available, but the book has still managed to widen my understanding of Toshio Masuda ’s amazing directorial career and I’ve been making an attempt to try and see as many of his films as possible lately, which is why I was so disappointed that I missed the Toshio Masuda films shown during the Nikkatsu Action series. I’m currently researching some interesting aspects of Toshio Masuda carreer and I hope to see a few more of his early films soon on DVD. You can expect to see more posts from me about the director in the future.
Here’s a brief blurb about Toshio Masuda from the only English text featured on the cover of Toshio Masuda - Films - Complete Guide. It’s written in broken English so don’t be surprised if you find it a little hard to follow:
“Action, Romance, Comedy, Animation, The War. A Giant in the field of Japanese program pictures. Toshio Masuda was born in Kobe City, October 5th 1927. There was a year his 16 films have reached the TOP 10 in the yearly charts. It is the second highest record in the history of Japanese movies. He also has been in the chart from the 1950’s through until 1990’s, for about 5 decades. This is a miracle and a marvelous thing. His films themes are not only about action but comedy, romance, animation and the war. And every theme relates to the bloom of youth.”
It’s really astonishing and extremely sad that the work of such an important Japanese director like Toshio Masuda is almost completely unavailable to western audiences and has often been totally overlooked by western critics and film scholars. Thankfully due to the hard work of some people such as the fine folks at Outcast Cinema that is slowly changing and I’m extremely grateful for all their efforts.
Since I’m on the topic of Nikkatsu Action cinema, I also wanted to mention that I recently finished reading Mark Schilling’s latest book No Borders, No Limits: Nikkatsu Action Cinema, which is a quick read and well worth picking up if you’re interested in Japanese cinema. I’ve enjoyed many of Mark Schilling’s books over the years such as The Encyclopedia of Japanese Pop Culture and The Yakuza Movie Book so I was looking forward to reading his latest effort and I think it’s probably his best book yet because it limits its focus to one topic and provides readers with some interesting tidbits about the genre. No Borders, No Limits: Nikkatsu Action Cinema is somewhat light on content but it easily makes up for that with lots of fascinating interviews with important directors and stars, as well as beautiful still shots and incredible poster art reproductions. I don’t always agree with Schilling’s interpretations of Nikkatsu Action cinema that he puts forward in the book or his opinions regarding particular films and directors. And occasionally while reading the interviews he conducted with directors I desperately wished I could have jumped in with my own questions, but I’m very grateful that Schilling is making a much needed effort to research the work and careers of talented filmmakers like Toshio Masuda who is featured in his book along with Seijun Suzuki, Yasuharu Hasebe and Koreyoshi Kurahara. Since so little English language information is available about Nikkatsu’s Action cinema Mark Schilling’s book is a very welcome addition to the slowly growing body of Japanese film criticism and history that’s trying to forge ahead and follow uncharted paths that were often neglected by other well-known Japanese film critics and scholars in the past.
Here’s a few brief paragraphs from Mark Schilling’s Forward to No Borders, No Limits: Nikkatsu Action Cinema:
“The label said it all: Nikkatsu Akushon. Nikkatsu was a studio that had been around since the silent days and Akushon was “Action,” written in the katakana syllabary for foreign words. During their peak, from the late 1950s to the early 1960s, Nikkatsu Action films evoked a cinematic world neither foreign nor Japanese, but a mix of the two, where Japanese tough guys had the swagger, moves and long legs of Hollywood movie heroes. Where Tokyo streets, Yokohama docks and Hokkaido plains took on an exciting, exotic aura, as though they were stand-ins for Manhattan, Marseilles or the American West.
. . .
“Foreign critics long ignored Nikkatsu Action. Donald Richie and Joseph Anderson’s seminal 1959 history The Japanese Film: Art and Industry passed over the entire genre in silence, as did its 1982 revised edition. Joan Mellen’s 1976 study The Waves at Genji’s Door: Japan Through Its Cinema does not mention Nikkatsu or its films and stars even once. The rise of Seijun Suzuki to cult fame in the West in the 1980s brought the genre more attention abroad, but often in a negative way, with critics hailing Suzuki as an overlooked and discarded master, while dismissing the films of his colleagues as studio hack work (despite having seen few of them.)”
Mark Schilling’s book No Borders, No Limits: Nikkatsu Action Cinema retails for $15.95 and it’s currently available at Amazon for only $10.85. The Japanese book Toshio Masuda - Films - Complete Guide was published last year by Hotwax in association with Shinko Music Entertainment Co. LTD and it should be available at better Japanese book stores such as Kinokuniya. You can also purchase the book online at places such as YesAsia.com, but it costs a lot more there. The original retail price is about $37 and YesAsia is selling it for $50 plus shipping and handling costs so potential buyers should be aware of the considerable price hikes by some retailers.
The Nikkatsu Action film series is still going strong and many films will be shown across the country in various U.S. locations throughout April and May. For more information about the event please visit the Outcast Cinema Blog for locations and showtimes.
There is sad news today of the death of Alain Robbe-Grillet who has left this world at the ripe old age of 85. GreenCine Daily has collected some links to news stories and various articles about this talented writer and director. I also recommend Robert Monell’s brief piece The Films of Alain Robbe-Grillet and the Alain Robbe-Grillet Bibliography.
