Angel of Death

Written by the legendary Jess Franco and directed by Andrea Bianchi (Burial Ground), Angel of Death (AKA Commando Mengele) is a dreadfully inept Euro action flick that is nowhere near as sleazy, gory or trashy as it should have been given subject matter and the 'talent' involved, and which consequently bores for almost its entire runtime.

The film stars Antonio Mayans as Marc, a Nazi hunter on the trail of the notorious German doctor Josef Mengele (Howard Vernon), who is alive and well, creating mutant monkey men in his laboratory. Assembling a team that includes an explosives/weapons expert, a martial artist, a circus acrobat, and an electronics wizard, Marc must gather evidence before launching an attack on Mengele's heavily guarded fortress.

Incredibly uneventful for most of the time, I kept telling myself that it must get better eventually, but that simply wasn't the case. After lots of excruciatingly dull Nazi nonsense, with not a single credible performance from the entire cast (a chimpanzee steals the show), the film finally gets to the action packed finale in which almost everyone dies. Sadly, an opportunity to go overboard with the blood and guts is sorely missed, most of the extras simply falling unconvincingly to the ground with red paint on their shirts.

This movie is horrible, awful, ridiculous, and stupid. I advise everyone to watch it immediately. It has anti-climactic kung-fu slow motion sequences, outraged Jewish circus performers, and evil monkey/human nazi experiments. Watch this and I promise you will be dumber after having seen it. You will probably drop out of college or high school once you behold the magic that is Angel Of Death (aka Commando Mengele). Oh yeah, it was written by Jess Franco and directed by Andre Bianci (Burial Ground: Nights Of Terror).

Oh, how visibly low-budget this is. It's immediately detectable in the extra excitable cinematography, curt editing, uneven sound design, oddly meek costume design, and "yeah, no, that's good" direction. To these facets add dialogue, scene writing, characters, and exposition that are Just So, and sometimes laughably perfunctory. The story is passable in the most uselessly broad of strokes, and plot development, but it really feels like after a basic concept was pitched, the rest of the screenplay was cobbled together just to loosely assemble a picture around it. All this definitely does reflect in turn on the acting, and it often comes across that the players are Just Getting By, or in sometimes plainly overacting - though in some cases I'm unsure if they're simply not very good at their trade. True, one may expect such qualities from movies that Jesus Franco was involved with, in varying proportions, but still 'Angel of death,' also known as 'Commando Mengele,' readily shows itself to be a viewing experience only for ardent fans of the filmmaker or the blithely curious. And even then, let me be frank: it's not recommendable.

I do like Norbert Verrone's music, though some of it is weirdly repetitive, and other themes are peculiarly out of place. The filming locations are lovely. I'm unclear whether it's Franco or Andrea Bianchi who is to be credited as director (or maybe both?), but while that aspect is seemingly content with a single take of every moment, it's technically proficient. For the most part this isn't outright bad, just unmistakably weak owing both to limited resources and limited skills. Yet when the question turns to the screenplay whipped up between Georges Friedland and Marius Lesoeur in addition to Franco, the whole absolutely falls apart right in front of our eyes. 'Angel of death' at least maintains a steady pace, such that it seems to go by rather quickly. Yet "cobbled together" really does feel like the best phrase to describe the plot; the premise seems clear enough, but it belies a story that in actuality is thin, almost haphazard in its construction, and roundly unconvincing in multiple capacities. The movie doesn't inspire excitement so much as it does considerable skepticism: characters come together in flimsy fashions, and we never get a clear idea of who they are; scenes are written and executed with the tack of "sure, that'll work"; specific advancement of the narrative is marginally slow and a little oblique. Some shots are repeated while others have no purpose; some moments are repetitive as they are employed, and others are needlessly embellished with slow motion; no few small details decidedly raise a quizzical eyebrow.

It sounds promising from the outside looking in, but it doesn't take long to start forming an unfavorable impression, and that impression is only augmented and confirmed as the feature progresses. The single most admirable element here might be the practical effects, but what is that saying? The action-oriented climax is reasonably well done (though still not written well), but by that point, does it matter? 'Angel of death' comes off as a production where all involved were doing the bare minimum, and even at that, either not especially trying, totally incapable, or so restricted by the resources available to them as to give off those airs. "I suppose that'll do" was apparently the order of the day, but whoever was managing the project, they were emphatically mistaken, for the final cut is one instance after another of dubious craftsmanship. As indisputably fishy as some story ideas or otherwise inclusions are, somehow as the title enters the third act it still manages to become even more shady. To be blunt, my favor waned more and more over these ninety minutes until watching ultimately became a chore. There was some potential in the concept, and in a scattering of the notions herein, yet by and large the end product might the worst possible rendition of that concept. I congratulate those who get more out of the feature than I do, but the number of people who could earnestly enjoy it is surely very small. Leave 'Angel of death' for Franco devotees and those who, for better or worse, will watch anything; everyone else, move along.

I have the substance release of this film...not great quality but pretty watchable. I can't wait til someone like full moon features rereleases this film and restores it. Great 80s action...extremely cheezy but awesome

Devoted cult film fanatics already know better than to pay any attention to the low ratings of obscure and infamous titles around this website, but I would still like to emphasize the fact that the miserable 2.1 out of 10 rating for "Commando Mengele" should be disregarded blindly! Despite being a total rip-off of "The Boys from Brazil", despite the involvement of reputedly awful European film-makers (like Jess Franco and Andrea Bianchi) and despite the at times intolerably high level of tackiness, this is one outrageously entertaining and delightfully provocative gem! It's a bad film but in the best possible way: dumb but never boring, full of plot holes and incoherent as can be, gory and vile but never shocking and boosting acting performances that are even worse than those in a kindergarten play. A young couple discovers the hideout place of the fugitive Nazi monster Dr. Mengele in a remote little Uruguayan mountain and promptly he doesn't like unwelcome visitors. The girl dies but this guy Marc teams up with a former nightclub dancer who Mengele selected as his mistress. Whilst awaiting green light from the Jewish Nazi-hunters commando to attack, Marc gathers together a specialist fighting unit containing an acrobat, an artillery expert, a martial arts champion and a technician, all of which have a personal score to settle with the Nazi butcher. But they'll have to hurry up, as Mengele and his sidekick Wolfgang have readily developed plans to found The Fourth Reich. "Commando Mengele" is fast-paced and full of crazy action, but you'll have the most fun spotting all the things that are just plain wrong! Like all the contradictions in the script, for example, or the fact Howard Vernon (a Jess Franco regular) didn't even bother to do some research regarding Mengele's appearance! Vernon looks and acts like his own usual self, without a fake mustache or a trying to talk with a German accent. The finale is one fantastically spectacular smörgåsbord of action and crazy twists, and in the end we STILL don't know for sure whether the bastard is dead or not! Awesome stuff.