Pseudo-science is the new religion; self-proclaimed intellectualism, our saving grace...deceitful politicians, our gods. Our actions are monitored, our thoughts and expressions harnessed. It's a nice, safe world, with equality for all, or so the high-brows tell us. Orwell warned us of its advent, and today, more than ever, this variation of suppression anchors our reality.
The prediction wasn't exclusive to "1984". It resurfaced in a French, detective-movie sequel entitled "Alphaville": aka, "A Strange Case of Lemmy Caution", as offered by avant-garde director, Jean-Luc Godard.
Caution (ersatz, Agent 003), is played by Eddie Constantine, who had portrayed the character (based on Peter Cheyney's literary creation) in prior hard-boiled yarns dating back to '53. However, "Alphaville" differs from its predecessors in its surreal, science-fiction context (even though Jess Franco's "Attack of the Robots", with Constantine, initiated the blend three years prior).
In "Alphaville'"s parallel '65 (or some year thereabout), computer technology has swung into full gear. Professor Wernher Von Braun (formerly known as Leonard Nosferatu and played by horror-veteran, Howard Vernon) has constructed the ultimate Big Brother surveillance device, the Alpha 60: a forerunner to the Forbin Project, HAL 2000 and Ultron. The devilish IBM creation possesses an implied omniscient consciousness, its deep, reverberating voice acting as both a judgmental interjection to Caution's actions and an overriding commentator to events.
Caution (pretending to be journalist, Ivan Johnson) initially pursues a fellow secret agent, Henri Dickson (Akim Tamiroff), into Alphaville's doleful heart. Intrigued and suspicious, Caution snaps pictures as part of his investigative progresses (in essence, documenting the past, which is frowned upon in this strange, new world). Along the way, he gains the incentive to derail the Professor and his monstrous machine.
Alphaville is, indeed, a peculiar place. Though the plot appears to unfold in Paris, Alphaville is a conglomerate of many cities and countries: modern in design and dosed in foreboding shadows and disquieting customs.
When you check into a hotel, you're assigned a pretty woman, who asks if you'd like to sleep. Her salacious implication is tempting, but can she (or any of Alphaville's robotic citizens) be trusted? Caution knows well enough to reject his seductress' mechanical advances and wastes no time to engage in a fight with a stranger who, for whatever odd reason, has been sent to do him in. After the brawl, Caution sits and converses with Alpha 60: an intercom voice that conducts a brief but invasive exchange. The surreal pace has been set.
Caution then meets Von Braun's daughter, Natasha, played by the charismatic Anna Katrina. At first he's wary of her (since she claims the authorities assigned her to him, with the belief he's there to enjoy "Festival"). However, Caution falls in love with her, and she seems to reciprocate, though claims unfamiliarity with the forbidden feeling.
From there, the two engage in a series of abstract scenarios, which further reveal Alphaville's dystopian underbelly, including the existence of "dictionaries" in lieu of Bibles, wherein the contents are consistently changed to fit the latest propagandist spurts: a homage to Orwell's Newspeak. In addition, neon Einstein equations flash throughout the city, promoting the notion that science, not sentimentality, is the worthy guide. A seedy hotel harbors love-starved souls, broken by the city's mundane cycle, including the now suicidal Dickson; and there's a cold, calculating realm called Grand Omega Minus, where we learn people are brainwashed and dispatched to the Outer Countries ("galaxies", as they're called) to instigate revolts and general dissent.
One of the film's most unsettling scenes depicts a group of men being executed at an indoor swimming pool: their crime, a display of emotion. (This includes a gent arrested for weeping over his wife's death.) After the men are shot, bathing beauties follow them into the pool, ritualistically stabbing them and commemorating their deaths with water ballets: a form of meticulous but empty pageantry.
Such scenes symbolize much of Alphaville's inherent flaw. Like Jack Finney's "Body Snatchers", emotion is considered a shameful hindrance. Even minor moments of levity are at best staged and crude: a socialized, totalitarian imprisonment, where no one stands out from the pack and therefore, no one ever matters, beyond acting as another cog in the bland body politic.
In influence, "Alphaville" foreshadows Patrick McGoohan's "The Prisoner", where actions are monitored and freedom scorned. Additionally, the story depicts Caution as a Ditko avenger (and therefore, a forerunner to "Watchmen'"s Rorschach), defining individualism and justice when the powers-that-be choose cruel conformity. Like Philip K. Dick's Rick Deckard, Caution also sees the wrong in using others as puppets, but unlike the android hunter, never doubts his motive: liberation must reign for all!
