horror – Sat In Your Lap

House [Hausu] (1977)

A Method To The Madness

***This Review Contains Spoilers***

What struck me most on my first viewing of House (or Hausu)was that alongside the film’s sheer over-the-top, phantasmagoric madness, I found the whole thing to be weirdly endearing. Initially, I was concerned I was getting into something awfully pretentious but I was able to surrender myself to the fact that I was watching a film which employees a different filmmaking technique in just about every scene. House has one of themost cliché of horror movie premises, yet it gives way to one of the most unique and weirdest viewing experiences with descriptions ranging from “Evil Dead on steroids” to “a Scooby-Doo episode directed by Mario Bava” – perhaps no other film holds a better claim to the title of being “one wild and crazy ride”.

Japan’s reputation for “WTFness” could make House a film easy to dismiss, however, there is a method to the madness. Director Nobuhiko Obayashi was a director of commercials before taking on the mantle of House, and the artifice of commercials is all over the film alongside (pre-MTV) music video style editing, of which I’m sure it’s no coincidence that House was shot using the 4:3 aspect ratio – the aesthetics of House are all about the embrace of artifice. A film of contradictions, House is an art-house film (or art-hausu film one could say, ba-tum-tiss!) and one which was reportedly a huge success with the youth demographic in Japan upon its release (with the film’s extraction of sex appeal from its young female stars as well as nudity in several scenes may have got many young men into the theatres). In this regard it’s also worth mentioning House stands out as it is uncommon for Japanese films to have an English language title. Yet at the same time House symbolizes a return to tradition, a rejection of realism in 1970’s cinema. Right from the opening prologue, the movie proclaims in the vintage Broadway font what you are about to see is “A Movie Presentation”. This is part of the reason why beyond its scenes with killer futons, man-eating pianos and decapitated heads biting girls on the derrière, House is as I previously mentioned, weirdly endearing – the director’s love for cinema comes through and feels like a celebration of the medium. If I were to compare House to another film it would have to be Buster Keaton’s Sherlock Jr. Both films celebrate the art form with their use of special effects which blur the line between reality and fantasy with both also featuring a movie within a movie. House has a Technicolor-look reminiscent of the work of Jack Cardiff with its use of deep, saturated colour with the film’s colour scheme remains largely consistent throughout with its use of oranges, reds and blues and being a horror picture, it does have that autumnal/Halloween vibe (even though it is set during the summer). Speaking of, as a horror film is House actually scary? Well, this measure is subjective of course but I did personally jump at the reveal of severed head of the character Mac as well as Gorgeous’ giant profile suddenly entering to the screen from the right.

House is like a feature-length dream with its mad array of images. The images from the film were conjured from the mind of a child, Obayashi’s pre-teen daughter Chigumi Obayashi (who does receive a conceptual credit and even has a cameo in the film as a shoemaker). I am dubious of having a child being a film’s creative consultant since the last movie I saw to do so was those dreadful Robert Rodriguez Spy Kids films but in House, this influence works and another aspect which makes the film endearing. To anyone who has never seen House, it’s difficult to put into words just how insane a film this is without sounding melodramatic. This encyclopedia of movie storytelling and its array of practical special effects wizardry is a joy to behold from primitive blue screen to the use of stop motion – there are a few films in which an obscene amount of effort is put into every shot. On the other hand, there are sections of House which do have a chilled-out nature to them and the cheesy vibes of Beach Party film. Just a warning that several sequences in the film do contain strobe lighting effects (as if the Japanese weren’t content enough with giving people seizures through Pokémon episodes). Upon my third viewing of House, I did find myself becoming more desensitized to its bizarre nature and more understanding the filmmakers’ mindset on how they could have created something like this. That said, where Mr. Togo’s transformation into a pile of bananas and the bear wearing the chef outfit fit into the grander scheme of things I can’t explain. I guess you got to have some randomness for randomness’ sake.

