|
The Fearless Vampire Killers
[MGM]
1967; color
Directed by Roman Polanski
Starring: Jack MacGowran, Roman Polanski, Alfie Bass, Jessie Robins, Sharon Tate, Ferdy Mayne & Iain Quarrier
|
|
As is probably obvious enough from the existence of this website, when it comes to movies I prefer low budgets to blockbusters. Which means a lot of "famous" films and the works of "famous" directors get past me. (I only put the term in quotes because fame is in the eye of the beholder.) So, in the name of full disclosure, I know very little about Roman Polanski. Or rather, I know very little about Roman Polanski that doesn't involve gossip, rumor, innuendo, an unnamed 13 year old girl or Sharon Tate. In other words, stuff about his personal life, not the movies he made. In fact I thought this would be my first foray into Polanski film. Then I looked him up on the IMDB and realized he directed Rosemary's Baby; and that I'm kind of an f'in idiot for not knowing that. (And for the record, just like everyone else reading this, I have seen Rosemary's Baby. Albeit on TV, but I think it still counts.) Anywhoo, prior to watching this in full I had seen bits of it on TV but wasn't a hundred percent sure what the deal with it was. Now that I've seen it I'm still not sure! Is it a comedy? A black comedy? A movie that wasn't meant to be funny but is? (Well, I guess it's not that last one since it's not actually funny. In hindsight I suppose I should have put those terms in quotes as well because funny is also in the eye of the beholder.) The world may never know. What I do know is, at it's core this is a vampire movie along the lines of our beloved Hammer Studios and has all of the benchmarks of the genre: a weird old doctor, his weird but loyal assistant, weird dusty townsfolk, not so weird busty maidens with easily accessible neck flesh and, of course, a big ol' spooky looking castle, complete with the prerequisite hunchback, smoke machine, basement big enough for multiple coffins, etc. In other words, nothing too out of the ordinary for your ordinary horror film. It's just the way the package is presented that's confusing. To me at least. (Plus the doctor mumbles a lot and the sound on the version we rented was abysmal so I admittedly missed some dialogue.) One piece of Polanski related gossip / rumor / innuendo I read on the internet about this movie specifically is that it was completely hacked apart and re-edited for it's American release by a woman who was considered a particularly questionable editor. (And by that I mean it's rumored a lot of the directors whose films she edited later questioned the validity of her work.) This I tend to believe, just because I tend to believe he probably knew a little something about movie making by this point and wouldn't put out something so disjointed on purpose. On the other hand I may have gone into it expecting something different (like a Young Frankenstein level of comedy) or this may be the kind of thing that makes more sense the more you watch it. Like a Jean Rollin movie. We'll have to wait and see.
—Bunny
|
|
