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This is another one of those "lost Eurohorror treasures" I read about for years before finally stumbling upon in Brentwood Home Video's HORROR RISES FROM THE GRAVE bargain bin set, which is worth EVERY penny. One of the forces that championed this film to me was Cathall Tolhill and Peter Tombs' IMMORAL TALES -- a highly Squonk Approved compendium on European erotic horror & exploitation films 1962 to 1982 or so. The nice big color reproduction of the EL BUQUE MALDITO marquee poster was what really caught my imagination though: The image of the bikini'd lovely being carried to her death like a life-sized holy communion is very striking, and in fact restaged in the film in a really eerie moment.But when I first saw the print Brentwood digitized I kind of wondered if Cathall & Pete had been referring to a different film. Along with their writings, posts to various message forums on Eurohorror and contact with folks who knew it inside & out had sort of created this expectation of an insane, bowel eviscerating excersize in borderline pornographic horror.What I found, instead, has been FAR, FAR more precious: this is one of the most gloriously goofy movies ever made, and now a genuine Guilty Pleasures favorite -- especially when viewed in it's 'UNCUT' 90 minute form available online from a number of sources, though forget about Amazon. The preferred English Language version to find is a long out of print re-issue for home video from the mid 1980's called HORROR OF THE ZOMBIES. Unfortunate choice of titles; one of my thesis statements on Ossorio's work relates to how irresponsibly his work has been marketed. Sorry to nitpick, but the Blind Dead aren't "zombies", they are Templars. Members of the Knights Templars sect, based on a legend of a band of blind monks who banded together to protect the innocent from the ravages of the Spanish Inquisition [which No One Expects!!, by the way]. [Sorry had to do that once :D]Ossorio changed that legend and made the Templars a group of Knights who had learned the secret of eternal life while on Crusade in the middle east: Torture and ritually slaughter a gorgeous Spanish supporting actress, then feast on her still warm blood and flesh. If anything they have more in common with vampires -- very much in vogue for 1970's Eurohorror. They sleep in graves or coffins between blood rituals, cannot be harmed by conventional methods other than burning, and according to EL BUQUE MALDITO, fear exorcismic incantations & flaming crosses. Good thing they had a Professor from a local science institute with them to act as an "Expert" figure who just happened to be versed in the Templars.And right there is the beginning of why this is such a fun movie. Movies used to be fun. Now there has to be some message, some underlying theme to redeem the $20 million dollars wasted on the garbage flooding the cineplex screens. They are painful to sit through, and look like they were painful to make.Not this one. This must have been a riot, mostly because Ossorio apparently shared the insight with those involved that what they were making was GARBAGE, and as such the film is better than it had to be but still produces some great laugh out loud "That is sooo fake" moments that are just plain "fun". If anything, the movie looks like it may have been inspired by that old SCOOBY DOO WHERE ARE YOU? adventure with the Ghost Pirate on his sunken galleon in the Sargasso Sea [or wherever]. The film starts with a rather pointless introduction that includes an unpleasant sex assault scene [flavorings of a women in prison flick?], but once the main action moves above the galleon set Ossorio was able to utilize the interest level picks up.Fans of Godzilla films and other classics of miniature trick shot cinematography will be WOW!'ed by the gripping images of a model boat bobbing in a bathtub. Those familiar with the churning force of the sea will be impressed that Ossorio found himself the one spot in the Medeterranean to film this where THERE IS NO WIND, waves or other natural forces that might ruin a shot. The scenes on the galleon were actually shot on what looks like a closed television soundscreen, and bring to mind the stunning realism of Hammer's PREHISTORIC WOMEN, set in the treacherous reaches of Pinewood Studios, where they made a fake jungle. I love stuff like that! Give me Ossorio's model boat destroyed by being lit on fire by a cigarette lighter over another Jar Jar Binks movie any day & I will be a happy man.Of the legendary scenes of sex and GORE that are often whispered about, forget it. Yes, Brentwood's appropriated print has shortened the sex assault scene and did cut the one "big" gore moment, where the ditzy blond lesbian fashion model is hacked to bits by the Templars as a mid-voyage snack, but the results of finding it intact will probably leave the GORE fanatic non-plussed. "That's it?" was my reaction after seeing it "uncut" for the first time. And yes, that's it. No nudity at all registers on this print, and it is not a "covered" take, though the theory that it appears to have been made for television is salient; That would explain the broadcast media style "videotaped" look to the majority of the soundstage scenes, where the first two and last installments of the series are all photomechanical film down to the last frame.So with no boobs & very little blood [the two first blood rituals happen off-camera, and we aren't even treated to a viewing of the messy aftermaths], the main interest in the film is related to who made it and how. Ossorio was a very visually oriented director, and posters of comments are 100% correct when stating that the images involving the Templars skanking about in their rotting robes & drooling all over the fashion models are mesmerizing ... There is a juxtaposition going on, with bikinis and Go-Go boots on one side, rotting skeletal vampiric Templars on the other, that creates a sort of "Gee I wonder" impression. The mind takes over, fills in the gaps, and PRESTO! A film that suggests perhaps more than it actually depicts.But that is what leaves peope feeling short changed; one trusted colleage whom I had sought an opinion on this said it was "boring", but I think we come back to my thesis: Nobody really knew how to market Ossorio's movies and lumped them in with crapola that deserves titles like ZOMBIE FLESH EATER, when in fact he was making modern Spanish art with film, circa 1973. The best images he arrived at are just as beautiful, horrible, repulsive and hypnotic as anything Goya ever painted, and made him a whole heck of a lot of cash.Seek out those Brentwood sets [it is also available on a 5 disc 10 movie set called DEADTIME STORIES that has his final BLIND DEAD film on it as well] and be prepared for skinny fashion models being menaced by goons, shuffling templars on a boat, a burning model in a bathtub, and you should be all set. "Zoinks!"
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