House follows seven girls each named after a single personality trait- Gorgeous, Kung Fu, Prof, Fantasy, Mac, Sweet and Melody. At the beginning of their summer break, they decide to spend some time at the country house of Gorgeous’ aunt, where all is not what it seems. The story does play as an inverse of Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs, seven girls each defined by a single personality trait, show up at a house in the middle of nowhere which is in need of cleaning, owned by an old woman who lives alone. Of the ensemble, Gorgeous is the closet to the film having a protagonist as she has a clearly defined arc, beginning with a subplot involving her father attempting to bring a stepmother into the family and freeing his daughter from domestic chores such as ironing his shirts in a story right out of a Yasujirō Ozu film. Even in the film’s opening scene, a teacher mentions how she is having an arranged marriage during the summer, a topic often explored in Ozu’s work. The only girl in the group named after a purely negative trait (and of course, she dies first) is the gluttonous Mac (derived from the English word “stomach”), although fantasy itself holds its negative aspects, My favourite of the group however has to be alpha in the form of Kung Fu, whose speciality skill leads to several very humorous (whether intentional or not) fight scenes against an array of moving objects.

Acting as a mascot for House with its prominence in promotional material is the white ragdoll cat that joins the girls on their adventure (good kitty!). Cats hold a supernatural significance in Japan and it’s evident the cat in House is doing the bidding of a witch, even preventing Mr. Togo from joining the girls at the house to potentially rescue them. This witch in question is the aunt (Yōko Minamida) herself who proves to be an interesting figure. She has an ominous ghostly look to her and is portrayed in the mould of the classic Yurei, a ghost from Japanese folklore that cannot pass onto the afterlife. She is also vampiric in nature, wearing tinted glasses when going outside, and feeling unwell after being in the sun not to mention the interior of her house is very dark. Oddest of all, she feels revitalized by the presence of the girls which allows herself to not require the use of her wheelchair. The aunt is a Willy Wonka-like figure and the house is her factory as the girls are taken out one by one by the house itself, much of this done through the watchful eye of Gorgeous assuming the mantle of her aunt, becoming possessed by her in act of metamorphosis. Like the kids in Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory, it’s not made clear if the girls are actually killed literally or just in a metaphorical sense. Usually, in slasher films, the young people are killed as a comeuppance for their promiscuous actions, but do the girls in House deserve what they receive? One of the film’s themes and one which is confirmed by the director is how the trauma of World War II still affects the aunt whose finance never returned from the war and correspondingly how the seven girls take their peacetime living for granted. To quote Obayashi; “These girls born after the war and therefore unaware of how precious peace is, come to the house on summer vacation. The old woman’s bitterness about the war turns into an evil spirit and devours the girls”. This taking of peace for granted is showcased during the movie within a movie, in which a flash from a camera cuts to an atomic cloud, to which one of the girls makes the trite comment, “That looks like cotton candy”. This is at least the case with the subtitles on the US Criterion Collection release. On the UK Masters Of Cinema release, there are no subtitles on this shot even though giddy chatter from the girls can be heard. Speaking of subtitle differences between these two aforementioned releases, in the scene introducing Gorgeous’ father, a film composer who has just returned from Italy after working with Sergio Leone, his line of dialogue in the Criterion release states the rather unbelievable comment “Leone said my music was better than Morricone’s”. However, in the Masters Of Cinema release, the line is the less dramatic “Both Leone and Morricone liked it very much”. Is someone taking liberties in the translation process?

Of the various interpretations of House, that which strikes me the most is the film being a coming-of-age tale of Gorgeous’ urge to stay a young woman and refusal to enter womanhood. As the house eats the young girls, blood erupts from it, the blood of menstruation – a symbol of womanhood triumphing over youth. It’s also worth noting the blood in question comes from the cat, an alternative name for a cat is a…, ok you know what I mean. Likewise, when people are young they will have certain friends and as they become older they may move on from these friends as a result of maturity. Gorgeous’ dying friends can be seen to represent this while her stepmother going up in flames in the film’s final scene could be viewed as her lack of need for a mother figure in adulthood. I have read theories bringing this theory to greater extremes of analyses, in particular, an extensive write-up on the now defunct (but thankfully archived) IMDB boards in which a user by the name of nemuro8 proposes the seven girls all represent aspects of puberty (I’m not sure if I buy into it but it’s food for thought); “Fantasy represents naivety and the fear of the change. Mac represents hormonal changes with her increased appetite. Sweet represents the desire to fill expectations and the role of domestic life. Melody represents creativity and the desire to have fun. Kung-Fu represents courage and brashness. Prof represents logic and leadership. Gorgeous represents vanity and beauty.”