At this time of the year it seems like every film critic suddenly becomes an expert on horror films and starts publishing their quickly put together “Top 10 Scary Movie Moments” or “Best Films to Watch on Halloween.” These lists are often compiled by people who’ve seen a limited amount of films and their horror selections are often tired and stale. Does anyone really still need to be told that a Criterion DVD release like Carnival of Souls is worth watching? Or horror classics like Hitchcock’s Psycho and Romero’s Night of the Living Dead are “must see” movies? With that complaint out of the way, I’d like to bring your attention to the name of one director who really deserves a lot more attention, and that is Pupi Avati.
Unfortunately the name Pupi Avati tends to elicit chuckles instead of respect, which is a shame. Avati created some of the most fascinating and chilling horror films to ever come out of Italy during the seventies and eighties, and he’s worked with many well-known Italian filmmakers such as Pier Paolo Pasolini, Lucio Fulci and Lamberto Bava.
As a director Avati has never stuck to one film genre. Besides horror films he’s made musicals, comedies and romances. I’m sure that’s one reason why his films are often overlooked by horror fans, who tend to favor directors that work almost exclusively in the horror genre. Another reason Avati is probably not as well-known or respected as other Italian genre directors is due to the fact that so many of his films are impossible to find and most of them have never been released in America until recently.
The director has made at least 3 or 4 horror or fantasy films that I’m aware of, and I’ve only been able to see two of them myself (The House with Laughing Windows and Zeder) since they were released as part of the Image Euroshock DVD collection in the U.S. Even though I’ve only seen a few of his films, I find Avati to be one of the most fascinating filmmakers I’ve ever come across. His horror films are deliberately paced and extremely thoughtful. They explore esoteric themes and interesting concepts about life and death, but unlike many of his contemporaries, his films lack gore and effects. They also tend to lack nudity and sex which some critics find bothersome, since his perceived prudishness could be seen as conflicting with the sexual themes in his films.
The absence of excessive gore and nudity in Avati’s films is probably the final and most obvious reason why his movies have so often been overlooked by horror fans who tend to be male and often prefer their horror films with plenty of violence and bare breasts. That’s not to say that The House with Laughing Windows (1976) and Zeder (1983) don’t contain any violence or nudity, but compared to most Italian directors from the same period such as Lamberto Bava, Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci, Avati’s films could be seen as much less visceral. They tend to generate their scares and evocative mood more from what the audience doesn’t see, instead of what’s put before them on screen. I personally find Avati’s style of filmmaking extremely smart and sophisticated. He seems to mix the best aspects of classic gothic Italian horror films with the most interesting aspects of modern Italian horror films, and this gives his work a very personal look and feel that is all his own.
The House with Laughing Windows is the earliest Avati film that I’ve seen and it’s easily one of the best Italian thrillers made in the ’70s. According to the video interview with the director and his crew that accompanies the DVD, the script was written five or six years before the film was made, but it was re-written right before filming began. I suspect that the changes might have been somewhat inspired by Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now, which was made in 1973 since both films share a few similarities, but that’s impossible to confirm since The House with Laughing Windows was supposedly written years earlier. Fans of the 1973 horror film The Wicker Man might also see some similarities between Avati’s movie and that British thriller. One thing seems certain; the script clearly has some references to Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Salo (1975) in it. Avati contributed to Pier Pasolini’s original script for Salo right before making The House with Laughing Windows and it’s easy to make a connection between the two movies since they both explore ideas about torture and sadism.
The House with Laughing Windows opens with a brutal scene involving a mysterious man being tortured and stabbed. It’s creatively shot with muted tones and quick cuts that take away a bit of the shock it elicits, but some viewers will immediately be reminded of Pasolini’s Salo. Avati has said that his Catholic upbringing deeply effects his filmmaking and that becames apparent while watching the opening minutes of The House with Laughing Windows. Throughout the course of the film, Avati will evoke Catholic imagery and iconography over and over again in some subtle and very unsubtle ways.
After the film’s somewhat graphic opening minutes, we’re introduced to the movie’s main protagonist, a man named Stephano (Lino Capolicchio) who has come to a small and beautiful Italian village to restore a decaying fresco painting on the wall of an old church that vividly depicts the slaughter of St. Sebastian. We’re immediately made aware that this small town is a bit odd simply due to its unusual inhabitants which include dwarves, ghost-like women, depraved altar boys and raving drunks, among others.
Stephano finds the fresco in the church extremely lifelike and as the film progresses we follow him on a quest to learn more about the mysterious artist who created it known as “The Painter of Agonies.” Along the way Stephano is plagued by threatening phone calls and he receives unusual clues from the town’s odd inhabitants, which often lead to murder. As the bodies start to pile up, questions surrounding the fresco’s artist become more and more complex, and Stephano realizes he’s uncovering clues to a disturbing mystery that no one in the town wants solved. The House with Laughing Windows isn’t a typical giallo film and I hesitate to use the term here, but it does have plenty of giallo-style flourishes that should appeal to fans of the genre.
