"La Mansion De La Niebla" (1972) d / Francisco Lara Polop, Pedro Lazaga

Oh yeah, you can definitely hand over to me any vintage seventies groovy gothic mystery, Italo-Spanish style, with all fucking speed...  like tonight's review, sort of a live-action Scooby Doo episode with jet-setting, chain-smoking, cerveza-swilling Spaniards instead of Scoob and the gang, as co-directed by F. Lara Polop and Pedro Lazaga, and the complaints will almost always remain minimal. Enjoying the classic "spooky old house" formula are the likes of the eye-catching Ida Galli (as Evelyn Stewart here), and the fiery Analia Gade, as well as Franco Fantasia, who you've seen before in Umberto Lenzi's Mangiati vivi (1980).


"Don't scratch my paint job!", warns Mr. Porter (Franco Fantasia) to the cameraman on the hood.
After a rousing round of road hog reveals that a cocky young fella's motorcycle is the preferred mode of transportation to hot brunette hitchhikers over goateed,  flask-swigging, weak-hearted gents in driving gloves with Mustangs, a molto foggy shortcut leaves a group of travelers, an unstable redhead named Elsa (Analia Gade) who's prone to lengthy flashbacks, Fred (Andres Resino) the biker and his dark-haired ride-thumbing prize, Laura (Analisa Nardi), Mr. Porter (Franco Fantasia) the Mustang-whipping showoff, and a married couple called the Tremonts, all stranded together at a dark and mysterious mansion with adjoining creepy graveyard overnight until the treacherous fog lifts.


Don't mind if I join you in one, baby. That next puff, with the teetering ash, is gonna be so delicious.
The estate is owned by a shadowy creature named Martha Clinton (Evelyn Stewart) who boasts of an ancestor two generations removed being a vampire, or witch, or maybe both, and just so happens to be a dead ringer for the woman in the portrait hanging on the wall, who died thirty years earlier in a limousine accident, along with her chauffeur, both of whom have been inexplicably spotted by members of the group earlier that same night...Then there's that desperate scratching coming from behind the big heavy door that's bolted shut that Martha refuses to open, dismissing the noises as rats in the cellar. What unfolds next is a dizzying tapestry of superstition and investigation, deceit and homicide that assures the viewer that less people will see the following morning's first light than originally settled in for the night...


"This could be my last cuchi-cuchi!" screams Maria del Rosario Mercedes Pilar Martinez Molina Baeza (Analia Gade, and not really Charo).
This one turned up as the late, late movie once in awhile on local NY/NJ stations when I was growing up in the seventies, and I always fought back the sleep to watch it when I could. Genre nuts, be forewarned, though: The moody, minacious affair is certainly not bogged down by blood or sex, like many of its more radical European complements of the era, and the only genuine scare I experienced was a moment around halfway through where I thought I'd run out of cigarettes (perish that fucking thought, eh?), but to the filmmakers' credit, the retro-style ambience that's ladled on in their stead nearly compensates for the missing elements here. On the scale, a pair of Wops lurch forward out of the fog, worth a peek.


File under 'Worse even, than getting shot': Getting shot and falling backward, as your head lands in the fireplace.

"Misterio en las Bermudas" (1979) d/ Gilbert Martin

By 1979, it's safe to say the lemon that once was the phenomenon of Mexican lucha libre movies had been squeezed of nearly every drop of entertaining juice, and tonight's review, known as Mystery in the Bermuda Triangle en ingles, is a brittle, dialed-in epitaph for the zany genre, bereaft of any real thrills. El Enmascarado de Plata, or Santo, as he was known worldwide, was already sixty-two years old(!) here, and though he would make four more wrestling movies before his death in 1984, the writing was already clearly on the wall.


"A thousand masks and you haven't got one condom?"
After a plane vanishes from sight during a tropical storm caused by a mirrored periscope of sorts, two Mexican anglers snag the mask of Santo from the rippling surf, leading one of the fishermen to tell the not-that-amazing tale that led up to this event. We see Santo, The Blue Demon, and Mil Mascaras dust off some ham n' egg opponents in a brief triple tag team match before they're asked by the government to go undercover to protect an Iranian karate-princess while she signs an important treaty. What's undercover for three guys in masks whipping around in convertible sports cars and stretch Cadillacs, I ask you. On the evil, scheming side of the peso, is an egghead assassin who's enlisted a trio of Mexican Mata Hari's to seduce valuable information out of the wrestlers/super heroes/special agents. He's also hired some thugs to rough up Mil Mascaras on a pier, and jack his wristwatch. What a bastard.


