Late Night with the Devil, Being, Secret Window, The Land Unknown, Castle of the Creeping Flesh, and A Bay of Blood
Horror Bulletin Weekly Newsletter #278
We’ve got a good mix of old and new for you once again. We’ll open with the new “Late Night with the Devil” (2024) and then look out a “Secret Window” (2004) with Johnny Depp. After we take a break for our short film of the week, “Dysmorphia,” we’ll move on to 1957’s “The Land Unknown” and 2019’s “Being.”
The weekly newsletter this time around has two more oldies:
“Castle of the Creeping Flesh” from 1968
“A Bay of Blood” from 1971
Check out all our books with one easy link: https://brianschell.com/collection/horrorguys
Announcement!
Check out https://hourlongpress.com/ and sign up for the weekly free nonfiction book newsletter. The first seven books were about legendary horror icons: Vincent Price, Lon Chaney Jr., Bela Lugosi, Christopher Lee, etc. Now we’re moving into some various topics that we find interesting.
This week, it’s Brian’s turn once again, and he’s sticking with horror as his theme. This time, it’s “Halloween: A Guide to All 13 Films.” We look at all 13 films, plus a nice explanation of various timelines, alternate universes, remakes, requels, and– oh, it’s just complicated. It’s all here though!
Late Night with the Devil (2023)
Directed by Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes
Written by Cameron Cairnes, Colin Cairnes
Stars David Dastmalchian, Laura Gordon, Ian Bliss, Fayssal Bazzi
Run Time: 1 Hour, 33 Minutes
Trailer:
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
They did an excellent job of taking us back to the 1970s with the retro look and feel of a late night talk show/variety show. There’s quite a long introduction narrating a fictional history of Jack Delroy and his “Night Owls” show that was a competitor to Johnny Carson. Then we view a Halloween episode of the show that starts out normal and gets wilder and weirder as it goes on. We thought the ending was a little weaker than the rest of it, but we still liked it a lot.
Spoilery Synopsis
We get an early 70’s news montage as the narrator tells us that TV broadcasts the chaos. It’s April 1971, and a new late-night show, “Night Owls” premieres. The host of the brand-new show, Jack Delroy, comes out and makes a joke about everyone watching Johnny Carson instead.
Time passes, and we see that the show is a hit. We’re told that he’s a member of “The Grove,” a sort of secret society in California. Jack wants to beat out Carson as the main late-night show, but he can’t get there. In 1976, Jack’s wife gets lung cancer and comes onto the show, but even that doesn’t beat Carson; she died two weeks later.
Jack disappears for a month and then returns. The ratings start to fall, and it looks like his contract may not be renewed. It’s now Halloween night in 1977, and more importantly, it’s sweeps week. We are told that it was the live TV event that shocked the nation. Credits roll.
Jack and his co-host, Gus, have some lame banter. Jack tells the audience about the importance of sweeps week. He starts talking about popular interest in the occult, and their first guest is a spiritualist-medium, Christou. Christou talks about hearing the voices of the dead and the relevance to Halloween.
Christou goes into a trance, and it all looks like a generic staged mind-reading trick. Then he talks to a woman in the audience about a relative who killed himself; it all seems very serious this time, but it’s probably just fake. They get ready to go to a commercial when Christou suddenly has some kind of seizure and screams. The power goes crazy and Christou’s eyes go glassy; his nose bleeds. Then he says the spirit is gone, and they go to a commercial.
The next guest is Carmichael the Conjurer, a former stage magician who is now a professional skeptic and paranormal investigator. He says the world would be more interesting if the supernatural were real, but he’s never found anything real. He even offers a fortune for real proof. Christou has a coughing fit as Carmichael explains Christou’s trick and calls him a fraud and liar.
Jack admits that the scary reading from Christou may have been from Madeleine, his dead wife. Christou is looking really sick as Carmichael tries to scoff. Christou pukes green slime all over the stage and Carmichael. They immediately cut to another commercial.
When they return, Jack says that Christou is being seen by a doctor. Carmichael still thinks it was all a trick. Jack introduces the next guest, June Ross-Mitchell, the author of “Conversations with the Devil.” Jack thinks the book was profoundly disturbing. We cut to a recorded interview with Szandor D’Abo, the head of a Satanic cult. We watch clips of a ritual for the demon Abraxis. There was an eventual FBI standoff with the cult, and they all died in a mass suicide except for young Lilly, a strange girl.
