THE NIGHT OF THE SEAGULLS 1975

Blind Dead Movie Night  # 4 !

     The 4th (and final) entry in Amando de Ossorio Blind Dead quartet THE NIGHT OF THE SEAGULLS (or SEA GULLS as seen in the credits) has never been a favorite among fans , but I’ve always really enjoyed it as it has a wonderfully creepy atmosphere and is a HUGE step up from the rather pathetic THE GHOST GALLEON. Once again tweaking the basic premise of the previous movies (along with the Templar Knights motives & origin), Ossorio creates a definite H.P. Lovecraft vibe here (particularly THE SHADOW OVER INNSMOUTH) as he puts the Blind Dead back on solid ground where they belong -and thankfully back on their horses and out of a ship’s hold. In addition the main characters are much more sympathetic, being helpful and even somewhat heroic in the course of the plot. Plus in a somewhat refreshing change the sexual misogyny themes from the previous films (in particular the rapes) have been eliminated here, but fear not -as it would not be a Blind Dead experience without them - we still get the female sacrifices.

    Setting things up with a middle ages prologue that shows a young couple that are set upon by a group of the Knight Templars with the husband being killed and the woman carried off to a seashore castle where she’s killed and has her heart cut out and deposited into the mouth of a very creepy looking frog-like idol, with her remains tossed on the rocky beach for the crabs to feast on. Forwarding to the present Dr. Henry Stein & his wife Joan (Victor Petit along with Maria Kosty from VENGEANCE OF THE ZOMBIES & EXORCISMO) arrive in a remote seaside fishing village in which he plans to set practice in.

    Upon arrival in the village they find the inhabitants acting downright hostile to them and the present town doctor already on his way out of town. That night after discovering him wounded at their door Joan gives shelter to the village simpleton Teddy and allows him to stay in the attic. Later their woken up by the ominous tolling of a bell along with the screeching of seagulls and then catch a glimpse of a young woman being lead by a procession of black-clad town folk toward the beach, all of which the doctor dismisses as a “obscure religious ceremony” (ya think ??).

    The next day while again facing irate villagers Joan is befriended by Lucy (Sandra Mozarowski) and the couple hire her as a housekeeper. Eventually its learned that every seven years the villagers offer up seven young woman over the course of seven nights as sacrifices to the blind Templars who rise out their graves at the sound of the tolling bell and ride their horses out to beach where the victims are tired to the rocks, with the sound of the seagulls being the souls of the past sacrifices. Although not specifically credited to his works there is very "Lovecraftian" feel running thru the proceedings with an isolated seacoast village immersed in ancient & evil religious practices and the statue that the knights pray to (and deposit the victims heart in the mouth of) looks like something straight out of a Cthulhu fever dream.

     Lucy soon becomes next in line for the Templar's and its her rescue by Dr. Stein that sets up the rampaging Knights who attack the home of the Stein’s along with Lucy and the now severely wounded Teddy taking shelter there as earlier he had been hurled off a cliff by the villagers. Somewhat bizarrely once the Blind Dead start their rampaging (on account of the missing Lucy) the villagers hot foot out of there and make it to safety, which seems kind of strange as the massacre of them would have made a magnificent set piece. As it would have been similar to RETURN OF THE BLIND DEAD perhaps Ossorio decided to forgo it? There is also questions of the complicity of villagers themselves who (if the timeline is to be believed) have been offering up sacrifices for about 700 years (!).

    Although the Blind Dead don’t make their first appearance to almost 20 minutes in, the film creates a very genuine atmosphere of doom and forbidding with the isolated village, the castle & altar room sets and the Knights slowly galloping along the beach all adding greatly to the film. This time Ossorio keeps the secondary plot elements more to the background and the lead characters in the form of the doctor and his wife are written with some more depth and sympathy then in the past films in the series.
    However there is some REALLY awful day for night photography that pops up & glaringly stands out as the soft focus and gauze like filtering can’t hide the bright blue sky & sunshine. The climatic attack upon the doctors house is one the best staged set pieces in the series and the finale with blood gushing out the Templars eye sockets as they collapse is startling. Antón García Abril really cranks up the creepy Gregorian chants and weird distorted instruments on the soundtrack, as this in my favorite soundtrack of the four (Enough Already - These NEED to be released on CD !!)

