NOCTURNA (1979), MAMA DRACULA (1980)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

Once again I venture into the dusty depths of "movies-so-bad-they're-just-bad" with the idea of saying something pithy about degrees of rottenness.

NOCTURNA was one of two star vehicles for Nai Bonet, a dancer/singer of French-Vietnamese extraction. Neither movie did well and Bonet gave up acting. But unlike the second movie, a gangster-melodrama, NOCTURNA's use of vampire-tropes put it more or less on the radar of horror fans-- that, and the fact that the budget allowed for the casting of familiar faces John Carradine and Yvonne DeCarlo. 

The movie has some comic bits, but is primarily a soppy romance. When the long-lived Count Dracula (Carradine) is forced to convert his castle into a "Hotel Transylvania," his granddaughter Nocturna (Bonet) seeks to modernize the castle for current customers. The young-looking vampiress (actually about 300 years old) hires a disco group to entertain at the hotel, and she meets one of the performers, Jimmy. She falls in love and runs away with the singer to America. The affronted Count follows, and Nocturna appeals for help to another vampire, Jugula (DeCarlo), who knew Dracula back in the day. The longer Nocturna remains in love with Jimmy, the more quickly she'll lose her vampire nature and become a mortal woman-- a fate Dracula wishes to prevent.

I can't say that this story of first love held my interest much, but at least the script picks one simplistic idea and sticks with it. Bonet's acting talent doesn't equal her beauty, but she's not so much wooden, as some reviews state, as one-dimensional. Once she's in love, that mood defines her whole character-- with the exception of one moment when her grandpa sends a servitor to abduct her, and she gives him an offscreen mauling. The script is low-energy and low on conflict-- eventually Jugula just talks Drac into, shall we say, "dying and let living." But DeCarlo and Carradine bring some oomph to their stereotypical roles, even though I have to admit that at its best the film is never funny.

That said, the Belgian "comedy" MAMA DRACULA has no idea what it wants to be. I hypothesize that its director/co-writer might've seen THE FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS or ANDY WARHOL'S DRACULA and said, "I can do that." Somehow the producers roped Louise Fletcher into the title role-- possibly because the project offered her a starring-role-- and off they went.

The Warhol-attributed flick is a probable influence because the writer of the script repeatedly borrows the earlier film's penchant for having characters pronounce "virgins" as "wer-gins." The narrative begins with eccentric and mousy scientist Professor Van Bloed, who's working on a project to create artificial blood. Somehow news of his experiment reaches the ears of modern-day vampire Countess Dracula, and she summons Van Bloed to her Hungarian castle. The countess, who calls herself Elizabeth once and is clearly based on the historical Erzebeth Bathory, doesn't bother going around fanging necks. Instead, like her real-life model, she has her twin sons-- who unlike "Mama" often appear with full-fang action-- kidnap young women so that Elizabeth can bathe in blood, thus keeping herself young. However, in this modern era virgins are in short supply (another borrowing from WARHOL'S), so the countess hopes Van Bloed's process can help her.

So where's the conflict? Well, there's almost none to speak of. Van Bloed is a ninny who doesn't comprehend the reality of vampirism, and so when he tells the twins that he needs lots of real blood for his synthesis experiments, he never realizes that the vamps are going to start preying on local village girls. (Somehow the alleged shortage of "wer-gins" never interferes with the twins' quest.) While the vamps are hunting, a goofy old vampire hunter and his young female companion come to town. The script gets nothing out of the hunter except to show that he wouldn't know a vampire if one bit him.

The young woman Nancy-- not sure if she's a daughter, niece, or secretary-- becomes a little more consequential because the vampires kidnap her too. Van Bloed sees her at the castle and falls for her, but she doesn't reciprocate. In fact-- and I guess this lame wrapup counts as being slightly original-- she falls for both twins and marries them both. I don't think the professor ever finishes his experiment, though he ends up hanging around the castle like a funny uncle of some sort. 

There are a handful of topless scenes, but not enough to allay the dullness. Fletcher's not called upon to do anything but sit around looking stately while her sons do all the heavy lifting. The actors playing the sons are lively but again, not funny.

For all of these reasons, MAMA DRACULA's only accomplishment is to make NOCTURNA look good by comparison.

DEATH RACE: BEYOND ANARCHY (2018)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *sociological*

It is devoutly to be hoped that this is the last of the DEATH RACE series. I've certainly seen worse serials, but from the first in the series, the franchise, as re-invented for the 21st century, has remained resolutely formulaic.

