La notte dei dannati

Having been a long term fan of Pierre Brice originating from "The Mill of the Stone Women", I went to great lengths to get a copy of this film, finally procuring a French print entitled "Les Nuites Sexuelles" which is more appropriate. Despite an intriguing and promising plot the film is merely an excuse for interminable nude and unerotic lesbian sex scenes between the various starlets cast in it. Brice appears only briefly and has not nearly enough to do in the film to come anywhere near saving it. This is not a horror film so much as a borer film...one would wind up damning oneself on any night when 90 minutes was wasted watching it. Cutting by 70 minutes or more would be a definite improvement. To be avoided at all costs.

Typical for the period horror film, Night of the Damned features a castle, a curse, some nudity, and a few murders (mostly off screen). A reporter visits a sick friend who believes himself cursed. Relatives of the friend are being inexplicably bumped off under strange circumstances. Is this a supernatural phenomenon or the result of an all too human inheritance plot? The film goes down easy enough but is not overly memorable. The color cinematography is warm but there is little atmosphere. The trippy climax is enjoyable but the film could have used more psychedelia. Bottom line: die hard fans of Euro-horror might want to give Night of The Damned a look. Don't expect The Reincarnation of Isabel/Black Magic Rites - a much wilder ride.

Jean Duprey (Pierre Brice), the hero of Night of the Damned, is a renowned sleuth who helps the police with particularly difficult cases - he's like a '70s Euro-Sherlock Holmes, except being Italian, he has a tasty wife, Danielle (Patrizia Viotti), instead of a loyal male companion.

When Jean receives a puzzling letter from his old friend Prince Guillaume de Saint Lambert (Mario Carra), the detective and his wife decide to pay a visit to Guillaume's castle, where they meet the prince's creepy wife Rita (Angela De Leo) and become embroiled in a centuries old mystery involving a witch's curse (no prizes for correctly connecting the dots).

The scene is set for lots of atmospheric gothic horror with cobwebby, candlelit corridors, dark, dank dungeons, and creaky, crumbly crypts, but sadly director Filippo Walter Ratti conjures up very little in the way of tension or scares, the majority of his film being a slow, uneventful, dreary mess that not even some gratuitous nudity and light lesbianism can make bearable. The film also features several murders (of naked women, of course) but there is no gore to speak of- just a few scratch marks on the victims' breasts.

2.5/10, rounded down to 2 for Danielle's annoying hysterical screaming.

Amateur detective Jean Dupris(Pierre Brice)is summoned to the home of his friend Gil.Not long after Dupris and his wife(Patrizia Viotti) arrive Gil dies in his sleep.Gil's companion turns out to be a witch who kidnaps women,engages them in sex orgies and then kills them when she's through.Dupris decides to hang around and help solve these range murders.Unfortunately he doesn't notice that his wife has fallen under the control of the lesbian witch,who enjoys scratching female breasts."Night of the Damned" is a pretty sleazy Italian Gothic horror with beautiful women and a good amount of nudity.The action is pretty slow and there is not much suspense,but if you are into Italian horror give this one a chance.7 out of 10.