The Vampire's Coffin

The Vampires Coffin(1958) Starring: Abel Salazar, Ariadna Welter, Germán Robles, Yerye Beirute, and Alicia Montoya Directed By: Fernando Méndez Review FROM THE DEPTHS OF EVIL COMES A DIABOLICAL KILLER OF BEAUTIFUL WOMEN! Hello Kiddies your pal the Crypt-Critic is back with more vampires and grave-robbers. This looked liked a good-black and white B-movie with a vampire heading it as the monster and I was right but I forgot to notice it was made in Mexico. In this film we got a doctor who is studying cellular health I guess and takes note from a story of doctors who stole a grave. Doctor Mendoza and a friend of his named Bazarra do the same thing and our asked by an old woman to stop but they do not listen. Bazarra is paid and wants to take the vampires gold necklace but in doing so takes off the stake and unleashes the vampire to finish his evil deed. The film does present some horror movie tropes and is a b-level flick, it doesn't offer much fright and you can clearly see the strings holding up the bat but the actors performances and the action do go a long way from making this a fun film to sit through. Just remember kiddies don't pull off the stake.

Dr. Enrique Saldivar (Abel Salazar) once again has to protect Marta González (Ariadne Welter) after evil vampire Count Karol de Lavud (Germán Robles) is brought back to life.

Director Fernando Méndez's sequel to his previous year's El Vampiro features many of the same cast playing the same characters, and yet it isn't anywhere near as successful as the first film, lacking the original's wonderful gothic atmosphere, despite beginning promisingly with a howl of a wolf and a spot of grave-robbing.

The bulk of the action takes place in a hospital and a theatre, neither location possessing the ominous vibe of the original's run-down rural hacienda with its secret passageways and creepy family crypt. Worse still, the theatre location leads to some dreadfully choreographed dance numbers with Welter looking bored and confused throughout.

Thankfully, Méndez saves the best for last, with a fun battle between Enrique and the count in what must be Mexico's worst wax museum: not only are the exhibits totally unrecognisable (they have the characters' names pinned to them so that visitors aren't left guessing), but all of the props are real and potentially lethal. This means that there are sharp axes and spears for weapons, as well as a fully functional guillotine and a 'Virgin of Nuremberg', an iron maiden filled with very sharp spikes.

After escaping being bitten by Lavud (in rubber bat form, suspended on very visible wires), Enrique eventually manages to pin the vampire to the wall with a spear, while Marta narrowly avoids having her head chopped off by the guillotine.

4.5/10, generously rounded up to 5 for IMDb.

Like Miami's Ivan Tors, K. Gordon Murray (his nickname was 'Kagey' for his initials) conducted all of his English dubbing at Florida's Soundlab studios in Coral Gables before making a mint with not just horror entries but a series of children's films such as "Rumpelstiltskin," "Little Red Riding Hood" and "Santa Claus," often performing narration himself. Universal's 1931 Spanish language "Dracula" was a huge success south of the border, but as a film industry the genre didn't truly take off until the 1950s, and while most think of masked wrestlers battling the Universal monsters 1957's "The Vampire's Coffin" and its predecessor were serious takes on the undead, though this sequel lacked the atmospheric setting of "The Vampire" ('Dracula set on a hacienda'), the first half located in a modern but deserted hospital, the rest dividing time between musical numbers in a theater and a shadowy wax museum. Mere weeks after "El Vampiro" premiered in October 1957, producer Abel Salazar was already shooting the follow up, rejoined by three more cast members for their second go round, including ingenue Adriadne Welter as Martha and Alicia Montoya as Martha's Aunt Mary, foiled by two grave robbers who steal the body of German Robles' Count Lavud, the stake still protruding from his heart, moving the coffin to the local hospital where Marion (Carlos Ancira) works with Salazar's Henry. His partner in crime (Yerye Beirute) is employed at the local wax museum, greedily sneaking back in to steal the Count's medallion, but in removing the stake restores the vampire to vengeful life, again casting a spell upon pretty Martha while also attacking a preteen girl in her hospital bed, and a streetwalker who fails to outrun the old bat. German Robles looks more comfortable in his second outing and proves ready for another shot, soon to arrive with the Nostradamus quartet. The urban milieu is no match for the isolation of "The Vampire," but at least this time Salazar actually dispatches his adversary, in bat form as well. Already typecast as thugs, Yerye Beirute would be familiar with Boris Karloff fans in both "Fear Chamber" and "Incredible Invasion," plus "Bring Me the Vampire" and Lon Chaney's "La Casa del Terror."