BEYOND ANARCHY takes place some time after the 2008 DEATH RACE, making this the only direct sequel. The 2008 sequel focused on the prison's attempt to make "new fish" Jensen Ames assume the identity of the once-popular racer Frankenstein. One presumes that even after the demise of the 2008 villains, someone else picked up the gauntlet and eventually enlisted someone to take over the role. In fact, the new Frankenstein is so successful that he becomes the de facto ruler of "The Sprawl," a subculture that has grown out of the prison community. Indeed, there are only occasional scenes of oversight of the Sprawl by prison authorities. The Sprawl is actually closer in concept to the aforementioned film TERMINAL ISLAND, in which convicts are turned loose on a remote island to sort out their own affairs.

Frankenstein isn't the hero this time, though. Another new fish, Connor Gibson (Zack McGowan, a dead ringer for Keanu Reeves), is enlisted by the warden to challenge the power of Frankenstein so that the prison can bring the cons back into line. Danny Trejo reprises his role from the other films to serve in Gibson's pit crew, while Danny Glover signs on in a related support-role. Gibson and Frankenstein exchange bon mots about their destined encounter, and despite all the distractions Gibson finds time to romance a local girl from the Sprawl.

There are enough fights and fast-cars to keep one engaged on the purely kinetic level, and a few of the lines are at least passable "tough guy" dialogue. But I don't think the returns can diminish much more than this before descending into total incoherence, and so ANARCHY seems like an ideal place to park this particular vehicle for good.

THE MAN WHO COULD CHEAT DEATH (1959), CIRCUS OF HORRORS (1960)

PHENOMENALITY: (1) *marvelous,* (2) *uncanny*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological, sociological*

Anton Diffring certainly lucked out, Many actors-- Peter Lorre, Basil Rathbone, Bela Lugosi-- became typed after having starred in horror films. Diffring was tapped to headline Hammer's THE MAN WHO COULD CHEAT DEATH because Peter Cushing declined the role. Diffring then also starred in a second terror-flick the next year, Anglo-Amalgamated's CIRCUS OF HORRORS. Yet he continued to act in numerous mainstream movies thereafter, only occasionally dipping his toes into other metaphenomenal fare.

CHEAT adapted Barre Lyndon's play THE MAN IN HALF MOON STREET, which had previously been adapted in 1945 under that name, though I have the impression that the film was not a major success. The premise is that scientist Georges Bonnet (Diffring) becomes a renowned amateur sculptor in late 19th-century Paris, as well as a social bon vivant, since he appears to be a handsome man in his thirties. In truth, Bonnet is one hundred and four years old, his youth preserved by a glandular experiment he conducted with his now aged colleague Ludwig, the only person who knows his secret. Over the decades, Bonnet and Ludwig have staved off the Devil of Age by harvesting glands from corpses and transplanting them into Bonnet. Bonnet's doing so well that he throws over his current flame, a model named Margo, in order to pursue an earlier love, Janine (Hazel Court)-- much to the displeasure of another of Janine's conquests, Doctor Gerrard (Christopher Lee).

Unfortunately, if Bonnet doesn't get his gland-fix in time, he becomes a green-eyed maniac. Ludwig's hand has succumbed to paralysis, so he can't perform the transplant operation any more. His suggestion is to acquire the services of the best possible surgeon to take over-- none other than Gerrard. 

CHEAT is an okay thriller, but it's very talky and Bonnet's downfall feels by-the-numbers, with no strong insights as to why he wanted immortality so badly in the first place. Diffring is decent but unexciting, but I doubt Cushing could have done any better. Chris Lee's supporting role resembles many others he did during the sixties, where he was injected just for the effect of his name. However, he makes the most of an underwritten role. Bonnet's transformations are decent but unremarkable.

CIRCUS OF HORRORS is a very different beast. Pop fiction is full of polymath mad scientists who can conjure up both laser-ray cannons and mutated beast-men with a flick of the wrist. However, to my knowledge the evil Doctor Schuler of CIRCUS is the first time a mad plastic surgeon revealed himself to be equally expert at running a circus-- even one nicknamed "the Jinxed Circus."

