I missed last week, so for this week I’ve got a 4-pack of capsule reviews to try and catch up.
Amando de Ossorio’s Blind Dead series is one of those classics of European horror that I missed in my younger days. (I haven’t seen any of Paul Naschy’s werewolf films, either). When I finally did get around to them, I found it difficult to get past the constant misogyny and unbelievable actions of the main characters. The undead Knights Templar were always the main attraction, however, and the bearded, burnt and blind monsters are really worth the price of admission.
Every time I watch these films, I tell myself that I’ve seen them enough. That I don’t really need to subject myself to the flat acting, casual rape, and terrible people just to get a few moments of the Templars laying the smack down. And yet… somehow, I always find myself wanting to revisit them. There is an atmosphere of dread that lingers after the Templars appear, and their desiccated appearance is still effective, even if the stick-like arms don’t always convince.
So here we are again. Maybe for the last time. Ah, who am I kidding. A couple of years from now I’ll have convinced myself it’s worth it to watch them again.
The Medium
The Blind Dead films’ availability are all over the place, and I’m not really sure why. I watched Tombs of the Blind Dead on Shudder, Return of the Blind Dead on YouTube and both The Ghost Galleon and Night of the Seagulls on Tubi.
For physical releases, Tombs of the Blind Dead has a recent Blu-ray and 4k from Synapse; Night of the Seagulls is available on Blu-ray from Shout Factory. Neither Return of the Blind Dead nor The Ghost Galleon appear to have a US release (at least on Blu, I think there are different DVD releases).
For Streaming, you can see Tombs of the Blind Dead for subs on Shudder, The Ghost Galleon for subs on Flix Fling and Full Moon and for free (with ads) on Tubi, Return of the Blind Dead (as Attack of the Blind Dead) for subs on Flix Fling and Full Moon, and Night of the Seagulls on Shout TV and Tubi (with ads). They can all be rented or purchased at various online vendors.
Tombs of the Blind Dead (1972)
After an opening sequence involving a sect of Templar-type knights torturing a woman before drinking her blood, we’re brought to modern day. Virginia (María Elena Arpón) runs into an old high school chum, Betty (Lone Fleming) who she once had a sexual encounter with when they were schoolgirls. The two women agree to go on a train trip along with Virginia’s totally-not-a-boyfriend Roger (César Burner). Annoyed at her boyfriend’s infatuation with Betty, Virginia jumps off the train – as you do – and ends up lost near some old ruins.
Virginia decides to spend the night in the creepy old ruins – again, as you do – but the Templars from the opening scene rise up from their graves and chase her, before finally running her down and feasting on her blood.
Roger and Betty enlist the help of local hoodlum Pedro (José Thelman) and his lover Maria (María Silva) to find out what happened to Virginia. Things go well. No, wait, Pedro rapes Betty and the Templars rise up again and kill everybody.
There are some cool moments in the film. The knights are a great design, desiccated and eerie – moving deliberately to surround their prey before striking with their swords, or riding people down on their ghostly horses. The setting of the village/fortress is very atmospheric – particularly at night. There’s also a damn effective sequence involving a woman stuck in a mannequin factory, which reminds me of Maro Bava’s Blood and Black Lace. Outside of these elements, things are not so good, with hateful characters, casual rape, a threadbare plot and a sagging middle act that drags on way too long.
The end almost redeems the whole movie, however, with the monks chasing the only survivor onto a train and killing their way through the passengers. The train arrives at the station and there’s the general feeling that the knights will disembark and then humanity is in some real trouble. The knights are very much like vampires that look like mummies, drinking blood and causing their victims to rise and attack the living. They can also move around in the daylight in this film, unlike later entries.
The Bottom Line
If I’m honest, it’s a rough first entry in the series. While the Templars are visually arresting and things always pick up when they’re on screen, they’re just not in it enough to paper over the shortcomings. And that rape scene really disgusts.
Return of the Blind Dead (AKA Attack of the Blind Dead, AKA The Return of the Evil Dead) (1973)
This is more of a remake than a sequel, with the original story of the Templars being slightly tweaked and most of the action taking place in the town that was an abandoned ruin in the original. There are also a couple of returning actors – Lone Flemming and José Thelman – though they play completely different characters. Let’s say it’s a re-imaging, like Evil Dead 2.
We’re once again shown the Templars committing their evil sacrifice, before being burned and blinded by the local villagers. This time one of the knights swears vengeance on the town. Then we arrive in the present day, to find the village of Bouzano is readying a celebration of the 500th anniversary of the Templars defeat. I’m sure it’ll be fine.
Nice, round anniversary numbers are always a good time for bad things to go down in a horror movie. Is there a movie where the protagonists are like, “Oh no, it’s the 87th year since <insert terrible event> happened! The dead are rising up/demons attacking/ghosts spreading syphilis!”?