Avati manages to create an unsettling mood and sustain it throughout the entire duration of the film until it’s unforgettable climax. The director makes full use of shadows and the lovely local scenery. Avati also takes every opportunity available to him to shoot his characters out of windows and doors, or looking through and at windows and doorways. Windows and doors are impressively used as a visual motif over and over again throughout the film, which helps to beautifully highlight the movie’s primary themes.
Avati made The House with Laughing Windows with a crew of 12 and a budget that wouldn’t pay for the catering bill of most Hollywood productions. The movie is an excellent example of the creativity and ingenuity of European directors making genre films during the seventies, and I really can’t recommend it enough. Once you see The House with Laughing Windows it’s impossible to forget it.
Avati’s 1983 thriller Zeder is just as good, if not better than The House with the Laughing Windows, and it’s also well worth seeking out if you’re interested in seeing more of the directors work, or just want to watch a incredibly effective horror film.
As I mentioned above, The House with Laughing Windows is available on DVD from Image as part of their terrific Euroshock Collection and it was originally released in 2002. The film is presented in widescreen with English subtitles and the print is excellent. The DVD also comes with a really nice documentary about the making of the film, which features Pupi Avati, as well as many cast and crew members. Other extras include a Lobby Card Gallery and a Theatrical Trailer.
Avati is currently 69 years old and working on a new thriller called The Hideout, which should be completed this year. His latest film was shot in America and it features an international cast that includes Burt Young, Treat Williams, Giovanni Lombardo Radice, Yvonne Sciò, Laura Morante and Michael Cornelison. I have no idea of Avati’s latest film will be released in the America, but since it’s an international production I hope it gets a wide release.
I only have access to what we call “Standard Basic Cable” TV in the San Francisco Bay Area so I don’t watch a lot of television because there isn’t a lot to watch. The only semi-24-movie channel I get is AMC and this week they’re offering viewers a spectacular Seven Nights of Hitchcock. Since Hitch is one of my favorite directors I couldn’t be happier. I’ve decided to try and spend my evenings this week getting re-acquainted with a lot of his films since many of my favorites are included in the great line-up AMC has scheduled.
Last night I watched The Birds and Rope again. I’ve seen both films countless times but I never get tired of them. The suspense Hitchcock conjures up in Rope is just unbearable at times and the script has an incredible rhythm that I always find really mesmerizing. It’s the perfect example of “less can be more” when it comes to great filmmaking. John Dall, Farley Granger and James Stewart are all really terrific and together they seem to make up some kind of perfect unholy trinity that always astonishes me. Rope also has one of my all-time favorite Hitchcock film endings. I always get chills when Stewart turns his back to the camera and red lights flicker and fill up the small apartment as sirens are heard in the distance.
As for The Birds, I love the ambiguous story and the way it plays out. Tippi Hedren is terrific in it and I’ve always thought she was an underrated actress. Like most of Hitchcock’s films, Rope and The Birds are both loaded with sexual innuendos and an uneasy eroticism that really appeals to me.
Publicity shots from The Birds (1963) and Psycho (1960)
Hopefully I’ll find the time to write-up a few more thoughts on some of his films in the future, but in the meantime here’s a list of my personal Top 15 Favorite Hitchcock Films. I was only going to post a Top 5, but Hitch deserved better than a measly Top 5 so I’m sharing my Top 15 Hitchcock Films instead (the numerical order isn’t significant).
1. Shadow of a Doubt (1943)
2. Rope (1948)
3. Psycho (1960)
4. Spellbound (1945)
5. The Birds (1963)
6. Vertigo (1958)
7. Rebecca (1940)
8. Marnie (1964)
9. North by Northwest (1959)
10. Strangers on a Train (1951)
11. Dial M for Murder (1954)
12. Frenzy (1972)
13. Foreign Correspondent (1940)
14. The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)
15. The Trouble with Harry (1955)
Is anyone else enjoying AMC’s Seven Nights of Hitchcock as much as I am? Feel free to share your own list of Top 5 or Top 15 Favorite Hitchcock films below if you’re so inclined.
Images from Koji Wakamatsu’s Go, Go Second Time Virgin (1969)
I recently reviewed Koji Wakamatsu’s impressive Go, Go Second Time Virgin (1969) for Cinedelica. If you’re interested in Japanese avant-garde cinema and pink films, I highly recommend giving Koji Wakamatsu’s films a look.
I’ve also recently been helping M. S. over at his French language Japanese film site Wild Grounds with his English translation of an interesting French interview with director Koji Wakamatsu which is now available to read at his website. The interview was originally published in the French cinema magazine Sex Star System in 1976 and now English audiences have the opportunity to enjoy the interview for the first time. Information about Koji Wakamatsu is hard to find so I’m very thankful that M. S. made the time to translate this informative interview.
Coincidently Midnight Eye recently published an interview with the writer and filmmaker Masao Adachi who is one of Koji Wakamatsu’s most important collaborators and it’s also well worth reading.
It’s wonderful to see Koji Wakamatsu and Masao Adachi’s complex, controversial and experimental work getting some much needed attention lately!