In 1947, Schuler flees English prosecution for a botched surgical operation and ends up with his two aides in France. By chance he comes across a run-down circus, suffering from a postwar disinterest in cheery attractions. The young daughter of the rumpot circus-owner has a disfiguring scar, so Schuler talks the owner into letting him fix the girl's face. In gratitude the father signs over part ownership to Schuler, after which the father conveniently gets himself killed by a performing bear. (It's one of the few "accidents" at the circus for which Schuler is not directly responsible.)

Years pass with Schuler and his assistants-- one being a woman deeply in love with him-- making "Schuler's circus" a resounding success. Yet Schuler isn't content with square living. He believes himself a genius of plastic surgery, and since he can't practice openly, he recruits low-class women with disfigurements and entices them to join the circus in exchange for facial repair. If Diffring's Bonnet was Faust, Schuler is a road-company Mephisto-- and any time his conquests try to leave his service, they have unfortunate accidents.

However, the circus's reputation sparks an investigation by a young reporter, who chats up Nicole, once the little daughter of the late circus-owner, and now a lissome young acrobat. (At least her transformation into a performer makes sense, given her having lived with the circus all her life. The shady ladies, not so much.) Inevitably the sinister surgeon is undone, less by the investigator than by Schuler's own controlling nature. 

Both the direction of Sidney Hayers and the script of George Baxt (both of whom would later work together on 1962's BURN WITCH BURN) provide good barnstorming entertainment to paper over the lapses in logic. Diffring makes a good hissable (if one-dimensional) villain, and of all the mad scientists who pursued evil to nurture their egos, Schuler must be the only one who "ran away to join the circus."

DEAD AGAIN IN TOMBSTONE (2017)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

Despite the sequel-setup at the end of DEAD IN TOMBSTONE, it took another four years for Guerrero de la Cruz (Danny Trejo) to get a second revival.

I mentioned in my review of the previous film that the idea of a protagonist going around killing evildoers for Satan was a dubious one. The sequel's makers evidently decided to drop that concept, for there's just a quick mention of Guerrero going around doing the devil's business, but with no appearances of Satan or Hell as such. Guerrero still wields the powers of Hell-- he can survive a lot of punishment, such as getting shot up or blown up by dynamite-- but he doesn't seem to have to report to his Infernal Majesty any more.

Guerrero suddenly gets a yen to check on his only surviving relatives. a grandmother and a daughter named Alice (Elysia Rotaru), in the town of Silver River. (Despite the title, none of the action takes place in Tombstone.) But there's a new enemy in the offing: ex-Confederate officer Jackson Boomer (Jake Busey). Boomer is convinced that Guerrero's family possesses a book of Satanic spells with which Boomer can raise the dead and conquer the world. Eventually the evildoer succeeds in raising a handful of zombies clad in Confederate grey, and despite the presence of other anachronistic dialogue, no one makes the obvious pun about the South rising again. Guerrero's grandma is killed during all the contentions, which forces Alice to bond with the father she never knew. In addition, there's a vaguely angelic doctor who comes to Guerrero's aid, and so the agent of Satan is forced to make a definite choice between heaven and hell. 

The direction and scripting is no less formulaic than before, but because the budget is leaner, the action set-pieces aren't as overblown-- though the only one I really liked was a long catfight between Alice and Boomer's prostitute ally. And despite the banality of Boomer's raise-the-undead scheme, and of Confederate villains generally, Jake Busey makes an appealing dastard. The film ends so as to suggest that there won't be any more adventures for Guerrero as an agent of Hell-- which definitely sounds like a blessing for this reviewer.

DEAD IN TOMBSTONE (2013)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

There's the germ of a decent idea in this DTV "weird western," though the idea itself is nothing new and in many ways contradicts the Christian mythology of Satan's influence on Earth. Most Biblical accounts indicate that Satan wants evil to proliferate on Earth, the better to spite God. Therefore it seems counter-intuitive that His Infernal Majesty would do anything that decreases Earth's supply of evildoers.

Nevertheless, the idea of Satan empowering agents who go around harvesting criminals to send them to Hell has persisted in popular culture, at least since 1940, when Timely Comics unleashed one such agent, the original Black Widow. Sometimes there are variations: evil souls escape Hell and Satan's agent has to send them back, as in the 1998 teleseries BRIMSTONE. But DEAD IN TOMBSTONE doesn't bother to ring in any more logical setup.

