Mario Bava's Planet of the Vampires (1965)

Title: Planet of the Vampires (1965)

Director: Mario Bava

Cast: Barry Sullivan, Norma Bengell

Review:

In the world of filmmaking, there are directors out there who choose a certain type of genre and make it their specialty, making only films from that particular genre. Others like to venture out of the box and do all sorts of genres. For example, Terry Gilliam is a director who has never ventured far from the fantasy genre; he has decided that fantasy is his specialty, and his quite good at it, if not one of the best. On the other hand, a director who constantly shifts genres and rarely makes the same film twice is Ridley Scott. The guy goes from sci-fi, to fantasy, to sword and sandal films, to gangster films. You name it, he’s done it, or on his way to doing it. He does seem to love the sci-fi genre though since amongst all the genres he has worked on, it’s the sci-fi genre he’s most worked with, in fact, he is currently working on his third science fiction film, a prequel to Alien (1979) called Prometheus (2012). The thing about directors such as these is that they always try and make the quintessential good film for whatever genre they happen to be working on. If Ridley Scott’s going to make a sci-fi, he will make sure it will be the best damn sci-fi you have ever seen. By they way, Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979) was very influenced by the film I will be reviewing today, Mario Bava’s campy science fiction/horror film, Planet of the Vampires. But more on that later! Italian maestro Mario Bava was a director who was primarily known for his classic contributions to horror but in reality, Bava made films from many different genres. Planet of the Vampires was his venture into sci-fi territory. How was it?

Well, story goes something like this: the crew of spaceship Argos is forced to land on an alien planet known as Aura when their sister spaceship The Galliot crash lands there. There should be no major problem with this operation since the planet has an atmosphere, and it appears there are no dangerous life forms on the planet. Yet, upon landing on the planet something strange happens to the crew of The Argos! Everyone suddenly tries to kill each other! What has overcome them? Why has everyone suddenly turned so murderous and violent? Thankfully, this fit of anger passes, and they all go back to normal. But the question remains: what just happened? The crew decides to continue with their rescue mission. Once they reach The Galliot, they discover that most of the crew is either dead or violent and crazy! What’s going on in this strange planet?

‘Planet of the Vampires’ is actually a very misleading title for this film since there are no vampires to be seen on this flick. At all! A more appropriate title would have been Planet of the Zombies; since what happens on this film is that the crew members die and come back to life as zombies, not vampires. But whatever, I guess that was just a clever marketing scheme used to capitalize on the popularity of Hammers vampire films, which were quite popular during the time of this films release. Even The Haunted Planet, one of the films many alternate titles suits this film better.

So basically, what we have is a planet in which the buried don’t stay buried, they come back as zombies, and you can’t trust anybody. It’s the kind of story where you have a bunch of people locked up in an isolated environment, and you don’t know who is going to turn against whom. It has a similar vibe to John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982). This comparison makes sense; since Carpenter has stated on more then one occasion that Bava was a major influence on his films. But then again, Bava was a major influence on many filmmakers, for example, the similarities between Ridley Scott’s Alien and Bava’s Planet of the Vampires are many. Let’s see; we have a spaceship that is forced to land on an alien planet. The crew decides to venture out into the planet and explore it since it has an atmosphere. While exploring the planet, they encounter an abandoned spaceship from another alien race that also crash landed on the planet, but died; what’s left of them are their giant carcasses. Sounds pretty much like the first half hour of Ridley Scott’s Alien don’t it? But it aint, its Bava’s Planet of the Vampires!

Aesthetically both films are similar as well. The alien planet is shrouded by eternal darkness, never ending fog and the landscape is filled with jagged mountains. The only difference between the two films is that Bava made his film with a mere 100,000 dollars, while Ridley Scott made Alien with 11 million. Of course you can achieve a whole other level of believability with 11 million clames, but still, it goes to show just how much Bava could do with a small budget. Plus the level of influence Planet of the Vampires has had on science fiction films over the years goes a long way considering the films meager budget showing once again that its not how much money a production has, but the talent that’s behind the camera that matters. A relatively small film like this one has influenced so many others that have come after it! That’s how influence goes, one filmmaker influences the next, and the next, and the next, each film taking things one step further. Each film trying to improve on the previous one that influenced it. The chain could go something like this: Planet of the Vampires influenced Alien, which in turn influenced Galaxy of Terror (1981), which in turn influenced Aliens (1986), which in turn influenced an innumerable amount of films, like David Twohy’s Pitch Black (2000). But they can all be traced back to Bava’s Planet of the Vampires! It just goes to show how important Bava was as a filmmaker; a real trend setter.