Clip from Wakamatsu and Adachi’s Go, Go Second Time Virgin (1969) below:
I’ve become completely obsessed with British filmmaker Peter Whitehead lately. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to be very easy to get a hold of most of his films besides Tonite Let’s All Make Love in London (1967) and his Rolling Stones’ documentary Charlie Is My Darling (1966), which are the only two Whitehead films I’ve managed to see. If anyone can offer me advice on where I might be able to get full uncut copies of his later experimental work such as The Fall (1969), Fire in the Water (1977) with John Lennon and Nathalie Delon, as well Daddy (1973), I would be very grateful.
You ask what you should watch. I ask how I should live. It’s the same thing.
- Corrado Zeller (Richard Harris) in Antonioni’s The Red Desert (1964)
Cinephiles have suffered some great losses in recent days with the death of Ingmar Bergman, actor Michel Serrault and now Michelangelo Antonioni. I was really touched by all the great tributes I read to Bergman yesterday but I never became too personally involved with Bergman’s work myself. I admired the man greatly and seriously respected his influence which was obviously enormous, but Bergman and I often seemed to see the world through different eyes. I definitely need to see more of Bergman’s work, but in all honesty my personal relationship with Bergman could never come close to the long lasting and personal one I share with Michelangelo Antonioni.
My first introduction to Antonioni was on a rainy Sunday afternoon when I was only about 12 years old back in the early 1980s. I was at home watching television when suddenly good old channel 2 in the Bay Area started to run Blow-up. At first I kept watching because I thought actor David Hemmings was incredibly cute, but as the film went on I became more and more drawn into the film’s mysteries and silences. While I enjoyed the swinging London setting and the sudden excitement of hearing the Yardbirds perform “Train Kept A-Rollin”, as well as the colorful and frenetic moments of Hemmings’ character shooting beautiful British models with his camera, it was really the silence and the isolation infusing Antonioni’s Blow-up that truly touched me and fascinated me in ways that few other films previously had. Once the movie had ended I knew I had seen something very special. I can remember trying to explain the film to friends and having trouble finding the words. At the time I was alone in my appreciation for the film but that was okay with me.
As the years passed I would see more of Michelangelo Antonioni’s films and I would also continue to feel more alone and isolated from a world which contained astonishing landscapes and breathtaking beauty while often remaining extremely cold and incomprehensible to me. Antonioni captured the world I saw and experienced with his camera. His films have made me appreciate and understand human loneliness and isolation in ways that few artists have. I’ve been moved and deeply touched by his work, which seemed to grasp at beauty in the most unexpected places and embrace the mystery of life that so many other artists, directors and human beings run away from or try to avoid and fill up with noise.
Appreciating the silence in life is essential to appreciating the work of Antonioni.
I’m often astonished by the amount of talking that characters do in film after film. When I was younger I would watch movies directed by the brilliant Woody Allen, or countless wonderful Howard Hawks’ comedies and be surprised and utterly entranced by the amazing communication and humor shared between characters and the deep feelings openly expressed in countless monologues. And while I appreciate well-written dialogue, the real world around me has always been rather silent. In my experience people rarely communicate. We might chat about life, work and family but it is often just surface nonsense with very little substance to it. Real relationships are hard to foster. True friendships are rare and should be treasured. We seem to be naturally guarded creatures who roam the world alone and finally die alone, no matter how deep our relationships are with friends and family. Michelangelo Antonioni understood this like no other director I’ve ever encountered.
Monica Vitti and Alain Delon in L’ Eclisse (1962)
Antonioni often tossed out convention when he made his films and embraced ambiguity. He knew that real life was full of questions that rarely had answers and he knew human behavior was often unpredictable and motivated by the incomprehensible interior life of every individual. He brought all of this truth to his films and I love him for it. I’m grateful that the world I know was so beautifully captured and shown to me through his camera. Antonioni was able to communicate with me in ways that few other artists and human beings have been able to and I’ll be forever grateful to him for that. Within Antonioni’s silences I heard symphonies.
Unfortunately it hasn’t always been very easy to see Antonioni’s films. In recent years that has changed due to companies like Criterion which have been making Antonioni’s films more accessible to American audiences, but I’ve still only seen L’Avventura (1960), La Notte (1961), L’Eclisse (1962), Red Desert (1964), Blow Up (1966) and The Passenger (1975) myself. Each of his films has resonated deep within me and I’d have a hard time leaving any of them off a list of “Favorite Films” that I might put together.
With Bergman’s death and now Antonioni’s passing, critics are bemoaning the lack of respect these directors seem to have with modern audiences but I think it’s ridiculous to weigh their incredible achievements against popular opinion. Antonioni’s work is so incredibly modern that it still confounds critics and divides audiences. If that isn’t the mark of an important filmmaker who’s work is still worth exploring and has much to offer current audiences, I don’t know what is. I have no doubt that Antonioni’s films will be appreciated for years to come and new generations of film lovers will find themselves discovering his work and being as deeply moved by it as I have been.
David Hemmings and Dario Argento on the set of Profondo Rosso (1974)
One of my favorite Italian directors has been making lots of news lately. On July 7th Dario Argento launched his first official website which is shaping up to be a really magnificent site jam packed with lots of info and eye-candy spanning Argento’s 40 year career. Unfortunately it’s only an Italian language site at the moment, but there are rumors that an English language mirror site will appear sooner or later.
