Vampyros Lesbos (1970)
----------------------
filmed in Spain, German with English subtitles
recently reissued on DVD

a psycho-psychedelic collage of St Tropez glamor,
sapphic stage acts, poisonous softcore sex,
and lounge music gone satanic


Good points
-----------

-A heady cocktail of spacey synth and sexy piano
sleaze mirror Linda's confusion as she wanders
into the vampiric realm. Wiggy soundtrack is
super-cool featuring fuzz guitars and electronic
sitars. Like listening to Yello on mushrooms.
Weirdass staticy walkie-talkie garbled lead-ins.
Music by Manfred Hubler and Siegfried Schwab

-cool lesbian performance art with a slightly
narcissistic hot stripping chick doing something
with another chick who is pretending to be
a mannequin (oxymoronically called a "dance
partner" in the film)

-cheesy zoom camera angles on the loyal
manservant, Morpho

-the countess' swinging 70's pad. Black and
white modern furniture with a splash of red here
and there.  One room has a ceiling completely
covered in red tassles of varying lengths, giving
the effect of blood dripping from the ceiling

-directed by Eurotrash exploitation king
Jesus Franco (the Spanish Hammer) who makes an
appearance as the sadistic killer Memmet

-implausible excuses for gratuitous nudity. I
always ask people who are visiting on business
if they would care to go skinny-dipping

-Agra as the archetypal Renfield character
brings out the themes of frustrated sexuality,
loneliness, & unrequited love. She is not the
only one damaged in the vampire's wake (see
Memmet above)


Bad points
----------

-Linda's boyfriend is obviously gay. No wonder
why she is drawn to a lesbian vampire. He asks
why she seems inexplicably 'excited' after seeing
Nadine's groovy lesbian performance art. Duh.

-Turkish supper club strip show: You can tell
that the audience "reaction" scene and the actual
performance were recorded separately. There is
no interaction whatsoever. So badly done as to
be amusing. Reminiscent of the remarkably bad
audience scenes in 'The Gore Gore Girls'

-the countess' visitations to Linda on the
psychic/dream plane could have been a bit more
creative/creepy instead of a rehash of the strip
show and a pink kite floating around

-Animal allegory (the moth drawn to the scorpion)
is a bit overdone. Once is in fact enough in
this case


Viewing parameters
------------------

The flexible dual nature (soft porn, cheese) of
this film lends itself to multiple viewing
parameters:

-a classic vidi for the "solitary" viewer

-a good view with your eternal gothic vampire
mate

-could be watched in a group for sheer cheese
effect with maybe a glass of wine