Above, Ridley Scott's Alien (1979), below, Mario Bava's Planet of the Vampires (1965)

Planet of the Vampires is a real Bava film, it has all his trademarks. One of the legendary filmmakers’ trademarks is making a film with an extremely low budget, yet making the end product seem beautiful beyond its budgetary limitations. Bava was famous for saving his producers money on his productions; as a result they were always willing to finance his films because they would always make their money back. On Planet of the Vampires, the budget limitations are visible at times, mainly when it comes to showing the spaceships flying in space. I have to admit, this is one of the few set backs that the film has, the effects aren’t convincing when it comes to the spaceships, which are obvious miniatures that scratch on looking like something out of an Ed Wood film. Some might hate this aspect of the film, others will find it adds to the films b-movie charm. The effects on this film where achieved old school style, with miniatures, smoke and mirrors. And they were all achieved on camera! The small budget they had pushed the filmmakers creativity in order to achieve
the visuals they needed to tell their story.

U-shaped spaceships. Above: Alien (1979), below: Planet of the Vampires (1965) 

But what really makes this one special is Bava’s trademark use of colors and style. The planet itself is lit with Bava’s wonderful use of primarily colors, lots of reds and blues. The use of these primary colors gives the whole film a pulpy, comic book feel. Planet of the Vampires isn’t the deepest film in the world, its story is extremely simplistic, almost childlike in its innocence, but visually it pulls you in. Some of the most visually striking moments come when the crew stumbles upon the giant skeletons of the long dead alien species. That scene is awesome! Spookiest part is when they play a machine that lets us hear how these creatures sounded when they talked in their alien language. You can definitely see where the ‘Space Jockey’ in Alien came from when you see these scenes. Another eerie scene is when the crew members who have died come back to life as zombies, this scene reminds us that we are also watching a horror film! Bava successfully mixed both genres with this film.

Giant alien skeletons! Above: Alien (1979) Below: Planet of the Vampires (1965)

My only problem with Planet of the Vampires is that it drags in certain areas. Visually its amazing, love the colors and the marriage of sci-fi and horror, but I found it lacking in terms of excitement and thrills. The film starts out with a real interesting premise, and the alien planet is eerie enough, unfortunately the film manages to fall into a rut as far as excitement goes in its third half. Things could have turned out so interesting had we gotten a glimpse at those giant aliens! But no, they never show up. Same as in Ridley Scott’s Alien, we never get to see where the giant aliens come from. I guess that’s just another way in which Planet of the Vampires influenced Scott’s film. But still, Planet of the Vampires is a beautiful marriage of science fiction and horror, it might not be the most exciting film ever made, but is sure is a great film to look at!

Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5

The films original Italian title translates to: Terror in Space

Danger: Diabolik (1968)

Title: Danger: Diabolik (1968)

Director: Mario Bava

Cast: John Phillip Law, Marisa Mell

Review:

Mario Bava mostly worked on suspense and horror films. He is best known for having directed such horror classics as Black Sabbath (1963), Black Sunday (1960) and Kill Baby Kill! (1966).  Yet every now and then, Bava took a detour into different genres. Such was the case with Danger: Diabolik a film that was based on an Italian comic book of the same name. The comic was about Diabolik, an anti-hero that fought evil with evil. In the comics, Diabolik’s way of punishing villains was usually with death. The comic book - or “fumetti” as comics are known in Italy- is the longest running and most successful comic book in that country. So of course since the comic book being was so popular, a good adaptation was expected. Those expectations were met by Bava’s film. Many critics agree that Danger: Diabolik was one of the most faithful comic book adaptations of its time.

