MANIA (1974)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. For decades this Renato Polselli sex and horror tale was thought to be lost. It turned up recently but in poor quality, cut and in Italian only. Finally, here's an uncut version (for extra minutes of sex and violence, widescreen, terrific quality and subtitled! Renato Polselli (under his Ralph Brown moniker) takes a drive-the-widow-crazy plot and turns out this crackpot cinema classic. Even with subtitles some of this still makes no sense, but it all works wonderfully, and in Polselli's hands even continuity errors seem natural, like the haunted woman driving during the day while it's pitch-black in her car making it look like she's driving around town in her own personal hell. Polselli's bizarro world is one where cripples run riot in wheelchairs, where naked catfights and whippings can and do break out at anytime, where the women wear nightshirts day or night and the dead are resplendent in windbreaker and playtex dishwashing gloves. Brad Euston, mugging like he's out to take home the Mickey Hargitay award for outstanding overacting in a film, takes acting honors in the dual role as the dead scientist/crippled brother.
GIROLIMONI: THE MONSTER OF ROME (1972)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. Nino Manfredi, Gabriele Lavia, Guido Leontini. Based on true events, Girolimoni The Monster of Rome is another one of Damiano Damiani’s films which has sadly faded into relative obscurity. The first victim, four-year-old Emma Giacomini, was kidnapped while playing in a public park on the 31st of March 1924. She was found later that same evening in the Monte Mario area of Rome, bruised and beaten, but still alive. Newspaper headlines cried out for the arrest of the maniac responsible triggering fascist-dictator-on-the-ascent Benito Mussolini to become personally involved. Fearing his government would be seen as weak, ineffective, and unable to protect the public he set up a special task force to catch the monster, headed by chief-of-police Arturo Bocchini. His brief was simple; catch the monster as soon as possible. The investigation, on the other hand, was anything but simple. Although numerous eye-witnesses came forward describing a tall man, around 50, well dressed, and with a mustache the police would hit one dead-end after another. The monster left few clues; scraps of pages torn from an English language brochure for religious articles and the handkerchiefs he used to strangle his poor young victims.
BATTLE OF THE STARS (1978)-ENGLISH DUB WITH SWEDISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. I'll admit I love these shitty star wars ripoffs by Alfonso Brescia. This is the one that is impossible to see (all the others are easily accessible via U-Tube). Director: Alfonso Brescia (as Al Bradley), Stars: John Richardson, Yanti Somer, Walter Maestosi. A spaceship investigates an out-of-control planet and discovers a computer that controls an underground civilization.
KISS OF THE DEAD (1974)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. Directed by: Carlo Infascelli, Stars: Silvia Dionisio, Orso Maria Guerrini, Peter Lee Lawrence. The Countess Clara is in love with Andrea Valverde but agrees to marry the Count Guido when he learns that Andrew is his brother from his mother’s side. Clara produces a daughter, Guido leaves ensnared by chanteuse Yvonne and Andrew goes to war in Libya. Yvonne, to seize the goods of Clara makes the poison. Clara is buried but thanks to a kiss of his brother wakes up. Yvonne tried to turn the events in his favor but she is sentenced.
CRAZY KILLER (1991)- Director: Jean-Claude Roy, Stars: Charley Boorman, Pierre Clémenti, Eva Mazauric. A French detective is investigating the murders of women around a brothel and discovers a young man is using them for snuff films. Charley Boorman ,who plays the villain (and I mean villain) ,is John Boorman's son,but it is a far cry from "Esmerald forest"! A trashy movie dealing with trash! Although many characters are French (as Roy is himself) ,the action takes place in Korea (of course such things could not happen in a civilized country such as Roy's homeland).The filmed deaths make the viewer a peeping tom although the directing is so dismal it looks like a farce (which it is not) as three hooded men rush towards the victim.
