THE BLACK CAT (1989)

  Luigi Cozzi gives us his version of the 3rd movie in the SUSPIRIA trilogy way before Argento gave us the official one with MOTHER OF TEARS. While I didn't completely hate M.O.T. this one is way more enjoyable and wackier watch. We get a movie-within-a-movie which is also a sequel to SUSPIRIA, a crud-faced witch who likes to puke green slime on people, a black cat lurking about(which is really the only thing this has to do with Edgar Allen Poe), Caroline Munro being her sexy self, an outer space fetus, laser beam fights, time travel, a rocking soundtrack which includes Bang Tango and a bunch of other nonsense that makes no sense but boy do I love it! 

 Released in Italy as DEMONS 6, and it has even less to do with the DEMONS series than it does Poe!

THE WITCH'S MIRROR (1962)

 Mexican horror concerning a witch who uses her magical mirror to helps a poor murdered woman get revenge from beyond the grave on her cheating scumbag killer husband. It almost feels like 2 movies because about halfway through your fairly typical witchy vengeance story suddenly becomes an EYES WITHOUT A FACE rip-off. Director Chano Urueta was also responsible for some of those groovy old Blue Demon lucha libre flicks of the 60s and 70s.

 

VACATION OF TERROR (1989)

  The grandson of  legendary Mexican horror film director Rene Cardona brings us this tale of a haunted vacation house that's inhabited by an evil doll that's possessed by the spirit of a witch burned at the stake a hundred years ago. Walls bleed, various creepy-crawly animals show up, knives get thrown about and things burst into flames. It's kind of like a crappy version of THE AMITYVILLE HORROR but it must have been popular enough in Mexico to warrant a sequel 2 years later. 

THE LONG HAIR OF DEATH (1964)

 Director Antonio Margheriti(or Anthony Dawsom as he's credited here) gives us his take on Mario Bava's BLACK SUNDAY with a kinda similar witch's revenge tale(there are actually 2 so-called witches knocked off here so that's something different). Complete with Barbara Steele, it's hard not to compare these 2 films and Bava, as usual, is responsible for the more iconic movie.  Margheriti is no slouch in the gothic horror department though and if slow-moving, artfully-shot Euro-ghost/witch stories are your bag you could certainly do worse than this.  

 Despite the title there isn't anyone being strangled to death by any long hair. You'll have to watch more modern garbage for that type of literal horror junk. 

THE SHE-BEAST (1966)

  I've always though of this one as the worst Barbara Steele movie. That's probably due to the fact that you really don't get much sexy Steele action in it. You don't get really get a ton of Steele at all though since she becomes the titular monster for a good portion of the runtime. Speaking of which, the monster here is one of the grossest and most maniacal representations of a witch put on film so that's something worthwhile.  The overall tone of the film seems a bit off since half of it seems to be a comedy(including bumbling cops involved in Keystone Cops-like chases) whenever someone is not being brutally murdered.  So if you dig schizophrenic Eurotrash monster movies from the 60s it's worth a look.  

 Also honorable mention has to go out to Mel Welles(Mr. Mushnick from LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS) for his portrayal of a very sleazy Innkeeper(he even tries to rape his own niece in one scene!).

                                              Known in Italy as THE LAKE OF SATAN:

Played on a double-bill with this other Italian horror from a year earlier:

  and played in England(under a snazzy re-titling!) with this Italian/French spy movie:

THE DEVIL (1981)

 Obscure Hong Kong/Taiwan co-production horror flick that's just chock full of fresh wriggly worms that unlucky actors get to spit out of their mouths. It starts out with a woman being bloodily bludgeoned with a large rock and robbed and then it becomes a tale of ghostly revenge with people spewing out the aforementioned worms plus maggots, centipedes and snakes for variety! But is it really the ghost or just this one bespectacled nerdy character who is doing all the evil spell-casting? Well I don't want to ruin the twist ending for you so if you can handle a very disgusting ride hop on board. Also for added chuckles and levity there's a little boy character named Ding-Dong that shows up in stupid outfits.
 The cheap-o DVD I have of this calls it DEVIL'S EXPRESS but that title never appears onscreen.

