Aubrey's Jess Franco Marathon

Ok, here we go:

001 Tenemos 18 años aka We Are 18 Years Old (1959)





With:
Isana Medel
Terele Pávez
Antonio Ozores
Luis Peña

Two girls (Isana Mede and Terele Pávez) are writing the story of what they did on their holidays (a road trip), and then telling each other (after a flashback), that the events they have written really didn't happen like that: that the Werewolf/ Phantom of the Opera/Jack The Ripper, who only struck every 50 years and ended up by killing one of them, was in truth a sad drunk who was quite nice really, and didn't kill anyone (How could he have killed you when you're still here? the other girl says), and that the nice priest who helped with their car was actually quite aggressive and scary.

There is a kind of sub plot about their cousin (Antonio Ozores: who seems to have been a fairly well-known comic actor: his humour is very broad) continually trying to scrounge money from them, using excuses that are more and more bizarre (though he always wants the same amount – 500, which one of the girls has to remind him of when he accidentally says 100 one time); the men on their journey who try to rip them off all look a lot like him as well, though they don't seem to notice this. The cousin sells them the car they use for the holiday, which is like an old fashioned car from a Punch cartoon, but yellow instead of black.

The film has some odd bits of realism as well, odd for a comedy anyway: the two girls are cousins, but one is living with the other's family because her own parents were killed in the civil war: and later, an escaped prisoner (Luis Peña) they meet tells one of the girls about his ghastly childhood, parents dead, scrabbling for food, tripping over dead bodies in the street, etc (The first time you cry out; then it seems normal) (this section was cut by the Spanish censors).

There is a putting away of childish things ending, that seems to go against the rest of the film (and against the rest of Jess's films as well), and though it's supposed to be a positive ending it's really quite sad.

The music is fine: jolly dance band comedy music most of the time, with an atonal/prepared solo piano part (played by Jess himself), during the Phantom of the Opera bit.


I missed a bit through dozing off (I'd been ill), and when I watched the bit I'd missed again it was like falling into a comfy chair, or coming back home, or something: it has a really nice 50s European feel to it, with some Míro-like Andalusian landscapes (I think I mean Míro anyway), and a distinctive, faded colour scheme.

Not great Jess, and there is none of the roving, zooming camera and sweaty obsessiveness that one associates with his films, but it is sweet-natured, funny, and very enjoyable.

A nice 50s animation style title sequence:



The cousin says they're going to break his legs unless he gets 500:



The Phantom's story:



Spanish Surrealist background:



The escaped convict explains how he came to be that way:



He walks towards the border, and (he hopes) freedom; Isina (Jess's Fiancée at the time) wants to stop him but doesn't:




The whole film is below; it is worth watching (and entirely safe for work).


We Are 18

002 La Reina del Tabarin (Queen of the Tabarin Club) 1960



BFI synopsis: A young aristocrat falls in love with a gypsy-girl the day of his engagement. After a fight in which the young man is injured and convalescent for a while, he returns to his love, the gypsy-girl, who has became a well-known artist in Paris – but the story is really told from Lola's point of view.

Or from Luis Balbo:

Madrid, 1913. Lolita is a pretty Gypsy girl who dances in the streets for a living while her uncle Pepe plays the barrel organ and her brother passes round the hat. One night Lolita is attracted by the sounds of a party. She introduces herself and dances for the guests. She is rewarded with a meal and meets the son of the house, Fernando. Attracted by the vivacious young girl, Fernando passes himself off as Roberto, a waiter, and though he is engaged to the beautiful Monique de Segur, he falls in love with Lolita.

When Lolita learns of the engagement, she challenges Fernando to choose between them. He promises to marry her and arranges to elope with her that night. On his way to the assignation Fernando provokes a duel in which he is wounded and is thus unable to join Lolita. The broken-hearted girl leaves Madrid for Paris. There, she becomes the pupil of the Milanese maestro Picardi and begins a new career as "Lola Miranda"...



