La Torture

Hexen geschändet und zu Tode gequält is exactly as lurid and heavy-handed as its title suggests. Released in 1973, during a European exploitation wave obsessed with medieval sadism and religious hysteria, this German-Austrian production lures with the promise of dark eroticism and moral outrage but delivers a clunky, unpleasant mix of theatrical cruelty and sluggish pacing.

Visually, the film occasionally conjures a sense of decayed menace. Stone dungeons soaked in candlelight, convent corridors thick with foreboding, and muddy village squares all evoke a suitably bleak atmosphere. Cinematographer Franz Xaver Lederle occasionally frames scenes with painterly restraint, but the impact is dulled by the film's erratic editing and murky print quality, which varies wildly depending on the version viewed. What might have been moody and oppressive quickly becomes muddy and monotonous.

Tonally, the film leans into its worst impulses. While some period dramas explore superstition and injustice with nuance, Hexen geschändet flattens everything into a cycle of accusation, humiliation, and punishment. It is less a coherent narrative and more a loose patchwork of sordid vignettes stitched together by vague moral panic. The score wavers between melancholic organ drones and jarringly upbeat cues that feel bizarrely misplaced given the subject matter, further muddying the film's already confused tone.

The performances are as uneven as the script. Herbert Fux, a familiar face in European sleaze cinema, gives the most arresting turn as a fanatical inquisitor, sneering and sweating his way through every scene with manic relish. He alone seems to understand the feverish energy the film aims for. The rest of the cast, particularly the women playing accused witches and helpless villagers, are reduced to one-note victims, alternating between hollow fear and passive nudity. They are given little to do beyond suffer, often graphically, for the camera.

Despite its provocative themes and shock-value title, the film fails to offer insight, suspense, or even sustained tension. It wallows in degradation without ever interrogating the madness it depicts. There is no real character development, no arc of resistance or redemption, only a parade of cruelty that numbs rather than disturbs. Where other films in the witch-hunt subgenre, such as Witchfinder General or The Devils, manage to balance their brutality with commentary or atmosphere, Hexen geschändet settles for crude spectacle.

During the 1970's, following the success of Michael Reeves "Witchfinder General", the original "Mark of the Devil" and perhaps Jess Francos sleaze-fest "The Bloody Judge", there was a hype about films involving the torture and killing of witches.

However, the hype didn't live long, producers figuring that you can only torture, rack and burn a witch so many times before the audience gets bored and interest soon faded and "Mark of the Devil 2" (the original German title translating loosely as "Witches: Defiled and tortured to death") could not cash into the success of it's predecessors.

It may not only have been the end of a hype that doomed the film but the production itself: Director Adrian Hoven and his crew were veterans of so-called Folk-movies, which meant that they knew how to shoot a handsome scenario but didn't have a clue how to film a dark, gloomy and misanthropic film like "Mark of the Devil" – let alone, how to film grizzling scenes of torture and inquisition. The torture scenes are lame, the subplot drags on and about halfway through the film, the viewer wonders why he's even bothering to follow up the story.

Second problem is the cast: it's enjoyable to see the return of Nalder (whom the US-audience probably know best as vampire Mr. Barloff in Stephen Kings "Salems Lot") and Johannes Buzalski (a veteran of Germany's sleazy-raunchy sex comedies), returning to their roles in "Mark of the Devil" in all but name. However, there is no Herbert Lom, no Udo Kier, Herbert Fux or Olivera Katarina that would supply charm and charisma. Both protagonists and antagonists come across as pale, stiff, indeed, wooden and invoke none of the sympathy or disdain that the original cast invoked.

Perhaps completists need it in their collection but if you really want to know what all the fuss about the "Witchhunter movies" was all about – and it wasn't so much, compared to modern gore-fests like "Saw" or "Hostel" – then stick to the original films mentioned and give "Mark of the Devil 2" a pass.

4 out of 10 points and that is being generous.

Although a blatant rip-off of "Witchfinder General", the original "Mark of the Devil" is easily one of the greatest European exploitation movies ever made. The sequel, however, is one of the worst. I can't even properly explain what went wrong, since all the ingredients for a fierce and shocking exploitation hit are there, but somehow "Mark of the Devil 2" became the lamest and dullest flick about torture & witch-hunting that exists. There are some great names in the cast, but either they stay far below their usual qualities (like Anton Diffring) or they are badly restricted by their shallow and uninteresting roles (like Erica Blanc). The original was a masterpiece of cruelty. You could almost feel the agony and experience the living hell those poor women were going through yourself. Here, there's just a lot of screaming and only a handful of nasty images. These witch-hunters, Balthazar Von Ross and his misogynist minion Natas, don't even bother to put effort into their accusations. They just point out random women and torture them to death. There isn't the slightest bit of unsettling atmosphere, building up suspense or effective use of the torture scenery. All the sequences involving the bald nuns are downright odd, and the only two noteworthy moments of torturous cruelty involve a pair of fiery shoes and a nasty crotch-impalement. In fact, the only truly great thing about this dud is its original German title "Hexen geschändet und zu Tode gequält". What genuine exploitation-lover wouldn't want to see a film with a title like that?

