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La Noche Del Terror Ciego aka Tombs of the Blind Dead (Amando De Ossorio 1971)
This is the first in Spanish director Ossorio's notorious Blind Dead series which compisies of four films in all. It was followed by Return of the Evil Dead (1973), The Ghost Galleon (1974), and Night of the Seagulls (1975). I ordered the whole set from the US a few weeks back on Amazon as the first two films are cut in the UK. There are two versions of the film on the disc, a cut US print, and an uncut subtitled Spanish version; naturally I chose the latter.
The Blind Dead of the title are actually a group of 13th centuary Satan worshippping Templars, who having been executed for unholy crimes, return from their graves at night to drink the blood of the living. In this first installment a trio of friends (a volatile love triangle) head by train to the country for the weekend; only for one of them to go missing after stumbling on the Templars ruined monastry and waking them from their slumber.
I found this to be slow but watchable, moderately acted stuff, short on sense a lot the time, but very atmospheric with it. Most of the scenes with the dusty Blind Dead (blind because their eyeballs were pecked out by crows) were confined to the violent third act of the film, but it was definitley worth the wait. Shots of them riding on horseback in slow motion, and silently shambling after their prey were creepily effective. Unlike most zombie movies this certainly had it's own sense of gothic style, like a more explicit Spanish version of Hammer. Yes it's an exploitation affair with the obligatory lesbian love scene, over the top violence, buckets of blood and sex obsessed characters. Interesting if you like 70's Euro-horror, probably one to avoid otherwise.
La Noche Del Terror Ciego aka Tombs of the Blind Dead (Amando De Ossorio 1971)
This is the first in Spanish director Ossorio's notorious Blind Dead series which compisies of four films in all. It was followed by Return of the Evil Dead (1973), The Ghost Galleon (1974), and Night of the Seagulls (1975). I ordered the whole set from the US a few weeks back on Amazon as the first two films are cut in the UK. There are two versions of the film on the disc, a cut US print, and an uncut subtitled Spanish version; naturally I chose the latter.
The Blind Dead of the title are actually a group of 13th centuary Satan worshippping Templars, who having been executed for unholy crimes, return from their graves at night to drink the blood of the living. In this first installment a trio of friends (a volatile love triangle) head by train to the country for the weekend; only for one of them to go missing after stumbling on the Templars ruined monastry and waking them from their slumber.
I found this to be slow but watchable, moderately acted stuff, short on sense a lot the time, but very atmospheric with it. Most of the scenes with the dusty Blind Dead (blind because their eyeballs were pecked out by crows) were confined to the violent third act of the film, but it was definitley worth the wait. Shots of them riding on horseback in slow motion, and silently shambling after their prey were creepily effective. Unlike most zombie movies this certainly had it's own sense of gothic style, like a more explicit Spanish version of Hammer. Yes it's an exploitation affair with the obligatory lesbian love scene, over the top violence, buckets of blood and sex obsessed characters. Interesting if you like 70's Euro-horror, probably one to avoid otherwise.