On July 8th Argento was awarded the prestigious lifetime achievement award in Italy called The Golden Pegasus Award (The Pegaso d’Oro). Argento is mentioned at the very end of the following news article.
Last but not least, his newest film La Terza Madre (a.k.a. Mother of Tears) is set to be released on October 17th in Italy. La Terza Madre is the final chapter in Argento’s infamous “Three Mothers” trilogy, which started in 1977 with Suspiria and was followed by Inferno (1980). It’s hard not get excited about the film if you enjoyed the previous films in Argento’s trilogy. The cast, which includes genre favorites such as Udo Kier, Daria Nicolodi and Philippe Leroy, is very impressive. Lots of hype has surrounded the film, but only time will tell if it will be as good as the previous two movies. A bad quality video featuring the La Terza Madre trailer has been floating around YouTube which appears to be pirated, but it’s the only trailer online at the moment. *
*Edited! A link to the new trailer for La Terza Madre has been added below! (7.21)
Filmmaker Julien Duvivier is undoubtedly one of France’s most important and influential directors. Unfortunately unlike many of his contemporaries, such as Jean Renoir and René Clair, Duvivier’s cinematic contributions are sometimes forgotten. He was often dismissed by the Nouvelle Vague and his real talents were in re-imagining crime thrillers and fantasy films, which are genres generally overlooked by most critics. The director’s ability to produce worthwhile films in multiple genres may have not won him much critical praise during his lifetime, but in recent years Duvivier’s contributions to French noir and fantasy cinema have begun to be fully appreciated.
Duvivier found some success in Hollywood during the late 1930s and early 1940s with the lavish musical The Great Waltz (1938), a the star-filled comedy called Tales of Manhattan (1942) and the interesting dark fantasy anthology Flesh and Fantasy (1943), but he’s mainly remembered for the films he made with the great French actor Jean Gabin such as Pépé le Moko (1937) and Voici le temps des assassins… (1956). Unfortunately many critics still dismiss his later films and that’s a shame. I think some of Julien Duvivier’s most interesting movies were made in the sixties, including his last film Diaboliquement Vôtre (a.k.a. Diabolically Yours, 1967) which I just watched for a second time recently.
Diaboliquement Vôtre is a dark psychological thriller starring Alain Delon, Senta Berger, Sergio Fantoni and Peter Mosbacher. The movie opens with Georges Campo (Alain Delon) taking a long drive at high speeds down a seemingly deserted road in the French countryside. The drive is powered by a great soundtrack from composer François de Roubaix and it’s beautifully shot from the perspective of the driver. This perspective never really changes throughout the film since most of the events that follow are seen through the eyes of Delon’s character Georges. When the drive ends with a violent crash Georges finds himself waking up inside a hospital with amnesia. He quickly notices a wedding band on his finger but he can’t seem to recall his wife Christiane once she arrives at the hospital. Georges’ wife Christiane is played by the beautiful actress Senta Berger so he has no problem following her home even if he can’t remember marrying her.
When Georges arrives at his country estate he is overwhelmed by his luxurious surroundings. He can’t remember previously living there, but he’s more than happy to move in and make himself comfortable. Georges’ complacency seems a little odd at first but with a partner as lovely as Senta Berger and a home fit for a king, it’s understandable why someone might not ask too many questions and just accept their fate with a smile.
Things begin to get complicated when a family friend and doctor named Freddie (Sergio Fantoni) arrives for a visit and Georges seems to recognize him. Georges’ memories of Freddie don’t appear to coincide with reality but it’s clear that Georges’ reality has become more than a little clouded after his accident. Georges expresses his doubts about his new home and current wife, but Freddie manages to convince him that his injuries from the car crash are the reason for his confusion. The two men share a few laughs and Georges soon falls comfortably into the role of loving husband and Master of the manor again.
We’re also introduced to a Chinese servant named Kim (played rather stereotypically by German actor Peter Mosbacher) who devotes himself to Georges’ wife Christiane. The servant Kim not only cooks and cleans, but he also sews all of Christine’s cloths, offers her massages, styles her hair and satisfies numerous other desires. Georges seems to sense something strange about the relationship between his wife and the servant so he becomes increasingly rude and aggressive towards Kim as the movie progresses. Georges’ anger seems to increase as every sexual advance he makes towards his wife Christiane is refused.
As the film unfolds Georges becomes more and more suspicious of everyone around him and the situation he has found himself in. He even begins to question his own sanity after he starts hearing voices and having disturbing nightmares. Georges is also continually given drugs which are supposed to be helping him recall his memories, but they only seem to be adding to his muddled state of mind.
One of the most interesting things about Duvivier’s Diaboliquement Vôtre is the way the director plays with ideas about human identity and memory, as well as destiny and fate which were common themes that Duvivier seemed to enjoy exploring in his films. Alain Delon’s character Georges is perpetually torn between discovering the truth about his identity and succumbing to the pleasures that his current life offers him. He could easily answer many of the questions he continually raises about his past by asking to see family photos and talk to other family members or friends, but instead he engages in an ongoing conversation about his existence with himself and anyone who will listen. These conversations seem to take place in a void or echo chamber where Georges’ thoughts are continually thrown back at him.
