The Frankenstein Theory

The Frankenstein Theory [QuickFix]

Directed by: Andrew Weiner

USA, 2013

Horror/FoundFootage, 87min

Well... I’m really finding myself sick of found footage movies right now. Mainly due to the fact that the thought process of “how should we make it look real” shines through so damned hard. When the found footage style and look becomes convention, then it’s time to move on. Jumpcuts, interrupted interviews and candid commentary “off camera”, actors reacting to off-screen audio, and a no show monster until the very last moment is more generic than the fake “boyfriend behind the shower curtain” scare. This one even has the obligatory skeptic character in the shape of Jonathan Venkenheim’s girlfriend who shouts and screams at him as he establishes the core idea of the film – "the Frankenstein monster was real and I’m gonna find it!"

Kind of had an interesting plot and a decent cast, but I found it just too slow. But hey, you do what you can with what you have, and just make it work the best you can. Ten years ago it would have been awesome, but today it’s just lame unfortunately. Oh, and the formulaic pinnacle shot/reveal of the “monster” attacking/sieging/snatching or what ever climax, is certainly an anticlimax. Which ironically is the only time the movie ventures off formula conventions, the camera stays on the tripod and never falls over to Dutch the final shot.

Go watch Terence Fishers innovative The Curse of Frankenstein, Roger Corman’s Frankenstein Unbound, Paul Morrissey's Flesh for Frankenstein or Jack Smight’s insanely underrated Frankenstein: The True Story instead if you want a Frankenstein fix.

Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein

Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein
Original Title: Dracula contra Frankenstein
Directed by: Jesus Franco
Spain / France, 1972
Horror/EuroGoth, 88min
Distributed by: Midnight Video

It really is Francomania here right now, I find myself being drawn back to the films I saw years ago, and it really is like reuniting with an old friend. Movies that I once saw too many of in one go and perhaps didn't appreciate as much as I should have. But boy am I enjoying them this time round. At one point I actually started having regrets that I let all those damned VHS tapes go to the rewinding grounds in the sky (I donated them to Monkey Beach actually). I’ve taken it so far that I’m actually listening to Jess Franco and his B-Band on my iPod on the way to and from work! But it's good stuff, and a nice change from the Piero Umilliani & Chet Baker disc I've been playing too long.

Once can’t argue that Franco really has a fascinating spectrum to his catalogue. Not only the cheesy sleazy stuff, the horror flicks, the strange drama stuff, the sexy comedies, the sinister W.I.P. films, the jungle film, but be he’s also been a healthy contributor to the genre that somewhat defines European horror, the niche I refer to as EuroGoth.

I feel that it’s kind of unfair to give Franco’s Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein a hard time, because you can’t really go into a Franco film wanting to experience hardened emotions of fear, shock and dramaturgical fulfilment. It doesn’t work that way, and I can’t really believe the amount of trash that has been written about his movies when you start to poke around the net and even in the books and magazines of say ten-fifteen years back. They all complain about the same thing. Dracula looks silly, Frankenstein’s make up is tacky, and the Wolfman is ridiculous... you get the message.

You have to take it for what it is, and this is one of the keys to understanding his movies. There are a set of themes and motifs that Franco keeps returning too, and until you know these, you won’t get it. The mad scientist trying to recreate the face of his loved one, the widower seeking revenge for the death of her beloved partner, the seductive - but complex female and so on. Then there's the returning characters like the Red Lip Detectives, The Countess, Dr. Orloff, Al Pereira, the Jazz club/Cabaret scenes etc. etc to name a few. Before you have a knowledge or insight into these motifs, characters and traits, you probably won’t enjoy the show, or get the full magnitude of their intent.

A majority of criticism against Franco is that he constantly remakes the same film over and over again – The Awful Dr. Orloff 1962 has been remade with the same base theme several times up to Faceless 1987. The avenging lover was remade several times as Miss Muerte 1966 and as She Killed in Ecstasy 1971 and so on. You get the point. Now this shouldn’t’ really become a foundation for debate, as people rarely criticise, say Picasso for painting several similar themed paintings over and over again, you rarely criticise your favourite band for sounding as they did on the last couple of albums, you rarely criticise Hammer Studios for using the same casts and location over and over again, you rarely criticize your favourite TV show for reusing the same formula over and over again! It’s in our nature, we want safety, even if it means repetition and don’t want to be challenged with change. So please don’t waste your time writing "Yet another tiresome piece of crap from Franco…" over and over again. And I’m not telling you that you aren’t entitled to your opinion, it’s just that that exasperating opening or ending line just proves your ignorance - You didn't get it.