The soundtrack to House (which was released before the film had even entered production) deserves a review in its own regard as it works as a cohesive album rather than just a collection of songs (with most but not all of the tracks you wouldn’t guess are from a horror film). The jovial main theme of the film has a section with a superb synthesized rendition of the melody, which is only heard briefly in the film itself. Hungry House Blues on the other hand is a delta blues style track that only appears very briefly in the picture, however, this version on the soundtrack is a whooping 6 minutes long complete with plenty of slide guitar action and even has vocals in the style of a 1930’s Mississippian black man (who provided these vocals?). Buggy Boogie is a piece of early ’60s, rockabilly cheese while The Beach Boys style Cherries Were Made For Eating is a real uplifting, banger of a choon, provided by the band Godiego (whom makes a cameo in the film as the song is being played). Eat is in a way the defacto theme of Kung Fu, as the piece is played every time she gets involved in her trademark skill – a good piece if you need a quick dose of adrenaline and the one track which has an undeniably funky, 70’s sound. In The Evening Midst is the most profound track and the real centrepiece of both the film and album, an instrumental played by Melody several times throughout the film which acts as a relief to the horror surrounding it. The track feels similar to the piano melodies from David Bowie’s Hunky Dory and ends on a beautiful crescendo (it’s also worth noting, this piano melody does bear a striking resemblance to the piano riff on the song Welcome to the Black Parade by My Chemical Romance). The final track of both the album and film is titled House Love Theme, this Beatles-like calm after the storm which feels reminiscent of Abbey Road side B. This is the only song in House which actually features Japanese lyrics of which I am unable to find a translation of thus I can’t comment if the lyrics actually hold any thematic relevance to the film.

House is the kind of film to be watched on the big screen at a midnight showing alongside the likes of The Rocky Horror Picture Show. It does feel like was designed and destined to become one of the ultimate cult films. I do find myself fascinated by films such as this which remained unknown in the west for decades before obtaining a mass following. Of the film’s 149 reviews on IMDB, only 14 were written prior to the film’s first North American release in 2009. It makes you wonder what’s still out there…

The Face Of Another [Tanin no Kao] (1966)

Look At Me, Drunken One Night Stand. I Mean She Is My Wife

***This Review Contains Spoilers***

The Face Of Another is an imperfect but intriguing viewing experience from the ever-fascinating face-swap genre. I would call The Face Of Another a unique film but the only thing preventing me from doing so is a similarly themed film (and one released the same year nonetheless) in the form of John Frankenheimer’s Seconds. Both films involve a man in a loveless marriage who goes behind his wife’s back to get both a new face and new identity with the two films being full of avant-garde and neo-realist imagery. Both films have major differences between them too but hold enough similarities to make the pair a great double-feature. The visuals present in The Face Of Another stick with the viewer long after watching, even right from the opening scene which features an x-ray of a skull delivering exposition, while the black & white, high contrast cinematography beautifully captures a documentary-like look at mid-1960’s urban Japan (even Japan wasn’t immune to those dodgy looking 60’s tower block apartments).

We only receive a vague description of how engineer Mr. Okuyama (Tatsuya Nakadai) came to have a disfigured face. It appears to have be an industrial accident as in his own words as he was acting carelessly when inspecting a new factory owned by the company he works for (“We should have used liquid air. But we ran out… we used liquid oxygen instead. I thought it was liquid air”). Mrs. Okuyama (Machiko Kyo) is the wife who has fallen out of love with her disfigured husband – it’s never stated but it’s obvious as she can’t bear to look at his face with the bandages removed. He is no longer the husband she once knew, he is now a skin suit of a husband. The Face Of Another explores how a transformed physical appearance might impact one’s inner personality. It’s not indicated much his disfigurement has changed Mr. Okuyama’s personality or was he always rather unpleasant, neurotic and borderline psycho? Just observe the manner he berates a secretary for not asking who he is when walking into the office. Furthermore, Mr. Okuyama lives in a westernized house with no traditional Japanese ground furniture and is littered with trendy 60’s decor yet there still remain a few traditional Japanese ornaments in the home – showing a modern couple who are caught between tradition and what is seen as modern and hip.

