Tag Archives: Lesbianism

EVIL Seduces the Woman of her Dreams. “Vampyros Lesbos” reviewed! (Severin Films / 4K UHD and Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Men Beware of the “Vampyros Lesbos” now on 4K UHD and Blu-ray

Linda’s dreams vividly disturb her with imagery of an idyllic island where blood rivulets watercourse down curtains while being in the romantic embrace of a swarthy beautiful woman.  These dreams are so powerful she must see a therapist about them.  When attending an nude performance art show with husband Omar, she’s shocked to see the woman on stage is the same woman from her dreams.   The coincidence lingers with Linda on her business trip to a Turkish island where she meets Countess Nadine Carody to discuss a large inheritance from a Count Dracula.  Come to her surprise, Countess Carody is the same woman from on stage.  Immediately, Linda’s under Countess Carody’s suggestive sexual influence of a lesbian vampire.  When Carody falls deeply for Linda, she will stop at nothing to have her whole, as one of her, to pass along the tradition of inherence as Dracula has done for her, but Omar, the psychiatrist Dr. Seward who’s familiar with vampirism, and a Memmet, a hotel clerk moonlighting as a rogue and vindictive vampire hunter, aim to help Linda from Carody’s grasp one way or another. 

The director behind some of Europe’s sleaziest erotic-horrors, such as “The Sadist of Notre Dame,” “Ilsa, the Wicked Warden,” and “A Virgin Among the Living Dead,” Jesús Franco, aka Jess Franco, was a prolific cult icon of the past, the present, and will still be in the future.  The Spanish born filmmaker grew up in the Francisco Franco dictatorship for over 30 years but that didn’t stop him from expressing his artistic freedom with the 1971 released “Vampyros Lesbos, “ a German production set in Turkey that mirrors the classic Bram Stoker tale but with teaks of character, scenery, and sexual orientation albeit “Dracula” is too thought to be a homoerotic tale to some filmic scholars.  Compositely filmed in Turkey, Spain, and Germany, “Vampyros Lesbos” is a production of Tele-Cine Film und Fernsehproduktion, Central Cinema Company, and the Fénix Cooperativa Cinematográfica with Karl Heinz Mannchen as executive producer and Artur Brauner as producer, both of whom worked on Franco’s “The Vengeance of Doctor Mabuse,” and the story, based loosely off of Stoker’s tale, is penned by Franco. 

Like other Franco productions of this caliber, the cast is comprised of internationals, ranging from Spain to Sweden, from Britian to Switzerland, and to finally Germany without a single Turkish thespian in sight despite the story’s setting locale of Istanbul.  As mentioned briefly above, “Vampyros Lesbos” follows a threadbare version of Bram Stoker’s iconic Gothic tale that trades the grotesque Gothicisms for sunnier skies and idyllic island houses.  The basic principal characters are present from Stoker’s story but have been tweaked to fit Franco’s feverous surreal aesthetic that has a really sink its teeth into the homoerotic indulgencies.  Swedish actress Ewa Strömberg (“The Devil Came from Akasava,” “She Killed in Ecstasy”) resembles something along the lines of a Jonathan Harker-type but instead of being in real estate, like Harker, her character Linda Westinghouse is an inheritance lawyer dispatched to Countess Carody’s island home where she is bewitched by Carody’s infatuation and lust for her lifeforce.  Countess Carody is the obvious counterpart to Count Dracula but spun in a way that makes Bram Stoker’s story more like a tangent rather than remake as it’s Count Dracula’s fortune Countess Carody is inheriting.  Spanish actress Soledad Miranda (who also costarred with Strömberg in “The Devil Came from Akasava” and “She Killed in Ecstasy”) is the sultriest creature on the screen in Carody’s nude and neck biting pastimes and coupled with the easy-going Linda, Strömberg and Miranda sizzle as lesbian lovers very comfortable with each other’s performances and bodies.  Van Helsing is embodied by Dr. Seward but with reverse tendencies that do not require the doctor to be the stake to stop vampirism but rather entertain an unexpected twist trait that’s quite opposite.  Seward is played by British actor Dennis Price (“Tower of Evil”) and is a comparable Van Helsing amongst the previous lot but definitely less harrowing and dramatic than most.  Seward’s deranged patient Agra is the final piece to the Stoker narrative semblance as the story’s Renfield.  German actress Heidrun Kussin (“The Swingin’ Pussycats”) does not eat or feign eat bugs and other nightcrawlers to aspire being a vampire but retains Renfield’s psychic connection while going hysteria topless as she squirms in bed for her master’s return to whisk her away into the night.  “Vampyros Lesbos” rounds out the cast with new cast not familiar to Bram Stoker’s “Dracula” with Andrea Montchal (“Eugenie de Sade”) as Linda’s husband Omar, José Martínez Blanco as Countess Carody’s loyal bodyguard Morpho, Paul Muller (“Lady Frankenstein”) as Dr. Seward’s assistant Dr. Steiner, and Jesús Franco in the role of Memmet, a hotel clerk with a visceral vendetta against vampires. 