June and Lilly come out on stage, and Lilly is weird from the get-go. She says Jack is going to be very famous, very soon, and that he shouldn’t worry about his ratings. At the break, June tells Jack that this is all a bad idea; Lilly is getting more and more unpredictable. The producer, Leo, tells Jack that Christou died in the ambulance.
When they return, Jack asks June what a parapsychologist is. Carmichael is still there, and he’s rude. She tells of her work with Lilly to figure out the demon that lurks within her. June and Carmichael argue. They’ve brought some things: a dagger, skull, and a few other items. Lilly says that “Mr. Wriggles” wriggles his way out of her from time to time.
Gus’s theremin goes berserk and shatters the glasses on the table. Lilly says Mr. Wriggles did it; Jack wants to talk to Mr. Wiggles. June says it’s a bad idea, but the others pressure her to summon the demon– after the commercial break. Gus and Jack argue about how weird Jack has been tonight and that he’s messing with things that he shouldn’t.
When they return to the show, June explains what’s going to happen to Lilly, who is strapped to a chair. She brings the demon out of Lilly very easily. Lilly’s face changes, and she talks in a different voice. She says she and Jack go way back; they met in the tall trees. She says Jack and June have been sleeping together, and June smacks her. Things quickly escalate to “full Exorcist,” right on camera as Lilly’s chair levitates and electrical disturbances fly around the studio. Jack interrupts, shaken. Carmichael wants to debunk it all. No, it’s time for another commercial.
Jack thinks the show is going really great; he releases Lilly’s straps. Gus tells Carmichael what happened to Christou– that wasn’t fake. Leo says that some of the crew have walked off, but the FCC wants to meet in the morning. This could be huge.
After the break, Jack apologizes to anyone who might have been offended by the televised demon possession. He talks to Lilly, who says it was like being asleep and awake at the same time. Jack wants to hear Carmichael explain it away.
Carmichael wants to re-enact the demon possession using Gus as a subject. He pulls out a spinning pocket watch and hypnotizes Gus and the audience. Then he asks Gus about his fear of worms; that seems random, but he’s right. Gus talks about how hot and itchy he is, and then he starts pulling worms out of his neck. He rips open his belly, and hundreds of worms pour out. Carmichael snaps his fingers, but it doesn’t stop. Gus turns into a big pile of worms, but then Carmichael manages to end the trick. It’s all fine. Jack wants the whole thing replayed from tape; it’s completely different from what everyone remembers.
Jack has to admit it was a fine trick, but June insists that she didn’t hypnotize anyone. Lilly suggests playing her part of the show back from tape as well; it’s exactly what we saw previously, so it wasn’t a matter of hypnosis. They slow the tape down, and Jack sees the ghost of his dead wife standing behind him. On the stage, Lillt starts to shake, and things get weird again.
Lilly’s head bursts open, and fire pours out. She kills Gus, and the audience stampedes for the door. June and Jack get thrown around the stage. June has her throat cut open. Carmichael finally believes before bursting into flames. Leo pulls Jack out the back door.
“Station Difficulties” appears on the screen.
Gus introduces Jack onto the show; it’s a new episode. Jack doesn’t know why he’s there or how he got there. It’s all very ominous. He reappears in segments that we’ve seen clips of before, only they all go badly. Jack tells the audience to “Turn off your televisions.” We cut to Jack signing papers for the studio as cultists attend. “Jack’s greatest sacrifice is yet to come.” Szandor D’Abo is there, and he congratulates Jack. A door opens, and Jack sees Madeleine on her deathbed. She says that he had to pay a price to become #1.
“It wasn’t supposed to turn out this way,” he cries. He picks up the dagger from the table and stabs her.
Back on the set, in the real world, Jack has stabbed Lilly. Everyone else is dead.
Commentary
The first nine minutes are pure exposition and flashback, telling us Jack’s backstory. It’s a very realistic interpretation of a 70’s talk show, except I don’t remember any of them being this entertaining in real life.