This is a musical (in the way that Cabaret was a musical, with the songs and performances given as being real) telling the story of Lolita, a street singer (Mikaela - Micaela Rodríguez Cuesta), as she rises to playing to Royalty at the Tabarin club in Paris: on the way finding, losing, and finding love. (I think the BFI gets it the wrong way about, as the story is definitely from Lola's point of view.)

It opens on a scene of her performing in a crowded market, with her uncle on the barrel organ. It is a joyful, exuberant scene, her performance better or at least more enjoyable than those that come later; in one Fall-like moment the uncle starts turning the handle more slowly, seemingly to enjoy the effect, before she gestures impatiently at him to get it together, for Christ's sake, and speed it up.

There is a cut to a man (Fernando, played by Yves Massard) in a carriage promising undying love to the woman with him, before getting out of the carriage and going to see another woman where he does the same.

Obviously, they meet, and despite the difference in their social class, fall in love, his philandering forgotten (though his mother does warn Lola about it). Now I lost the plot a bit. The film has no subtitles, and my Dora the Explorer level of Spanish only allowed me to make out odd mentions of houses, a crown (maybe), friends, and someone saying “Come on”, so I found the subtleties of the dialogue hard to follow. There is a visit to Lola's house, where the couple find all the family asleep in bed, a fight Lola has with a neighbour woman, and a duel that Fernando fights in her honour, where he deliberately shoots into the air.

Meanwhile, Lola performs at a salon where she is sneered at for being of the People, and then takes singing lessons (where, for the first time, she sings out of tune). At one point she is supposed to meet Fernando, but he doesn't turn up because he has been injured in the duel, so she resolves to have nothing more to do with him and gets on with her career.

At the climactic performance, on New Year's Eve, he turns up at the Tabarin but she spurns him, before being told – I think by the man who Fernando fought the duel with – what really happened, and persuaded of his fidelity: and then, after her triumph, they walk out together in the cold dawn.

I missed a lot of it, and found the plot-explaining bits tedious, but there was generally enough to keep one interested, even without knowing what anyone was saying. It is a good natured and humorous film, with one or two Franco touches, even though it was a film that he took on as a way to get his name known.

Soledad Miranda (who was a few years later to become Franco's muse) has a small part: but I did not see her, and from the clip that is on Youtube it seems that my copy had that bit cut (maybe because of a close-up of the Can-Can dancers' legs just before).

One scene that was baffling was the way the characters guzzle down grapes while the chimes for the new year are being struck (on a gong). I looked this up and it seems that it was a Spanish tradition stretching all the way back to 1895 or 1905, designed (if you manage to get down 12 grapes before the chimes have finished) to bring good luck, or keep off witchcraft or something.

The film features a proto-steadi-cam effect, where Mikaela steps onto the dolly so the the scenery moves about behind her while she is singing.

This is the cut scene with Soledad Miranda.

I don't know if Lola being called Lola Miranda is a coincidence or what.



The street singer:



The fight:



The Duel:



Came the dawn:

004 The Awful Dr Orlof (1962)



Howard Vernon
Diana Lorys
Conrado San Martín
Ricardo Valle
Perla Cristal

The first real Jess Franco film, and possibly his most famous (though not his best).

Dr Orlof (Howard Vernon) an ex-prison doctor, abducts young women and tries to use their skin to repair his daughter's scarred face; he is stopped by a spunky young ballerina (Diana Lloys) and her klutzy police inspector boyfriend (Conrado San Martin).

Obviously ripped off Eyes Without a Face, though Franco claimed not to have seen it before he started on Orlof. There's no reason for him to have lied, and he was usually quite open about his various liftings (see that previous film), so maybe it was an "Idea in the air" as he said.

The film is set in a country somewhere between France and Germany. It starts with a very drunk woman making her way home across a darkened square, accompanied by a soundtrack of loud percussion (two comments on IMBD complain about this cacophony, but really it is one of the best bits of the film: a normal creepy string soundtrack would not be anything like as effective). Anyway, the woman gets inside and undresses, before going to her wardrobe and being attacked by the half human figure hiding there. This is Morpho (Ricardo Valle), who seems to be a have been named for his somnambulism. He takes the body back to Dr Orlof's. The skin graft doesn't work, again: and then Orlof realises what the problem is. Up to now he has been using the skin of dead women, when he what should really have done is taken a graft from a living subject.