It was the original Mark of the Devil that was notorious for "barf bags" being given to theater patrons at the time. I think Part 2 stood a better chance of such bags actually being used. In fact, Part 2 contains what must have been the first vomit scene in a movie. Remember, this came before the Exorcist. Part 2 notably graphic and brutal,for its day.

Let's see, MARK OF THE DEVIL PART 2, gee whiz. I've had a difficult time trying to think of exactly what to say about this movie since I managed to see it last spring. To call it unpleasant would be kind. It's perhaps the sleaziest, scummiest example of the early 1970s Euro Horror exploitation movie fad that I can think of, a film that appears to be genuinely ineptly made from the ground up, with only some amusing costuming and bizarre interior location choices to really recommend it to casual viewers just looking for cheap thrills.

The notoriety of the film is partly based on it's current unavailability. The only way to see it these days is to find one of the gray market unlicensed home video transfers floating around sourced from overseas prints with gibberish subtitles burnt into the picture. Usually I would say that's a shame but in the case of MARK OF THE DEVIL PART 2 it's pretty much what the movie deserves; this is among the few genuine horror movies which come to mind had to be cut even to qualify for an "X" rating, which is saying a lot. Having it restored to it's original full length is not really a pressing issue for humanity right now, though sadly it would probably be a brisk seller. People love this kind of crap.

For those who aren't in the know, the MARK OF THE DEVIL films were part of a brief flurry of "Witchfinder General" torture show movies inspired by Michael Reeves' controversial period thriller CONQUEROR WORM, a wildly popular artistic statement about man's inhumanity to his fellow man that was exactly the movie the world had coming to it in 1968. The idea was to explore the possibilities of inflicting suffering on the supporting cast by evoking the pre-Reformation era of Puritanical Inquisitional hysteria, with an omnipotent, otherwise untouchable torture artist going from town to town condemning people as witches for kicks. In addition to the original MARK OF THE DEVIL and MARK PART 2, both courtesy of Mr. Adrian Hoven, there's Ken Russell's timeless favorite THE DEVILS, Jess Franco's THE BLOODY JUDGE with Christopher Lee, Bernardo Arias' nauseating THE INQUSITOR, and Jacinto Molina's INQUSICION as an eroticized Spanish twist on the theme. My but they are delightful movies.

I don't even really remember the exact premise behind MARK PART 2, something about a traveling family of nobelpersons who run afoul of a local magistrate using religious frenzy as an excuse to shackle up anybody who displeases him and torture the living *beep* out of the poor sods. Reggie Nalder -- whom "Star Trek" fans may recognize as the blue Andorian ambassador from the original series episode "Journey To Babel" -- is a perfect embodiment of evil as the ghoulish, power crazed maniac who's official torture experts go to work on Erika Blanc and anybody else whom they can justify throwing onto the rack.

Watching the film was a difficult experience, not only because of how unpleasant the proceedings are but due to the nature of the home video version I found myself in possession of, which appears to have been made from a bunch of 3 minute long MPEG clips of the film that were smuggled out of Scandanavia on a pile of 1.4mb floppy discs and joined together by someone on crack using a freeware editing tool. And yet quite frankly that's probably about what the movie deserves, it enhanced the forbidden, sleazy, scumbag nature of the whole affair.

My favorite segment was what I call The Shoes Of Fire Ordeal, which admittedly is one of the most ingenious torture gimmicks ever cooked up. Euro Horror favorite Anton Diffring (in the film's Oliver Reed role) is first beaten senseless, nearly drowned in freezing water, and when he still won't confess to being in league with the devil, Nalder's henchmen fill a pair of over-sized iron clogs with burning coals and shove the guy's bare feet into them. Ouch.

We also get a bit of Nunsploitation fare as the fetching young Sinead O'Connor lookalike baldie nun finds herself being whipped, groped, raped, singed, pierced, and ultimately kindled up on the ole' witch burning stake by assorted lesbians and disgusting fat slob jailers who take great joy in her suffering. I didn't, but then again this movie was not made for me. I am not sure exactly who the target audience was but they are out there somewhere, waiting for this movie to be restored to DVD from the original pre-cut elements. I wish them luck.

Not sure what else to say about the movie. I've heard it described as "hilarious" by others and there were indeed plenty of bad laugh moments during the proceedings, especially if you watch it while consuming alcohol which is probably the only recommended way to approach the material. The whole concept of the movie is ridiculous, with whatever statement they were trying to make about the hypocrisy of organized religion being lost in the shuffle of vomit, bile, mucous, and blood. The movie was also ineptly made on a nonexistent budget, which is par for the course, yet there is a sort of bizarre, clammy, claustrophobic atmosphere achieved based on the unique Northern European locations used for the filming, and the crypto Dutch Quaker costumes are quite funny.

That's about the only positive thing I can say about it, though. I certainly didn't enjoy the movie's over-hyped sadism very much, but having it under my belt means that for the rest of my life I can concentrate on watching things that are perhaps more rewarding. I can also now use this movie as a sort of barometer by which to judge other films -- "It didn't suck as bad as MARK OF THE DEVIL PART 2", or maybe "It actually managed to suck even more than MARK OF THE DEVIL PART 2". Can't wait to use that line.

3/10