Imagine yourself trapped inside a museum of the dark middle Ages and a resurrected vampire and his maniacal sidekick are chasing you. Where is the absolute last place you want to hide? I'd say inside the uncanny Virgin of Nuremberg torture device, because there's a good risk you'll get brutally spiked to death. And yet, the elderly lady in this film stupidly runs into her spiked coffin. "The Vampire's Coffin" is a rather disappointing sequel, as director Fernando Méndez doesn't re-create the Gothic atmosphere of the 1957-original but puts the emphasis on comical situations and dialogs. No more ominous castles with eerie cobwebs and dark vaults, but confused doctors and clumsy assistants that provoke laughs instead of frights. The story opens inside Count de Lavud's final resting place, where an eminent doctor and a hired assistant steal the coffin in order to examine the corpse at a private clinic. Naturally the wooden stake gets removed from his heart, and the vampire count comes to live again, immediately enslaving the petty thief to do his dirty work. The vampire has his eye on a beautiful female patient at the clinic, and it's up to Dr. Enrique Saldívar to rescue her soul and to destroy the bloodsucker. "The Vampire's Coffin" uses a limited amount of locations and there's very little action. The whole film would actually be pretty boring if it weren't for a handful of memorable sequences and decent acting performances. The photography is amazing, though, with the sublime use of shadows and darkness. This is most notably during the scene in which Count de Lavud stalks a young woman through the deserted streets of little town at night. It's the only truly worthwhile scene of the whole film, the rest is fairly mediocre and déjà-vu.

EL Ataúd del Vampiro(1958), The Vampire's Coffin, is not a fitting sequel to El Vampiro,both featuring German Robles as aristocratic vampire Count Lavud. This sequel seems like a quickie followup. Most of the film is filmed inside modern buildings or building sets. It lacks the beautiful foreboding night fog scenes of the former. However, when I first wrote this review I had only seen the K. Gordon Murray dubbed version. I expressed thoughts that the Spanish version might be better. I have now seen the Casa Negra restored version in which the beautiful photography and music are quite apparent. The restored version DVD has both Spanish with and without English subtitles as well as the inferior K. Gordon Murray dubbed English version.

German Robles's acting is fine; he is quite the natty-charming-aristocratic-menacing-sensual vampire seeking Martha (Ariadna Welter) from the first movie. There is also an interesting scene in which he picks up a woman in a bar. He returns to this life?? thanks to a thief who becomes an assistant and acquires that status while attempting to steal the Count's large pendant and in the process pulling out the stake and thus bringing the Vampire back from the nether place to which he had been consigned in El Vampiro. The Count does not punish him but acknowledges his appreciation and makes him his assistant. (This is somewhat a precursor to Leo (Manver) the beguiling, willing hunchback assistant in the later Nostradamus films).

The Spanish restored Casa Negra version is part of a two DVD set with El Vampiro in both Spanish with and without English subtitles and dubbed English. The movie does now stand on its own and is worth seeing IN Spanish with or without English subtitles. I would now give it a 7.5 or 8 rating for its genre. IMDb will not allow any modification of my review of El Vampiro so I am unable to mention the quality of the Casa Negra restored version of El Vampiro; it is outstanding. I would add to my earlier review of that film that the photographic and sound quality are magnificent in the Casa Negra restored DVD.

Thomas J McKeon Indianapolis