Lorna, the Exorcist (1974)--Repost with critique of the Mondo Macabro DVD

Save this paragraph, what follows below is my original post on Lorna, the Exorcist, as published on December 27, 2009. Despite my desire to tinker with the text, I have resisted the urge to change it. It is not very good, alas. The original title of this post was "Jess Franco's Lorna, the Exorcist (1974)," and I have removed the "Jess Franco's" from the title (as an incidental note, this is because I've largely abandoned the auteur theory as a workable critical approach). I've recently received the Mondo Macabro DVD release of Lorna and am, again, quite impressed. The DVD release presents the film in a beautiful, anamorphic widescreen transfer, and the film is presented with an English language option and a French language option with English subtitles. I've watched the disc twice and have yet to listen to the English track, as I much prefer the French. The subtitles are excellent. Included on the disc are text essays and interviews with author Stephen Thrower and Gerard Kikoine. The Kikoine interview is of particular interest, as he shares his anecdotes about Robert de Nesle, editing Jess Franco's films, and his early work as a sound editor and film editor. Kikoine also talks about French cinema and censorship in France during the seventies. It is recommended and is my favorite supplement on the disc. The super-dope Mondo Macabro trailer reel is included also. This DVD release is essential Franco, and I cannot think of a true, cult film fan who does not have a stack of red DVD boxes on their shelf in his or her collection. One other note, there is a scene in Lorna which I reference below as being more provocative in its original version. Mondo Macabro has included this scene in their loving restoration of the film (an introductory text halts the beginning of the film on the disc, describing the laborious process of bringing this transfer to the public. This is very commendable work, and I appreciate it when Franco is attributed the value that he deserves.). I have left the original screenshots from my old vhs transfer and have included, above them, screenshots from Mondo Macabro's release. This is not done for comparison, as it is obvious that there is none. I have left the original screenshots, as they were part of the original post and they show how old school Franco fans saw this film, perhaps, prior to this essential release. I purchased my copy here, but it can also be found here.

Patrick (Guy Delorme) and Marianne (Jacqueline Laurent) Mariel, along with their daughter, Linda (Lina Romay), near the threshold of her eighteenth birthday, decide to leave their lush villa and head to the coast for a vacation. Patrick receives a phone call at his holiday destination from a woman named Lorna (Pamela Stanford), who wants Patrick to keep his end of the bargain that the two made nearly eighteen years ago. Lorna, The Exorcist (1974) (a more apt title is this French one, Les possédées du diable) is another Robert de Nesle/Jess Franco collaboration. Whatever pact the duo made with the devil of low-budget cinema is unleashed upon the viewer. The trademark Franco production style, cheap, small crew, few actors, single locations, etc., works completely in Lorna's favor. "Franco delays the descent into the plot as long as possible," write the authors of Immoral Tales, "increasing the claustrophobia, working out his compulsions." The film's extremely simplistic narrative allows Franco to paint a perverse tableau of images, shrouded in the most intense and haunting atmosphere.The eroticism of Lorna, the Exorcist is carried by Romay's Linda and Stanford's Lorna, and their love scenes are captured by Franco with longing, loving looks, slow embraces, and gentle touching and caressing. Lorna begins with Linda emerging from a balcony to seduce a willing Lorna upon a bed. It's a sequence made all the more powerful upon the later revelation that Lorna is the actual seductress; and Lorna's visits to Linda are in her dreams. Visually this sequence and another where Lorna seduces Linda while taking a bath are treated by Franco at the edges of voyeurism. Each sex scene dares to move one step further into its intimacy, threatening to remove any intimacy at all by revealing all. When Lorna finally confronts Linda and reveals her plans for the young daughter, she tells Linda her tale of first meeting her father and the pact they made before she was born. Lorna and Linda embrace again, and perversely Franco plays on the film's incestuous theme. Apparently, this consummation scene was far more provocative and graphic originally (fact from Immoral Tales) and was absent from my French print of the film. (A still from Lorna from this sequence is included in Obsession: The Films of Jess Franco.) The erotic sequences are not reserved completely for Lorna and Linda. Catherine Lafferière appears as a mad patient (victim or lover of Lorna) being treated by a doctor played by Franco; and her performance is as uninhibited as Romay or Stanford. Her scenes have little narrative weight and seem to exist to only permeate the truly erotic and haunting atmosphere.Virtually all of the characters have one motivation and each actor is able to play to his/her motivation with a singular intensity. Delorme's Patrick runs on fear and plays as a desperate man throughout out the film. Laurent's Marianne, like Linda, is a victim of Patrick's pact with Lorna: she doesn't know what to do or what is about to happen. In a particularly nasty scene, she's the victim of one of Lorna's spells in one of the most wince-inducing scenes in Franco's filmography. Lina Romay is fantastic as Linda and is able to genuinely balance the effective and seductive erotic sequences with a wide-eyed performance in the more innocent scenes. Stanford, as Lorna, again delivers with another seductive performance, even all the more brilliant as Franco has her hidden behind quite a bit of bizarre makeup and some impressive costumes. The primary location of the modern hotel lacks the grandeur of the genuine and more ancient locations of Franco's other work, but as the Immoral Tales authors note, the hotel (and Franco's compositions) contributes to the film's claustrophobic and intense atmosphere. Producer Robert de Nesle contributed to the hauntingly beautiful score with André Bénichou, an essential element to Lorna. In Lorna, the Exorcist, Franco plumbs the dark depths and delivers a provocative and dark gem.