It starts out pretty simple but escalates quickly and gets really weird. We really liked this one!
Secret Window (2004)
Directed by David Koepp
Written by Stephen King, David Koepp
Stars Johnny Depp, John Turturro, Maria Bello, Timothy Hutton
Run Time: 1 Hour, 36 Minutes
Trailer:
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This was a really good one, taking a creepy stalker to another level. As things get worse and worse, we wonder how Mort the victim will get out of this. Can he satisfy the stalker and turn things around to free himself? Gotta watch to find out.
Synopsis
Mort Rainey sits in his car and tells himself to turn around and get out right now. Then he does just that– No, he has to go back to that motel. He goes inside the office, grabs a key, and interrupts a couple having sex inside. Credits roll.
Six months later, someone comes banging on Mort’s door. It’s John Shooter, who tells Mort, “You stole my story.” He’s unpleasant and wants to settle this dispute, but Mort has no idea what he’s even talking about. He leaves a copy of “Sowing Season” that John wrote; Mort’s never heard of him or his story. He looks at it, and it’s almost word for word of something he wrote in his story “Secret Window.” He keeps telling himself, “I didn’t steal that story. I don’t think.”
Mort’s soon-to-be ex-wife, Amy, calls. They talk about when he wrote the story, he was drunk most of the time.
Later, he runs into John in the woods. John says he wrote it seven years ago, but he has no idea how a big-deal author like Mort got ahold of his story. Mort says he wrote it in 1994. John is more than a little bit menacing. John gives Mort three days to get a copy of that magazine to prove the date.
That night, Mort finds his porch light has been broken. He also finds that his dog has been killed.
The next morning, Mort goes to the sheriff, but he seems a little incompetent. Next, he goes to his private investigator friend, Ken, who asks if Mort did steal the story, which Mort again denies. He stops by Amy’s house but doesn’t go in after the magazine.
When he returns to his cabin, he finds Ken waiting there for him. He’s checked the place out, and it’s all safe. Ken promises to check into John first thing in the morning. We see that Mort is maybe a little paranoid; he smashes his bathroom in a panic. He soon finds John outside, and he knows all about what Mort’s been up to. John really doesn’t like the way Mort messed up the ending he wrote. John threatens to find and hurt Amy if Mort doesn’t make things right.
The next morning, Amy calls and says someone burned down their house last night. He goes to assess the damage and runs into Amy and her boyfriend, Ted. They’re the couple he barged in on in the pre credit sequence. The fire investigator says it was definitely arson. Mort tells all about John as the likely suspect.
Amy asks if John is “like that other guy,” and Mort swears that it’s not like that this time. Mort and Ted argue at the insurance company. Ted mentions that he's from “Shooter’s Bay.” John’s last name is Shooter. Hmmmm.
Ken calls; he ordered a copy of the magazine, and it’ll be there tomorrow. Ken suggests that maybe John is really working for someone else; could it be Ted? Only one person in town saw John, and the two make plans to see the old man in the morning.
Mort oversleeps in the morning and when he gets up, he finds his car open and running outside. When he gets to the meeting place, Ken hasn’t shown up yet. On his way back home, he runs into Ted at the gas station and accuses him of hiring John to terrorize him. Ted wants Mort and Amy’s divorce papers finalized, but Mort is stalling.
John calls Mort at home and tells him where to meet. Mort finds Tom, the old man who saw him with John, inside his car dead along with Ken, also dead. John says that he’s left plenty of evidence that points the two dead men to Mort. Mort cleans up the crime scene and dumps the victims’ truck into the lake– along with his wristwatch.
Mort goes to the Post Office and picks up a copy of this magazine. He tries to avoid the sheriff, who feels guilty about hiding the bodies. Mort looks at the magazine, and he finds that the important pages have already been torn out.
Mort starts talking to himself in a very unstable kind of way– he might just be crazy, he says so himself. He explains to himself that he made it all up; there is no John Shooter. John shows up and admits that he’s imaginary. He killed Tom and Ken and set Amy’s house on fire.
Amy arrives outside Mort’s cabin. She finds the pages of the story outside next to the car, right where Mort left them. She finds lots of evidence that Mort is simply crazy, including finding Mort wearing John’s hat and talking like he’s from Mississippi. She runs out to the car, but he grabs her and drags her out just as Ted drives up. Ted gets a shovel to the face and then gets beheaded, as does Amy.