    Of special note in the cast is the pretty Sandra Mozarwoski playing Lucy who very convincingly carries an air of resigned doom about her thru the course of the film. Only 15 years old at the time of filming she sadly committed suicide in 1977 at the age of 18, but not before appearing in over 20 films with most of them being in the exploitation field including LOVE TRAIN FOR THE S.S., SCHOOL OF DEATH, HOUSE OF PSYCHOTIC WOMEN & DEVIL’S POSSESSED.
   With this being the last in the "official"series at some point I hope to get to John Gillig’s excellent THE CROSS OF THE DEVIL (1975) which is an interesting combination of Hammer (Gilling directed THE REPTILE & THE PLAGUE OF THE ZOMBIES) and Spanish Horror and features some of the Blind Dead mythos. There is also Jess Franco’s oddball MANSION OF THE LIVING DEAD which doesn’t really feature the Blind Dead, but is often lumped in with them and probably best described as a “homage”(It does however have the mostly nude Lina Romay in her blonde wig “Candy Coster” persona & some evil monks) .

La Noche del Terror Ciego (Tombs of the Blind Dead) 1972

(Blind Dead Movie Night # 3)

"Don't Move...Don't Breath...Don't Let Them Hear Your Heart Beating... !!"

    Taking a bit of inspiration from George Romero’s NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, adding some creepy European historical atmosphere and topping it all off with some shocking for the time levels of sex & gore, in 1972 writer & director Amando de Ossorio kicked off what can be described as the greatest horror film cycle from the golden age of European horror. Starting with TOMBS OF THE BLIND DEAD Ossorio’s quartet of films, while although borrowing from the zombie genre, created a wholly original mythos that differed from previous Spanish horror films that had their monsters based upon the more traditional werewolf & vampire storylines. Although referred to as a series each of the four movies do stand on their own with the three subsequent ones after TOMBS each being a kind of re-working of the basic premise from TOMBS.

     The origin of the Blind Dead Templar Knights is tweaked and fiddled with throughout the series, but TOMBS is where the basic premise is laid out. In a flashback to their origin story (placed as a prologue in the U.S. version and slightly edited) the Knights, who after returning from The Crusades have become immersed in blood sacrifice and devil worshipping rites, tie up an un-credited Britt Nichols (Jess Franco regular i.e. LA FILLE DE DRACULA) spread eagle on a wooden rack, slice her open and then proceed to drink her blood vampire-like. As this has been going on for awhile, it finally gets the local populace riled up enough where they proceed to execute the Knights and hang then in trees till the crows eat their eyes out. 

   Flash forward to the present. In an oceanfront resort Virginia (the very beautiful María Elena Arpón) bumps into Betty (the very beautiful Lone Fleming) an old schoolmate of hers and at the urging of Virginia’s boyfriend Roger (César Burner) the trio goes off an a weekend train trip together, in which Roger obviously has some “plans”. Felling uncomfortable with Roger’s advances toward Betty (and with memories of a past lesbian encounter with Betty) Virginia hops off the train and heads off toward a group of buildings which she had spotted from the train. Setting up of the great sequences in 70’s Euro horror, she arrives at the buildings and discovers them to be a creepy old monastery (complete with a REALLY creepy old graveyard). Camping out there for the night, she settles down in her sleeping bag and because of her transistor radio does not hear the Blind Dead slowly rising out of their tombs (in a sequence that is re-used in the 2nd and 4th films) and giving chase on their horses (it’s never explained about the presence of the horses or zombie horses ?? - but they add to the atmosphere & fun).

     As with all Blind Dead movies the plot drags a bit when the Blind Dead aren’t around. TOMBS sets their initial resurrection & attack sequence in the first 30 minutes and then waits until the climax for their next appearance, so we are treated to a rather lengthy middle section that has Betty & Roger investigating Virginia’s disappearance, visiting a professor to get the history of the Templars and rather inexorably hooking up with some smugglers (the leader of whom is related to the professor !?). TOMBS does introduce a plot device however that doesn’t appear in any of the others films and that’s the reanimating of the bitten victims of the Knights. The resurrection of Virginia’s autopsied body (complete with stitches) helps the non-Blind Dead middle section along and her initial rising up from the autopsy table and later stalking of a female victim in a mannequin factory (complete with Bava-like pulsating red light) is a definite highlight.