The film’s stylish modern look also adds a lot to the production. Diaboliquement Vôtre was shot by the great French cinematographer Henri Decaë who was behind the camera for many of Alain Delon’s most important films such as Plein Soleil (1960), Le Samourai (1967), Le Cercle Rouge (1970), Les Félins (1964) and Le Clan des Siciliens (1969). Decaë’s camera was clearly in love with Delon because he shot the actor beautifully and manages to continually imbued him with an aura of charm and mystery that is undeniably appealing. Henri Decaë’s skillful camera work also flatters the lovely actress Senta Berger who has rarely looked more beautiful than she does in Diaboliquement Vôtre.
The movie ends with a few minor twists and turns which may or may not surprise viewers, but in the end we still know very little about Georges and the rest of the characters in the film. Their future is also a bit of a mystery since Duvivier’s conclusion to Diaboliquement Vôtre is somewhat open to interpretation and in turn lets us imagine multiple outcomes. Like many other European thrillers from the period, Diaboliquement Vôtre shrouds it’s rather conventional plot in metaphors and existential ideas that will probably only appeal to a handful of viewers. At first glance it’s easy to miss a lot of the movies’ underlying themes, but if you’re willing to suspend disbelief and follow Georges down his path to self discovery I think some viewers might find the film as rewarding as I did.
In an ironic twist, director Julien Duvivier was killed in an auto accident on October 30th just a few days after completing production on Diaboliquement Vôtre in 1967. It’s impossible to watch this film without considering the director’s final moments. There is something telling in Duvivier’s existential world view that seems to seep into the film’s every frame and shape its somewhat ambiguous end. If Diaboliquement Vôtre is any indication, the director would have continued to make interesting films if he had lived a bit longer and that is a real tragedy. As pessimistic and conventional as the film might appear to some, I think it has a kinetic energy and progressive style that’s incredibly modern and appealing. Diaboliquement Vôtre is an important final addition to Julien Duvivier’s extensive filmography.
Diaboliquement Vôtre is currently available on DVD as Diabolically Yours from Telavista but the quality of the DVD is rather awful. Hopefully another company will restore the film and give it the quality widescreen release that it deserves.
I never made a film thinking that I’d win the Grand Prize in Cannes. Never. I always thought it would be so beautiful for my films to be shown in theaters in the suburbs and the theater is packed with people who are enjoying my films. There it is, That’s more than enough. There’s nothing else. - Jess Franco
Today one of my favorite filmmakers turns 77 and I couldn’t let the date pass without wishing him a very happy birthday wherever he may be.
Franco seems to polarize people in my own experience. There’s a good chance that if you like him, you love him and if you don’t like him, you probably can’t understand what all the fuss is about. Either way you cut it, Jess Franco is a fascinating and creative man who for good or bad, may have made more movies than any other director I personally know of.
I tend to prefer Franco’s early films, in particular the movies he made between 1962 and 1972. The body of work he produced during that period is really amazing. Franco is one of horror cinema’s greatest auteurs in my opinion, and very few filmmakers working with his limited resources have been able to match his creative passion and shear volume of work.
Out of the 40+ films he made during 1962-1972, I’ve only managed to see 22 so far. Naturally I have my favorites such as The Diabolical Doctor Z (Miss Muerte, 1966) and I tend to prefer Franco’s films when they creatively blend horror with eroticism as in Venus in Furs (Paroxismus, 1969), Succubus (Necronomicon - Geträumte Sünden, 1968) and Vampyros Lesbos (1971) over his straight up erotic films. Many of Franco’s best movies inventively mix genres, which makes them almost impossible to easily categorize.
I also really like his early spy and espionage films that often featured strong female protagonists saving the day as in Two Undercover Angels (Rote Lippen, Sadisterotica, 1969) or trying to take over the world in The Girl From Rio (The Seven Secrets of Sumuru,1969).
Franco uses music brilliantly in his movies and he’s also a great musician in his own right. Volumes could be written about the numerous nightclub scenes featured in almost every Franco film. He returns to exotic dance clubs and erotic strip joints over and over again in his work. It’s almost as if the musician in him is longing to get out, so these trips he makes to various nightclubs in his movies could be one way that his inner musician is able to express itself.
When I think about Franco’s best films a few words replay in my head such as haunting, beautiful and surreal. There is an otherworldly quality about much of his work that I find utterly entrancing and even after watching so many of Franco’s movies (30+ at last count) I’m still eager to seek out more of his films and return to my favorites over and over again.
You can also find a nice post about Jess Franco over at Jeremy’s terrific blog Moon In The Gutter.
Tim Lucas also wrote up a great piece about Jess Franco today over at his Video WatchBlog. Here’s hoping that Tim follows up his Mario Bava book with a book on Franco!
I had planned on finishing up the Lucio Fulci tribute I started last week, which was slowed down by unexpected computer troubles, but I was deeply saddened to learn that the great British filmmaker & cinematographer Freddie Francis had passed away on March 17th due to complications following a stroke and I decided to spend some time writing about Francis instead since he’s long been one of my favorite filmmakers.