GIMLET (1995)-IN SPANISH WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. Director: José Luis Acosta, Stars: Ángela Molina, Viggo Mortensen, Abel Folk. Julia runs a trendy bar in Barcelona. She treats men with caution, believing one can love too much and invite pain. She's been dating Pablo, one of her waiters. After his grisly murder (his heart is cut out), she receives anonymous messages and video tapes from a man who says he is in love with her. Another murder follows, the police give her 24-hour protection, and Pablo's replacement at the bar, the virile Antonio, seems to be attracted to her. As Julia's stalker closes in, she's on the verge of a nervous breakdown, then becomes almost serene. Leading the investigation is a police comisario who's eyes are covered as he awaits the completion of treatment. Will we see the murderer?
ROOM NEXT DOOR (1994)- Director: Fabrizio Laurenti, Writer:Pupi Avati, Stars: Mark Benninghoffen, Thomas Patrick, Mary Sellers Martin Yakobowsky is a brilliant lawyer whose family originally comes from Poland. He is assigned by his legal practice to resolve a contentious case in the prevalently agricultural town in the heart of Iowa, where he was born. After his initial reluctance, due largely to his having cut off all ties with the community of his birthplace, Martin decides to return to the town. He arrives to find himself dealing with a dispute between a powerful state congressman and the poor Polish farm-workers. But while he works on the case, Martin is brought face to face with his past, as the murders of his former girl friend and her friends, the Scibor brothers resurface disconcertingly. The lawyer goes back over the judicial records which led to a maniac being sentenced to death. However certain details (the disappearance of the murder weapon among them) makes him realize that an innocent man was convicted. At the same time, it seems that Martin is being continually threatened. Images from his past reappear and begin to exert an obsessive hold over his memory. Gradually, the lawyer loses sight of the professional duties which brought him back to his hometown. He falls prey to a form of madness that leads him to the discovery of a horrifying truth about.
SPECTRUM: BEYOND THE END OF THE WORLD (1983)-IN SPANISH WITH ENGLISH SUBS RARE SPANISH SF FILM! Director: Manuel Esteba, Stars: Eduardo Fajardo, Daniel Martín, Inka María. Two brothers, scientists try to beat the record for staying inside a cave underground. When they surface to look horrified that something wiped out the human being and that they are the only survivors. Something terrible the threat.......
EYES OF CRYSTAL (2004)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. Director: Eros Puglielli, Stars: Luigi Lo Cascio, Lucía Jiménez, José Ángel Egido. When a young couple and a peeper are killed in the field with sadism, Inspector Amaldi and his partner Freese unsuccessfully follow the leads trying to track the criminal. Meanwhile, the college student Giuditta is being stalked and goes to the precinct, where she is attended by Amaldi, and immediately they feel a great attraction for each other. When another woman is murdered, Amaldi and Freese realize that they are chasing a serial killer. Amaldi visits Professor Civita, trying to find the meaning of three leaves found in the crime scene. Amaldi, who battles with his violent temper, tries to put the clues together and to avoid the next murder of the unknown psychopath.
ORLAK THE HELL OF FRANKENSTEIN (1961)-IN SPANISH WITH ENGLISH SUBS. A SPECTACULAR MEXICAN B&W HORROR FILM WITH A GREAT MONSTER!! Director: Rafael Baledón, Stars: Armando Calvo, Rosa de Castilla, Irma Dorantes. Criminal Jaime Rojas is released from jail and he helps Dr. Frankenstein to escape and continue his experiments to create life. When the scientist succeeds and creates Orlak, a remote-controlled creature with Rojas' face, the crook uses Orlak against his treacherous partners in crime and the woman that betrayed him. Working in a chiaroscuro landscape and with not much funding, Baledon cleverly reverted at appropriate times to the minimalist approach of certain German filmmakers of the silent era, not in duplicating expressionistic poses and design, but in evoking an expressionistic sense of positioning and drama; at other times, he created a visual delight, part expressionistic, part surrealistic, as when filming about a wedge shaped building whose center juts toward the audience in the middle of the screen. Sets still standing from the Nostradamus series were used, and enough craftsmanship is in evidence to impart a moderate richness of production.