It’s the same principle when watching a Franco film. He goes back, or returns to the initial idea and sees how he can recreate the piece from a different perspective - be it with new actors, a new producer and Production Company, or a new location and sets. One could say a new budget, but Franco seldom received more money for his next film, than he had for the previous. I can relate to this from my line of work. Great the show rated wonderfully, now let’s get to work with the second season – but there’s never a penny more put n the kitty, as we managed so grand the first time around, instead let’s see what we can make cheaper. It sucks, and it definitely takes the edge off creativity. You can see the initial ideas and line of thought in The Awful Dr. Orloff, and then watch how he tweaks and refines the source up to Faceless – which still stands as the better of the two, even though The Awful Dr. Orloff was the movie that gave him his breakthrough and got Orson Welles interested in the Jazz man from Madrid.

So if you have seen a Franco film and didn’t find anything that you liked, enjoyed or actually had a positive experience from and thought that it was the largest pile of garbage you have ever seen, then back the hell off and don’t go back there. These films are obviously not for you! You wouldn’t go back to eat a meal at a restaurant you didn’t enjoy, just to see if they got any better at the same meal would you?

With that out of my system, let’s get down to work with Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein. Well what can one say? Sure it is a slow movie, sure the creatures do look kind of dorky, but that’s what special effects on a minimal budget looked like in those days. Remember that the zombies in Romero’s landmark Dawn of the Dead 1978 still look pasty however much we want them to look scary as hell in our memory of the film.

Basically the movie sees Doctor Frankenstein [Dennis Price] bring back his monster [Fernando Bilbao] with the aid of his slave Morpho [Luis Barboo – see, that Morpho! Remember Dr. Orloff’s handyman from The Awful Dr. Orloff? It’s Morpho – Frankenstein is Dr. Orloff in the Franco universe. It all comes together when you know what to look for doesn’t it!). With the monster resurrected they plan to enslave Dracula [Howard Vernon], who has been put out of action by the Vampire Hunter Dr. Jonathan Seward [Alberto Dalbés], and create an army of the undead.

One by one the women of the village fall victims to Dracula’s bite and become part of Dr. Frankenstein’s army. Just like the primary cast that consists of regular Franco actors who all had equivalent parts in the counterpart film The Curse of Frankenstein (La maldición de Frankenstein) shot at the same time – the female victims are also frequent Franco ladies, Britt Nichols, Geneviève Robert, Eduarda Pimenta and Josyane Gibert.

After sustaining a vampire bite – strangely missing from the movie – Steward becomes almost apathetic, while he is nursed back to health by the village Gypsy [Geneviève Robert]. She becomes so outraged by the plan and procedure that Frankenstein and Dracula have taken that she curses them all and calls upon the Wolfman [Brandy – your guess is as good as mine, he, or she, never acted again!] to put a stop to their fiendish plans.

Needless to say a final battle is in store and the whole show goes down with a bang. Even if it’s not much of a bang, perhaps one could say it’s more of a frizzle, but I’ll get back to that in a short while.

I don’t want to say that Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein is a homage to the Universal Horror’s, or a nod to the Hammer flicks, because I don’t feel that it is. I’m certain that somewhere along the lines, producers – the guys with the small bag of cash, that call the shots – told Franco that they liked the Hammer films, which where, and had been successful in the late sixties, early seventies, but now heading downhill at full speed. The same year as Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein, Hammer produced the appalling Dracula A.D. 1972, directed by Alan Gibson, which set the Count in a modern London. An idea that I’m certain Franco would have used if he were to copy the Hammer films - where better to locate the Gothic characters if not sizzling Spain. Just imagine Dr. Frankenstein and The Count checking out sexy chicks at a hot, vibrant Jazz club. It almost happens, but instead Estela [Gibert] performs a French song and can-can like dance in its place. Again a recurrent scene in Franco's movies, is the light going on yet?