The Face Of Another contains a B-movie story presented within a sophisticated, art-house style. The film is in the mould of the Universal Monsters tradition with the plot’s similar themes to Frankenstein and Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Correspondingly, when Mr. Okuyama wears his bandages and fedora he bears more than a striking resemblance to the Phantom of the Opera and Claude Raines’ The Invisible Man (Okuyama later comes to think his newfound face makes him invincible). Throughout the course of the picture, Okuyama visits Dr. Hira (Mikijiro Hira), who is able to offer Okuyama a face transplant in which the facial mask is from that of a donor (a concept which was science-fiction in 1966 but has become a reality today with French woman Isabelle Dinoire receiving the world’s first face transplant in 2005). Just how much of Dr. Hira’s technique creating a face mould which can be taken on and off another’s face still remains science-fiction is a question I am unable to answer. The Cronenbergian figure of Dr. Hira is a more down to Earth mad scientist (if that’s not an oxymoron). He has a slight, subtle twinge of madness to him, with the interactions shared between doctor and patient being my favourite part of the film. He is a medical doctor yet also a plastic surgeon at the same time complete with several nurse assistants within his dreamlike and surreal clinic, which itself is really something to behold. It is a blank space with no observable windows or doors in which the background changes upon every visit and is littered with transparent panels and prosthetic pieces hanging around like works of modern art.

One of the film’s most interesting dialogue exchanges takes place between husband and wife as they have a discussion about the covering of one’s face. They speak of how during Japan’s Genji era it was considered virtuous to conceal one’s face as well this continuing to be the case for women in Islamic countries. There is an accidental modern relevance to this conversation as following the Covid-19 pandemic, the covering of one’s face in the west has become seen as a virtuous act in the eyes of some. Okuyama chooses to use his new appearance to seduce his own wife (unbeknownst to her that the man is her husband), and there is a preserve intrigue that comes from watching this play out. The seduction proves successful however afterwards she claims to have known it was him all along. Did she really know it was him? Would the presence of body markings have given it away?

The Face Of Another also contains a subplot unconnected to the main plot about a young woman whose face is beautiful on one side but disfigured on the other. She is shunned by others and has never been treated like a lady by men other than her older brother (her introductory scene even features an extra whom I swear to God looks like the Japanese half brother of one of The Beatles). Her brother is the only man who understands her pain and solitude and even kisses the disfigured part of her face, leading to an incestuous relationship between the two. Her story acts as a doppelganger to the main plot although I feel it is the weaker and less interesting aspect of the film. The Face Of Another does move at a slow pace and like any art-house film, said elements can test the viewer’s patience but ultimately the patient viewer is rewarded in the end.

During one scene with the disfigured girl, she is walking through a mental asylum housing Japanese war veterans, of which she volunteers her time, all while non-diegetic Hitler chants play in the background. Likewise, throughout the film, Mr. Okuyama and Dr. Hira visit a traditional Munich-style German bar complete with traditional German music. Is the film trying to make comment on Japanese war crimes and the country’s coalition with Nazi Germany? Along with the film hinting the disfigured girl may have received her scars from radiation poising from the bombing of Nagasaki, the spectre of World War II looms over The Face Of Another. Although the pink elephant in the room for anyone familiar with Japan’s involvement in World War II is the clear parallels between the film’s theme of medical experiments and the Japanese war crimes including the experimentation of humans at Unit 731.

The Return of Doctor X (1939)

The Return Of Doctor X is a movie with very little value to it aside from the anomaly of being Humphrey Bogart’s only horror/science fiction film in which he plays the titular Dr Maurice Xavier, a.k.a. Marshall Quesne (pronounced “caine”). Dr. Xavier is essentially a zombie-vampire, a doctor who was sentenced to the electric chair after trying to see how long babies could go without eating (gruesome even for today, let alone 1939), only to be resurrected by a proto Dr Frankenstein, Dr Francis Flegg (John Litel) and is kept alive by regular injections of Type One blood. I do love the Karloff-like design of the character with his pale, white face, punk rock style hair with the white streak and a rabbit which he carries around with him (I’m making this my future Halloween costume). The Return Of Doctor X is a rare instance in which Bogart played a subservient character, of whom is quite Peter Lorre-esque with his tragic and pathetic demeanour, while his unnatural body movements and limping call back to Karloff’s Frankenstein’s Monster. The film’s climax does, however, venture into more traditional Bogart territory in which Xavier partakes in a gangster-style shootout. Bogart is a consummate professional who doesn’t phone in the role regardless of how much he was known to detest it. Just contrast him to his master played by John Litel, of whom the movie gives him somewhat of an arc in which he eventually regrets his actions playing God, he is a much more generic bad guy.

