Movie: Brides of Blood (1968)
Directed by Eddie Romero and Gerardo de Leon
As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL
Plot:
A Peace Corps volunteer, a scientist and his frustrated wife land on a remote South Pacific Island. But the Island has a monstrous secret that they may not be able to live with. Hilarity ensues.
Reaction:
I really couldn't get into this film. It didn't really suck, but the sound and picture quality were atrocious, and it was hard to follow. Especially the dialogue. And it wasn't a good night for me to have to concentrate extra hard, because I was really exhausted. Now, that's not really the fault of the movie. Certainly not the part about me being exhausted. And even the part about the picture and sound quality shouldn't be counted against it. The disc it was on had been mastered from a beaten-up copy; the movie, as it originally showed in theatres and drive-ins, was probably much better. I rated it a "4" in class, acknowledging that I would have to rewatch it.
Upon rewatching, I understood the plot better. The story is better than I had originally thought. There's more nuance, and the premise is explained better than I had originally realized. In many ways, it's kind of a classic Star Trek story, except for the fact that it's you know, set on earth. But it still didn't really hook me in.
I've been told that Filipino horror films have a reputation for being overtly sexual, and this really wasn't -- although the climactic "the monster's dead so let's all fuck" sequence kind of hinted at that aesthetic.
Oh, by the way, a bit of advice for the guys. If you ever find your love interest stripped naked and tied to an altar where a hideous beast of unknown origin is going to rape her to death, and said beast may arrive at any moment, untie her and run off immediately. Don't take the time to cover her up. Such nods to modesty could be deadly for the both of you.
Ratings:
Me: 4.2
Dave: 9.3
Ethan: 8.5
Joe: 9.8
Scott: 6
Sean: 1 out of 4
Extras:
Following up last week's session, in which we watched The Horror of Party Beach, Keith showed us an interview with director, Del Tenney. Tenney talked about his history in show business, and how HoPB came to be. He seemed like your typical Florida retiree. A regular guy.
That was followed by Joe giving us his belated review of El Topo, which we saw in January. I was, I admit, feeling vindicated that Joe -- like me -- didn't much care for that unintelligible piece of shit. His review was actually quite amusing, and I note that he no longer considers Shock Treatment (the 1981 film -- not the 1964 film) to be the worst thing shown in this class. That said, he still prefers El Topo (which is Spanish for "The Topo") to any Adam Sandler film. Go figure.
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