The film is based on the longest running Italian comic book of the same name

Danger: Diabolik is about a super-criminal who goes around stealing from and making fun of the government. Basically, he works as a Robin Hood of sorts, only instead of stealing from the rich and giving to the poor; he steals from the government and keeps it to himself. Actually, he steals for himself and his smoking hot girlfriend Eva Kemp, who seems to have nothing better to do then to worship and adore Diabolik. Well, besides adoring him, she also helps him in his criminal escapades. The whole movie consists of Diabolik stealing things from the government. 10 million dollars, 7 priceless jewels and a giant gold ingot.

I have to admit, I immediately tool a liking to Diabolik and his attitude. As is the case in many parts of the world, Diabolik figures that the government is dirty and that they unjustly take too much from their people, so he takes justice into his own hands and steals from them. The character is kind of like a hero to the people in that sense. He might not steal from the government to give to the poor, but in a way, he takes from those who unjustly take too much from those who have very little. From those who have put their trust in them. I love how every time he steals something and gets away with it, he laughs this evil laugh. It’s an overpowering laugh, a powerful laugh, almost as if he was getting back at the government for us. His laugh in a way says “we got away with it! And there is nothing they can do about it! Ha Ha Haaaaa!” Many times, when a country is under the rule of a despotic government, its people feel powerless. What can one individual do against the powerful government machine, with its guns, tear gas and unrelenting police force? Nothing. The efforts of the subversive are usually met with violence and death. But in the fantasy of Diabolik’s world, the rebellious side wins! And in this way Diabolik is a hero of sorts. An anti-hero to be more precise.

Looking cool and taking names!

Since Diabolik is a character that is 100% against the system, Bava ‘s film connected with the anarchy that Italian youths were going through in those days. In a way, Danger: Diabolik is a love letter to anarchy. In the film, the government is taught a lesson by having their precious money taken from them. Diabolik manages to steal 10 million dollars from under their noses! And what does Diabolik steal their money for? So that he can make love on top of it with Eva on his gigantic rotating circular bed! That’s what he steals it for! By the way, that is one of the most memorable visuals in the film. Diabolik and Eva making out on top of ten million dollars. The bad guys on this movie are cops and government officials, and anything that Diabolik does is to hurt their finances or their pride. One scene manages to transmit that air of complete disrespect for authority. It’s the scene in which the head of police is giving a speech, and Diabolik releases a laughing gas (called “exhilarating gas”) amongst the crowd. In seconds, the crowd is laughing at every word that the head of police is saying! The head of police joins them in exhilarating laughter while Diabolik and Eva sit back and enjoy the mayhem. They themselves don’t get affected by the gas because they took their “anti-exhilarating” gas capsules.

There is a genuine desire with this movie to demonstrate that the government is simply doing a terrible job at administering the peoples taxes. One scene has Diabolik declare that they are putting the peoples money to such bad use that they don’t deserve to have it. So what does he do? He blows up all of the banks and governments tax buildings! I got flashbacks of Tyler Durden blowing up the credit card buildings in Fight Club (1999) while watching those scenes.

Dandger: Diabolik is very much a comic book movie and Bava’s usual play with colors serves this film perfectly. Bava frames images on this film as if they were comic book panels, but he does it in a way that you would not expect. It’s certainly not as obvious as what Ang Lee did in Hulk (2003), where he literally framed things within a comic book panel. Nope, Bava framed things, but he used objects in the scenery to do this. He used elements in the foreground and background of the frame to achieve that comic book look and feel. On the other hand, this feels a lot like a James Bond film as well. We have secret underground lairs, car chases, helicopter chases, we get submarines, and lots and lots of sexual innuendoes.

Speaking of the sexual references in this film, they are many! To start things off, Diabolik and Eva are really crazy about each other! Right from the get go, when the film begins, we see Diabolik returning to Eva with the ten million dollars, the immediately end up making out on top of the money. I always thought it was a cool thing about Diabolik that was fuels him to do all these things is his love for Eva, to make her happy. They both live in this luxurious underground lair that even includes a Jacuzzi! All through out the film there are many phallic symbols, one scene stands out in which Diabolik is holding a laser gun (while he is shirtless by the way) and she looks on devouring him with her eyes. He then grabs a hose so that he can transport melted gold onto a mold, and she bites her lips as the gold splurts out! It doesn’t get any more obvious then that my friends. In this way, Bava makes fun of the sexual elements in James Bond films as well. It doesn’t hurt that Bava chose really beautiful looking people for this film either. John Phillip Law and Marisa Mell ooze sexy hotness on screen. It helps that they were both romantically involved while filming Danger: Diabolik.