THE DEVIL'S CROSS (1975)-IN SPANISH WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. Finally a great looking copy with English subtitles for this Paul Naschy scripted film by John Gilling! The multi-layered narrative begins with a series of opium induced visions within the mind of writer Alfred Dawson. He imagines the legendary medieval Templars pursuing a damsel through a forest. In order to recover from his opium addiction he takes a trip to Spain where he encounters the very superstitions which have caused his mental imbalance. He finds himself stalked by a sinister figure in a black hood who murders his friends and acquaintances along the way. It is gradually revealed that the figure is the devil himself, and Dawson ends up accused of the series of killings.
EYES WITHOUT A FACE (1991)- Director: Bruno Mattei (as Herik Montgomery), Stars: Monica Sellers, Gabriele Gori, Emy Valentino. This rare film by Italian sleaze director Bruno Mattei is not - as the English title "Eyes Without a Face" suggests - a remake of Georges Franju's all time horror classic "Les Yeux Sans Visage" (which, as every genre buff should know, inspired Jess Franco's "Les Prédateurs de la Nuit" in 1988, one of Franco's best). "Gli Occhi Dentro" is a thriller in best Giallo tradition and often reminds of the typical genre outings of the 1970s. And this is quite a surprise considering that Bruno Mattei is known for trashy horror and exploitation films, but hasn't made a Giallo before this one. A serial killer murders baby sitters and plugs their eyes out. The killings resemble crimes from the latest issue of a successful comic book series called "Doctor Dark" about a schizophrenic who is a renowned professor by day and a maniac killer at night. The artist of the comic series is a young woman, and obviously the killer tries to make her suffer for his crimes: she starts finding the plugged out eyes of the victims at her home. After half an hour of the film, it seems that the maniac is caught. But it doesn't take much time to find out that the man apprehended is not the real killer.
PROFILE OF SATAN (1969)-IN SPANISH WITH ENGLISH SUBS. Director: Juan Logar, Stars: Eduardo Fajardo, Manuel Gil, Ricardo Palacios. Extremely obscure Spanish horror film from the 60s!!Tells the story of how Satan's influence on mankind over history has resulted in everything bad that has ever happened. And it's really, really subtle about this message too as it intersperses newsreel footage of war and assassinations in case you can't quite connect the dots with the didactic dialogue.
VERTIGO OF A CRIME (1970)-IN SPANISH WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. ANOTHER RARE PAUL NASCHY THRILLER!! Director: Pascual Cervera, Stars: Paul Naschy, Juan Amigo, Barta Barri, Sun de Sander. Naschy plays a sadistic criminal, who reads body-building magazines, in this tale of rival gangs and drug trafficking. A cache of cocaine is stolen in France. Following the trail of the assailants, two men of the organization arrive in Madrid, where they suspect that the loot can be hidden. Once in the Spanish capital, the investigations of the two thugs will lead them to a select club that seems to be, in reality, the focus of drug distribution in the area.
NIGHT SHIFT DISC 1 (1987)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS. TV series produced by Dario Argento. 15, short parts telling various tales of murder with a running theme of Taxi drivers, only the Episode titled "Heavy Metal" which was an extra on the Demons 2 dvd has been seen by a wider audience. The score is pretty awesome as it uses music from loads of films , including; Suspiria, Psycho and even Star Wars at one point. Episode Listing:
Turno di Notte
1. E di Moda la Morte {Lamberto Bava}
2. Heavy Metal {Lamberto Bava}
3. Buona Fine e Miglior Principo {Lamberto Bava}
4. Giubetto Rosso {Lamberto Bava}
5. Il Bambino Rapito {Lamberto Bava}
6. Babbo Natale {Lamberto Bava}
NIGHT SHIFT DISC 2 (1987)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS. 15, short parts telling various tales of murder with a running theme of Taxi drivers, only the Episode titled "Heavy Metal" which was an extra on the Demons 2 dvd has been seen by a wider audience. The score is pretty awesome as it uses music from loads of films , including; Suspiria, Psycho and even Star Wars at one point. Episode Listing
Turno di Notte
1. E di Moda la Morte {Lamberto}
2. Heavy Metal {Lamberto}
3. Buona Fine e Miglior Principo {Lamberto}
4. Giubetto Rosso {Lamberto}
5. Il Bambino Rapito {Lamberto}
6. Babbo Natale {Lamberto}