    The acting is uniformly fairly stale (even in the non-dubbed version) with most of the characters being rather flat, with only Maria Elena Arpón (who was also in the excellent The House That Screamed) as Virginia showing any real spark - and unfortunately she is killed off quickly. In addition the lesbian flashback between Virginia & Betty is unintentionally hilarious with its white gowns, chezzy lounge music & soft focus (not to mention ballroom dancing). Whatever faults are in the movie (as with all Blind Dead movies), they are redeemed by the presence of the Blind Dead themselves with their final attack on a passenger train the greatest scene of horror in the series (especially in the uncut version on Blue Underground's DVD). Ossorio pulls off some excellent set pieces including the eerie mannequin factory (complete with Bava inspired lighting) and the very creepy monastery & graveyard.
   I still give the nod to TOMBS follow-up RETURN OF THE EVIL DEAD as the best of the series, but TOMBS OF THE BLIND DEAD is a classic of Spanish horror and a great place for the uninitiated to dip their toe in (and you'll want the magnificent Blue Underground Blind Dead Collection box afterwards).

Blind Dead Movie Night # 2 - Return of the Evil Dead 1973

"Tonight They Will Return !"

   The second of Amando De Ossorio's Blind Dead films 1973's Return of the Evil Dead is pretty much regarded as the best one in the series (it’s my favorite) and its success along with the first one led to the rush release of the rather lake luster 3rd entry The Ghost Galleon in 1974. Unlike Tombs of the Blind Dead which has a slow build-up to the first appearance of the Templars, Return starts off with bang and never lets up as the Blind Dead make their first appearance 15 minutes in. As with the next two movies in the series Return changes the mythos & origin of the zombie Templers are changed (in fact each movie can almost be viewed as re-imaging of the first one).

   Starting again with a flashback sequence showing the torture & sacrifice of a young woman by the knights, this time around locals from the nearby village of Berzano storm the monastery and burn out the knights eyes out before putting everything to torch with the leader of the Templars swearing revenge from the grave. Flash forward 500 years and the citizens of Berzano are getting ready to celebrate the anniversary of the knight’s destruction (complete with fireworks & a burning puppet show for the kiddies). Jack Marlow (Tony Kendall) shows up to supervise the fireworks display and meets up with an old flame of his Vivian (Esther Roy) which incurs the suspicion of the corrupt town mayor (Fernando Sancho) as he’s got designs on her also and rules over the town like a little fiefdom.

  Stealing off to the ruins of the mortuary Jack & Vivian start to re-kindle their relationship when they’re surprised by Murdo a halfwit cripple who’s the caretaker of the mortuary who warns them of the old Templar curse - “Tonight they will return!” Later the town commences with the celebration and the embittered Murdo (who earlier had been taunted by of some of the local kids) kidnaps a village girl and sacrifices her over the burial ground of the Templars and they began to rise of their tombs. Mounting their “zombie” horses the Blind Dead set off for the town.
   Meanwhile Jack has talked Vivian to run away with him but on the way they meet up with a survivor from the Templar’s initial attack on her house who warns them of the oncoming terror. Heading back to town they a arrive just as The Templar's descend upon the partying townsfolk slashing & hacking their way thru the festivities. Jack and Vivian along with the mayor and some other townsfolk barricade themselves in a church with the mayor showing himself to be a real low level scum as he sacrifices various people in attempt to escape (including a terrifying sequence with a small girl that ranks as one of the series best moments of horror).

   For the most part Ossorio keeps the whole thing moving at a terrific pace not allowing it to get bogged down with extra plot devices that sometimes saddle the other films in the series. By keeping the focus on the Blind Dead the movie succeeds in keeping the horror & atmosphere front center and while it does tone down the nudity a bit (of course this being a Blind Dead film there has to be a rape - but only attempted here) while amping up the blood (especially in the Spanish version - both this and the somewhat tamer U.S. version are on the Blue underground DVD). A wonderful slice of terror from the golden age of Spanish horror.