The film does start off with what almost sounds like an ironic take on the prevalent mythos of the Wild West. The West was not an arena devoted to duels of good and evil, but rather, to conflicts between differing levels of evil. However, nothing in the story follows up on this potential. 

Guerrero de la Cruz (Danny Trejo) is a career outlaw who has led the Blackwater Gang on many a robbery. His sole virtue is that when we see him organize his gang to raid the bank of Tombstone, he tells his men-- including his rash half-brother Red (Anthony Michael Hall)-- that he wants them to pull off the crime with as little killing as possible. However, Red wants to lead the gang, and to that end he talks the other five owlhoots into backshooting their leader.

Down to hell goes Guerrero, and in the interests of budget, all we see of hell looks like a blacksmith's forge, occupied by Satan (Mickey Rourke), though he's billed in the credits as "The Blacksmith." Satan begins gratuitously torturing Guerrero, but by accident or design lets slip that he needs more evil souls to stoke his furnace. This concept is more in line with the evil acts of fairy-tale creatures like ogres, but this potential too is dropped. Guerrero makes a bet with Satan: in exchange for being returned to life, Guerrero will execute all six gang-members and send them to Satan's fires. Satan agrees, but only if the bandit-leader can kill all six in one day, and all by his own hand. If Guerrero fails, he returns to the service of the devil.

The avenger of Hell returns to Earth and proceeds to lay waste to the Blackwater Gang, naturally saving the worst traitor, half-brother Red, for the last. Guerrero gets unwanted aid from sexy sheriff's wife Calathea (Dina Meyer), who wants vengance for the gang's murder of her husband. This complicates Guerrero's quest to ace all six bandits himself, but as one might expect, he does show his inner hero by protecting the feisty femme. In the end, Guerrero kills all of his targets but loses his bet, so that he's consigned to continue as Satan's harvester.

TOMBSTONE is replete with many violent scenes of shooting and fighting, but none stand out. Trejo's performance as the accursed badass is sturdy but similarly unremarkable, while Hall and Meyer do their best with unrewarding characters. Despite the apparent setup for a sequel, it took another four years for Guerrero to get "dead again."

ELFEN LIED (2004)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *good*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological, psychological, sociological*

I rated the original 2002-2005 manga ELFEN LIED as one of the most impressive manga serials in terms of its pervading mythicity. The 2004 TV adaptation lasted just one season, consisting of thirteen episodes, meaning that the show wrapped up long before mangaka Lynn Okamoto was even close to finishing his opus. So, given that the storyline of the anime had to be shortened with a generally arbitrary conclusion, is it as mythic as the original story?

The answer probably won't be the same for every uncompleted adaptation, but ELFEN LIED has the advantage that, as noted in my manga review, of not being "densely plotted." Two ordinary school kids, Kouta and Yuka, give shelter to Nyu, a strange young woman with horns, little realizing that she's a member of a race, the Diaclonii, that evolved parallel with human beings. Though Nyu seems childish and innocent, she has a second persona, Lucy, who is filled with bitterness against humanity for years of ill treatment. Lucy-- capable of slaughtering people with her powers-- has escaped from a nearby scientific installation, and the agents of that installation are willing to move heaven and earth to imprison her once more. Thus the Japanese youngsters and their small coterie of friends are plunged into a world of ultraviolent assassins and monsters. 

The thirteen episodes just barely have time to introduce all of the principals, and a couple of minor villains (both killed by the series' end) before the aforementioned climax. One episode does allude to a new "Big Bad," whose function in the manga was to raise the stakes of the ongoing conflict. This villain's presence suggests that the anime's producers may have been hedging their bets in case they were granted a second season. However, at least the third evildoer remains on the sidelines and doesn't generate a plotline of his own, so there's no great loss when he fades from the narrative.

My concept of mythicity depends on a process I call concrescence, which is generally defined as a "growing together of separate parts." Mythic concrescence appears in narratives where the "parts" we generally call "symbols," and which I call "correlations," join so as to form a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. This isn't always possible with a plot-heavy narrative. However, because both the manga of ELFEN LIED and the anime adaptation focus largely upon characters, both are able to illustrate the tribulations of the freakish Diaclonii, monsters who fiercely desire the pleasures of humanity but who are denied them by their very nature. The conclusion of the anime bears some broad similarities to that of the manga, so it may be that Okamoto was consulted about the general direction of his concept so that the climax would possess some of the manga's general resonance. All that said, the anime's chief virtue is its potential to introduce audiences to the manga's terrible beauties.