Freddie Francis began his career in cinema as a camera operator working with directors like Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger on The Tales of Hoffmann (1951) and John Huston on Moulin Rouge (1952), Beat the Devil (1953) and Moby Dick (1956).
In the late 50s Francis started focusing on cinematography and quickly became a master of his craft. He helped form what would later be called the British New Wave and was responsible for the impressive look of some of the best “angry young men” films of the period such as Saturday Night And Sunday Morning (1960). He also worked with great British directors like Joseph Losey on Time Without Pity (1957) and Jack Cardiff on the Oscar winning Sons and Lovers (1960). His early work helped breathe new life into British cinema and his black & white cinematography for director Jack Clayton was especially groundbreaking. The thoughtful drama Room at the Top (1959) and the haunting thriller The Innocents (1961) are both wonderful examples of what Freddie Francis was able to do with his camera.
Francis later turned to directing and was inspired by filmmakers such as Billy Wilder, William Wyler and Tod Browning, as well as his mentors which included John Huston and Michael Powell.
Some of his best work can be seen in the early films he made for Hammer Studios. Paranoiac is an under-appreciated gem made by Francis in 1963 which is beautifully directed and shot in stunning black & white. The director also manages to get Oliver Reed to deliver one of his greatest performances in Paranoiac as a tormented alcoholic. Another impressive early effort from Francis was the disturbing thriller Nightmare made in 1964. In Nightmare Jennie Linden plays a young girl who’s plagued by nightmarish visions and Francis does a stellar job of bringing the dark dream world she inhabits to life.
His color films were often just as interesting as his early black & white efforts, and some of his best movies included the seven horror films he made with the great Peter Cushing. Their first Hammer film together was the impressive Evil of Frankenstein (1964). Many fans of the Hammer Frankenstein films shun The Evil of Frankenstein because it takes a much different approach to the the character of the Doctor compared to how he’s usually portrayed in Hammer films. Instead of making Doctor Frankenstein a crazy & nasty man who’s out to do harm by making a monster, Freddie Francis turned him into a sympathetic character who’s horrified by his creation. I personally think the film is a great homage to the classic Universal Frankenstein movies of the 1930s & 40s, and the “birth of the monster” is especially well executed.
Following The Evil of Frankenstein, Freddie Francis made my favorite British horror anthology, Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors (1965) which has some extremely effective moments and is creatively shot. It also has a terrific cast that includes Christopher Lee, Donald Sutherland and Peter Cushing as the mysterious fortune teller Dr. Sandor Schreck. Francis had the ability to weave shorter films into a wonderful whole. They didn’t always work, but more often than not they did and in Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors he was once again able to coax his cast of actors into giving some memorable performances as the tormented victims of Dr. Sandor Schreck’s prophecies.
Freddie Francis would later on go to direct many other great horror anthologies including Torture Garden (1967) and Tales of the Crypt (1972). Tales of the Crypt is based on the EC Comic series of the same name and it was the first film Peter Cushing made after the sad death of his wife Helen. I’ve always been touched by the way Freddie Francis and Peter Cushing worked together on Tales of the Crypt. Both men decided to come up with a way to pay their respects to the woman Peter had deeply loved and lost, so they changed the name of Cushing’s deceased wife in the film to Helen and brought actual pictures of her onto the set. Many people assume that Peter Cushing was distraught at the time, but Freddie Francis has always said that it was a choice that he and Peter made together to honor her memory. I’m sure that working on the film probably helped Peter Cushing work through his grief, because he delivered a terrific and sympathetic performance in Tales of the Crypt as the eccentric Mr. Grimsdyke.
Other memorable films that Francis and Cushing made together include the excellent occult thriller The Skull, the creative werewolf film Legend of the Werewolf (1975), the creepy and entertaining Ghoul (1975) and The Creeping Flesh (1973) which brought Peter Cushing together with Christopher Lee in one of their best parings. I recently watched The Creeping Flesh again and was planning on writing up a review for it so you can expect a longer analysis of the film from me soon.
Oddly enough, one film that Francis and Cushing did not work on together was Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968). The film was Francis’ feature entry into Hammer’s Dracula series, but like The Evil of Frankenstein, Francis didn’t necessarily follow Hammer formula in Dracula Has Risen from the Grave and Peter Cushing’s Van Helsing is nowhere to be found. What his Dracula film does include is some breathtaking studio photography and lovely use of color, which makes it’s one of the most visually striking of all the Hammer Dracula movies. It also has some surprisingly gory moments and Lee’s Dracula is smartly presented as a seductive, yet scary creature with animal instincts and a nasty temper.
As the 1970s approached Freddie Francis was becoming increasingly tired of the British horror genre he helped create. He had never intended on making a name for himself in horror cinema, but the dramas and comedies he wanted to direct never materialized. Horror fans greatly admired his skills as a director and cinematographer so studios like Hammer, Tigon and Amicus continued to offer him projects which he reluctantly accepted. I’m thankful that he did, because I think some of his best work can be found in the atmospheric horror films he directed.