Some time passes, and Mort’s all cleaned up and looking much healthier. He fixed the ending of his own story, so now he’s enjoying his happy ending. The sheriff comes by and says they both know what he did. “Eventually, we’ll find those bodies, tie them to you, and then we’ll put you away.” Mort explains that the ending to this story is perfect, and that’s the only thing that matters.
We look outside his “secret window” to the garden full of corn that’s growing there. What’s under all that corn to make it grow so thick and lush?
Commentary
The conflict was over whether Mort’s story appeared in a specific issue of a magazine. Couldn’t they have just looked it up online? This was in 2004 after all. The story wouldn’t have been available online, but surely some hobbyist had a list of the stories and dates. Still, the original story was written in 1995, so maybe that explains it.
I considered all along that John wasn’t real, but it wasn’t certain until near the end. Overall, I liked this one a lot!
Short Film: Dysmorphia (2024)
Directed by Amy Geist
Written by Amy Geist
Stars Brit Macrae, Jordan Knapp, Laura Domerick, Blair Lindsley
Run Time: 12:17
Watch it:
What Happens
Isabella records a YouTube video where she talks about her miraculous cancer recovery. We see that she has many donors to pay for her treatment. She thanks them profusely and then logs off. Afterward, she removes her scarf and lets down her long, perfectly healthy hair; she’s faking cancer for the donations.
In reality, she plans to use the money from her donors to pay for various plastic surgeries. Then she starts hearing things, and we see some oddness in the mirrors.
What happens when you lie on the Internet? Bad things.
Commentary
Who says motherly advice has to be good advice? The bit with the “marker” at the end is really good.
It looks good, is well-paced, and has a fun concept. We’ve seen these kinds of creature effects before, but it’s really effective here.
The Land Unknown (1957)
Directed by Virgil W. Vogel
Written by Laszlo Gorog, William N. Robson, Charles Palmer
Stars Jock Mahoney, Shirley Patterson, William Reynolds, Henry Brandon
Run Time: 1 Hour, 18 Minutes
Trailer:
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
It’s a small group of sweaty survivors struggling in a tropical zone in Antarctica inhabited by dinosaurs that never went extinct. One has to take the age of it into account, and when one does, it’s surprisingly entertaining. The story, acting, direction, and effects are all decent enough. Overall we enjoyed it.
Synopsis
We open in a military briefing about a mission to Antarctica, and we’re told about Admiral Byrd. They’ve found warm water and animal bones there, which they weren’t expecting.
Captain Burnham welcomes journalist Margaret Hathaway, and he warns her about being alone with 800 men. She seems smart, capable, and used to dealing with misogyny. He introduces her to Commander Alan Roberts and Lt. Jack Carmen. She’s going along to document their exploration. He shows us footage of what appears to be actual Antarctica footage. Not long after, everyone boards big ships and heads south.
On the boat, Alan and Margaret flirt awkwardly. They get there after several weeks, and Jack takes off in the helicopter with Steve, Margaret, and Alan. They see seals and penguins and Mt. Erebus, a dormant volcano. They arrive at the warm-water region, but they get a call that bad weather is coming, so they need to return to base. They can’t fly around the storm, so they have to set down before the storm hits.
A huge flying bird swoops out of nowhere and damages something, so they have to land, right now. They drop below sea level somehow and notice that the temperature is going up. It’s 91 degrees. They find the bottom and hit pretty hard. Mechanic Steve says it’s not a hard repair, but it’ll take some time.
Alan says there’s volcanic activity here, which is why it’s so hot. We get glimpses of monsters and weirdness in the background, but none of the characters see anything. Steve comes back and says he can’t fix the copter after all - a part is broken - so they’ll have to hope for a rescue. Jack gets on the radio to call for help, but he runs the battery down.
Another of those birds flies over, and they all see that it’s a pterodactyl, not a bird. Alan says the warmth is trapped here, so evolution has no reason to advance; there’s no telling what kind of ancient creatures might live here. Soon, they see a couple of giant lizards battling it out in the distance. Then a T-Rex shows up. They turn on the helicopter blade, which chops it a bit until it backs away.