So instead I look at the film as Franco’s interpretation of Universal and Hammer, as seen through his frequent used themes, inside a Franco universe, but with the use of their iconic characters. Sure an influence, but not a homage. And to his defence, the sets in this movie are astonishing, it’s probably some of the best laboratory set design [by Antonio de Cabo – his only one] that ever was made during this period of low budget cinema. Also, despite a pretty diligent use of the zoom, this movie has some awesome imagery and wonderful compositions thanks to cinematographer José Climent, and knowing that Franco wasn’t a stranger to getting behind the camera himself, I’m sure that he had a decent participation in the images. Some of the shots easily beat the Hammer films atmosphere and visuals of the same period in time.

Sure the fake bats obviously hanging off rods just out of frame are silly, but then again, the Hammer movies never managed to pull this one off either, their bats are still just a stuffed bat hanging from a rod just out of frame, so that’s just fine by me. On the other side, Franco and editor María Luisa Soriano [who worked on many of Franco’s films and on Paul Naschy films crash cuts from the real bat – yeah, real bat, because in the close ups, it’s a real bat held up by the wings for the valuable shot – to the actor or actress looming over their victim with such efficiency that the illusion actually works!

The movie has a magnificent score by Bruno Nicolai and Daniel White, who both scored many great Franco movies, and the soundtrack for Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein isn’t too far away from James Bernard’s music for all those Hammer films. But still keeping that wonderful style that we love from those great movie soundtracks they composed for Franco.

And for the narrative, well I’ve never been a fan of compilations of iconic monsters bashing it all out, they all belong in their own narrative space and those films don’t really get me excited at all – not even Ishirô Honda’s King Kong vs. Godzilla 1962.

But that isn’t what I feel this movie is about. In some strange way I feel that there’s a cunning Franco critique towards the Universal monsters, and the Hammer films hidden away in the movie. Because, and I love the movie for this reason; they are all completely incompetent. Yes completely incompetent! Dr. Frankenstein’s plan fails miserably, Seward (the Van Helsing character of the flick) is a utterly worthless vampire hunter, and spends the last half of the film a vampire bitten drone, the Vampire maidens lay comatose in their coffins, all but one with an apparent own agenda as she bites and kills Morpho, Frankenstein’s monster more or less takes his own life, hiding away in his electrical chamber when the push comes to shove, and the Werewolf doesn’t really have any impact at all, but getting tossed around by Frankenstein’s Monster, and finally the angry mob of villagers, lead on by Seward, complete with pitchforks and burning torches arrive at the castle after the Doctor has killed Dracula, the vampires and scampered off towards new experiments in fear, leaving Seward to wave his crucifix completely pointlessly as the movie comes to an end...

So there you go, the Universal monsters, reinvented by the Hammer Studios are completely incompetent in the wonderful world of Jesus Franco.

Image:

2.35 Widescreen

Audio:

English dub, Mono

Extras:

Original Trailer for Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein and Franco's Jack the Ripper 1976. Unfortunately Midnight Video doesn’t produce their exclusive Collector Series anymore, but the movie can still be obtained on DVD-R from them and is still the most superior version of the film available.

I can't locate a trailer, but instead I leave you with this and ask the question: What happened, and where did it go?

Santo & Blue Demon vs. Doctor Frankenstein.

Santo & Blue Demon vs. Doctor Frankenstein.
Original title: Santo y Blue Demon contra el doctor Frankenstein
Directed by: Miguel M. Delgado
Mexico 1974
Lucha Libre/Horror, 95min

Distributed by: Rise Above Entertainment.

Every country has their own little niche that works its way into its national cinematic heritage in one way or another. The UK has it’s gritty working-class realism, Sweden has it’s obligatory skinny-dipping flicks of the sixties and Swedish Sin of the seventies, Finnish cinema has that wonderful drinking in silence whilst in the sauna melancholy, the Germans have their strict global angst, Italy has the wild twisted world of their Spaghetti remakes, Brazil has the surrealism of Coffin Joe, Japan has the wonderful mayhem of Godzilla, and the Mexicans have El Santo!