Arguably the most notable film out of the prolific Jesús Franco filmography, as I believe it to rival another outstanding piece of work from Franco, “Eugenie… The Story of Her Journey into Perversion, starring Christopher Lee and Maria Rohm based off the Marquis de Sade novel, “Vampyros Lesbos” is perhaps Franco’s most recognized piece film that has a sliver of notoriety while also spurring a remake years later in a 20-minute short film in 2008 by Matthew Saliba.  Most of Franco’s repitoire can be said as messy, a mash up of other films recut to make a new film, hackeneyed, and a complete dull, but “Vampyros Lesbos” is different.  It’s also not the same Eurosleaze one might be familiar with in regard to his catalogue; in fact, “Vampyros Lesbos,” despite the name, doesn’t even feel like sleaze.  There’s a naturality about it underneat it’s Bram Stoker-homoericism message sans the gratuitous nudity that’s more of a playful exploration of sexuality.  The only resemblance of sex is through the vampiric rite of seductive foreplay and subsequential drinking of the blood and with only Linda and Countess Nadine in scenes of embrace.  Not even poor Linda’s husband, Omar, has conjugal interactions and that plays into the whole theme of the story that Oman and Linda have this sexless relationship and here comes along Countess Nadine and her oozing sexpot of Linda’s fantasies inside a one-side power dynamic.  There’s no degenerate-filled debasement in this sexploitation, one the story’s traits that actually separates itself from “Eugenie,” and Franco, like with “Eugenie” on this element, actually helms an artistic aesthetic with good editing, crafty angles, and a varied cinematography blend of natural and stylized imaging. 

Provocative European sexploitation that isn’t busk European sleaze, “Vampyros Lesbos” is zenith Jess Franco, a social-political rebel and artist unafraid to tell a story that won’t tickle everyone’s interest but definitely be an archetype of the director’s caliber.  Severin Films proudly presents “Vampyros Lesbo” onto a new 4K UHD and Blu-ray dual-format set with a 4K presentation scanned from the original 35mm negative.  The 4K UHD is compressed with HVEC encoding onto a BD100 and the standard Blu-ray is AVC encoded onto a BD50 with respective resolutions of 2160p and 1080p.  The European 1.66:1 widescreen is the aspect ratio on both formats, but the UHD uses DolbyVision to expand upon the already lush color pallet with a richer complexity within the color scheme even though Franco loves his most muted black dressings on characters and on sets.  The extra pixels offer deeper textural, mostly auspiciously perceived in the club scenes that present a room of textures and in often brightly lit captures that don’t washout the details but rather define them more accurately.   The standard Blu-ray offers the same approach but brought back a step or two due to format limitations on the color scale and pixel count but a lesser keen eye won’t take much notice.  The original negative print shows no egregious mishandling damage or degrading emulsion wear.  The only audio track available is the German Mono ADR track with optional English subtitles.  This release does not contain the English dub that’s lost out there in physical media land.  The mono track has a flat tone with no depth to speak of and is full of desynch between dialogue movements and audio overlay but never hides behind the other single output layers. German Manfred Hübler and Sigfried Schwab eclectic score is a fun listen with brass, piano, sentur, light drums, and bass compiled to an era swanky main score that’s quoted being a sexadelic dance party, and rightfully so.  There’s even a distorted vocals on a slow beat jazz track that provides the unsettling and sultry notes for the underplayed horror side of this sexploitation.  Special features on the UHD includes audio commentaries by Kat Ellinger, author of Daughter of Darkness, and a collab between film academic Aaron AuBuchon and Oscarbate Film Collective’s John Dickson and Will Morris.  The UHD concludes with the German theatrical trailer.  The standard Blu-ray has more wiggle room for bons features with all the above from UHD, plus an interview with Jess Franc just prior to his death Interlude in Lesbos, an interview with Stephen Trower, author of Murderous Passions:  The Delirious Cinema of Jesús Franco, a Jess Franco career appreciation by “Anora” director Sean Baker The Red Scarf Diaries, the Stephen Thrower hosted In the Land of Franco, Part 12 looks at iconic locales from Franco’s films with a primary focus on “The Sadist of Notre Dame” which his set in Paris, France, an interview with Soledad Miranda historian Amy Brown Sublime Soledad, a 3-minute mini interview with Jess Franco labeled Jess is Yoda that provides some comedic flair and “Star Wars” references, and the German opening title sequence.  Physically, Severin’s release has a stark, hard contrast cardboard O-ring slipcover with Soledad Miranda in a seductive position starring right aback at you in front of black background.  The backside of the slipcover contains no technical information but does have review quotes, credit acknowledgments, and lingering stare between Countess Carody and Linda Westinghouse.  Inside you’ll find the classic 4K UHD Amaray with Severin’s original Blu-ray art from 2015, commissioned by graphic artist Ben Benscoter.  There is no reverse image on the sleeve.  The discs are held separately with one each side of the interior.  The 89-minute film is not rated and is region free for global enjoyment.