According to the audio commentary for The Return Of Doctor X featuring director Vincent Sherman (of whom went on to do better work in his career), the film had a troubled production with the original script going in one direction and then being significantly altered during filming. This is evident when watching the film’s trailer of which the majority of footage featured is not in the finished picture not to mention the film’s as various credit errors (Wayne Morris is billed as Walter Barnett but is referred to as Walter Garrett in the film). Likewise, the film oddly gives the “All persons fictitious” disclaimer full-screen treatment before the opening titles, whereas it’s usually in small print at the bottoms of the credits. What was the studio worried about?

The premise of The Return Of Doctor X has potential with its mix of vampirism and reincarnation but with the exception of Bogart, the mystery yarn fails to flesh out the story or characters (although I do find it interesting that the movie has to explain the more recent scientific discovery of blood group types, whereas today this is common, layman knowledge). Wayne Morris might have worked at the title character in Kid Galahad but he’s no leading man material in the role of a go-getter reporter from Wichita. The Return Of Doctor X is a typical example of the Warner Bros B-movie product of the late 30’s/early 40’s – the film is by the numbers and has no real flashy moments. Worst of all, it is masquerading as a sequel to the two-tier Technicolor, pre-code gem Doctor X, however, there is no connection between the two films. Many would point to The Return Of Doctor X as an embarrassment in the career of Humphrey Bogart, however I would point to it as another example of how great an actor he is as he brings so much life to an otherwise average film when he’s on-screen. Boris Karloff made a career playing roles like this, why should Bogart’s attempt at playing a monster be looked down upon?

Thirteen Women (1932)

Mean Girls

***This Review Contains Spoilers***

Aeons before the likes of Michael, Jason, Freddy or even Norman there was Ursula Georgi (Myrna Loy).Thirteen Women is one of the earliest prototypes of the slasher film (made at a time when most horror movies featured supernatural creatures) in which the half-Hindu, half-Javanese Ursula (even though Georgi is a name of European origin) seeks revenge on her former high school peers due to their racist mistreatment through the use of horoscopes which don’t predict a happy or successful future. Whether or not Loy actually enjoyed doing exotic roles such as this during her early career, she remains professional and doesn’t phone it in. I delight at that stoic dialogue she delivers and when she gives you that blank stare you know you’re done for, not to mention she goes through many a memorable costume change throughout the film’s short runtime.

Throughout the picture Ursula has control over her victims, leading them to commit suicide. However, the film does not make it clear if she has supernatural mind control abilities (“I was his brain as I am yours”) or simply can just manipulate her victims though psychological means as the film’s opening prologue appears to imply:

“Suggestion is a very common occurrence in the life of every normal individual…

…waves of certain types of crime, waves of suicide are to be explained by the power of suggestion upon certain types of mind.”

Pages 94 and 105 of Applied Psychology by Professors Hollingsworth and Hoffenberger, Columbia University.

The extent of the mistreatment towards Ursula is not made clear. In her final monologue at the film’s climax, Ursula speaks of she tried to become white and it was almost in her hands when the sorority of girls wouldn’t let her “cross the colour line”, subsequently followed by the sorority’s leader Laura Stanhope (Irene Dunne) acknowledging their cruel treatment. The film’s racial subject matter was frank for the time – this was after all when screen star Merle Oberon was hiding her mixed-race origins from the public.

Thirteen Women is an oddity in the career of Irene Dunne, being her only macabre picture in a filmography of generally light-hearted fare. Laura is the only woman in the sorority who attempts not to act so gullible and take superstitions seriously (not to mention she has one fine Beverly Hills Home). Thirteen Women is an example of a female ensemble film yet oddly all the women in the picture are comprised of divorced and single mums – there are no husbands insight and even the one who is married shoots her hubby at the beginning of the film.

Thirteen Women doesn’t disappoint with those to be expected pre-code shocker moments from the circus acrobat accident in the film’s beginning to Ursula going as far as to send poisonous chocolate and later a bomb disguised as a birthday present to kill Laura’s child. The film’s atmosphere is also aided with an exotic score by Max Steiner (topped with plenty of gongs thrown in there for good measure) at a time when most movies seldomly used scored music. Steiner would go onto compose King Kong the following year at RKO and the rest is history.