They soon find some of their food eaten and missing. Something opened cans, and it wasn’t the T-Rex. There must be something intelligent out there. Alan reminds everyone that the main expedition will be leaving in 25 days, and they’ll be stuck here forever if that happens.
Alan explains the evolution of the monkeys, and the others have never heard such a crazy thing. Monsters attack, and someone carries Maggie away into a little boat. Alan finds the “man’s” footprints, and the three men pursue on foot.
Maggie wakes up, and there’s a strange man there who offers her something to drink– in English. He’s Dr. Carl Hunter, the only survivor from a previous expedition; he’s not even sure how many years it’s been. He’s got a big shell that he uses as a horn to scare away the dinosaurs. Alan, Jack, and Steve come in with their guns drawn, and Hunter tells his story.
Hunter offers to give them the missing part from his helicopter in exchange for leaving Maggie there with him. He’s mostly insane at this point after being there for so long.
Maggie’s grabbed by a creature with tentacles, and Hunter saves her this time. She thinks the guys should take Hunter’s deal and leave her there. She steals the boat and heads to Hunter’s cave. A sea monster intercepts her little boat, but Hunter is there with some huge torches and a horn that he has sort of conditioned the animals to avoid. This one is really persistent, but he eventually beats the creature.
Steve follows them, and the two men fight. Steve tortures Hunter for the location of the copter parts, but Alan charges in and stops him. Hunter gives them a map to the wreck; all he really wants is to be left alone.
The guys get the missing replacement part and fix the helicopter. A dino knocks out Maggie, and Hunter could keep her in his cave, but he does the right thing and carries her to the waiting copter. The T-Rex shows up again, and the three men take off in the helicopter before it gets them.
They lower a winch to get Maggie, and Hunter helps her into it. Hunter rows off into the fog, alone, and we see the water dinosaur from before following him. It capsizes his boat and smashes him while the others watch from above.
They shoot the dino with a flare gun, and Alan jumps in to save Hunter. They’re all going home! They’re within sight of the boats when they run out of fuel and do a water landing. Still, they all survive. Alan says there’ll probably be another expedition next year, and invites Maggie to go along… for their honeymoon!
Commentary
Dinosaurs in Antarctica? Why not? The hardest thing to believe is that that little helicopter had that much fuel.
The dinosaurs are pretty well done for the time. The T-Rex was a guy in a suit, but we’ve seen worse. Kevin noticed the T-Rex was drooling, which was a nice touch. Some of the giant lizards were real lizards in extreme close-ups.
The cast is small, and the acting is decent. Considering the age of the film and the limited effects, it’s really pretty well done.
Being (2019)
Directed by Douglas C. Williams
Written by Matthew Quinn, Douglas C. Williams
Stars Lance Henriksen, Robert John Burke, Ben Browder
Run Time: 1 Hour, 25 Minutes
Trailer:
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This seemed like it should have been better than it was. There was too much talk and not enough alien strangeness. It’s got some interesting ideas and cool moments, but mostly it was pretty dull.
Spoilery Synopsis
Reverend Campbell talks to a group of people about something that happened, and he says every bit of it is true. Credits roll.
A super bright light comes on the barn and then goes out again. At the police station, there’s a man waiting to be interrogated about missing bodies. Two FBI agents, Dixon and Costa, come in to talk to the man. He’s got a record, but he’s been a “ghost” for the past six years. Joseph explains that it wasn’t him; it was “them.”
We flashback to Joseph waking up, disoriented. He gets mental flashes of something alien. Later, Dale, Dennis, Tanya, and some friends come over, and there’s some drama.
We cut back to the FBI, now questioning Dale. Back at the party, all the power goes off in the farmhouse where the group has gathered. The family bickers and argues, and they all notice their phones are dead as well. So are the flashlights and everything electric. Everyone seems needlessly hostile to each other, and you have to wonder why they got together in the first place. They all hate Joseph for abandoning them; they even had a funeral for him, but he says “it’s complicated.”
Joseph calls the sheriff on the landline. The sheriff is skeptical about where Joseph’s been all these years. Joseph then goes out to the barn, where his brothers put all his stuff after he “died.”