Last Rites: Jess Franco’s “Vampyros Lesbos” is on the select short list of how the Spanish director should be judged by existing and new fans of his work and remembered in his long career and legacy as a truly psychedelic, auteur driven, lesbian vampire film with plenty of women-centric allure and flesh.

Men Beware of the “Vampyros Lesbos” now on 4K UHD and Blu-ray

Feminism Fights EVIL The Only Way Possible in “Broken Mirrors” reviewed! (Cult Epics / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

The Best Depiction of the Unpleasant Side of Brothels.  “Broken Mirrors” on Blu-ray.

An Amsterdam brothel Happy House Club clings to the good girls that remain employed to pleasure the reprobate and insensitive johns that visit.  Dora, a virtual working girl lifer, brings in new blood, Diane, a young mother desperate in need of financial support because of her drug addicted husband.  Night after night, customers select through the ever-growing service list the club’s owner deems profitable while the women and the matron manager naively cope with a profession that’s quick, easy cash.  They create a process, a standard of procedure so to speak, that tries to make the work that much less degrading but with each client, a little piece of their humanity is chipped away.  Simultaneously, a methodical serial killer abducts the women he previously surveillances from off the street, chains them to a bed in a remote room, takes snapshots of them in confinement, and slowly starves them to death, which could last months.  The two stories are intertwined and connected by a gender dominance disease in which a slow resistance begins to build to an explosive head.

The unofficial sobriquet of the Queen of Feminism Marleen Gorris had made a name for herself as a staunch supporter of feminism and lesbianism with her controversial and provocative films.  Her acclaimed 1982 debut written-and-directed “A Question of Silence” show oppressed gender solidarity and mutiny against a systematically enslaved masculine society.  Continuing her crusade against the patriarchal grain, Gorris followed up “A Question of Silence” with another powerfully messaged, social commentary film that, again, places women emotions and safety under the unyielding thumb of men two years later with “Broken Mirrors.”  Natively known in the Netherlands as “Gebroken Spiegels,” the film marks the return of select cast from her inaugural feature, marshalling in a new narrative in the neo-feminism cinema under the returning production company Sigma Film Productions with producer Matthijs van Heijningen (“A Woman Like Eve,” “The Cool Lakes of Death.”).

