Vengeance of the Zombies

DVD

Review by C. Demetrius Morgan

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Synopsis

The actual, unabridged, presented exactly as written synopsis from the DVD: "These two grave robbers are robbing a tomb when they get trapped inside. Then this voodoo guy shows up and brings the body to life and it kills them. The dead body's cousin (I think) goes to this séance, then goes to a cursed house to visit this guru."

To which I say (laughing): What?

NOTE: This is part of the "Revolt of the Zombies/Vengence of the Zombies" DVD double feature found on the Family Value Collection budget label.

Listed Video Run Time: none

Actual Run Time: 87 minutes

MPAA Rating: Unknown. (No ratings listed on DVD.)

Cast: Jacinto Molina, Romy, Mirta Miller, María Kosti, Aurora de Alba, Luis Ciges, Pierre Besari, Antonio Pica, Elsa Zabala, Montserrat Julió, Ramón Lillo, Norma Kastel, Ingrid Rabel, Asunción Molero, Fernando Sánchez Polack.

Director: León Klimovsky.

AKA: La Rebelion de las Muertas/ Revolt of the Dead Ones/ Revolt of the Female Dead/ The Rebellion of the Dead Women/ Vengeance of the Zombies

Summary: A out of the ordinary Spanish giallo horror movie starring Paul Naschy (Jocinta Molina) that combines black magic and voodoo zombies with Scotland yard and seventies hippy dippy Gurus. They don't make them like this anymore.

The Setting: England, 1972.

The Story: Grave robbers enter a crypt to pilfer jewelry from a recently deceased woman. Suddenly the crypt door closes. Oh no, now what? A cloaked figure appears outside the crypt with a wax figurine. He begins to recite a voodoo incantation to raise the dead and, wouldn't you know it, the woman inside the crypt suddenly gets up and attacks the crypt robbers! Guess crime really doesn't pay.

After the voodoo zombie mayhem the title sequence rolls. From here the action unexpectedly shifts to a Guru named Krishna and his group of cult of personality worshipping dilettantes. A group that includes Elvira- sadly not the Mistress of the Dark- and her less than enthused male friend. A zombie attack and train trip later things really start to get weird when Elvira begins to have odd dreams in which she is whisked off to a gloomy room where she becomes the center of attention in a satanic black magic ritual led by a horned satyr. Observing are two green faced hags and a gold skinned woman who stands nearby stirring a smoking cauldron with a thighbone!

Confused yet? Well get this there's also a stabbing, a pair of bloody (and very bare) breasts, Guru hanky panky, live chicken decapitation, a corpse hanging from a meat hook, an exsanguination, and lots of black magic voodoo. Family Value? Only if you're a member of The Addams Family!

The Characters: The main characters of interest (without giving too much away) are Elvira and the guru Krishna. Elvira is your typical rich girl heiress type. Krishna is the almost too good to be true Hindu holy man. Then there is Elvira's boyfriend Lawrence. He's the ardent skeptic character with an interest in occult lore, ala the Night Stalker or Spectre, who decides to take it upon himself to research the activities/background of the Guru. It's all very strange.

The Vengeance: This is a Naschy title. If you are a fan of cult horror movies you know that name and know what you're in for. If not then brace yourselves because Paul Naschy movies are cult Spanish horror at it's best and worst. It's all a matter of perspective.

On the surface Vengeance of the Zombies is basically a mess of a way out seventies Phantom of the Opera styled suspense story drunk on black magic with voodoo zombies and a hippy dippy Guru mystic house guest. However, upon closer examination, this is a occult giallo. As such Vengeance might be suitable for use as an Unbidden scenario or as the basis of a Shadows in the Fog plot seed. Too, given the existence of zombies, it goes without saying that this could also be mined for zombie plot ideas. With that in mind I'd suggest that Blood and Brains, one of the better Zombie supplements I've had the pleasure to review, might be useful . It's for D20 Modern but it covers generic Zombie creation rather well. Other possible role-playing games Vengeance might be well suited to mining ideas for/being used with are Blood Games, All Flesh Must Be Eaten, JAGS Horror, GURPS Horror, Dead Inside, Shadows, or any generic role-playing game intended to create an horror or occult style milieu.

Appraisal

Vengence (sic) is an obscure Spanish horror movie. It's dubbed in English, which means it has some unusual dialogue choices, and the pacing might be a bit slow for those used to action packed Hollywood movies. But it's also full of occult weirdness and has just enough blood and bare flesh to keep gore hounds awake. That means the only real consideration here is: Was the product worth the price? Well as it was a single dollar I think I can honestly say this delivers far more bang than expected for a buck.

Video Quality: C+ (Ok but lots of video tape pull lines.)

Movie: B

Rating: 7 ½ out of 10 worm infested golden apples.

Perspective: It's Halloween time again. That means PD (wink wink nudge nudge say no more) horror movies will be popping up in various stores all across this great nation of ours and probably across the border into Canada too. But which to pan and which to scan? A question all the more important given current economic trends.

Sure cable and satellite offer fuller, more watchable, and usually uncut versions of horror movies around his time of year as well but there's a certain thrill to buying a bargain bin title every now and again. Alas all the movies that appear around this time of year aren't necessarily worth watching, especially if video quality is your main concern. That's why I wrote this review. Well one of the reasons anyhow.

Could the source for this print have been a TV edit? Not likely. But the video was definitely sourced from videotape. The telltale tape pull lines appear every now and again as does some flicker. Overall the video quality is decent but not great. Grain is very evident so if you have a high end set up this will probably look bad, but not so bad as to appear as if it were projected through a crap smeared window, unless you have a really high end HD setup with a really large plasma screen TV.

On the surface these mystery DVDs are just this side of shady. A double feature from a label that seems to appear only in Dollar Stores? Seems dodgy. And what about that name, Family Value Collection, doesn't exactly seem like the sort of label you'd expect to find quality horror under, does it? But don't let that label or the $1 price tag fool you, this is not family fare, not by a long shot. As I said this is no TV edit.

Negatives: These DVDs are very mysterious. So far I've only heard of them being found in Dollar Tree stores. There is absolutely no information about the company, not even a street address, listed on the packaging nor is any information about the company available online. The lack of contact information and the fact the DVD has "Treasure Box Collection" printed on the inner ring make these DVDs seem very dodgy.

Positives: For a buck this DVD was just too good to pass up. Considering that the Naschy feature turned out to be a rather decent print with nude scenes intact makes this double feature DVD a real treasure box find, pardon the pun.

Availability: So far as I've been able to determine aside of a few random listings popping up on eBay these seem to be exclusive to Dollar Tree dollar stores. Then again I haven't run all over town looking for them so it's possibly the usual suspects might carry them too. At Dollar Tree these DVDs can be found where all the Halloween stuff is in an orange cardboard box labeled Halloween. Other (confirmed) titles in the Dollar Tree/ FVC Halloween DVD line include:

Final Thoughts: Dollar store DVDs can be fun as long as you don’t expect much. But two horror movies for a single green back? It almost seems to good to be true. In a way it is. Bargain DVD transfers appear to come from one of two sources: Videotape, which means old broadcast masters or perhaps a rare ex-rental; or mysterious, and ever so shady, gray market dubs. The cream of the latter crop tends to be sourced from Laser Disc (or ripped from DVDs from other regions) and usually turn up on slightly more expensive bargain bin DVDs and "collectors" DVD-Rs. Or they used to before the whole MPAA/RIAA saber rattling began. Caveat Emptor.

Copyright © 2005 C. Demetrius Morgan