Young girls are going astray, and the cops are clueless in front of the many reported missing persons. The mastermind behind all the kidnappings, Dr. Irving Frankenstein [Jorge Russek] is trying to transplant a human brain into a young female body so that he can bring his wife back to life after he put her on "ice" eighty years ago to prevent a disease in her brain killing her. Yeah eighty years ago. His failed experiments roam the streets, often returning to their loved ones and killing them! The mad professor, not only a Frankenstein by name, but also the grandchild of the legendary Victor Frankenstein, has also invented an amazing regeneration potion that keeps him young until he's managed to transplant the brain with out the unfortunate streak of errors that have been tormenting his research. You would think that the youth potion would be enough to keep him happy, but nay, this potion is only used for his sinister uses. His love for the ice cold wife, and lust for reunification drives him into dark territory and the potion is only a tool to reach his goal. For some strange, unexplained reason wants to transplant Lucha Libre superstar El Santo's brain into his latest creature Wrestler fiend Mortis, but before that he has his foul henchmen kidnap El Santo's scientist girlfriend to lure him right into the trap. Obviously El Santo’s tag team mate (at least in the movies) Blue Demon comes to El Santo's aid as they dropkick and slam dunk their way through Frankenstein's thugs in their quest to rescue the girlfriend before annihilating and de-masking Dr Frankenstein’s and his fiendish monster in a grand wrestle-fest up on the rafters of the arena.

Santo & Blue Demon vs. Doctor Frankenstein is a great movie. It’s one of those wonderful pieces of world cinema that, like many other Santo movies, can easily help the most tedious hours of the night just sweep by. Just sit down and enjoy the show; bizarre stories, weird scenes, illogical narrative, crap acting, poor sets, and not so special effects make this a great way to waste an hour and a half, but for the love of god, it's EL SANTO and that makes up for a lot. You don't watch Godzilla movies for the dialogue and plot do you? You just want to see that 50Ft tyrant cause mayhem and kick ass, just like you want to see Santo pile drive the antagonists into the floor rescuing a few cute Latinas on the way and grooving out to those grinding scores by Gustao Cesar Carrión don’t you! In some ways you could think of Santo & Blue Demon vs. Doctor Frankenstein as an obscure Mexican cocktail of James Whale's 1931 classic Frankenstein, Franju's Eyes Without A Face 1960, Jess Franco's The Awfull Dr. Orloff 1962 and Faceless 1987 with a fair amount of Wrestlemania chucked in to add to the action scenes. Absolutely Stunning in other words!

Director Miguel M. Delgado directed an impressive amount of movies, somewhere close to 160 films in almost every genre that was in demand. Mostly comedies and dramas where his big passion, but he did direct some of the more memorable Santo movies too; Santo vs. Frankenstein’s Daughter 1972, Santo and Blue Demon vs. Dracula and the Wolfman 1973, Vengeance of the Crying Woman and this one, Santo & Blue Demon vs. Doctor Frankenstein, both 1974. As you see many of the movies utilise good old fantastic elements and on more than one occasion, even outside the few Delgado titles, El Santo went up against foes from the classic gothic world, made famous by all those Universal horrors of the thirties… Two things come to mind, first the political subtext of a national hero conquering the iconic American monsters; second the brilliance of using already established protagonists. The characters Frankenstein, Dracula, The Mummy and The Wolfman, need no explanation as everyone knows how evil and bad they are which let’s the story kick right in and El Santo can get to work beating the crap out of the villains.

Most of the Santo films hold the same narrative form as those fabulous Godzilla movies. Present a problem, send in Santo/Godzilla, overcome some obstacles, and solve the problem. Nice and easy, grateful matinee entertainment for the whole family. But it is fair to say that the movies are perhaps not the primary thing of concern in this strange niche. What I find the most fascinating is that real life Lucha Libre star Rodolfo Guzmán Huerta portrayed the masked hero “THE SAINT” in fifty-four Mexican Wrestlemania movies. He took on Evil Brains, Zombies, Vampire women, Martian invasions, Dracula, Frankenstein, Mummies, Aztec Women, Karate Killer, Death, Wolf Women, and even the Bermuda Triangle.