7. L’impronta dell’assassino {Cozzi}
8. Ciak si Muore {Cozzi}
9. Sposarsi e un po’morire {Cozzi}
10. Delitto in Rock {Cozzi}
11. L’evasa {Cozzi}
12. La Casa dello Stradivari {Cozzi}
13. Giallo Natale {Cozzi} (With: Asia Argento & Daria Nicolodi)
14. Via delle Streghe {Cozzi}
15. Il Taxi Fantasma {Cozzi}
SEX OF THE DEVIL (1971)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. ONE OF THE RAREST ITALIAN EROTIC GIALLI IS FINALLY AVAILABLE! Director: Oscar Brazzi and stars Rossano Brazzi, Sylva Koscina, sexy Turkish starlet Hulya Bengun. A surgeon, Andrea, goes on vacation in Istanbul, taking with him his wife, Barbara, and an assistant, Silvia. The three of them lay in a villa on the Bosphorus, whose owner, the French sculptor Claudine, died mysteriously in his time, hanged on a tree. In the house, now run by Fatma, already ruler of Claudine, strange things begin to happen, apparently supernatural in origin, that contribute to aggravating the already tense relations between Andrea and Barbara. While the surgeon, who tries to uncover the truth about those phenomena, is hindered by a stranger, who tries several times to kill him. The film personifies EUROTRASH from the 70s!
GAMMA (1975)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS. Gamma is a television drama, a giallo with a sci-fi background, in 4 episodes, aired for the first time by RAI in 1975, directed by Salvatore Nocita on a subject by Professor Fabrizio Trecca. Set in France in an unspecified future, the drama tells the story of a brain transplant on an injured young race car driver, and its ethical implications. The death penalty is essential to the plot and hence the French setting, although the last execution will take place only two years later, to be totally abolished in 1981. The guillotine, although modernized, retains the typical structure and includes the tradition of the last cigarette. As an alternative to cognac taken on an empty stomach it is injected a drug to inhibit the will. The main element of the work is the debate on the progress achieved by medicine, which intervenes radically on a human being, and the danger of the spread of drugs ever more sneaky, here in the form of a common cigarette, whose consumer becomes dependent on both the drug and the drug dealer. The media then tended to elect the so-called "drugged cigarette" as the sole means of consumption, concealing the more brutal syringe. A final frame bears a caption that reveals the identity of the donor, that of "a modest employee died of pneumonia", making ponder on the fact that although it is possible to transplant a human brain, you can still die from common diseases.COMES ON 2 DVDS FOR $15
HOUSE AT THE END OF TIMES (2013)-IN SPANISH WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. Dulce is a mother who has encounters with apparitions in her old house, where it unleashes a terrible prophecy. Thirty years later, turned into an old woman, she returns home to unravel the mystery and tragedy that has tantalized her This movie surpassed my expectations in every possible way. Even though it it doesn't have the best special effects or the highest budget, it is still one of the best suspense/horror movies I've ever watched. Why? Because the plot is sincerely excellent! It's original and you just cannot guess what's going to happen. It was carefully thought and every single detail of the movie fits perfectly, like a puzzle. The performing of the actors was really good as well, and the movie didn't feel cheap or fake! I wish this movie would get more attention.
MYSTERE (1983)-UNCUT LETTERBOXED PRINT. Assassins are after a prostitute who has come into possession of a cigarette lighter that, unbeknownst to her, contains the negatives that show a politician's assassination. A delightfully playful giallo starring the beautiful Carole Bouquet as Mystere,a high class call girl who becomes the target for a couple of assassins. On its initial release Mystere seemed rather twee,especially when compared to Argento's Tenebrae, but the years have been very kind to this excellent little film. John Steiner as the ruthless hit man, Ivanov, gives one of his best performances of the eighties. Looking slick and menacing as the leather suited killer, Steiner glides through his scenes with ease and flair. Peter Berling turns up as a sleazy old man, and Janet Agren is nice as Mystere's friend. A great showcase for Bouquet's undeniable beauty, director Carlo Vanzina captures the actress at her most alluring. Splendid stuff with a great score by Armando Trovaioli.
