Saturday, October 18, 2014

October Movie Challenge: Vampire 1960s

The 60s were an interesting time for horror, and not one I get into a lot.  The 60s was almost always about science delving into forbidden areas.  Where the 50s gave us giant monsters and arguably the dawn of Sci-Fi cinema and the 70s a ton of occult-influenced movies, it is easy to see the 60s a coming together of these ideas.  Science tries to explain, defeat, or ever create the monsters of old.

Atom Age Vampire (1960)
Ah the 60s and all things scary had to be about atomic energy.
Actually there are no vampires in this one. Just a crazy doctor and his "atomic" cure for skin disfigurement.  I guess the vampire bit comes from the plot that he has to kill young women to keep his patient and now love interest alive...or at least looking normal.
Pretty dull. I actually paused to watch an episode of "Adventure Time" ("Simon and Marcy") in the middle of it.  Marcelline is a much better vampire anyway.



The Bloody Vampire (1962)
"Whip those horses for Satan's sake!"  
There are some interesting bits here.  The mandagora root growing underneath a hanging victim and the horse and coach moving completely silent.  In this one the descendants of Count Cagliostro are sorcery using vampire hunters.  Actually for the time this is movie is quite good and considered to be one of the best Mexican horror movies made.  Very creepy and gothic.  The characters are actually quite engaging. Much, much better than I expected it to be.
I'd love to try a game of a family of vampire hunters and vampires dealing deadly attacks to each other over the century.
There is a great review here and I mostly concur with it.
http://www.coolasscinema.com/2009/03/bloody-vampire-1962-review.html

Nightmare Castle (1965)
Another Italian gothic horror with sci-fi leanings.  This one though also features the queen of 60s horror Barbara Steele playing sisters.  Much more open brutality than you see in later movies.  Steele's character is beaten, tied up, tortured with acid and even electrocuted.   Not sure if this is really a vampire movie or not.  Sure the maid needs fresh blood and there are some ghosts.
Despite the lack of vampire in the traditional sense this made for a good flick.



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Tally so far:  24 Total Watched / 17 New

What do you find scary?
October Horror Movie Challenge hosted by Krell Laboratories.


2 comments:

Unknown said...

The Bloody Vampire is a pretty entertaining film! I regret that I waited so late in my horror movie watching life to watch Mexican horror films. They have such wonderfully fevered imaginative quality. A few years ago there was a company called Casa Negra which released a nice clutch of Mexican horror films before expiring. The recommend for you from that set is, obviously, The Witch's Mirror. Not sure how hard it is to get now but hey what can you do right? Not saying it is a perfect movie but I've spun my copy plenty.

Timothy S. Brannan said...

I have some others coming up. I hope I can get to them.