"As if you couldn't tell by the matching silver lame' headbands and jumpsuits, we're from an underwater city..."
Our heroes have a sloppily choreographed scrap or two with the egghead's beefy henchmen, save a drowning countryman from grainy stock footage of a shark, have a pair of uninspired car chases (and a boat chase) that show off their flash vehicles (and motorboat), and sit around sipping champagne in their best leisure wear (and color-coordinated maskies, of course). Santo's sympathetic spy-girl, Rina (Silvia Manriquez), is kidnapped by a pair of humps in silver lame' jumpsuits and taken to an unnamed city under the ocean, which has it's own sun, grass, and luxurious hotel, apparently. There, after being purified (by standing in a fountain in a bikini, mind you), she is reunited with her scientist father, who informs her she will never dwell among the surface folk again. In the end, they rescue the princess, but are transported off-camera to the underwater city, leading to the inevitable nuclear apocalypse that will no doubt occur in a Lucha Libre-less world, as evidenced by footage of a stock mushroom cloud. Could this really be the end???


"Which one of you high school gymnasium assassins has Mil's action slacks?"
If you set out to see every single Lucha Libre movie as a weird goal for yourself, I suppose you'd probably want to add this one to your list. Compared to earlier efforts, though, this one is flatter than the sounds coming out of a seventh grade marching band practice. The two stories barely intersect (or make sense, really), and the usual rough n' tumble action you might expect from one of these things is phoned in and lifeless. Notably, Mil Mascaras appears on camera momentarily without a mask on...from behind. Wah wah wah wahhhhh. You'll be blowing sad trombones of your own throughout this mess, which only manages a single Wop on the rating scale, a thrown match if there ever was one. Avoid.


"After this mission, we should become masked Chartered Accountants..."

"Calvaire" (2004) d/ Fabrice Du Welz

Thanks to Belgian filmmaker Fabrice Du Welz, you can pretty much cross the High Fens natural reserve in Liege off your bucket list of places to visit. When I think about tonight's review ...also known as The Ordeal (2004), and rightfully so, as Du Welz has concocted a bizarre mix of beautiful cinematography and gripping psychological terror, the madness of  love, and dreary, ominous isolation that makes for a pretty wild ride, while tapping into earlier films like Psycho (1960), Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), Deliverance (1972), and Misery (1990). If those titles don't paint a vivid enough picture of what kind of lunacy you're in for here, it's outta my hands, folks. I've done all I can...


"Dominique, nique, nique, s'en allait tout simplement...c'mon, ev'rybuddy!"
After cabaret singer Marc Stevens (Laurent Lucas) speeds away in his personalized van from his last successful gig belting out mundane love songs (in a personalized cape, mind you) to horny Belgian grannies (and smitten nurses who Polaroid him their boobs) in a backwater convalescent home, he breaks down during a sleet storm in the dark and desolate wilderness of Liege, bumping into a disheveled-looking chap named Boris (Jean-Luc Couchard) who's been searching for his dog, Bella, in the elements, and who points him towards the empty local inn, where an quirky little fellow named Paul Bartel (Ha! ...as played by Jackie Berroyer) sets him up with a bed and breakfast, on the odd promise that he does not go near the village. While out on a nature walk, he does just that, spying a horrific gaggle of crummy-looking mutant locals as they take turns making love to a pig in a nearby barn. Bartel promises that his van will be repaired by morning, and the men trade a joke for a song after dinner, amid melancholy vibes over Bartel's wife, Gloria, who apparently broke camp ages ago.


"Check your pay envelope, I put Polaroids of my boobs in there.", notes Mademoiselle Vicky (Brigitte Lahaie). 
The next morning, things have gone from disadvantageous to deplorable. Marc's van looks to have been broken into and rummaged through, the only phone has been disconnected, Bartel is nowhere to be found, and the small closet in his room is now filled with women's dresses. He then notices an angry Bartel outside smashing the fuck out of his vehicle with a sledgehammer, and runs down to try and reason with him, only to get brained with the detached battery. Bartel sets the van on fire and drags the unconscious lounge singer off. When he finally comes to, he's wearing a dress, tied to a chair, and getting his injured, bleeding head shaved by the innkeeper, who seems to have convinced himself that the man is his wife, returned to him. When Marc tries to escape, Boris returns him to Bartel's tractor (which is spotted by some of the locals on a trapping run), and later crucifies him (!) to some support beams in the barn. From here, the situation only turns more distressing by the sickening minute.


"If you don't pay attention to my footwork, you'll never be able to do the 'Tor Johnson' ...You've got it all wrong. Sway left, then right, then left, then right, then..."
Du Welz followed this effort up with Vinyan (2008), Alleluia (2014), and Colt 45 (2014), all of which are on my "to watch" list, for sure. Phillipe Nahon you'll probably remember from things like Haute Tension (2003), and Gaspar Noe's Irreversible (2002), as well as Seul contre tous/ I Stand Alone (1998). Brigitte Lahaie, as most of you should well know by now, was one of France's premier pornographic exports in the late seventies. I found this one as deliriously demented and rotten as any grindhouse flick from the seventies, though beautifully framed with a decidedly arthouse lens, lending a surreal feel to the unpleasant proceedings which might be a cultural curveball to mainstream genre fans. On the scale, Calvaire shuffles about to the tune of three Wops, a must-taste for discerning Euro-horror palates out there.


"Okay, well, since you put it that way...", shrugs Shotgun-face (Laurent Lucas).