                                          The Japanese VHS added some pluralization:

BLOOD ORGY OF THE SHE-DEVILS (1973)

 Cult director Ted V. Mikels takes his stab(literally since he stabs people in this!) at making a witch flick. The plot deals with a Satanic witch(Lila Zaborin) who makes a deal with some mobsters and then finds out sometimes ya just can't trust gangsters when they come back and try and execute her, and her helper(who looks like Corporal Klinger from M*A*S*H* dressed in a caveman outfit). Then it's basically becomes a revenge flick with witchcraft. It gets a bit dull in places as it seems pretty dragged out for what's a pretty thin story. There's a few flashbacks(and this is where we get to see Mr. Mikels doing his WITCHFINDER GENERAL impersonation) and there's a couple that I recognize from Mikels' GIRL IN GOLD BOOTS that show up so we at least have some good guys to root for I guess. It all ends in a pretty confusing manner with what I think are a group of religious doctors that show up to lay the smackdown on everyone. Not the worst of Mikels filmography though it tries to be artsy a bit too much and I was letdown by the lack of any orgy(or even any nudity!) but I guess I woulda known if I saw that PG-rating.
 Shown on T.V. as FEMALE PLASMA SUCKERS since they didn't care for the use of the word BLOOD back in the day.




                                        The VHS cover has more nudity than the movie itself!

Triple feature with another American 70s horror and an sexy Italian shocker!:

THE BLOODY JUDGE (1970)

 As much as I generally love director Jess Franco I've never been much of a fan of this burn-the-witches flick that he did with Christopher Lee. Lee is great as always in the title role but the film overall pales when compared to it's obvious inspiration CONQUEROR WORM and it never gets as sleazy or bloody(with it's PG-rating) as MARK OF THE DEVIL from this same year.  It is probably one of Jess' most professional and best looking films and it's not terrible it just suffers for reminding me of  better movies in this sub-genre. Franco regular Howard Vernon is pretty great as the executioner/torturer of accused witch-ladies but the movie sadly isn't all about him and his limping sadistic ass. There are a bunch of alternate titles for this which were various cut versions including NIGHT OF THE BLOOD MONSTER, THRONE OF THE BLOOD MONSTER, TRIAL OF THE WITCHES, WITCH KILLER OF BROADMOOR and WITCHES' TRIAL




                                      Didn't spot this monster anywhere in this movie:

THE CURSE OF THE CRYING WOMAN (1963)

 I remember first seeing this old creaky Mexican horror movie on Commander U.S.A.'s GROOVIE MOVIES program. He used to always make such a big deal about star Abel Salazar which is funny since he's such an unremarkable actor. He does get to have a big fight at the end of this but even that isn't all that exciting. In fact this whole movie is so slow-moving and hard to stay awake through I'm not sure if I ever made it to it's conclusion until this last viewing. There are a couple of interesting bits, besides the titular crying/crud-faced woman you get a monstrous assistant who hobbles around wearing one big Frankenstein boot, a crazy dude who I think is a werewolf but I musta dozed off at that part, a gang of killer Scooby-Doo dogs, a witch lady and eyeballs that turn black often. Overall though this one is pretty dull and there's no luchadores to be seen anywhere(for that you have to watch VENGEANCE OF THE CRYING WOMAN which stars Santo!).
 I have only seen the AIP-TV cut of this so maybe the original-language version makes more sense but I certainly hope it's not any longer than this.

WITCHCRAFT THROUGH THE AGES: HAXAN (1922)

 On a purely visual level this is one of the most amazing films ever made. It's a documentary of sorts explaining medieval beliefs towards witches, demons. Satanism and that sort of stuff. The director(Benjamin Christensen) appears as a very spooky-ass Devil and old ugly women cast crazy spells and kiss him on his demonic ass. This is also the most expensive DVD I ever purchased so I would have to say I'm a pretty big fan. It also might be the classiest of art films to appear on this entire blog.
 Since this was made in 1922 it was obviously originally a silent film but in 1968 there was narration by William S. Burroughs added(this version also has a shorter run time since there are less inter-titles) and this is the version I've re-watched many times over the years. A pretty cool jazzy score was also added to this version replacing a more classical score and I thin that it works really well with the strange visuals. I've seen this one a couple of those films to see before you die list and it's hard to argue with that if you're any sort of cinemaphile. AKA HAXAN, THE WITCHES, THE WITCH and HAXAN: WITCHCRAFT THROUGH THE AGES