SECRETS OF DR ORLOFF (1964)-FIRST TIME UNCUT AND ENGLISH DUBBED, LETTERBOXED PRINT. One of Jesus Franco better horror films , it stars Cast: Hugo Blanco, Agnès Spaak, Perla Cristal. A mad scientist creates a hideous monster to carry out his murderous plans. The picture is rife with carefully-executed camera angles and atmospherics, something that would become anathema to Franco's slash-and-burn methods of the 80s. The best scenes are reminiscent of (dare I say) Lewton and Franju. It builds up a strong pathos for the title character, thanks to a subtle, wordless portrayal that evokes Cesar in 'Cabinet of Dr Caligari' and Christiane in 'Eyes without a Face' (such homages were a Franco specialty). There is a particularly poignant sequence in which the zombie stumbles about near his own tombstone in a bleak, wintry cemetery. No matter what depths Franco's movies plunged to, they always offered a few wonderfully oddball cabaret scenes in smoky jazz or rock bars, and this is no exception. One singer performs a wacky, rhythmic Latin ditty that must have sparked the imagination of the members of the retro band 'Les Rita Mitsouko'. (These cabaret scenes were a welcome staple of the Euro-thriller genre of the 60s, also perking up the krimi series, several of the campier works of the Italian Gothic revival, and especially the outlaw melodramas of Jose Benazeraf.)
DEFEKT (1977)-IN HUNGARIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS. Gedeon is a young, ambitious detective. Three women have disappeared and he strongly believes that there’s a direct connection between them. All three of them were driving alone and disappeared in the same region. After a lengthy discussion, Gedeon gets the permission from his boss to go searching with his colleague in that area. Meanwhile, the next possible victim gets a blowout on the same road in the woods. Because of the night, the rain and her smashed car she looks for a safe, dry place. She finds a house in the middle of the woods where a man takes her in. To start with, the man seems nice but later he attacks her unexpectedly… And even the house holds more surprises to boot… This superbly realized and darkly atmospheric thriller from Hungary is an absolute pip! While 'Defekt' initially appears to take considerable liberties with the ubiquitous cinematic tropes provided by Robert Bloch's hugely influential 'Psycho'; the terse narrative nonetheless soon settles into a truly idiosyncratic, sparely-written, and decidedly taciturn, noirish thriller that makes excellent use of its slender running running time (67 mins approx) and equally meager locale. The creative photography and grimy art direction is uniformly excellent, and the supremely dark jazzoid score by Gyorgy Vukan is an absolute Lalo Schifrin-style delight! I found 'Defekt' to be hugely entertaining, and I sincerely hope many other similarly broad-minded, treasure-seeking euro-cult cinephiles will enjoy this minor gem of Hungarian, jazz-fuelled terror!
SUPERNATURAL (1983)- Directed by: Eugenio Martín, Stars: Cristina Galbó, Máximo Valverde, Ramón Lillo. A woman who can no longer bear abusive treatment from her husband, takes off and goes to live in Barcelona where she starts up a relationship with another man. Just as her husband has located her through a detective, he meets with a horrendous accident on the way to the airport and ends up back home from the hospital, wrapped in bandages due to his burns and completely disfigured. His wife arrives from Barcelona, but not in time to see him before he dies. Then the oddest things start happening. Furniture flies through the air, weird lights come and go, and a myriad of supernatural phenomena make it readily apparent that the dead husband is out to “get” his wife for her extra-marital affair. A priest and an expert in the paranormal are called in to help, but to no avail. The husband’s body is disinterred – though that does not seem to help either. When most everything has failed, the wife, her lover, and the master of the paranormal join forces to try to exorcise the spirit of her dead husband one last time.