The brothers have a semi-religious discussion about who has the power in town. Apparently, it’s all about who owns a car and who doesn’t. In the barn, Joseph talks to Grace, his former girlfriend, who is now married to Dale and carrying Dale’s child. Joseph tells her he doesn’t know where he’s been.
All the brothers go “coon hunting” in the auto shop and see something that’s not quite human. They shoot it, but then Tanya shoots Alan by accident. Everyone comes back into the house, and Carl’s talking about things that “human eyes were not meant to see. I’m talking about demons!” Joseph knows more than he’s telling, but Carl won’t let anyone leave the house to get help for Dale.
Joseph asks the creature outside to take him back again. “I understand now.” Dale hallucinates a conversation with the sheriff and the preacher. Suddenly, Tanya’s eyes turn white and Grace reports that Dale has died. Carl still insists that it’s the apocalypse, and Tanya starts getting all cryptic.
Joseph finally tells his story to Grace. Six years ago, “it” came for him. It took him to a place where he knew everything. It’s not a demon, “It’s beyond our labels. It’s beyond space and time.” Dale overhears the conversation, and now he wants the three of them to leave together, no matter what Carl says.
Carl enters with his revolver. He admits that he just shot Dennis outside, and then Grace whacks him with a shovel. Suddenly, there’s a bright light from outside and Joseph goes into the light. Grace wants to go too, but she ends up getting shot in the head.
In the morning, Grace wakes up and says she hasn’t seen Dale in so long. Dale wants to know what happened to the baby. What baby? Where’s Carl?
They all figure out that Grace doesn’t remember having a relationship with Dale at all. She’s been reset to when she was with Joseph. “That’s what it does. It doles out mercy. Its ways are not our ways.”
Back in the FBI room, the agents are not impressed with the story. They find Dennis, and he’s going to live. Alan is still dead. Tanya’s out in the field as well, with white eyes and looking a little insane. The FBI releases Joseph.
The sheriff tells the whole story to the reverend, who tells him to bury the truth. “In time, this will all just go away, just like before.” Turns out, the FBI guys have seen this before, and they also want to contain it.
Commentary
Lance Henriksen, the top-billed star, gets less than two minutes of screen time.
It’s sooooo talky and slow. Everyone in this family seems to hate each other, and all they do is fight. Carl’s a religious nut who insists that he doesn’t believe anything. Dale just goes along with everything Carl says. Dennis is a wimp who won’t stand up to anyone, and everyone just hates Joseph.
It seems vaguely religious, but not really, not exactly. It wants to be profound and fails badly.
It’s not a terrible story “on paper,” but it’s very poorly directed and paced. Most of all, it’s DULL.
Castle of the Creeping Flesh (1968)
Directed by Adrian Hoven
Written by Jesus Franco, Adrian Hoven, Eric Martin Schnitzler
Stars Janine Reynaud, Howard Vernon, Elvira Berndorff, Claudia Butenuth
Run Time: 1 Hour, 17 Minutes
Trailer:
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
It’s a confused and incomplete story, horribly dubbed and drawn out. There is an overabundance of breasts, lusts, and rapes. Yet it’s strange enough to be interesting as you ponder what the heck is going on. And at least it’s a short trip.
Synopsis
Credits roll as we get scenes from a very 1960s party. Baron Brack invites Elena to come home with him to his isolated, very private house in the country.
Meanwhile, Brack fixes a drink for Elena, and she laughs at him, which he finds annoying. He stares at her bug-eyed as he undresses her. “Please, No,” she whines as he undresses her and climbs on top. Afterward, she asks about his fiance. “You should have thought about that before you tempted me!”
Vera, Marion, George, and Roger get on horseback to find Brack’s country home. They have a lot of fun on horseback trying to find the place. Elena gets dressed as they arrive. Brack invites them in and tells the story about his neighbors in the castle. Vera wants to pay them a visit, but Brack says no one is allowed in the grounds of the Earl of Saxon.
Marion tells the story about how the Earl of Saxon’s daughter was attacked in the woods, so the Earl released a vicious bear in retaliation. Brack says there haven’t been any wild bears in the country in ages now. Elena, still upset about being raped, rides off on her horse. George and Brack ride after her– onto the Earl of Saxon’s land. Vera catches up with them later.