In English:

Original recipe:

THE WITCHES OF ZUGARRAMURDI (2013)

 Director Alex de la Iglesia is a fairly popular name amongst cult/horror film fans. Having only seen a couple of his movies I can't say I'm a huge fan and after watching this one that hasn't changed much. This film isn't totally terrible. You get a bunch of witches who jump around like those running cgi-zombies and walk on ceilings, including a very hot one played by Carolina Bang(who surprisingly isn't a porn star despite her name) who enjoys humping broomsticks dressed only in bra and panties, a little cgi blood & gore, a silly feminist message and a giant-boobed naked earth-mother goddess/monster(who's also a dreadful cgi-creation of course). My main problem with this, besides all the modern-day crappy computer FX, is the abundance of dumb humor thrown in every 2 seconds which gives the whole thing an extra cartoony feel. The English title, WITCHING AND BITCHING, gives you an even clearer indication of how dumb the whole thing is. Although this wasn't really my thing if you do dig your horror films with humor that runs the gamut from very black to Three Stooges-style slapstick maybe give this a watch.

THE CITY OF THE DEAD (1960)

 Better known in the U.S. as HORROR HOTEL this is a classic example of British horror starring Christopher Lee. The main hook here is the deep atmosphere that saturates the film. It's a familiar story of a witch who gets burned at the stake in olden times Massachusetts and returns, still wreaking vengeance 300 years later. The Italians would produce similar goth classics with Barbara Steele throughout the 60's and those would amp up the violence and blood but this one has to be given credit for helping to get the ball rolling and serving as a blueprint. Christopher Lee is also pretty awesome as usual. Overall it's a good Halloween-time movie, with all the fog and witchery going on and it ends with a large wooden cross inexplicably shooting fireballs at witches and warlocks(and maybe just some run-of-the-mill Satanists thrown in?). That's some crazy god vengeance there!
 I saw this as part of a horror marathon recently and it was by far the best thing on the bill.
 This was originally released in the U.S. on a double-bill with a movie called THE HEAD which is supposed to be a German version of THE BRAIN THAT WOULDN'T DIE that looks pretty nutty.



 also The Misfits dig it:

THE NAKED WITCH (1961)

 This movie is under an hour long and the first 10 minutes of it are a little documentary about witches so that would make the actual movie part around 50 minutes and it still drags! This was directed by Larry Buchanan who would go on to make a bunch of similarly crappy movies including ZONTAR and MARS NEEDS WOMEN but this one is one of his first stabs at horror. I would put this one in the same category as something like MANOS: THE HANDS OF FATE for it's slow-moving clunkiness. The title does deliver as promised and you do get a naked witch swimming around in one scene which may have been quite spicy to see in 1961. Even with this nudie bit it's still a rough sit.

Watch at a heavy risk of sleepy eyes:

THE NAKED WITCH is also an alternate title for THE WITCHMAKER which is a way more watchable witch-movie than this:

RITES, BLACK MAGIC AND SECRET ORGIES IN THE 14th CENTURY (1973)

 This Italian Satanic/witch movie starts off with some chick being stripped and then sacrificed to some pasty-faced demon lady named Isabel.  The cult of men doing this look like they took their fashion tips from THE GREATEST AMERICAN HERO.  While all this naughtiness goes on you hear a bunch of dogs barking and howling incessantly in the background.  From there a woman is attacked by angry bats and has her heart ripped out by some maniac.  Meanwhile those fucking dogs keep barking!  After about 20 minutes of this craziness they shut up and it all sort of starts to make sense as a group of folks take up residence in a spooky old castle and spooky shit starts to happen. This fools you into thinking there's some kind of a plot here which is not true.  It turns out our pasty demon goddess was just some lady burned at the stake for being a witch.  There's also a gory scene where she has her heart rammed through with a large stake.  So she's back for revenge or something like that but then some vampire stuff happens.  Overall this movie is a real mess but you do get lots of evil groping going on, a little lesbianism, bloodsucking, flashing colors/psychedelic freak-out scenes, a woman buried alive, hot naked European ladies cavorting about and lots of creepy devil-worshiping guys acting creepy and not much of that makes any sense.  Mickey Hargitay from BLOODY PIT OF HORROR is in there as Isabel's boyfriend.  There's a few alternate titles for this including THE REINCARNATION OF ISABEL and THE GHASTLY ORGIES OF COUNT DRACULA(yes Count Dracula is thrown in there also).  For advanced fans of off-the-wall Eurotrash who can handle a big helping of total weirdness.