BURIED ALIVE (1973)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. Director: Aldo Lado, Stars: Agostina Belli, Maurizio Bonuglia, Fred Robsahm, score by Ennio Morricone. Starring the wonderful Agostina Belli, and boasting a lush romantic score from Ennio (directed by Bruno Nicolai) Morricone. Belli, beautifully coiffed and appareled, is French duchess Christine who is victim of some really evil scheming by the villains Ferdinand (Maurizio Bonuglia, replete with mustache, but not of the twirling caliber) and older Morel (guest star Jose Quaglio). Ferdinand slips a form of poison in her drink one night, and when her lifeless-seeming body is found the next morning it's funeral procession time. the villains whisk away her body before burial, substituting sand bags in the coffin. Belli is placed in a tiny cell adjoining a water mill, where she wakes up to remain in captivity (and unknown to anyone but the baddies) for the rest of the picture. The good guys including her boyfriend and her brother (played by Francois Perrin and Fred Robsahm) eventually help out, but it is a little boy who discovers her plight and helps her, even trying to saw through the bars of her cell. Belli gives birth to a bambino (unaided -she's a plucky heroine) in her cell, the infant saved by being passed through the wide window bars to her young pal.
24 HOURS OF TERROR (1964)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS. Director: Gastone Grandi, Cast: Paul Janning, Stephen Mason, Laurent Madison, Dean Moor, Rex Robertson, Sterling Roland, Annie Stuart, Joseph Warrender, A. V. Belfast. 24 Ore di Terrore" mixes elements of proto-giallo and gangster cinema.The action takes place in a mysterious castle in France. One gangster is transported to it.During a stop in a motel he is attacked by another crook, who takes his identity. The French castle is a hideout for the group of drug pushers. But there is also an unknown killer who begins to murder the members of the gang.
THE GREEN TRACE (1975)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS. La Traccia Verde is an Italian Science Fiction TV miniseries, made by RAI in 1975. It was directed by Silvio Maestranzi, written by Flavio Niccolini, and stars Sergio Fantoni, Paola Pitagora and Sergio Rossi. It was first shown in three parts from 21 Dec 1975 - 4 Jan 1976. Set in the USA, the plot concerns Thomas Norton, a researcher in the field of lie detection, who provides his services to courts and private industry. One day he idly attaches electrodes to a plant in his office, and is surprised to find it responds with recognisable emotional reactions to the stimuli he gives it. He pursues this research, and keeps a plant wired up in his lab. When a woman who lives in his building is mysteriously murdered in his lab, the plant is the only witness to the crime.
MEMORY (1978)-IN SPANISH WITH ENGLISH SUBS. Ok, first please note the copy of this is rather poor. But it is a fantatsic Spanish SF horror film that so far isn't available any other way. Director: Francisco Macián, Stars: Fernando Sancho, Pedro Díez del Corral, Pat Johnson.
THE PERVERT (1975)-IN GREEK WITH ENGLISH SUBS. This downbeat Greek exploitation thriller directed and co-written by Chrissostomos Liambos concerns a psychotic killer (Kostas Gouzgounis) who was traumatized into impotence and madness by a sadistic female S.S. officer in his youth. Now he lives in a cave, where he lures women into depravity and death. The script owes more than a little to the Italian gialli then flooding the European marketplace, and makes a brisk wallow in the cinematic gutter, resulting in pretty Aleka Yeorgiou being used as bait to trap the killer into revealing himself. Regardless of its pacing problems, sleaze fans should find enough to recommend it, although general audiences will be offended. Kostas Politidis co-stars with Kostas Stefanakis and Anda Vartholomeou. Although the movie offers an almost endless stream of nudity, violence and general sleaziness, it gets rather timid when it comes to the actual murders which are hardly there. Most of the characters are centered around a bar running a prostitution ring, like the tough boss, his sleazy thugs, Vetta, the boss' girlfriend who also provides him with some fresh meat, Ersi, who insists she's not a hooker, and even an aspiring young student of medicine. Among the regulars is an industrialist, Mister Ivanov (Kostas Gousgounis - hard to buy in such a role) who frequently demands new girls in his mansion. When some girls start vanishing, tough-as-nails Police Lieutenant Aronis is on the case.