Thirteen Women’s biggest claim to fame is the film being the only on-screen appearance of the elusive Peg Entwistle, who committed suicide by hanging herself on the Hollywood sign, shortly before the Thirteen Women was released – ironically the only film she appeared in had suicide as a major theme. According to the book Peg Entwistle and the Hollywood Sign Suicide, Entwistle’s role as Mrs Hazel Cousins was central to the first 22 minutes of the film in which she was involved in a lesbian love affair leading to the murder of her jealous husband. In the 59 minute cut of the film, Entwistle is only on screen for a few minutes in which during that time she locks arms with another woman (her love affair?) and later shoots her husband and then screams at what she has just done. Thirteen Women originally ran at 73 minutes however the likely watered-down 59-minute cut is the only version currently known to exist. Perhaps somewhere out there exists a 73 minute print of Thirteen Women, regardless of what we are left with is still an entertaining hour. Perhaps future cult classic status is still in the waiting for Thirteen Women.

The Comedy of Terrors (1963)

A Graveyard Smash!

Four of classic Hollywood’s biggest horror icons together in a macabre comedy? Even if you’re not a diehard horror fan how can you turn down a film like this (if only Bela Lugosi had lived longer)? Each icon in The Comedy of Terrors plays to their strengths in this sitcom-like set up in which a group of characters, not all of whom can stand each other are forced to live and work together and have no way out of it. Surely there was potential in this to be a TV sitcom, at the short and sweet run time of only 83 minutes it feels like an extended TV episode.

Right of the bat the exposition explaining the film’s set up is a joy to listen to with the perfect comic timing from Vincent Price mercilessly insulting everyone to Boris Karloff’s random one-liners. Despite the film’s macabre tone, it does have an innocent element to it such as Price’s reaction to Peter Lorre’s poorly made coffin, “No one in their right mind would be caught dead in a thing like that”; nothing beats a distinguished actor delivering a corny pun.

Basil Rathbone is presented as the villain of the film, partially due to him being Basil Rathbone acting in an antagonist manner however his character isn’t doing anything wrong, he’s just trying to collect the debt he is owed from his tenants. Then again going all the way back to the Bible, those who collect owed money are always portrayed with scorn. After The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Comedy of Terrors has to be Basil Rathbone’s best ever moments on screen, showing off the full range of his talents from his swordsmanship and ability to recite Shakespeare all while hamming it up.

Vincent Price’s anti-hero is one real bad guy of the film, causing misery to those around him. Yet we still gravitate towards him in a reverse of the Basil Rathbone situation; because he’s Vincent Price. The relationship between Price and Lorre is the centrepiece of the film in a Pinky and The Brain like dynamic. I’m also surprised I didn’t notice Peter Lorre’s mask double until I had it pointed out to me, it’s the one aspect of the film which is actually creepy. Likewise, the other great member is the great Orangey aka Rhubarb the cat. As a cat lover, I appreciate the shots of the many shots the mean looking but still adorable feline.

Eyes Without a Face [Les Yeux Sans Visage] (1960)

A Woman’s Face

***This Review Contains Spoilers***

Eyes Without A Face is the type of horror film which earns more respect than your average film of the genre, thanks in part to its class and sophistication. It’s essentially a glorified B-movie but one which turns archetypes found in the mad scientist genre on its head. After all, horror stereotypes are not actually scary; normal people acting in an abnormal way is what’s truly frightening.

Doctor Genessier (Pierre Brasseur) has the look of a potential madman even resembling the maniac John Barrymore yet remains subdue throughout the film as a man wrestling with his conscience. His assistant isn’t a hunchback but rather a manipulative woman Louise (Alida Valli) who kidnaps young girls of the doctor’s behalf; much like in William Wyler’s The Collector, in which victims can be so easily kidnapped and taken to a secluded house without a trace. Without the creepy carnival-like music she would appear a different character – not so manipulative and eerie; ah the power of editing.

Eyes Without a Face presents by far the best combination I’ve ever seen of a movie which is unsettling yet beautiful at the same time; the two keywords which sum up the viewing experience. I’m not a massively squeamish person yet the thought of plastic surgery makes my body muscles tighten. Watching any scene with the facially disfigured Christiane (Edith Scob) makes me feel uneasy but simultaneously enraptured at the same time creating a unique combination of viewer emotion. Even with the absence of a woman’s most important physical asset, Edith Scob is the pinnacle of femininity in Eyes Without a Face. The manner in which she walks and moves in that white coat-like dress couldn’t be more angelic and I haven’t even mentioned the mask. If there is ever a cinematic image more implanted into one’s mind, it’s Edith Scob wearing that mask. It’s creepy, it’s unsettling, it’s emotionless, yet it’s one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen more so than most flesh and blood faces. The masks used in the film were moulded to fit Edith Scob’s own face, could that be the contributing factor to its beauty? Or is it the angelic figure which carries the mask, whose surrogate mother still brushes her hair despite the disfigurement.