THE WITCHMAKER (1969)

I have to admit that this movie isn't really very good.  It's full of lots of talking about witchcraft and devil-worshiping and the action is pretty stretched out through the running time.  But that being said this was a movie that I used to catch on New York's channel 9 Chiller Theater, or maybe it was the 4 o'clock movie, every once in a while back when I was a kid and I remember it scaring me.  So just for the sentimental value alone I rate this one higher than it realistically should be.  Being shot in the swamps of Louisiana I feel the movie does do a good job of creating a good spooky atmosphere throughout the whole film.   It also features a performance by a large fellow in a furry vest who's a warlock or "a berserk" as they refer to him and this guy used to give me nightmares so I guess if you were a monster obsessed kid in the 70's he crept around in your head for a while at night when you were trying to sleep.  Of course the movie also features Alvy Moore who was a familiar character on GREEN ACRES which kinda kills the scary tension that mighta been built up.  There's also a lack of nudity from all the hot-looking witches and their victims and that's a damn shame and seems very strange since there's almost a naked lady right there on the poster.  My DVD of this film is titled THE LEGEND OF WITCH HOLLOW and for some reason that sounds really silly to me.  Probably cuz it reminds me of that stupid SLEEPY HOLLOW story.  I can't really recommend this one unless you have a fond child-hood attachment or maybe you have a fetish for girls hung upside down before being sacrificed to Satan. AKA THE NAKED WITCH

MARK OF THE DEVIL (1970)

There were a few really good witch hunting/burning flicks from the 60's and 70's stuff like THE CONQUEROR WORM with Vincent Price and Ken Russell's THE DEVILS and I guess you could throw THE WICKER MAN in there too, but out of all those this one is the one I've gone back to and re-watched the most.  I'm not exactly sure why I like this one over all the others except maybe just for the fact that it is so gratuitous in it's display of the insanity of religion.  You get a tongue ripped out of a poor innocent rape-victims mouth by the roots, water-torture, branding, stretching, fingers lopped off, various more torture and a little more rape all in the wonderful name of organized religion.  As a result this film appealed to me as a young gore-hound and I can still go back to it now and appreciate the message.  Udo Kier is, as always, really good as the sympathetic withchfinders helper and this movie also stars a guy named Herbert Fux which sounds very porno-star-ish. The soundtrack on this sounds really similar to the slow music from CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST. There were a bunch of movies re-titled as sequels, all the way up to MARK OF THE DEVIL PART 5:RETURN OF THE BLIND DEAD which was just one of the blind dead movies, but unfortunately there never was an official sequel.  I like to think if there was a sequel our large breasted heroine would get some nasty revenge on Herbert Loms evil Christ-crusader/witch-raper but maybe that's too happy of an ending to such a realistic portrayal of the dark side of human behavior.

   

THE DEVONSVILLE TERROR(1983)

If you like watching women getting burned alive and killed in various ways for being witches maybe you will dig this. Has director Ulli Lommel ever made a decent film? I've yet to see one. THE BOOGEY MAN was another incoherent mess from what I recall of it. Plays sorta like Ulli's version of MARK OF THE DEVIL. Donald Pleasence shows up as a doctor for a bit trying to help one woman. The ending is pretty strange as one of the witches turns out to actually have super-powers and shoots laser beams out of her eyes which melt faces and make heads explode. Not sure if it's worth sitting through all the talky crap, in the rest of the movie, just for that though. Especially since you can just watch all 90 seconds of the highlights right here: