Jess Franco's first sequel to his popular 1962 Spanish
groundbreaking horror "Gritos en la Noche" AKA "The Awful
Dr. Orloff"
and Yes i know that that film was inspired by the french 1959 "Les
yeux sans visage" but Franco made this genre his own by
ramping up the violence and sex and by adding his own personal style,
something unique and hard to describe (but i'm sure his
biographer Tim Lucas know how to describe this style that makes you
feel Jess presence when you watches his film.
This nice atmospheric gothic horror and murder mystery
is from Franco's first horror period and has little of gore in it but
some
nice visuals in black & white. This film may be some sort of sequel
to "Gritos en la Noche" but i think it more resembles his
1962
The Sadistic Baron von Klaus
(Sinfonia per un Sadico/Le Sadique Baron von Klaus/La Mano de un hombre
muerto).
Both takes place in an Alp town and maybe in Austria, and both films
has the main suspects living in a castle with relatives
arriving for a stay. I very much likes this first early black &
white period of Jess Franco's films due to the gothic atmosphere
and the crisp cinematography (without the abuse of muff zooms) and these
4 films in b&w made between 1962 and 1965 are all
fine (Gritos en la Noche 1962, The Sadistic Baron von Klaus 1962, Dr.
Orloff's Monster 1964 and The Diabolical Dr. Z in 1965.
The Story:
A dying professor tells his secret to his disciple,
Dr. Conrad Jekyll (Marcelo Arroita-Jauregui) of how to make a dead man
live and to make him obey your orders. A Robot or Zombie handled by
the use of high frequency tones.
Dr. Jekyll is married to unhappy Ingluid (Perla Cristal) and he visits
a Jazz club where he meets women, and when they
disappoint him he makes his Robot, Andros (Hugo Blanco) kill them. Why
? Unclear, maybe he's just a misogynist maniac.
Melissa (Agnes Spaak) comes visiting her uncle Conrad and auntie Ingluid
and she soon get to know that her father Andros
died in the castle where the Jekyll's live. What really happened and
will she survive the stay ?
Jesús Franco can be seen playing the piano at
the Jazz club and one of Dr. Jekyll's women sings 2 numbers in spanish.
The film is presented in 1.66:1 widescreen, black & white, with
french or english audio LPCM 2.0 and with english subtitles,
Region A. Extras: Audio commentary by Jess Franco expert Tim Lucas,
French and Italian trailer, Alternate footage