Placer sangriento

I can't blast Placer Sangriento like everyone else on this board. I liked it. It reminded me of early Franco as did Vieyera's later effort, Dr. Humpp. The black & white photography is very atmospheric and moody, the girls are very sexy and the storyline is sleazy enough. Like a lot of horror films of that time, the police procedural footage is dull. I've often wondered if these scenes were meant to be for restroom breaks when they played theatrically. The ominous, memorable central music theme reminded me of the sensational main theme by Allesandro Allesdandrini in a film made years later, The Devil's Nightmare. Placer Sangriento is currently playing in a 20 minute version on Comcast on Demand in the Something Weird section (they sell the full version on DVD).

The swinging 60s saw protective parents world-wide concerned that exposure to way-out music might turn their kids into sex-crazed, drug addicts. In Emilio Vieyra's Feast of Flesh AKA The Deadly Organ, that's precisely what happens: young women are subjected to some cool organ grooves and become the zombie-like sex slaves of a masked maniac who hooks them on heroin; once in the grip of the 'monster', the women become his sexual playthings, but their inevitable fate is death, their 'master' stabbing them in the chest with his over-sized hypodermic needle.

Although this film could be viewed as a cautionary tale for potentially wayward teens or as the ultimate nightmare scenario for concerned parents, I doubt very much if this was the makers' intention—it's far too lurid a piece of trash to be given credit for containing any kind of moral subtext or for deliberately mining the fears of the older generation. No... what we have here, I believe, is exploitation, pure and simple—a delightfully dated piece of nonsense featuring some mild gore, beautiful people soaking up rays on the beach, groovy dance scenes in a smoky jazz club, and plenty of bare boobage, with nearly every hot chick getting her threads off during the course of the film.

Casual horror fans might find Feast of Flesh strictly Dullsville (Hell, even fans of this type of cheap South American schlock don't seem to have much positive to say about it), but I had a blast with the hilarious 60s slang ('this place is a drag... I'm splitting. Ciao!'), all of the tasty skirt (especially one particularly big-breasted sunbather and the gorgeous Gloria Prat as Beba), the terrible dubbing, and the wonderfully daft scene in which the police use a girl as bait for the killer, but fail to step in until after she has been fatally stabbed.

Feast of Flesh (1967)

** (out of 4)

Argentina horror film about a masked killer who stalks women so that he can inject them with heroin and make them his slaves. Originally rated X when it was released to American drive-ins, this thing now is rather tame in its violence, subject matter and nudity but it's a shame the direction is so incredibly poor because we might have had a pretty good film otherwise. The look of the masked killer is the film's strong point but the rest of the film, while interesting, is rather dull due to the direction.

A man in a mask injects herion into a gaggle of girls in between bouts of organ playing in this boring late 60's film. It was on the same disk as the superior "Night Of The Bloody Apes", so I felt what the hell, ya know? And every film I watch I feel the need to review. Even the VERY horrid ones. This is futher proof that Emilio Vieyra should have never gotten into making movies. Everything I saw of his is putrid, he's like the Argentian version of Indy-feces director Micheal Legge. YES that bad.

Something Weird Dvd extras: Outakes; Combo trailer; TV spots; comic art gallery; Short subjects: 'Gorilla and the Maiden', 'world's championship women's wrestling contest', 'Artist's Paradise', and 'White Gorilla'; Trailers for "the Deadly Organ", "Face of the Screaming Werewolf", "the Flesh Eaters", "Fleash feast", "Invasion of the Flesh Hunters", "Shiver Shudder Show", and "Tender Flesh". It's on a double bill with "Night of the Bloody Apes"

Easter Egg: Trailer for "the Curious Dr Humpp"

My Grade: F

Okay, "Deadly Organ" isn't as wacky as "Humpp" but there are plenty thrills for lovers of weird and obscure films. A spooky guy with a monster mask wrecks havoc on the beaches of Argentina by injecting heroin (!) into helpless young girls. He then plays an organ (hence the title, I thought it was another kind of organ..ha ha) and young zombielike girls come to him. In the film's most outrageous scene two cops interview a heroine victim of who the psycho is BY USING LSD AS A TRUTH SERUM!!?! According to the Mondo Macabro book "Deadly Organ" was made in 1965! The audiences of Argentina must've been pretty shocked by this druginduced gem. Only for the boldest trashfilm fanatics - mainstream Lynch/cultfilm wannabes should stay clear of this twisted little marvel.