Meanwhile, the Earl of Saxon pronounces his daughter dead. We see the Earl’s servant, Alecos, carrying Elena into the castle. Alecos leads the others to the castles, but reiterates that the Earl does not like visitors. The Earl looks at Vera, and his eyes get big.
Alecos tells Brack about the Earl’s daughter, who was attacked by a man in the forest three days ago. The Earl has sedated Elena, as she was in shock when she arrived. Alecos makes the Baron put on a costume which represents Death. There are period clothes for all of them. The Earl tells a story about an ancestor whose daughter was killed. The man tried to bring his daughter back from the dead, and they beheaded him for it. He mentions his own daughter died an hour ago, and from the look on Baron Brack’s face, we know he was the one who attacked her.
Roger and Marion show up, and she’s been injured. Marion looks just like Katherine, the dead girl, a fact that isn’t lost on the Earl or Alecos. She too soon gets sedated upstairs. The Earl asks a strange man, “Should we try it?” “Yes, we should.” They all sit down to dinner, where Brack and Vera make eyes at each other. Afterward, we cut to an operating room, where the Earl and the Stranger slice someone open.
On the way to their rooms, Alecos shows the guests a life-sized diorama of the Earl’s ancestor’s rape and murder. Brack says he’s not staying; he’ll ride his horse home and bring the car back tomorrow. Alecos warns Brack about the big bear in the forest.
Later that night, Alecos carries Marion, still unconscious, downstairs to the dungeon/operating room.
In the next room, Vera has a nightmare about the Earl’s ancestor and the story about his murdered daughter. This goes on for entirely too long, but it’s an excuse to show more bare breasts. We then cut to the old Earl, who learns about his daughter’s rape. All of this is in hazy “flashback” blurriness. The Earl knows it was the girl’s stepmother who betrayed her, and we see that Vera is the dream stand-in for the stepmother. He stabs her and then does a heart transplant to revive his daughter. We cut to the operation currently underway in the basement, and it’s the same thing, only in parallel.
Downstairs, the Earl and the stranger shock the heart back into action, and the operation appears to be a success. Upstairs, Vera and Roger have sex. George goes looking for Marion, but she’s not in her room.
Meanwhile, Baron Brack is attacked by a bear in the woods. George, on the other hand, gets lost in the underground labyrinth, much to Alecos’s enjoyment.
Upstairs, Vera and Roger wake up Elena, who is fine now. Alecos hears knocking at the door and lets Brack back in, covered in blood. Downstairs, George finds the dead body of Marion.
Upstairs, the Earl comes in, along with Marion– no, it’s his resurrected daughter, Katherina. More importantly, she’s told the baron who raped and killed her. The Earl pulls out his dagger and stabs at Brack but kills Katherina by accident. He pulls out the knife and kills Brack, too.
The Earl carries his dead daughter upstairs and jumps off the roof of the castle.
The stranger then gets on his horse and rides away; he was Death all along!
Commentary
The dubbing is atrocious. There are several scenes of what appear to be real shots of open-heart surgery (obviously a valve replacement). There are two full-on rape scenes and a third that takes place offscreen.
It's horribly drawn out. We didn't need the super-extended dream flashback to a story we'd already been told. The surgery scenes, although interesting, were also overly long.
The bear in the woods was a weird, out of the blue, touch of surprise. The ending is really weird and trippy, but the rest of the film was just… strange.
A Bay of Blood (1971)
Directed by Mario Bava
Written by Mario Bava, Giuseppe Zaccariello, Filippo Ottoni
Stars Claudine Auger, Luigi Pistilli, Claudio Camaso
Run Time: 1 Hour, 24 Minutes
Watch it:
Spoiler-free Judgment Zone
This is often considered the first real “slasher” film and some of the kills look like ones in later films like Friday the 13th. This is also a bit of a whodunnit with a surprisingly complex script with some unexpected things. It holds up well and is worth checking out for sure if you’re a slasher fan.
Spoilery Synopsis
We start at a bay and zoom in on an old house. An old woman in a wheelchair looks out the window. Suddenly, a man puts a noose around her neck and pushes her out of the wheelchair. She kicks and grunts for a bit before dying. The man hears something in the house and goes to investigate, but there’s nothing there. He leaves a suicide note for the old woman, but then someone we don’t see stabs him to death.