Is that a toy gun in between your legs, or are you just happy to see me?

In closing, I’d like to say that this is a really beautiful looking film, something that one can come to expect from a Mario Bava film. There are moments when Bava simply focuses on his sets (something he also did in Black Sunday) just so you, the audience can truly appreciate them. The characters and story hold very true to their comic book roots and simply put, this is a very sexy picture. A homage to anarchy, and spy films. Interesting how one of Bava’s best films ends up not being a horror film.

Rating: 5 out of 5

Mario Bava's Kill Baby Kill (1966)

Title: Kill, Baby Kill! (1966)

Director: Mario Bava

Written By: Mario Bava, Romano Migliorini, Roberto Natale

Review:

In Kill Baby Kill (Operazione Paura) Dr. Paul Eswai is called in to try and solve a mystery that is plaguing a small town in Italy. People are dying left and right in strange ways. Upon further inspection, it is discovered that the dead victims all have a silver coin in their hearts! Dr. Paul Eswai must investigate the mystery behind the deaths. Why are these people dying, and why is there a silver coin in their hearts? The Villagers are all scared; could their superstitious fright have a justifiable and believable cause? Or are these people just a bunch of frightened ignorant fools?

Kill Baby Kill is a fine example of Gothic Horror at its best. Like many of Bava’s films, Kill Baby Kill never lets go of its atmosphere which is something that I always appreciate of Mario Bava’s films. That constant never ending atmosphere. At times, Kill Baby Kill feels like an old Hammer horror film. Specially because the story centers around a small village/community in which everyone is collectively scared of something. What it is, non of them seem to want to say. The townsfolk in this film are so scared that even speaking about the origins of their fear is not an option for them. This reminds me of old Hammer films, when a stranger walks into a pub, and all the villagers gathered there look at him strangely, and don’t give too much information save for “leave while you still can!” or the traditional “this town is cursed! Forgotten by god! I can go no further!” So this is a Gothic Horror film through and through, of the likes that Hammer use to make. In my opinion, these Bava movies sometimes surpassed the old Hammer films in terms of over all gothicness.

We follow Dr. Paul Eswai as he arrives at this superstitious town right after a strange death has occurred. No one wants to tell him wants going on, but he is a determined soul, he is not a superstitious individual at all, so he goes onward with his investigation. It reminded me a lot of Ichabod Crane in Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow (1999). You know; the scientist/investigator type whose world views are firmly planted on reality vs. a group of scared highly superstitious individuals. In fact, I think Burton was extremely influenced by Kill Baby Kill when he decided to make Sleepy Hollow. That Burton movie has so many similarities with Kill Baby Kill. A scientist/investigator comes into town having to perform an autopsy on a victim. The people of the town are scared, superstitious and unwilling to help. There is a family mystery involved, a deep rooted secret that on one seems to want to talk about. Similarities between these two movies abound, let’s not forget how drenched in atmosphere Sleepy Hollow is! But I also found some similarities with films like The Wicker Man (1973) as well. The idea of a stranger coming in to investigate something that the town already knows all too well.

The spooky little ghost girl in Kill Baby Kill was actually played by a boy actor called Valerio Valeri

The supernatural takes center stage on this film because it is after all, a ghost movie. I place this one highly amongst ghost movies, particularly amongst ghost movies dealing with the ghost of dead children, like The Changeling (1980), The Shinning (1980), The Ring (2002) and The Devils Backbone (2001). On Kill Baby Kill we get lots of images of the ghost girl looking through windows or simply appearing in hallways to spook people. The thing about this movie is that the ghost girl doesn’t really do much save for looking at people through windows and spooking the shit out of them! This movie is all about that, the little ghost girl looking at you really seriously from somewhere. Interesting thing: the ghost girl was actually played by a boy! His name is Valerio Valeri. Bava probably did this to give the image of the ghost girl an off kilter element. You might get the impression that something is not quite right here just by looking at this little ghost girl.