Back in the thirties, at the start of his Lucha Libre career after, Huerta wrestled as one of the bad guys before making the choice to wrestle on the good side. Having stepped over to the good side, this is where he stayed for the next fifty years. During the early forties, Huerta was offered a part in the silver masked wrestling team, and offered the part of The Devil, The Angel or The Saint, Huerta made the choice to be The Saint, El Santo.

1952 was a big year in Santo’s now legendary life. The magnificent wrestling trio spawned it’s own comic book, the first Lucha Libre movie to star El Santo was announced (although Santo turned down the opportunity to appear in the movie because of his fear that the movie would bomb) and he had his first bout against another superstar of the ring, Blue Demon. Going up against the Los Hermandos Shadow tag team consisting of Black Shadow and Blue Demon proved a terrible mistake as after El Santo beat and unmasked Black Shadow, Blue Demon in a rage of fury wrestled El Santo to the ground defeating the long reining champion. This defeat ignited a rivalry that never ended, and until the end of his career El Santo remembered his humiliating defeat by Blue Demon. Outside the ring, in the wonderful world of cinema, it’s quite obvious that the two characters put their indifferences and feud to one side as movie makers couldn’t resist the prosperity of bringing the two most popular Lucha Libre stars together in their action packed narratives. Just like his fellow wrestler, Blue Demon, or Alejandro Muñoz Moreno as he was called underneath the mask also took the step into movies, but nowhere near as many as El Santo.

A few years later, in 1958, Santo made his screen debut with the two flicks The Evil Brain (El Cerebro del Mal) 1961 and The Infernal Men (Hombres Infernales) 1961, although Santo was not the leading star, he was more of a superhero side kick to El Incognito, and as Huerta had feared, the movies did miserably, even though they later where retitled to Santo vs. The Infernal Men. Although this was soon to change in 1961 when Santo took top billing for real and starred in Benito Alazraki’s Santo vs. the Zombies (Santo Contra los Zombis) 1962. The rest is what we refer to as history, Huerta went on to star in over fifty more Santo movies, both as a single hero taking on foes and in tag team combo’s with Blue Demon, and still today years after his retirement El Santo is paid tribute to as the pop-culture icon he is. Cartoons, Comics, Animated serial’s Rock’n’roll bands and who can forget that Turkish gem Three Mighty Men (3 dev adam) from 1973 directed by T. Fikret Uçak where Captain America and El Santo team up in a bizarre twist to fight off a villainous Spiderman. Wild stuff and definitely a must see if you have missed it. (It is still available on limited release from Onar Films webpage)

Staying true to his fans in the arena, Huerta stayed active on the wrestling scene and at the same times starred in the movies, he was a family man and also spawned ten children, which in turn gave him twenty-five grand children. From Huerta’s offspring both “The Son of Santo” and “The Grandson of Santo” have made their debuts on the Lucha Libre scene. Family is everything as you can see!

Late 1982 Huerta decided that it was time to step down El Santo’s activities in the ring and announced that it would be Santo’s last season in the ring. In the final brawl El Santo conquered ALL his opponents in the ring and retired the anonymous masked hero that the public had loved for so long on both the silver screen and the packed sports arenas of Mexico. During an appearance on the Mexican TV Show Contrapunto, Huerta surprisingly removed his mask revealing the true face of the masked hero once and for all. An action reserved for conquered Lucha Libre actors, the de-masking was definitive statement that Santo was retired once and for all. On the 5th of February 1984, merely a week later Rodolfo Guzmán Huerta died from a heart attack. Just as Bela Lugosi always was and will be Dracula, Huerta identified so strongly with his beloved character that his last request was to be buried wearing his infamous mask, the silver saint.

So now that you know the impressive story of Rodolfo Guzmán Huerta and the legacy that is Santo, I recommend that you seek out one of the many movies and spend an evening in the company of a legend larger than life. VIVA EL SANTO!

Image: Full frame 4:3

Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo 2.0, Spanish Dialogue, optional English subtitles.

Extras: The Best of El Santo - a two-minute reel of highlights from various Santo movies, Santo Collection Trailers, and a wonderful photo gallery