Even his failures were interesting such as the The Vampire Happening (1971) which plays like a stylish gothic episode of Benny Hill and the musical horror comedy Son of Dracula (1974) which features an impressive cast of musicians including Ringo Starr, Harry Nilsson, Peter Frampton, Keith Moon and John Bonham.
In the 80s Francis worked as a cinematographer on such films as The Elephant Man (1980, David Lynch), The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1981, Karel Reisz), Dune (1984, David Lynch), Cape Fear (1991, Martin Scorsese) and Glory (1989, Edward Zwick) which won him his second Oscar.
Thankfully he returned to directing for a brief time to make the terrific chiller The Doctor and the Devils (1985). The Doctor and the Devils was a film that Freddie Francis had wanted to make for 10 years and he got the opportunity to direct it when Mel Brooks (who he had met while working on The Elephant Man) agreed to help produce it. The film is based
as part of their terrific Euroshock Collection and it was originally released in 2002. The film is presented in widescreen with English subtitles and the print is excellent. The DVD also comes with a really nice documentary about the making of the film, which features Pupi Avati, as well as many cast and crew members. Other extras include a Lobby Card Gallery and a Theatrical Trailer.
(1967) and his Rolling Stones’ documentary Charlie Is My Darling (1966), which are the only two Whitehead films I’ve managed to see. If anyone can offer me advice on where I might be able to get full uncut copies of his later experimental work such as The Fall (1969), Fire in the Water (1977) with John Lennon and Nathalie Delon, as well Daddy (1973), I would be very grateful.
My first introduction to Antonioni was on a rainy Sunday afternoon when I was only about 12 years old back in the early 1980s. I was at home watching television when suddenly good old channel 2 in the Bay Area started to run Blow-up. At first I kept watching because I thought actor David Hemmings was incredibly cute, but as the film went on I became more and more drawn into the film’s mysteries and silences. While I enjoyed the swinging London setting and the sudden excitement of hearing the Yardbirds perform “Train Kept A-Rollin”, as well as the colorful and frenetic moments of Hemmings’ character shooting beautiful British models with his camera, it was really the silence and the isolation infusing Antonioni’s Blow-up that truly touched me and fascinated me in ways that few other films previously had. Once the movie had ended I knew I had seen something very special. I can remember trying to explain the film to friends and having trouble finding the words. At the time I was alone in my appreciation for the film but that was okay with me.
(1960), 
(1961), 
(1962), 
(1964), 
(1966) and 
(1975) myself. Each of his films has resonated deep within me and I’d have a hard time leaving any of them off a list of “Favorite Films” that I might put together.
from Telavista but the quality of the DVD is rather awful. Hopefully another company will restore the film and give it the quality widescreen release that it deserves.
Franco seems to polarize people in my own experience. There’s a good chance that if you like him, you love him and if you don’t like him, you probably can’t understand what all the fuss is about. Either way you cut it, Jess Franco is a fascinating and creative man who for good or bad, may have made more movies than any other director I personally know of.
(Miss Muerte, 1966) and I tend to prefer Franco’s films when they creatively blend horror with eroticism as in 
(Paroxismus, 1969), 
(Necronomicon - Geträumte Sünden, 1968) and 
(1971) over his straight up erotic films. Many of Franco’s best movies inventively mix genres, which makes them almost impossible to easily categorize. 
(Rote Lippen, Sadisterotica, 1969) or trying to take over the world in 
(The Seven Secrets of Sumuru,1969).
Franco uses music brilliantly in his movies and he’s also a great musician in his own right. Volumes could be written about the numerous nightclub scenes featured in almost every Franco film. He returns to exotic dance clubs and erotic strip joints over and over again in his work. It’s almost as if the musician in him is longing to get out, so these trips he makes to various nightclubs in his movies could be one way that his inner musician is able to express itself.
In the late 50s Francis started focusing on cinematography and quickly became a master of his craft. He helped form what would later be called the British New Wave and was responsible for the impressive look of some of the best “angry young men” films of the period such as Saturday Night And Sunday Morning (1960). He also worked with great British directors like Joseph Losey on Time Without Pity (1957) and Jack Cardiff on the Oscar winning Sons and Lovers (1960). His early work helped breathe new life into British cinema and his black & white cinematography for director Jack Clayton was especially groundbreaking. The thoughtful drama Room at the Top (1959) and the haunting thriller The Innocents (1961) are both wonderful examples of what Freddie Francis was able to do with his camera.
Freddie Francis would later on go to direct many other great horror anthologies including Torture Garden (1967) and Tales of the Crypt (1972). Tales of the Crypt is based on the EC Comic series of the same name and it was the first film Peter Cushing made after the sad death of his wife Helen. I’ve always been touched by the way Freddie Francis and Peter Cushing worked together on Tales of the Crypt. Both men decided to come up with a way to pay their respects to the woman Peter had deeply loved and lost, so they changed the name of Cushing’s deceased wife in the film to Helen and brought actual pictures of her onto the set. Many people assume that Peter Cushing was distraught at the time, but Freddie Francis has always said that it was a choice that he and Peter made together to honor her memory. I’m sure that working on the film probably helped Peter Cushing work through his grief, because he delivered a terrific and sympathetic performance in Tales of the Crypt as the eccentric Mr. Grimsdyke.