Equally as eerie and hauntingly beautiful is the only scene in which Christiane appears without the mask. Out of context, it wouldn’t entirely seem this way but the very idea that this face has been transplanted onto her from another girl is so uncanny to watch. This is also helped in part of Scob’s stunning piece of facial acting in which the Christiane is not yet used to her new face with the limited, almost robotic like display of facial movements.

My only issue with Eyes Without Face are two plot contrivances. At the beginning of the film when Dr Genessier identifies the remains of a recovered body as those of his missing daughter, the authorities at the morgue don’t even bother asking the other man they asked to come along to look at the remains to view the body for himself. Likewise, when the character of Paulette goes missing after leaving the hospital to investigate Dr Genessier on their behalf, the police don’t follow up on her disappearance. Are these plot contrivances for the connivance of the plot or did the filmmakers deliberately set out to portray the authorities as being that incompetent?

Regardless, such plot contrivances are only a minor annoyance in a movie with such startling scenes, imagery and set design from the painting of Christiane’s mother to Dr Genessier’s chamber. I’ve long felt that a medical or laboratory-like aesthetic is one of the most effective surroundings to capture in glorious black and white. This beauty culminates in the film’s ending in which Christiane performs a simple undoing of everything her father has been working on. This is not a Charles Foster Kane style destruction of a room but rather she gracefully stabs her surrogate mother and symbolically sets dogs and birds used for Genessier’s experiments free. Aside from the doctor getting mauled by the dogs, the ending is intense yet peaceful. Some films stick with you more than others: Eyes Without a Face is one of those which I found myself thinking about its visual images for days after seeing and they won’t be leaving me soon.

The Mad Genius (1931)

Emphasis on the Word Mad

I feel like no other decade seems to have as many obscure gems lost to time as the 1930’s; case in point, The Mad Genius. Coming out in the same year as the iconic adaptations of Frankenstein, Dracula, and Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde; but in my humble opinion, The Mad Genius is a better and more intriguing film than any of those.

The opening of The Mad Genius does a superb job at setting a time and place; central Europe in the early 20^th century. There is an impeccable level of detail in creating the world of a traveling performer; with the falling of the rain, the wind and the sound of horse and carriage taking full advantage of sound technology to create a world. Equally as impressive is Vladimar Ivan Tsarakov’s (John Barrymore) Berlin theatre and the large-scale stage set with hints of German expressionism throughout and the widespread use of music in the soundtrack, unlike other early talkies.

John Barrymore is (unsurprisingly) mesmerising as Vladimar Ivan Tsarakov (quite a name), one of the most repulsive characters he ever played as he spends the movie spewing pompous and at times mad scientist like dialogue. He has a misogynistic attitude towards women and is even seen ogling up the skirts of his dancers, in one of the film’s very pre-code elements. He is even a drug dealer, although the word drug is never used in the film nor is it identified what substances appear in the film. In one scene in which he refuses to deal drugs with the stage director played by Luis Alberni, I love his summary on drugs when he throws them into the fire; “If I drop this, you will be free, but you will suffer of course, but in the end, you will be happier than you could ever dream”. Likewise In one of the movie’s comic highlights, there is an early use of profanity in the film; “It’s unbelievable that there’s any human being living, who should be such a stupid ass”.

One of the many interesting observations in The Mad Genius is the combination of elements from other movies. The plot itself is derivative of Barrymore’s previous horror outing Svengali, while Tsarakov’s desire to create a great ballet dancer out of a young boy is a variation on Dr. Frankenstein (which the movie itself alludes to). When Tsarakov is wearing on overcoat he is bent over like Quasimodo; Barrymore’s facial appearance is very similar to that of Bela Lugosi in White Zombie, likewise, his voice is reminiscent of Lugosi’s Dracula. The theatre setting has vibes of The Phantom of the Opera and perhaps most interestingly are the elements of The Red Shoes with the film’s inclusion of ballet and the themes of going to extremes for one’s art. Could Powell and Pressburger have taken inspiration from The Mad Genius?