Bava has us follow Dr. Paul Eswai, through out the film. He is the protagonist we go on the journey with. We stick with this character throughout the whole film because he is the one character who is not spooked by superstition and the supernatural. To him, these things are all hocus pocus, and people are simply acting out of fear and ignorance. What I like about this kind of story is that this character, who’s beliefs are firmly grounded on reality is suddenly thrust into a world of ghosts, magic and the supernatural. So we have that contrast, reality and science vs. the supernatural and magic. Aside from it being a ghost story, we also deal with a theme that Bava loves to deal with in his movies: witches! Many of his films are centered on or star a witch in one way or another. Black Sunday (1960) was about an evil Satan worshipping witch who is trying to come back to life, Baron Blood (1972) has a witch who placed a curse upon the Baron, and on Kill Baby Kill a witch tries to protect the people of the town from the vengeful ghost. Little by little I’m getting to know what Bava is all about, but witches, the supernatural and pagan beliefs are definitely a huge part of what makes a Bava movie a Bava movie.

On this film, the witch is actually the good guy!

Bava also likes for you to take a good look at his sets. He has a lot of these swooping shots where we are simply meant to admire the lighting and the art direction. It’s as if Bava suddenly said “look how cool we illuminated this place! See how spooky it looks? Isn’t that great?” I have to admit, though I love how Bava lights a set and I love the art direction in his films, I don’t like how much he does these shots of people just walking through rooms so we can get a look at them. Some times a scene simply scans through a set, and goes nowhere storywise. He has a lot of shots like this one on Kill Baby Kill. Too much valuable movie time is spent on those shots that go nowhere, shots that are simply there for an aesthetic purpose. Id rather just appreciate the art direction while the story is flowing, instead of stopping everything dead on its tracks so we can get a glimpse at the cool sets. But this is a minor squabble I have with Bava. 

One of Bava's signature visuals is an evil entity looking through the window

This movie also benefits from having some excellent localizations, and that’s something that Italian horror directors like Bava and Argento always took great advantage of. They used all these beautiful old buildings  on their films because they knew these buildings would work wonders in a gothic and atmospheric horror film, and they use these localizations to full advantage. Kill Baby Kill is filled with spooky looking castles and buildings. Streets made of cobble stone, creepy looking homes. It just adds a lot of credibility to the proceedings that all these structures are real and tangible as opposed to the CGI fests we are getting nowadays. What happened to the good old days of shooting a film on an exotic location? But anyways, all in all, Kill Baby Kill was an enjoyable ghost story. It’s a bit slow paced, but that’s the kind of film this is. Its not the action/horror like we are getting nowadays, this is old school slow burner type of horror, where the emphasis is on atmosphere and dread, where the film slowly creeps up on you.

Rating: 4 out of 4

The films original poster translates to "Operation Fear"

Mario Bava's Baron Blood (1972)

Title: Baron Blood (1972)

Director: Mario Bava

Writer: Vincent Fotre

Stars: Elke Sommer, Joseph Cotton, Massimo Girotti

Review:

On this film Mario Bava wanted to go back to making the old gothic horror movies that he worshiped and loved so much. By 1972, he’d already made a slasher or two (Bay of Blood (1971) for example) and he wanted to go back to those types of horror films he’d made in the past. Films like Black Sunday (1960) and Black Sabbath (1963), both of which were tributes to old Universal monster movies and basically, old school horror films in general.

The story revolves around a young man who decides to go and search out his family roots. So he visits a Castle in Vienna which belonged to an old ancestor of his; the bloodthirsty torture loving Baron Otto Von Kleist know to all for the many victims he tortured under his reign of terror! This evil Baron was cursed by a witch to an eternity in the darkest pits of hell. Unfortunately, through the use of a magical parchment and some magic incantations, the evil Baron can be brought back to life! Which is what our two protagonists do. By mistake they resurrect the evil Baron, joking around with the parchment and the magical incantations, thinking it’s all a lot of silly superstition. Unfortunately for them, the incantations were real! And so the Baron comes back to life to continue with his bad habits of torturing people. Can the Baron be stopped? Will he ever get sent back to the fiery pits of hell?

"Excuse me, are these the try outs for the new Freddy Krugger movie?"

