La Nuit des vampires

In practically every vampire movie that I've seen, and they're quite numerous, the plot attempts to add a strange characteristic or gimmick to the myth of vampires. Usually these are very common things that are closely connected with the traditional characteristics (garlic, crucifixes, sunlight, …) but some movies truly exaggerate and come up with the downright craziest things. In this West German/Yugoslavian goth-horror production "Cave of the Living Dead", for example, the vampire attacks are accompanied by the loss of electric power! That's actually how the police knows there has been another murder. How do you explain that? I really don't see the connection between sucking the blood of a virgin and causing the lights to blackout.

Apart from this curious little anecdote, "Cave of the Living Dead" is actually a rather decent and entertaining early 60's Gothic horror movie that can easily compete with the better Italian and Spanish efforts from that era. The story and execution are very straightforward, but there are more than a handful of memorably suspenseful highlights, a good cast of characters and a beautiful homage to the greatest German silent horror movie ever made; Nosferatu. The film stars Adrian Hoven, who might be better known amongst horror fanatics as the director/producer of films "Castle of the Creeping Flesh" and the notorious "Mark of the Devil" movies. Hoven is terrific as the slick Interpol inspector (and bona fide cool guy) Frank Dorin, assigned to solve a series of strange and horrifying murders in a remote German village. During the past six months, seven beautiful young girls aged between eighteen and twenty-two years old have been found dead, and the only explanation the local doctor can come up with is heart failure. The petrified and superstitious villagers believe in vampires, and they're right of course. You don't need to be a very intelligent inspector to figure out the first murders coincided with the arrival of the mysterious Professor Von Adelsberg. The professor is allegedly occupied with his experiments all day long and his castle is build on a giant cave full of bats and coffins. Hmm, I wonder who's the vampire in this town… "Cave of the Living Dead" is quite fun to watch, especially to spot all the clichés and stereotypes, like village witch and the hysterical black guy. The atmosphere is often unsettling and most of the filming locations, like the titular cave and the well, are outstanding. The film is fairly explicit for its time and there's even some enticing nudity I totally didn't expect to see.

This is a German/Yugoslavian production distributed by Richard Gordon in the U.S. and released as a double-bill with the Italian TOMB OF TORTURE (1963), which I watched recently and was disappointed by. Though issued separately on R1 DVD (albeit both through Image as part of their "The Euro Shock Collection"), they were reviewed in tandem by the "DVD Drive-In" – where it was reported that TOMB was the better effort which, therefore, meant that I went into CAVE with virtually no expectations whatsoever (except for the Expressionist touches which were singled out for praise in the assessment)!

In any case, having last watched THE VAMPIRE HAPPENING (1971) – which saw the involvement of two crew members from SUCCUBUS (1967) – I opted to check out CAVE soon after, since it starred one of the actors (Adrian Hoven) from that same superior Jess Franco picture! Having mentioned bloodsuckers just now, the film under review is also known as NIGHT OF THE VAMPIRES – a title far more appropriate than the one it got stuck with, given that "The Living Dead" are generally associated with Zombies! At the very least, it should have been dubbed "Cave Of The Undead" (in view of the fact that a grotto plays a major part in the narrative)...

Now, after this lengthy intro, let us get to the matter at hand: those NOSFERATU (1922)-like nightly prowlings are indeed creepily effective and, undeniably, the best thing about the film…but it must be pointed out that the whole is a lot worthier than the goofy TOMB OF TORTURE! Hoven is a crack Police Inspector (whose womanizing ways and quick action tactics, as was pointed out by the review I mentioned earlier, seem to be patterned after the "Euro-Spy" fad which emerged in the wake of the James Bond extravaganzas!) assigned to investigate a series of female deaths on a remote island that have occurred over a period of six months and always during an electricity black-out. To be honest, the latter is as much a throwaway oddity (ditto for the presence of a hulking deaf-mute) as the underground resting-place of the chief bloodsucker!

Guessing the latter's identity proves to be child's play, but nobody seems to connect the start of the attacks with the arrival on the island of this particular character; that said, the local cops are depicted as buffoons, which is exactly why Hoven was sent for! Even so, while it is clearly stated that the 'plague' already numbered seven victims, when the vampire (played by Wolfgang Preiss, the ex-Dr. Mabuse himself, and another definite asset here) is eventually cornered, only the latest member of the 'cult' is ever seen by his side! Incidentally, it takes ages for the examining doctor (whose practice should, by all accounts, be steeped in superstition) to be brought around to accept that the supernatural is behind this crime-wave, whereas our hero from the big-city (eventually befriended by the doctor's black manservant) goes to consult an aged witch virtually the moment he arrives – WTF?! The look of the film deliberately harks back to the golden age of horror – which is certainly commendable – but, unfortunately, the end product in this case is mainly listless and, thus, miles removed from the classics of yesteryear (if not unenjoyable per se...

