Vampyros Lesbos (1970) Nestled at the bottom of
the insert in the DVD case is a message from the head man at Synapse Films. He
talks about how getting Vampyros Lesbos out on DVD was the most arduous project he's even been involved in and that he
hoped it was well worth the wait. After watching this one, I couldn't help but
shake my head at how badly that dude had wasted his life. Sitting through this
flick was what the WWF's dearly departed Big Boss Man would call "hard time."
It shouldn't surprise any of you that the man behind this lesbian vampire epic
is none other than Jess Franco. Filmed in 1970, the film details the
relationship between a countess who is a vampire and this woman that falls
under her spell. I don't suppose that that is necessarily a bad idea for a
plot. I never been a big fan of the entire vampire genre and always thought
the whole lesbian aspect was a conceit of the male filmmakers involved. It
seems to me that you've got your Hammer lesbian vampire flicks, the Karnstein
trilogy, and that's all this category of vampire films needs and deserves. But
somebody out there apparently was demanding a Turkish-based version of this
nonsense and Jess Franco didn't make nearly two hundred movies by turning
anything down, so here we are. As soon as the movie starts you notice a couple of things. First is that this
will be one of those flicks that wallows in its nudity. The first scene is in
the 1970 Istanbul equivalent of Score's. You got your naked babes gyrating
around one another and their dull routines go on forever. It wasn't
interesting, even on a prurient level. It was just kind of gross. Another
thing you'll notice is the music. Completely out of place and awful. It's
this crappy early 70s techno-progressive junk that pulsates and throbs and
makes funny noises. Synapse claimed this noise sparked an dance craze around
the world, but dance crazes have never been noted for their good taste as all
of us who took Lambada lessons in the early 1990s can attest.  At this nudie bar is Omar and Linda. Linda is an ugly blonde chick who is
entranced by the naked girl dancing on stage That would be Countess Nadine
Caroday. It turns out that she is Count Dracula's widow and times must be
pretty tough if she has to dance in seedy Turkish strip joints. Linda becomes
obsessed with the Countess and begins to hear her voice in her head and goes to
a shrink, who basically tells her that she just needs a good man to give her a
good rogering. It's hard to believe that a guy named Omar who hangs out at
strip bars isn't getting the job done.
Linda decides to go to the island hideaway of the Countess. I never figured
what the deal was, but she told people at her law firm that she was going there
to deal with the Countess' inheritance. So she goes to this hotel before going
to the island and while there she is warned by a crazed local not to go to the
island because the only thing there is "death and destruction." Then he tells
her to meet him in the wine cellar. She goes to the wine cellar and sees this
guy hunched over the tied up and dead body of a woman. She screams and then
she scrams. Then she meets the Countess. The Countess is sunbathing and
wearing these gigantic Jackie O sunglasses. Even though she's wearing a scuzzy
little white bikini, she has style! Around this time we are also getting these shots of insects. I always go into
"red alert" status whenever a movie like this starts showing me close ups of
bugs that are unrelated to the story. I mean I'm not going to complain if I
have to look at ants and I'm watching Them. But in this case we get to see a scorpion and moth. I understand that the
Countess is probably the scorpion and that Linda is the moth. Trying to be
stylish and symbolic in a T&A fest like this is utterly pointless. The movie
was already mind numbing in its stupidity and general incoherence - you don't
need to exacerbate the problem with some dumb shots that are from a film
student's bag of tricks. We have to periodically see these bugs the rest of
the movie. I wanted to tell the Countess to get a can of Raid.  Now that the Countess and Linda have met they immediately decide to go skinny
dipping. Thankfully that was accomplished with a long shot so we weren't
subjected to close ups of the beauty-impaired Linda. At this point we are
introduced to a new character, an ugly man who also likes to wear hideous
sunglasses. He is watching the skinny dipping and we later find out that he
works for the Countess as some type of bodyguard and his name is Morpho.
Somehow or other Linda ends up back on the mainland and lands in the nuthut.
Well, it's some sort of clinic run by a Dr. Seward who studies vampires. There
is also another blonde crazy chick in there who was apparently affected by the
Countess sometime before Linda. She generally flops around her room on the
floor or bed and runs her mouth. For the longest time I just assumed that this
ugly blonde girl was Linda, but eventually I caught on to the fact that this
was different skank. The movie didn't make any more or less sense either way. Omar comes by looking for his Linda. Apparently Seward put an ad in the paper
advising he was selling missing women or something. It's Turkey and it's their
culture and I'm not going to criticize it. I once roomed with a guy from
Turkey. He wore a toupee that snapped onto his head. He claimed that when he
wore the rug it made him an "Italian Casanova." I always thought it was
unnatural to have snaps installed in your head. I mean that's kind of
Frankenstein Monsterish if you ask me. And we all know what went down with
tall, green, and creepy, don't we? I kept my eye on my Turkish friend in case
I ever needed to round up a mob of angry villagers. Just in case.  Omar finds Linda and she takes off again. Omar should really give it up. Dr.
Seward told Linda she needed to fight her attraction to the Countess, but all I
really remember is that Seward was waving a silver ax around and told Linda the
only way to defeat this vampire was to split its head open. I thought he was
an expert, but I've never heard of that method. Whatever, I wasn't the one
attracted to Countess, so I simply shrugged.
The Countess gets wind of Seward's interest in her and she shows up with Morpho
in tow. Seward tries to get in her face and hollers some threats. Your
history books refer to this as Seward's Folly. Guess who Morpho strangles? At
some point Linda gets snatched by that psycho from the wine cellar you've
already forgotten about and he ties her to a chair and is going to saw her up,
but she ends up tricking him into untying her and she uses the saw on him and
escapes to the island hideaway. Omar is once again befuddled by his sweetie's disappearance so he sets off to
look for her. Naturally the first place he checks is that titty bar from the
opening scene. He manages to check there for over five minutes of movie
running time. We are again subjected to an extended dance from the Countess.
It would have been funny if wasn't just tedious by now. Omar has a brainstorm
between getting lap dances. Linda must be going to the see the Countess!. I
no clue how he figured it. Go ask Jess Franco. So he and a buddy (where did this guy come from?) head off to the island.
Linda is already there and she meets up with the Countess and she finally stabs
her in the eye and we see the scorpion apparently dead in the bottom of the
pool. When Omar and pal show up there is no trace of anyone but Linda. Was it
just a dream? I don't know but I can assure you that it was most definitely a
nightmare. This is another one of those movies afflicted with awful actors, no
interesting ideas, and a story that made little sense. You would think someone
like Jess Franco that has this many movies on his resume would demonstrate the
least bit of talent, if only by accident. But maybe I'm not giving him enough
credit, he was talented enough to get my money, after all.
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