This movie has its moments, but I doubt it’s an accurate representation of Bava’s genius behind the camera. Don’t take that the wrong way because there’s lots of good things to be seen in a mediocre Bava movie. For example, this movie has the lush atmospheric visuals that Bava is known for. He plays around a lot with lighting techniques on Baron Blood. There are a lot of streaks of light coming out of backgrounds, and lots of play with shadows and light. Speaking of shadows and light, the mysterious Baron Blood is kept in shrouded darkness for practically the whole movie. All we see is a glimmer, a dark blot, a shadowy figure moving about in silhouette. In this way the titular Baron reminded me of characters like The Phantom of the Opera and Sam Raimi’s Darkman (1990). You know, tragic characters hiding behind hats and trench coats.

Baron Blood has all the ingredients necessary to make an interesting character, unfortunately, he isnt really fleshed out and is reduced to running amongst the shadows of the castle. He's kind of a Vlad the Impaler type of guy. Everyone feared him because of his love of torture and murder; he is portrayed as a sadistic individual. His resurrection sequence brought to mind the resurrection of the evil Igor Javutich in Mario Bava’s own Black Sunday (1966). And this is something that Baron Blood is known for. Apparently Bava quotes himself a lot on this film, repeating images and situations from his previous films. Baron Blood himself is compared to the cloaked killer in Blood and Black Lace. There is a sequence in which Baron Blood uses an Iron Maiden-like coffin to kill one of his victims, just like the Iron Maiden-like mask seen in Black Sunday. In fact, after a character is killed in the Iron Maiden, we see his face and it looks just like the face of the witch in Black Sunday, a face filled with holes due to the effects of the Iron Maiden. Connoisseurs of Bava might instantly recognize the repetitiveness on this film. Are these signs of wear and tear in Bava’s directorial career? Was Bava running out of ideas and therefore repeated many things he’d done in the past? You be the judge. But we need to keep in mind that Baron Blood came real late in Bava’s career. He was as they say, on his last legs. And like many horror directors during their last days, Bava wasn’t at his best by this stage. Three more movies after Baron Blood,  and Bava's long fruitful career was over.

 

My main problem with Baron Blood was that it had many interesting elements going for it, yet it failed to be a great movie. The film was shot in a real life castle in Vienna which was a perfectly spooky and atmospheric for the story to unfold. We have the story of the resurrection of an evil supernatural entity. We have Iron Maidens, witches, and yes…even zombies! But unfortunately, all these elements do not add up to an exciting motion picture. To me the real problem with this film was its pacing; the film is way to slow! And for a movie about a character called Baron Blood, there is very little blood on this film! Save for a scene in which we see blood coming in through the cracks of a door, there isn’t much blood on this flick. Even the body count is low as hell. I wished they would have made the Baron a more formidable foe. I wished he would have been portrayed as a more interesting character. Unfortunately all the Baron does is run around the shadows, scaring Elke Sommer until she passes out.

Story wise, the movie could have gone in a more interesting route. Unfortunately, the film is just about the evil Baron being resurrected, him killing about three people, and then being sent back to hell. The story is so simple; you can tell some scenes are just there to stretch things out. Some scenes go absolutely nowhere which is kind of infuriating for me. One example of this is one scene where a clairvoyant invokes the spirit of the witch that put a curse on the Baron. This is an interesting scene because we see this witch come out of the fire, talking to us "from beyond the grave". After this ghostly apparition helps the protagonists, they leave. But the clairvoyant is visited by the Baron himself. But we never know what happens to the clairvoyant after she gets a visit from the Baron. Was the clairvoyant killed by the Baron? Did she use some magic to protect herself against him? Sadly we never know what happened for all we see is her covering herself with her arms and Bava cuts to something else entirely, never returning to that scene! What happened there? I wanted to know! Signs of wear and tear in deed.

One of the most visually interesting moments in the film

This film counts as Elke Sommer’s first collaboration with Bava; the second one was Lisa and the Devil (1974). She is not hard on the eyes I can tell you that! With all its flaws and slow pacing, Baron Blood can still end up being a rewarding watch. Even though it’s slow paced, and the story is paper thin, the film is drenched in Bava’s signature atmosphere and beautiful imagery, so at least it has that going for it. Unfortunately it sins by being boring, and I can honestly say its not one of Bava’s best.

Rating: 2 ½ out of 5

 

The original title translates to: "The Horror at Nuremberg Castle"