On many levels, the pursuit of liberty is presented as a dangerous quest in "Alphaville", but despite the film's pessimistic tone, hopeful moments arise from Caution and Von Braun's relationship. Such are represented through ethereal lighting and moments of soothing, contemplative thought. To supplement this, Caution's resistance to Alpha 60 champions the human condition, his unpretentious nature sparking a rebellion, which leads to a disturbing but enlightening climax.
Much has been discussed about "Alphaville" over the decades, and its various parts lend themselves to vast interpretations. Still, its primary theme tells us to resist dictatorial command, no matter how sophisticated or magnanimous it may seem. It's a lesson we must follow in our own reality. Indeed, if only more of us would emulate Caution's cause, we might regain the humanity we've allowed our governing bodies to seize under the pretense of equality for all.
Jess Franco is arguably the most prolific film
director of all time, with over 200 movies under his belt, having
bravely covered a variety of genres with his energetic, camera-zooming style. However, he's generally favored
experimental horror and pulp-type stories for his cinematic ventures and distinguished
them with such stately performers as Christopher Lee, Herbert
Lom, Klaus Kinski, Howard Vernon and Denis Price.
To horror fans, he more than made his mark with his chilling Dr.
Orloff movies, the first released in '62, injecting these entries with an affluent
dose of Universal and Hammer elements, while at the same time, making these efforts distinctly his own.
Based his macabre track record, it only seemed fitting that Franco
eventually took a stab at such legendary monsters as Dracula and
Frankenstein. (In fact, with the former, he offered a popular remake,
"Count Dracula", starring Lee in '70.) It was, however, in a
crossing-over of horror characters that he ventured roughly two years later, giving the
monster team-up formula a strange, mind-bending twist in two distinct
instances: "The Erotic Rites of Frankenstein" ("La
Maldicon de Frankenstein"), evidently the first of the set released, and "Dracula, Prisoner of Frankenstein" ("Dracula contra Frankenstein"), which I'll save for the climatic cap of this double-feature review, if only due to its more blatantly geared, monster participants.
"Erotic Rites" (which sometimes appears without
"erotic" in the title, and in this instance, it's essentially the primary Spanish
version that I'll reference), details real-life, purported mystic,
Alessandro Cagliostro, who in the context of this yarn, and in apt mad-genius
style, intends to forge an evil master race to take over the world,
of which the Frankenstein Monster (Fernando Bilbao) stands as its illustrious forerunner. (On a side note, Bilbao's Monster resembles Dave Prowse's in "Horror of Frankenstein", albeit with silver
body paint and the occasional power of speech.)
In that the Monster is still in Frankenstein (Denis Price)'s possession,
Cagliostro dispatches a strange, blood-sucking bird woman named Melisa
(Anne Libert), whose sports eerie, green feathers upon her
hands, to slay Frankenstein and his assistant Morpho (a name
familiar to Orloff fans, and in this instance portrayed by Franco), thus leading the Monster away from his creator and giving Cagliostro the chance to control him hypnotically: a common plot device of the Orloff movies, as
well as in the silent classic, "Cabinet of Dr. Caligari", which
appears to have greatly influenced Franco's storytelling style.
Cagliostro determines that to implement his master race,
he must make the Monster a mate, and abetted by
Melisa's intuitive skills, and the Monster's lumbering aid, a beautiful woman (Britt
Nichols, as Madame Orloff) is seized from her mansion, carted
to Cagliostro's lair and decapitated before a sect of
weird creatures: her head the first part of an intended,
supreme "bride".
Just a tad prior to the latter, Dr. Seward
(yes, the one of Dracula fame and here portrayed by Alberto Dalbes) teams with
Frankenstein's daughter, Vera (Beatriz Savon) to unravel her father's death, while Cagliostro takes time out to psychically entice a gypsy girl,
named appropriately enough, Esmeralda (Lina Romay: a most endearing
presence in Franco's movies).
Sadly, Esmeralda's contribution to the proceedings leaves her meandering about the countryside without apparent cause:
her purpose only succinctly defined in the film's final seconds.
Much of the story's center caters to the perpetuation of Cagliostro's demented plan, while Vera eventually ends up in his castle. This leaves Seward and a police inspector (Daniel Gerome) to track her
down, culminating in a shootout and a quick but intense confrontation between Cagliostro and the Monster.