As mentioned, a pair of actresses have carried over from “A Question of Silence” to maintain a principal performance in “Broken Mirrors,” beginning with Henriëtte Tol who played the outwitting secretary in Gorri’s debut returns as a woman working in Amsterdam’s red-light district as a seasoned employee of the Happy House Club.  Tol ups the ferocity levels of her previous performance while still maintaining a gradually steady sex appeal.  Another returning actress who nearly didn’t have any dialogue in her previous role as a mother without a voice is Edda Barends now in a character that can’t stop screaming for her life as the latest abductee chained to a cruddy bed in a cruddy room with a coming-and-going, polaroid-enthused sociopath. In Barends starkly different rage against the man machine archetype, the actress finds herself discomposed in the face man she can’t understand but eventually recognizes his nasty need and withdraws it.  Both women excel beyond the unsavory current conditions and transfer the power that’s been dangling over their heads into themselves.  Newcomer Diane, played by Lineke Rijxman, becomes the key to initiate the unraveling of power of a man-owned brothel that subjugates women not as mere employees of a man-owned business but as nothing more than moneymaking ass-shakers and back-layers.  Rijxman puts in the work of having her character be resilient at work and at home as she juggles a wide variety of disgusting clients to please their whims while coming home to deal with a junkie husband’s mess.  As the story progresses and the women fall deeper under life’s heel, Dora and Diane spark what begins as a mutual friendship that slips gradually into sexual tension, giving them more assurances when they need it the most as the brothel parties become bigger and more intense.  The parallel story runs along the same oppressive path but in unconventional, unlawful, and inhuman way with the kidnap and starvation torture of a young mother.  Eddie Brugman is also a returning “A Question of Silence” actor who now finds himself in the shoes of Jean-Pierre, a mild-manner husband and by all rights societally normal seemingly man who visits the brothel for a quickie, easy money as Francine (Marijke Veugelers) would proclaim, but his dark hobby is to snatch unsuspecting women for his own perverse pleasure of watching and hearing them plea for their lives.  By the end of both stories, connected by Jean-Pierre and who finds himself at the end of the disappointing stick for his kicks, crafts more than one way to not give in and to stand up against male malarkey and nastiness.  The cast rounds out with Carla Hardy, Coby Stunnenberg, Anke van ‘t Hof, Elja Pelgrom, Hedda Oledzky, Arline Renfurm, Johan Leysen, Wim Wama, and Elsje de Wiljn.

Not only is “Broken Mirrors” another contentious and provocative incendiary story that wedges apart men and women, with the latter being victimized and justified in their actions, but Marleen Gorris also directs one hell of a boiling point intertwining between parallelisms that almost have no link to each other until the reveal.  Gorris doesn’t necessarily employ red herrings to keep audiences guessing but rather keep the killer obscure, as all that we are exposed to see is from behind the man, who doesn’t speak much either and if he does speak, his responses are to the point with as little descriptors and adjectives as possible.  Not only is the editing between simultaneous stories organic but also the other editing techniques that materialize the characters’ emotional decaying befit the mostly linear structure, such as with the student party montage at the brothel that does a roundtable of individualized scenarios between the women and their slimeball clients in an emotionally painful grin-and-bear it series that culminates to which one character best describes the ordeal as feeling like a human lavatory.  The feeling is very much mutual with viewers as well, like a used wet nap to scrub off a soul staining filth covering head to toe, as Gorris represents a thematic exactitude of fiercely dividing feminism that would define her career. A clear understanding of how brothels operate is greatly depicted with that flimsy layer of excitement and efficiency to mask the ugliness underneath.

“Broken Mirrors” arrives on a Blu-ray home video from Cult Epics and, once again, resurrects and restores a pièce de résistance of Netherland celluloid. The new 4K high-definition transfer from the original 35mm negative is presented in European widescreen 1.66:1 aspect ratio on an AVC encoded, 1080p, BD50. 35mm print looks none worse the wear over the course of father time with a mint print. Restored color graded has freshened up the natural print palette of the brothel story while the kidnapper’s tale sustains a grayscale to bisect the narrative and the delineation for both presents a palatable depth. The aplenty natural grain doesn’t swarm and takeover the higher pixelations to award us with a satisfying vintage image that now enriched without any smoothing enhancements nor any compression issues to note. The Danish language release comes with two audio tracks: A DTS-HD MA 2.0 Mono and a LPCM 2.0 Mono. “Broken Mirrors” fair well from both dual channel formats with the DTS-HD aggrandizing the Lodewijk de Boer razor synth score with intent that in itself is a character. Comparatively elsewhere, the two outputs offer little differences and sate with forefront dialogue, balanced in front an equally balanced ambient track. Optional error-free English subtitles are available with haste text to keep up with the fast-paced Dutch. Special features include an audio commentary by Leiden University film scholar Peter Verstraten, an archived 1984 interview with U.S. sex worker and activist Margo St. James with Cinema 3 host Adriaan van Dis, a promotional still gallery, and trailers. The Cult Epics Blu-ray comes in a clear, traditional snapper sporting the film’s most iconic and titular moment, displayed also on the disc art, while the reverse side of the cover depicts a still image of Carla Hardy. The region free Blu runs at a not rated 110 minutes. A good double bill against “A Question of Silence,” “Broken Mirrors” makes for a morosely on the trot sister feature in more ways than one to further a Marleen Gorris artfully aired agenda.

The Best Depiction of the Unpleasant Side of Brothels.  “Broken Mirrors” on Blu-ray.