La cara del terror

The lugubrious, dermally destructive Sci-horror hokum Face of Terror remains a wild experiment in scientifically sinister terror!!! An ill-fated doctor Taylor (Fernando Rey) unknowingly tests his hugely unstable serum upon troubled mental patient Norma (Lisa Gaye), hoping to remedy her severe burns, only to induce hysterically antisocial results! Much has already been made of the derivative text, so I shall, instead, note the film's entertainingly psychotronic goofiness!

Catastrophically, the good doctor Taylor's revolutionary solution proves violently counter revolutionary, and briefly beautified Norma's plasticized dermal tissues angrily revolt, shockingly turning her into a shriekingly vengeful harridan! Talky, with a sluggish pace, Spanish 60s spookshow 'Face of Terror' will, to many viewers, appear like a relic from a bygone age. Arguably not on par with Jess Franco's macabre monochromatic masterpieces, this camp, melodramatic B/W Euro-schlocker is hopefully not without interest to more forgiving vintage Drive-In/Midnight Movie fans. The spectacularly shrill climax is exquisite, plus the groovy musical interludes, and lounge-y score are legit!!!

One of my sci-fi/horror/fantasy reviews written 50 years ago: Directed by Isidoro Ferry and William Hole Jr.; Executive Producer: Jack Miles; Released by Futuramic Films in America. Screenplay by Monroe Manning; Photography by Jose Aguayo; Edited by Antonio Ramirez; Music by Jose Buenagu. Starring: Lisa Gaye, Fernando Rey, Virgilio Teixeira, Gerard Tichy, Emilio Rodriguez and Conchita Cuetos.

Owing to Georges Franju's earlier classic "Eyes Without a Face", this oddly localed horror film (made in Spain) dealing with plastic surgery and revenge is very amateurish, partly due to hack auteur William Hole. The professional leading players help save the day, but it's really a waste of a good title.

Except that it's not justified why she was hospitalized in a mental institution and that in the second half of the film the heroine has the left half of the face destroyed instead of the right, it's a very good film. Lisa Gaye is impeccable in a difficult role for any other actress. Veteran Fernando Rey, Luis Bunuel's favorite from movies like: "Viridiana", "Tristana", "The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie", "That Obscure Object of Desire", is very good too. Me, I didn't like the end. Norma doesn't deserve that stupid death, falling on the shard of glass. She doesn't deserve to die at all. I would have preferred to be helped by the doctor once again, this time with the right serum and then to help her leave the country.

Fernando Rey is a wheelchair-bound professor who has developed a formula that can heal scar tissue. When he alights upon the badly disfigured "Norma" (Lisa Gaye) he injects her with his serum with almost miraculous results, which he proceeds to display to his peers and friends. Unfortunately, the serum begins to wear off and "Norma" - who had only recently escaped from a mental institution determines to exact revenge on the doctor and his assistant "Alma". The acting and dialogue are competent, but the pace is shockingly slow - far too many development scenes and far too little actually happens to keep the attention until the last ten minutes when "Norma" goes on a bit of a murderous spree. Although the dubbing is not bad, and it looks like some of it has been re-shot in English; it still struggles to make much headway leaving more blemishes on the story than his serum could really ever hope to cure.

Dr. Taylor (Rey) develops a revolutionary new process of restoring badly damaged human skin. His synthetic skin can quickly and painlessly eliminate scarring. Unfortunately, the Madrid Institute of Mental Health denies his request to start human testing of his procedure.

Soon after being rejected, he is approached by a desperate woman (Gaye) with appalling burn scars on the left half of her face from an accident involving an oil lamp. What Dr. Taylor doesn't know is that she is an escaped mental patient from the very institution that had just rejected his work. He agrees to attempt the procedure on her free of charge since she is to be the first human test subject. It turns out to be a resounding success.

Unfortunately, the patient flees the doctor when he discovers her true identity and wants to turn her in. During her escape, she incapacitates him with a blow to the head. Now on the run, she struggles to remain at large and even escape the Madrid area. The film follows her desperate plight to both remain free and prevent her new skin tissue from deteriorating.

"Face of Terror" (U.S. title) is rather well done in many respects. The cast is decent and the production values are fine. There are some genuinely chilling moments as our fleeing mental patient plots murder in order to get her way. Pacing is slow at times and the entire film is rather predictable, but it is still worth seeing if one is a dedicated fan of the genre.