Jess Franco's Sexy Sisters (1977)

Edna (Pamela Stanford) is not paying attention to the typically surreal floor show at the club, two nude females in interesting poses and donning demon masks; she is far more interested in Joe (Kurt Meinicke), after draping her leg over his chair to attract his attention. Edna requests a light for her cigarette and a drink, only to have both turned down. Joe's ears prick up when she finally and bluntly requests a shag, and the two go back to Edna's villa. Edna works him up in the living room; her maidservant serves bubbly champagne and undresses Joe; and then, Edna introduces Joe to Milly (Karine Gambier), Edna's sister who is bound to her bed and locked in a cozy cell. Joe and Milly have sex. Dr. Carlos Barrios (Jack Taylor) visits Milly the following morning to treat her physical symptoms and her "nymphomania." Milly is also apparently suffering from powerful sexual hallucinations, a symptom of possible paranoid schizophrenia.

Jess Franco's Sexy Sisters (1977) is one of a baker's dozen (or so) films that Franco made for Swiss producer, Erwin C. Dietrich, who paints this portrait of the Spanish film maker while under contract with Dietrich. When asked, "Was he [Franco] obliged to deliver a certain kind of film while under contract to your company?" Dietrich responds:

Well he pushed himself to work as much as possible. That was also because whenever he was on a set, he knew he had enough to eat. The money he could spend each month was far more that I usually live on, but it still wasn't enough for him. So, naturally he had a lot of financial troubles, overdue bills he had to pay. Several producers were hunting for him because he still owed them large sums. Every once in a while he just disappeared from the hotel where he was staying without paying the bill, leaving his suitcases and personal belongings behind. I can remember once seizing one of his suitcases from a hotel in the South of France from which he had done a moonlight flit. I sent a guy down there to pay Franco's bill and fetch the luggage because Jess told me it contained the negative of a film I had already paid for. Of course there was no negative in the suitcase (laughs). At least he was no longer wanted by the French police. Whenever he was shooting, the production paid for his food. That's probably why he wanted to work so much. He always came to me with new stories saying "I will shoot this, I will shoot that." I always gave him a free hand when he worked for me. I could use every type of film and as many of them as possible. (from Obsession: The Films of Jess Franco)

So I suppose Dietrich's answer to the direct question asked is "no" as evidenced by the last sentence of his answer. Dietrich's accompanying anecdote and description of Franco paints the portrait of a desperate, sometimes indulgent, and derelict artist. Not surprisingly, Sexy Sisters appears a desperate, sometimes indulgent, and derelict film. Not all the Franco/Dietrich collaborations are like this, however. Jack the Ripper (1976) with Klaus Kinski is perhaps their best known, while Doriana Grey (1976) and Blue Rita (1977) are two highlights (and personal favorites), for example.

Sexy Sisters begins visually and thematically in classic Franco style: dreamy, disorienting, and hypnotic. The opening floorshow and the odd, contrived sequence of events leading Joe into Milly's "quarters" are fantastically over-the-top. Franco familiar-face, Jack Taylor's appearance is welcomed, and his initial sequence with Gambier's Milly is fun. Taylor brings as much reservation to his role as he can muster (presumably to keep from laughing), while Gambier is totally uninhibited on camera. In fact, Gambier steals all of her scenes within Sexy Sisters and her presence would merit a viewing of the film alone. While the substance of Franco's compositions is wild in the Franco way, his camera is static. Dietrich is later asked in the same interview in Obsession whether he would work again with Franco, today. Dietrich would but says he would not let Franco shoot his own films. Likewise, Dietrich didn't let Franco shoot Sexy Sisters (Peter Baumgartner would shoot the film, a frequent Dietrich collaborator). When Franco shoots his own films, the result is most certainly from the "right side of brain," and the films are always as interesting visually as thematically (and usually poetic). Dietrich obviously disliked Franco's occasional shot out of focus or the poorly-lit, blurry shots which pop up, here and there, in Franco's flicks. Dietrich's style, which he uses in his own directed films, is very "left side of the brain": meticulously-composed, well-lit, and glossy (and usually not very interesting). Franco's static, Dietrich-style filming hurts Sexy Sisters, giving the film an air of coldness and detachment. Sexy Sisters begins a dark and provocative tale. Edna and Milly are true adversaries in the guise of caregiving Edna and pitiful and sick Milly. Edna's elaborate seduction of Joe is revealed to be passive-aggressive torture of Milly. Later, Edna has sex with her maidservant behind the bars in front of Milly with a wicked smile on her face. Later, Edna invites another man over to the villa to have his way with Milly (but this time, he's someone from Milly's past whom she hates very much). Taylor's diagnosis of Milly developing paranoid schizophrenia is fueled by Edna's deeds. Taylor's character thinks Milly's escapades are hallucinations that she is truly believing are real. Edna is doing nothing to dissuade the doctor. Why? The answer to that question comes with the final two-thirds of the film, as Sexy Sisters descends into a tired, formulaic, and predictable plot. Sexy Sisters becomes totally unengaging on a narrative level (and Franco's powerful, discursive visuals are absent to supplant the narrative). Franco is able to steal the occasional flare, but he's hampered by too much of a seeming desire to make a typical softcore film. It doesn't help either that virtually all the male actors, save Taylor, give absolutely atrocious performances. Stanford and Gambier are the real stars here and are shouldered with delivering Sexy Sisters with nearly all of the film's energy. As it stands, Sexy Sisters is completely uneven, undoubtedly entertaining and engaging at times, and truly overshadowed by myriad Franco films in his diverse filmography.