The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932)

The Wrath of Genghis Kahn

Talk about a trashy film, just how trashy? Boris Karloff plays a sort of Asian Hitler hell-bent on exterminating the white race, or how about the scene which involves Myrna Loy having a sexual fetish from seeing a man being whipped. Man, pre-code Hollywood was not right in the head. The film’s plot is like an Indiana Jones film which never got made (or more importantly could never be made), like Indiana Jones getting an artifact before the Nazis to avoid them harnessing its power to take over the world except here its Asian Nazis. This is the kind of film which is so off the wall that its fun describing it in one of the purest pieces of pulp escapism to come out of the 1930’s.

In today’s politically correct world where everything offends everyone and people are obsessed with racism (like seriously, what well-known movie doesn’t have a “This movie is racist” topic on IMDB) I find there’s a certain joy that comes from watching something as shocking and politically incorrect as The Mask of Fu Manchu; like a kid watching R rated movies behind their parent’s back. Even as late as the 90’s scenes from The Mask of Fu Manchu had to be cut for a VHS release (thankfully now in it’s fully restored original version on DVD) – notice for example how picture quality degrades for the line “A China man beat me? He couldn’t do it”.

Old Hollywood had an odd fascination with East Asia and Eastern Asian mysticism as Lewis Stone’s characters states, “Will we ever understand these eastern races, will he ever learn anything?”. Is it right to simply dismiss The Mask of Fu Manchu as a “racist” film? Is there a malicious intent with the film to demonize a race and culture with Dr. Fu Manchu being the anthesis to Judeo Christian values, or is it merely the representation of the perversion of a foreign culture and race.

No expense is spared on Fu Manchu’s layer. This is the bad guy layer that would make James Bond villains jealous. Complete with torture devices, crocodile pits, an assortment of mad scientist gizmos of topped with all-round luscious deco making The Mask of Fu Manchu one of the most visually sumptuous films of the pre-code era. Like any Bond villain Fu Manchu could kill his opponents with a simple gunshot but instead puts them on devices which will kill them at a slow pace, and yes, they’re able to escape and halt the bad guy’s evil plans.

Boris Karloff prevents the character of Fu Manchu coming off a total caricature, showing he is a man of taste and culture and one who puts the genius in evil genius, boasting that he is a doctor three times over having graduating from three different universities. Likewise, it amazes me how Myrna Loy transformed her image from an exotic to something as far from that as possible within such a short period of time; thankfully she didn’t do these kinds of roles for too long a period of time. I delight at that stoic dialogue she delivers and her ever menacing presence.

Glen or Glenda (1953)

Misunderstood

Note: This is the earliest film review of mine which I still have. While my other early attempts make me cringe in how amateurish they are, this one I find has an appealing innocence to it, therefore I present it as I originally wrote it back in 2011.

I might sound insane, but I’m giving an Ed Wood movie a positive score from an artistic point of view. Glen or Glenda marked Wood’s first film, which he not only written and directed but also starred in. The film was originally slated to be a biopic on Christine Jorgensen, the propriety of the first publicly known sex change operation (in this case from male to female) Wood, however, took over production and instead turned it into a film about his own transvestism.

Whether you’re conservative or liberal on issue of cross-dressing and trans-sexuality, Glen Or Glenda manages to do something which I’ve seen many sacred cows fail to do, create emotional interest in its main characters, and succeeds to raise question on what it means to be normal, with an issue which is just as relevant today as it was in 1953.

The movie’s production values are surprisingly good for a film of this calibre. The surreal dream-like sequence in the 2nd half of the movie features some impressive filmmaking techniques and manages to engage you in the character’s descent into insanity. Even the film’s acting is decent, certainly better than in the likes of Plan 9 from Outer Space.

Lugosi’s character is widely regarded to be a scientist representing God. At first, I didn’t understand the character’s role in the movie (plus the use of the stock of footage is completely random). However, I was impressed with how his catchphrase which he utters throughout the course of the movie actually finds its way to having relevance with the plot.

I’m not the type of person who over analyzes movies looking for their deeper meaning, but in Glen or Glenda it really came through quite obviously and did leave an impression on me, as well as changing my opinions on Wood as a director. I can defiantly sense Ed Wood put a lot legitimate feeling into this movie, and certainly comes through in the finished product.