I have to say some of the cinematography is outstanding - deeply and eerily Gothic. At times it reminded me a bit of Nosferatu (1922). The way the vampire came creeping into the bedroom, black magic, the grotto and the spirits dancing around the fire for examples.

The film plays out like a horror mystery rather than pure horror. It is more or less a detective story and not a bad one. Of course this detective has a witch helping him get to the bottom of the mystery. In a lot of ways it's your average vampire story: do vampires really exist, some believe it while others don't, a search for the vampires, etc. So it's not a bad watch.

Curse of the Green Eyes, Night of the Vampire or Curse of the Living Dead -- some the names you can find this film under.

6/10

After six deaths in as many months an Interpol agent by the name of "Inspector Frank Dorin" (Adrian Hoven) is sent to a remote village somewhere in Eastern Europe to investigate. When he gets there he finds that all six deaths were to women between the ages of 18 to 22 and that when they occurred all of the electricity had also gone out for an hour or so. To make matters even worse, the attractive hotel maid by the name of "Maria" (Erika Remberg) is killed that very night in the room next to him and Inspector Dorin is immediately suspected of her murder. Coincidentally, six months earlier, a reclusive scientist named "Professor von Adelsberg" (Wolfgang Preiss) has moved into a nearby castle and--along with the help of his pretty assistant "Karin Schumann" (Karin Field)--is conducting experiments which he insists must be kept secret for the time being. Now, although I wasn't honestly expecting too much from this movie, I must admit that it had a decent amount of mystery to keep my interest for the most part. Likewise, although it is filmed in black-and-white, the director (Akos Rathonyi) took full advantage of it by using shadows and other techniques to create a dark atmosphere. On the flip side, however, the story itself had a couple of unexplained issues and the script was especially bland. I should note, however, that the film I saw was dubbed from German to English and this could possibly explain the rather basic dialogue. Be that as it may, although this was certainly not a great horror film by any means, it managed to pass the time fairly well and for that reason I have rated it accordingly. Average.

The greatest films ever made mostly hail from the 50s, 60s, and 70s, and the silent era, with some outliers from more recent years. This is not one of those. Meanwhile, though there are plentiful exceptions, genre fare in the 50s is commonly known for subpar schlock more than earnest film-making and storytelling, and cinema only started to crawl out of that rut in the 60s. I'm certainly not saying that 'Der Fluch der grünen Augen,' also known as 'Cave of the living dead,' also known as 'Night of the vampires,' is as bad as 'Attack of the giant leeches,' but it falls well short of being an exemplar, too. For all the good horror and sci-fi to be claimed among mid-century fare, this flick roundly fails to make much of an impression at all. Could you do worse? Yes. Is there actually any need to watch this? No.

The filming locations are gorgeous. The production design and art direction range from commendable to fantastic, and likewise the costume design, hair, and makeup. Those stunts and effects that are employed, though not necessarily anything remarkable, are mostly quite good. Generally speaking this was beautifully shot, a credit to both filmmaker Ákos Ráthonyi and cinematographer Hrvoje Saric. The story is flush with ideas ripe for genre storytelling, fitting right in with more famous features that play in similar spaces. All this is well and good. Yet the writing is highly variable, at first feeling decidedly forthright, then gawky and scattered, then slothful. The plot does solidify and become more specifically engaging over time, but in a runtime of under ninety minutes, that irregularity is unfortunate, and the greater strength takes all too long to manifest - with the less favorable traits never going away., and continuing to rise and recede. For as nice as the visuals may be, Ráthonyi's direction is less sure-footed when it comes to bringing the screenplay to fruition, very much echoing the writing in its uneven thrust, with a curiously indistinct, flat tone further mucking up the proceedings. The acting sadly follows in kind, varying from "okay, sure" to "pretty good."

There are far worse ways to spend your time. However, that the most appreciable facets here have to do with the excellent craftsmanship, and not the storytelling, says all one needs to know about the movie. I'm glad for those who get more out of it than I do. I don't dislike this, and I don't regret spending my time here - but I won't spend one minute thinking about 'Cave of the living dead' hereafter.