MY CALL: This was… not good. Oh, I’ve seen far worse. But there’s no reason to recommend this to anyone. Also, I’d warn you not to trust the images of the mangled-faced, masked killer you find online. It’s all limited to one decent (yet unredeeming) scene at the end.
After a cold open of two dead bodies with two bare boobs on one of them, I guess I now know the kind of movie this is gonna’ be. Then again, the alternate title for this flick was Savage Lust. So there’s that. Oh well, here we go…
A bunch of college kids heading to a remote lake for the weekend come across an abandoned manor with a “monument” to a busted-up car in the front yard. They intend to break in and stay there for the night under the assumption that no one is home.
Once inside, they find evidence of a (perhaps) missing woman and indications that someone was in the house very recently. So, of course, they go snooping around the house looking for trouble. The house is heavily decorated with burlesque photos of the mysterious woman, almost like a shrine collaged on the wall by her stalker. This ends up adding to the nudity of the movie considerably, even if just photos.
They come upon a closet with a collection of… scalps! Yes, actual human scalps! And in the basement there are coffins! But no worries, guys. Let’s crash here tonight. No big deal. So as of now, they deserve the worst for their stupidity for sure.
Sleeping alone (in a dream sequence), a man is straddled by a strange naked woman; the woman from all the photos. Not surprisingly, he goes with it and doesn’t question a thing. Maybe I wouldn’t either. The scene gets rather graphic. But again, the original title of this tasteful film was… right… Savage Lust. Barf. I shouldn’t be surprised. I found that director José Ramón Larraz had made a movie about “sex vampires” (Vampyres).
But what about the horror? The death scenes are lame, off-camera, uninspired crap. Even the after-the-fact shots of the victims are unsatisfying. Sure there’s some blood. But there’s not much to it. No wound work, no on-screen stabs, no nothing. The closest we get to a proper death scene is someone dragging a blunt knife across a neck with no wound. This happens a few times and it’s the classic “we have no money” death scene.
The one great effect to celebrate here is the makeup on the killer. Her mangled Phantom of the Opera face looks awesome. In fact, it was an image grab of just that which got me to watch this movie. Too bad it only graces us at the end of the movie. Visually speaking, this movie is a one trick pony that bores us for most of the ride. I recommend a hard pass.