The overall performances in "Erotic Rites" are effective, though
Price's screen time is far too brief; in fact, his characterization of an affable
"body snatcher" in "Horror of Frankenstein" is virtually as
lengthy as that in "Erotic Rites": the latter of which even includes a few additional scenes where the doctor is fleetingly
reanimated by Vera and Seward.
This leaves Vernon to compensate for Price's lack of screen time, and he makes good use of such, injecting Cagliostro with an invigorating Dracula-like aura. That Vernon
also resembles "Dark Shadows'" Jonathan Frid (or
vice-versa) clearly accentuates Cagliostro's vampire-ish stance,
though the mesmerist thankfully never indulges in vampire
king's parasitic pastime, leaving Melisa exclusive dibs on all
blood-lapping.
In the end, "Erotic Rites" emerges as a decent enough Frankenstein
romp: never daring
to enter tongue-in-cheek, even though the atmosphere sometimes
proves heavily surreal and due to its overlapping elements, a tad confusing,
at least for the first viewing.
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While some will criticize "Erotic Rites" as too
complex, "Dracula, Prisoner of Frankenstein" has often
been denounced as an incoherent visual romp, perhaps due to its scarcity of chatter.
Its story is basic (and virtually the same as "Erotic Rites"): Dr. Frankenstein (again Price, though otherwise unconnected to his "Erotic Rites" portrayal, mainly due to the modern timeline) wishes to rule the world by assembling a dark army (how Cagliostro-esque!), which will include his Monster (again played by Fernando Bilbao, but here appearing more Karloffian in form) and a hypnotized Count Dracula (Vernon, aptly cast, though like Lee in "Dracula: Prince of Darkness", never verbalizing). Frankenstein again has an assistant named Morpho (though this time portrayed by Luis Barboo, who also has a smaller, though more articulate role in "Erotic Rites"), who weaves through the movie like an eerie bit of window dressing.
The odd thing here is, one might otherwise expect Dracula to initiate the command for destructive conquest (like Lee in "Satanic Rites of Dracula"), but instead it's Frankenstein who captures the Count (somehow or other in bat form), while keeping a striking female vampire (portrayed by Britt Nichols of "Erotic Rites") nearby to ensure his diabolical success. As to how exactly, Dracula, the lady vampire and the Monster are to help Frankenstein gain the upper hand is never fully explained (though it appears Frankenstein may have enlisted them to dispatch a vampire plague onto the world and from there intends to pull its dictatorial strings). Whatever the case, all explanations lie somewhere among the film's surreal implications. (In other words, to make sense of it, one must rely solely upon one's imagination.)
Later in the yarn, a werewolf (portrayed by an actor named "Brandy") ferociously surfaces, summoned by an intuitive gypsy (Genevieve Deloir) in a peculiar move to set evil against evil. Though the werewolf's precise origin is at best ambiguous, his presence nicely enhances the monster team-up component, and by the time he recklessly stumbles into the bizarre proceedings, one can easily embrace him with a good-natured shrug. Hey, the more the merrier, right? (For what it's worth, the lycanthrope's fight with the Monster is not only a nod to "Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman", but also feels atmospherically similar to scenes from various entries in Paul Naschy's Spanish werewolf franchise, which was in full swing around this very time.)
Earlier in the film, Dr. Seward (again, Alberto Dalbes) tenaciously tries to stop Dracula's infectious spread prior to the Count being captured, and this leads to one of his patients (Para Galbaldon, aka Mary Francis) being turned into a vampire bride (and she, unlike Nichol's character, becomes inseparably linked to the Count). Seward then virtually falls out of sight, only to return considerably later among the gypsies.
The big set-back to "Drac, Prisoner of Frank" is that Frankenstein's control over Dracula is never convincing. What gives the doctor the immense telepathic power to override Dracula's? It would seem that the vampire lord would have easily thwarted Frankenstein's intervention, then effortlessly turned the tables on him. (Some day-for-night scenes also prove a tad distracting, as do the painfully fake bats.)
Still, overall, the film is entrancingly engaging: not so much a sequel to "Erotic Rites", but rather a companion piece. (Please note: European horror follow-ups rarely sport much continuity anyway, as one can easily witness from Naschy's popular films.)
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For those hankering an initial taste of Franco's horror pictures, "Awful Dr. Orloff" and "Dr. Orloff's Monster" might be better bets, but for those who enjoy monster pairings and legendary mixes, these two installments wouldn't be a half-bad way to become accustomed to the director's dizzying skills.
Make a double feature of them, or for good measure, kick them off with Franco's "Count Dracula", just to get into the right, lurid mindset.You're certainly guaranteed a most unforgettable experience!