The horror of this – when he eventually does it, does not come over, though Orlof's callousness is chilling – Keep her alive – I might need her for something else.

The policeman's girlfriend decides to help him by acting as a decoy, and once she attracts Orlof, leaves a message for him to pick up: but, exasperated by all the false leads he has already been given, he doesn't even open the envelope until it is almost too late: and even then, without the help of a drunken vagrant...

The story is predictable, and the dubbed dialogue terrible: what makes this film worth watching is the photography of the rain-washed streets at night and of the ruined mansion Orlof takes one of his victims to: and Orlof himself (Howard Vernon in the first of maybe 30 films he made with Franco), driven mad long before the film starts, possibly by what has happened to his daughter, possibly by something at the prison, since his actions there (related in chunks of info-dump dialogue) seem more than a bit odd. There is also a few seconds of toplessness: not worth watching the film for but quite startling, given the date.

Orlof and Morpho:



Night scenes:





Orlof admiring the skin of one of his victims:



Morpho on the hunt:

006 – The Sadistic Baron von Klaus (1962)



Howard Vernon
Hugo Blanco
Gógo Rojo
Fernando Delgado
Paula Martel
Ana Castor

In another French/German town (in Germany, but near the border), the residents are haunted by the 17th century legend of Baron von Klaus, who abducted and killed several young women, always with the same curved blade. Eventually he was trapped and chased by the villagers out into the swamps adjoining the estate, where he disappeared, cursing the village and promising vengeance. Now the murders have started again.

A journalist has been sent to get the story; he and the investigating officer are old adversaries, and quite a lot of the film is taken up with their sparring. There are a couple of comedy bumpkins, a professor of some sort, a nice barmaid: and even a Baron Von Klaus, who you know know is the murderer, look at those eyes! - (and the fact that he's played by Howard Vernon). He is very cagey about where he was on the night one of the murders took place as well.

In the meantime, the Von Klaus matriarch is dying. Her son and his fiancé just make it back just in time for her to warn him about the old Count's room with her last words. Of course, he does the opposite of what she tells him and finds the Count's diary, thinks, This looks good.

Fairly standard early 60s crime/horror, with some nice B&W photography; but what makes the film is a long-ish torture/murder sequence – amazing for the time I mean, with most of the business out of shot, but still effective. Not his best, then: but still decent.

Country oafs:



The reporter is briefed:



The lover's confession:



The murder:



The reporter finds the diary:



Back to the swamp:

This is a bit of a niche interest Aubrey, eh?
Is it Spanish cinema in general you enjoy, or just this Franco? (who I've never heard of)
You always have the pic of his lovely Mrs on your posts I notice. That's devotion!
My only foray into Spanish film was Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth.

European (continental) cinema in general, but especially Franco. There is something about his films - the mood of them - that I find really addictive. The early films are his most mainstream; later on they become more Jess-like - cheaply and quickly made, with lots of roaming, zooming camera work and slippery plots. Some people can't stand him: and you do need to adopt a different sensibility towards his work than you do to that of (say) Steven Spielberg: I much prefer Franco though.

Lina Romay (in my sig) doesn't come into them for a while yet - 1970 I think it is. She eventually worked as a co-director, writer, and editor on his films, as well as acting in them.

The Jess Franco film was named in order to cash in on that, I think.

I used to love it when BBC Two would show French (usually) films on Saturday night - I remember Resnais's "The American Uncle", with Gerard Depardeau trying to hang himself off a door knob with his neck tie; or one (I have a copy, but can't remember what it's called) with a boy given his first cigar at a party, and then going to kiss a girl, and she tells him he has to choose between cigars and girls; he says "Le Cigar".

And then the seasons they had, of Buñuel, Hitchcock - and of French mainstream films, early on Tuesday evenings. Lots more. They still show a fair amount of stuff like that. but not so casually these days, and not in such great chunks - there were about 30 films in that Buñuel season.