And yes, things go absolutely pear shaped when the town outcast, Murdo (what a giveaway!) makes a human sacrifice to bring the Templars back.
This is actually the best of the Blind Dead films. It’s shot and paced well and the knights are on screen a lot, which reduces the amount of bad romance, cheesy dialogue and lecherous men I have to pay attention to. I mean, that’s all still there (I guess José Thelman just likes playing rapists), but the menace of the returning Templars means there’s less of it.
There are some great sequences with the knights in this outing, attacking the town during the height of the festival, running townspeople down and entering houses. The look better than ever, and there are a ton more of them, making their assault on the town more realistic and dramatic.
Survivors end up having to hole up in a church, but most of the people involved are assholes of one variety or another, so things fall part. The mayor (Fenando Sancho) is particularly greasy and tries to use a little girl as a distraction in order to get away. He literally leaves her to get killed by the Templars while he gets in a car!
The good guys survive this film (including the little girl), when it turns out the Templars must return to their graves by dawn. They don’t, which seems spectacularly stupid of them, but it’s a great closing sequence.
The Bottom Line
This was the only one of the Blind Dead films I hadn’t seen before, and I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. There was less of all the distractingly bad stuff and way more of the Templars, which is why I even bother with this series. It didn’t sag and had a decent pace. I can actually recommend this one, if you want to watch just one of the films to get a feel for them.
The Ghost Galleon (1974)
A fashion model attempts to find out what happened to her missing roommate and discovers a secret publicity stunt involving a major corporation and a boat purposefully lost at sea. Unfortunately for everyone, the girls have stumbled onto a ghost ship, populated by the Blind Dead! Of course, a rescue effort is mounted, and the ghost ship is found – but once you board, you’re stuck and the knights begin to pick off the rescue crew one by one.
Eventually someone figures out that it’s the knights themselves and their dark magic that holds both the ship and the remaining survivors hostage in some kind of twilight dimension. They quickly decide to toss the coffins containing the knights overboard during the day. (The knights cannot come out during the daylight hours – one would think they might choose an evil dimension with no day, but maybe it’s just tradition.) Hooray, everyone (well the two survivors) is saved! Except no one remembered that the dead don’t need to breathe.
This is my second favorite of the three Blind Dead films, but it’s still full of reprehensible characters, casual rape and misogyny and people doing stupid things for no reason. The ship is an atmospheric set (though the model work isn’t very good) and the monks have their usual creepy, menacing, slow assault on their prey. One particular sequence – chasing one of the initial girls around the upper decks – does drag on long enough to start being comedy, but they’re generally effective.
And again, the ending is the best part, with the knights rising out of the sea, deathless and implacable and probably a little pissed. As with the previous film, there’s no indication that their prey will also rise from the dead this time around, so no world-ending danger, but I still wouldn’t want to get in their way.
The Bottom Line
A major step down from Return – there’s just not enough of the knights to distract from the bad parts – The Ghost Galleon is still entertaining in a low-budget, Euro-horror sort of way. The knights are great, and I love the idea of a haunted ship in a nightmare dimension, it just doesn’t live up to the premise.
Night of the Seagulls (1975)
I think this entry has the most interesting story possibilities and the most ridiculous title. Unfortunately, it’s also the most boring. A doctor is assigned to a small, seaside town only to discover the population is haunted by knights that demand a sacrifice of seven girls every seven years. (Yet another reworking of the legend.) The doctor tries to intervene and hijinks ensue. I actually started to fall asleep at one point, though to be fair this was the last of the four films I watched, and maybe I was just tired.
Once again, the setting and the knights are the best parts – the seaside village appears to have been built right into the sides of a set of cliffs and half the tension of the film was wondering if the actors were going to fall to their deaths. The knights are effective as ever and have added a Lovecraftian Dagon-like idol to their general depravations. This time around they only feed on their victims after ripping out the heart (from the bared chest, natch) and feeding it to the idol. The knights make the basic mistake of leaving the last couple of victims alive in their lair, and the destruction of the idol seems to finally put an end to the threat of the Blind Dead.
The Bottom Line
I’m giving short-shrift to Night of the Seagulls, just because it was so boring that I lost focus at several points. It’s a great setup, a great location, and the knights are menacing as always, though I think they’ve been done better in the previous installments. It’s sad that this was the last outing for the Blind Dead, as I still think they have potential.
The Bottom Bottom Line
I both liked and hated these movies, which may seem a weird thing to say. There are sequences and images that will stay with me, and will probably lead me to watch them again at some point. (Maybe just Return of the Blind Dead, though.) There’s also a seemingly endless fount of tedium, hateful characters, and repetitive sounds/images. Any time the knights aren’t on the screen things seem to grind to a halt (except for that scene in the mannequin factory), and I always found myself hoping the Templars would show up soon and kill these people so I didn’t have to listen to them anymore.