Frank jokes about “Squonks” with his naked secretary he’s having sex with on the side. He’s going to the bay to investigate the suicide of the countess; her husband has mysteriously disappeared. She might come by later this evening to keep him company.
Back at the bay, someone with binoculars watches people acting suspiciously. Fossati runs around with an insect net, and Simon the fisherman jokes that he’s always hunting the same bug. They debate whether the countess’s death was murder or suicide.
Frank talks to his boss; he wants to buy the countess’s land from whoever now controls it; the blasting can start immediately afterward. They are going to develop the area. Four young people drive their dune buggy to the beach. They go into a house to dance, but someone is watching them.
Elsewhere, a strange woman reads her ominous tarot cards. She’s Mrs. Fosetti, and she goes looking for her husband in his “bug lab.” The two bicker and argue, and it’s clear they don’t much care for each other. He talks to his bugs and mocks Anna’s tarot cards. Paul says Frank wants to transform the bay into a sea of cement.
One of the young people goes to swim in the freezing bay while the other three break into a nearby house to dance some more. From the pictures on the wall, we see that it’s Frank’s house. The girl in the lake gets hung up on a rope and pulls up a dead body. She runs to find Roberto, but is instead chased by the unseen man. She doesn’t make it to the house. Roberto opens the door and he gets a knife to the face. The other two young people are having sex, and we see the killer drive a spear through both of them, all the way though the bed.
Anna does more tarot, but Paul’s not around to hear about it; he’s outside looking for more bugs.
Renata and Alberta leave the kids in their camper and go to visit the Fossatis. Frank watches them drive by as he arrives at his house. Renata is the countess’s daughter, and they want information about the “suicide.” Anna and Paul don’t believe it was suicide. They explain that the countess’s husband wanted to sell the whole bay to developers, but the countess wouldn’t allow it. Anna mentions that the countess had an illegitimate son, Simon; he may have inherited something in the countess’s will. Anna points them to Frank, who knew Renata’s father very well. Anna wonders how Paul got that big cut on his hand.
Frank has already gone to see Simon, and he’s signed papers. Renata finds her dead father in the bottom of Simon’s boat being eaten by an octopus. They go to Frank's house and find all the young peoples’ bodies. Frank comes after Renata, but she stabs him in the leg.
Everyone goes snooping in the woods. Anna goes snooping around Simon’s cabin. Albert returns and Renata tells him to “take care of” Frank. Paul also finds the bodies and runs home to call the police, but Alberto kills him before he can dial the number.
Frank’s secretary calls from the gas station; she’s on her way, but no one answers the call. Anna finds Frank passed out on the floor. Someone cuts her whole head off with an ax. Renata admits it to Alberto a few minutes later. She says they still have to get rid of Simon, but then they spot Frank’s secretary, Laura, driving in. Frank’s not dead, and he tells her to go get Simon.
Simon blames Laura for helping Frank kill his mother. He admits killing the countess’s husband. We get a flashback where Frank and Laura offered to buy the bay from the countess, but she wouldn’t sell. Laura stole the old woman’s diary. Frank told Laura to seduce the countess’s husband and get him to kill the countess, which he later did. Simon insists that Laura was involved and just as guilty as Frank. She throws boiling water in his face, but he still tackles and strangles her.
Simon goes for a walk and then we get another flashback where Simon talks to Frank about buying his land. Frank needs a copy of the old woman’s will. Out of nowhere, Albeto stabs Simon with a spear. Renata and Alberto ransack Frank’s house for the document, but then the lights go out and Frank attacks. Renata watches as Alberto kills Frank.
Alberto says “All’s well that ends well.” Then their two small children (whom we saw for about three seconds earlier) shoot them both.
WTF?
Commentary
This is often considered the first “slasher” film. The first two “Friday the 13th” movies both stole scenes directly from this. You can absolutely see the similarities between this and the “feel” of the F13 films. It’s well into the film before we find out who the killer is.
It’s quite good and still holds up pretty well today. That ending though– we never saw that coming!
Stay tuned for more regular and bonus reviews next week!
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