SECRET OF SEAGULL ISLAND (1982)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS. Previously available in an edited 90 minute version, it turns out it was a 5 hour miniseries! Stars: Prunella Ransome, Nicky Henson, Jeremy Brett, and Gabriele Tinti. Barbara Carey flies to Italy to visit her blind sister Mary Ann, who is studying in a music academy. Once in Rome Barbara discovers her sister has disappeared and, according to the Italian police, she may have been murdered by a maniac who is obsessed with young sightless women. With the help of Martin Foster, from the British Embassy, Barbara starts trying to find out what happened to Mary Ann. She even pretends to be blind herself in an attempt to attract the killer, and finally the clues lead her to Seagull Island, privately owned by a mysterious British citizen named David Malcolm. Barbara must then find the answers to several questions: was Mary Ann really kidnapped? What happened to David's wife and son in the island? And why is David's relative Carol so unhappy to see a woman with him?COMES ON 2 DVDS FOR $15
THE HOUSE IN THE WIND OF THE DEAD (2012)-IN ITALIAN WITH ENGLISH SUBS, LETTERBOXED PRINT. If you wonder whatever happened to the director of THE PERFUME OF THE WOMAN IN BLACK 1974, Francesco Barilli, well here's a brand new film he co-directed. Directors: Francesco Campanini, Francesco Barilli, Stars: Luca Magri, Francesco Barilli, Marco Iannitello. Italy 1947. Attilio is a former movie star Fascist disgraced. In desperation, he joins a band of robbers to make a heat. After the robbery Attilio and his friends run to the hills being hunted by police. They take refuge in a house that will prove to be a death trap.
HYENA OF LONDON (1964)-LETTERBOXED PRINT. Director: Gino Mangini, Stars: Bernard Price, Diana Martín, Tony Kendall. A serial killer called "The Hyena" is finally caught and eventually hanged. However, his body disappears before it can be buried, and soon thereafter dead bodies start turning up in a small village. The Italians made many excellent and highly atmospheric Gothic thrillers during the 1960s. "Hyena of London" was produced in 1964, at the peak of the genre's popularity. Like the films of Bava, etc., it benefits from historic European locations, authentic costumes, fine manners and moody scoring. Though marketed as a thriller most of the film is straight drama, with the macabre scenes confined to the film's beginning and end. Watching this made me recall "Terror Creatures from the Grave," which originally was the bottom half of a 1965 double feature with "Bloody Pit of Horror." It had much of the same film noir ambiance and class. "Hyena of London" is definitely not for everyone, but a good bet for fans of '60s Euro-thrillers or Tony Kendall.
MASQUE OF THE MEDUSA (2010)-In French with eng subs, letterboxed print. JEAN ROLLIN’S LAST FILM! Le masque de la Méduse opens with Méduse [Simone Rollin] walking through an aquarium. A young woman [Gabrielle Rollin] plays the cello amidst huge constrictors and buzzards. Méduse gazes at the young woman who then turns to stone. Méduse takes to the streets of Paris and walks straight to the Grand Guignol where she enters the stage and holds a lengthy monologue regarding her former victims. The Janitor [Jean-Pierre Bouyoux] listens on and sympathizes with her remorse…
HALF HUMAN (1954)-In Japanese with English subs. FINALLY THE UNCUT 98 MINUTE JAPANESE VERSION WITH ENG SUBS. The original Japanese story concerns the discovery of a giant prehistoric snowman in the Japanese Alps by a group of hikers. When a traveling circus attempts to capture the monster, they accidentally kill the monster's son instead. This enrages the larger snowman who kills the circus men, destroys a native village, and kidnaps the lead female. The hikers, along with the sole survivor of the native village, track the monster to its cave. The native girl saves the female hiker by attacking the snowman. "Half Human", known as "Monster Snowman" in Japan, was Ishiro Honda's second attempt at directing a monster film, after the first "Godzilla". The movie itself was a dark story involving scientists searching for the missing link, and their encounter with native villagers and an abominable snowman-like creature and its son. The original Japanese version of the film is said to be one of Honda's best, but it has been out of circulation for years and has never been available on video. Reportedly, Toho Studios feared that the film's unsympathetic and stereotypical depiction of the natives would today be considered offensive to the Ainu, one of the original native tribes of Japan who were persecuted for centuries and eventually pushed north to Hokkaido. Like their Native American counterparts, the surviving Ainu people eventually won sympathy and respect in Japan, so the banning of "Half Human" is apparently a result of Japanese society's sensitivity to the Ainu cause.