Note: after the conclusion of the series, a thirty-minute ELFEN LIED OVA was marketed. I have not seen this, as it was not included with the streamed series, but my understanding is that its events remained within the span of the timeline for the thirteen episodes, which suggests that the OVA did not advance the existing narrative further.

DARIO ARGENTO'S DRACULA (2012)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological, metaphysical, sociological*

This film debuted on movie screens under the title DRACULA 3D, though unlike numerous other efforts of the kind, the non-3D version just looks like any other film. The title DARIO ARGENTO'S DRACULA is at least more honest than that of the 1992 BRAM STOKER'S DRACULA, since the latter adaptation did not follow the Stoker book, but rather structured its narrative to include whatever struck the fancy of director Francis Ford Coppola. Argento like Coppola just emulated whatever aspects of the Stoker book pleased him, and added in a number of extrinsic elements. So maybe the best of all possible titles for this effort would be ARGENTO'S COPPOLA'S DRACULA? That said, for all its demerits the 1992 film does engage with many elements of Bram Stoker's mythic figure, while Argento doesn't produce a compelling take on the vampire count. 

ARGENTO'S is not the first Dracula film to take place fully in Eastern Europe, thus eschewing the "English invasion" trope of the book. Argento does work in a little more social commentary regarding Dracula's monarchical control of the Hungarian town Passo Borgo. Several times the script emphasizes that the ruling powers know well what a parasite Dracula (Thomas Kretschmann)  is, but they won't do anything about it, not even warning Englishman Jonathan Harker when he comes to Castle Dracula to catalog the count's library. Even before Harker's arrival, the audience sees the evil vampire attack and enthrall local sexpot Tanya, making her into his bride. (Like HORROR OF DRACULA, this version eschews the canonical threesome of vampire wives.) When Harker does arrive, the castle is inhabited only by the count and his bride, and both of them are eager to prey upon the young mortal's blood. 

This version of Dracula doesn't need Harker for any real services, so he immediately turns Harker into an undead. There's a vague suggestion that somehow the vampire lord used Harker to lure his wife (not fiancee) Mina (Marta Gastini) to Passo Borgo. The book intimates that Mina resembles one of Dracula's brides, and over time this was elaborated into the idea that Harker's beloved was the reincarnation of a long-dead countess, a trope used to strong effect in Coppola's film. In any case, when Mina arrives, she's greeted by old classmate Lucy Kisslinger. Like the Lucy of Stoker, this version makes brief reference to her having more than one paramour. And Argento sorta-kinda follows Stoker by having Dracula vamp Lucy before Mina, though there really isn't any particular reason for Argento's count to fixate on Mina's friend.

Mina seeks out the castle, but the Count puts her off, claiming he sent Harker out of town on an errand. This gives Dracula the chance to put his moves on Mina, telling her of her resemblance to his dead wife. Mina seems to recollect the count, intimating that reincarnation may be a possibility, but in due time she begins to fight back against the Count's control. Some of the local bigwigs also contemplate a rebellion, but the vampire appears among them and slaughters them all.

Providentially, vampire hunter Abraham Van Helsing (Rutger Hauer) arrives in Passo Borgo to save the day. He slays Lucy, Tanya, the vampirized Harker, and Renfield (who's an asylum resident as in the book, but who has almost nothing to do in this film). To be sure, the vampire-slayer only manages to do so with the help of his anti-vamp paraphernalia, not because he's a good fighter per se. This is demonstrated by the climax, when Dracula beats Van Helsing to a pulp and is only slain when rebellious Mina gets hold of one of the hunter's weapons: a garlic-infused bullet. However, after all these alarums and excursions, the finale brings the vamp back to life for a "surprise ending."

While this flick is nowhere near as bad as Argento's previous outing with a classic monster, the misbegotten 1998 PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, it's still generally underwhelming, despite the fact that Argento has some sort of violent activity going on most of the time. The abortive love-affair of Dracula and Mina casts few sparks despite the actors' attempts to give it their all, and Argento seems to have decided that Dracula's traditional metamorphoses were not cool enough, since the director has the vamp changing into such things as a swarm of flies and a (very risible) giant grasshopper. Rutger Hauer makes a decent Van Helsing, and Argento does at least give the guys in the audience a couple of very sexy vampiresses in both Miriam Giovanelli and the director's own daughter Asia.