Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. Rewind. This is Rob.
Speaker 2: Lamb and this is Joe McCormick. And Rob and I
Speaker 2: are out this week, so we're bringing you an older
Speaker 2: episode of our sub show, Weird House Cinema. This one
Speaker 2: originally aired on August twentieth, twenty twenty one, and this
Speaker 2: is Return of the Blind Dead.
Speaker 1: That's right, it's an Undead Templars movie. And since it
Speaker 1: is Friday, the thirteenth of October, this is an important
Speaker 1: date in the history of the Knights Templars. This is
Speaker 1: the date when the Catholic Church and royal authorities cracked
Speaker 1: down on the order and well set off the events
Speaker 1: of this film. Also, it's educational, Okay, it's not actually historic.
Speaker 1: You're going to hear discussed in this film. I think
Speaker 1: I think we do touch on the actual history of
Speaker 1: the Knights Templars very briefly, just to give it a
Speaker 1: little bit of background. But yeah, this is a work
Speaker 1: of fantasy, but it's a really fun work of fantasy
Speaker 1: and great for the Halloween season.
Speaker 3: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is Rob Lamb.
Speaker 2: And I'm Joe McCormick.
Speaker 1: This is our fortieth episode of Weird House Cinema and
Speaker 1: our first venture into the cinema of Spain, and it's
Speaker 1: also going to be our fourth episode that jumps into
Speaker 1: a franchise with the second film. We did this with
Speaker 1: Boggy Creek two. We did this with Transfers too, and
Speaker 1: I guess you could make an argument that we did
Speaker 1: this with Troll two, though of course Troll two had
Speaker 1: nothing to do with Troll one, so that's debatable.
Speaker 2: Did you actually comb through all of our titles to
Speaker 2: verify this?
Speaker 1: Well, I mean I have a list of episodes we've done,
Speaker 1: so oh okay, it wasn't much combing, but I did.
Speaker 1: I scanned it real quick.
Speaker 2: Wait a minute, Wait a minute, Wait a minute, I
Speaker 2: think you're forgetting one.
Speaker 1: What's that?
Speaker 2: The e Walk Adventure movie we did was indeed a.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, you're right, that's right. That was a sequel.
Speaker 1: Oh and you know what, technically, Teens in the Universe
Speaker 1: also a sequel, so make that. Wow, this would be
Speaker 1: what number six? Then the sixth film that we've looked
Speaker 1: at that is a sequel to another film. So here
Speaker 1: we go it's we're gonna be talking about Return of
Speaker 1: the Blind Dead aka Return of the Evil Dead.
Speaker 2: Also another eighteen seventy three, another exploitation horror movie from
Speaker 2: the seventies that is badly in need of a bath, Rob,
Speaker 2: How did you dig up this abomination?
Speaker 1: This is one I've been familiar with for a while.
Speaker 1: I think I actually used to have the first two
Speaker 1: of these, the first two Blind Dead films on DVD
Speaker 1: like Ages Past, and lost them at some point or
Speaker 1: traded him in or gave them away, and figured I
Speaker 1: would never need to go back and watch a Blind
Speaker 1: Dead film again. And yet, as these things, these things
Speaker 1: tend to work, eventually the thirst returned and I had
Speaker 1: to go out and watch these films again, or at
Speaker 1: least the second one here.
Speaker 2: This one was a first for me in a number
Speaker 2: of ways. I know I've seen some Spanish horror movies
Speaker 2: from the seventies before. I'm struggling to think of what
Speaker 2: they are, but I know I have. But this was
Speaker 2: the first movie that I can recall seeing that had
Speaker 2: zombies riding horseback.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, this one. So this is an interesting film
Speaker 1: from a number of different perspectives. First of all, just
Speaker 1: as a Spanish horror film. We'll get into this a
Speaker 1: little bit, but it does have kind of an important place.
Speaker 1: It is a key nineteen seventies Spanish horror film that
Speaker 1: ultimately had a big impact on that genre and that
Speaker 1: world of filmmaking. It's one that also has acquired a
Speaker 1: cult following over the years. You'll see it often, You'll
Speaker 1: see it associated with kind of I guess, kind of
Speaker 1: like doom rock kind of vibes. You know, it does
Speaker 1: have like, it has several of the elements, you know,
Speaker 1: the idea of like black hooded figures writing at night,
Speaker 1: weird sounds, they have big swords. So and yeah, it
Speaker 1: is in many respects. I mean, it is a zombie
Speaker 1: film basically, but it has this interesting place kind of
Speaker 1: sandwich between the like the George Romero era of zombie
Speaker 1: films with the First Night of the Living Dead and
Speaker 1: then bridging the way to the glorier realm of zombie
Speaker 1: films that was to come both in the United States
Speaker 1: and in Europe.
Speaker 2: Yeah, i'd agree. So if you look at like Knight
Speaker 2: of the Living Dead as a I don't know, you
Speaker 2: could argue a more cerebral horror film, something that's independent original,
Speaker 2: kind of thoughtful and is very dialogue driven. Almost could
Speaker 2: function as a stage play, right. This is a little
Speaker 2: bit closer to that full cheese zombie zone where it's
Speaker 2: more just about kind of like fluids coming out of
Speaker 2: people's bodies and things being really gross.
Speaker 1: Now, one of the things about our experience here today
Speaker 1: is that we each watched slightly different cuts of the film.
Speaker 1: Then I went back and watched portions of the cut
Speaker 1: that you watched. But the one that I watched is
Speaker 1: like a minute shorter and has a little less gore
Speaker 1: in it, and is missing one crucial scene that we'll
Speaker 1: get to here in a bit, So you probably encounter
Speaker 1: just a little more of the oozing juices compared to
Speaker 1: it to what I saw initially. But still there's some
Speaker 1: dripping blood in my cut as well.
Speaker 2: But this movie is not just a zombie movie. It
Speaker 2: also ties into some strange pseudohistorical themes about the Knight's
Speaker 2: Templar being warlocks or something.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so you don't really need to know anything about
Speaker 1: the knights Templars in order to watch this film, but
Speaker 1: I thought we'd tell you just a minimum of what
Speaker 1: they were and what they were not, so that you
Speaker 1: can maybe have a little more historical understanding of what
Speaker 1: we're going to be talking about here, because this whole
Speaker 1: film is about templars who have come back from the grave,
Speaker 1: that have come back with a thirst for human blood,
Speaker 1: or at least to kill people. I don't know, it's
Speaker 1: debatable how much blood they actually want to drink or
Speaker 1: if they just want to kill people.
Speaker 2: I don't recall them drinking any blood after they come back.
Speaker 2: The drinking blood, I think, is what allows them to
Speaker 2: come back in the future. Right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, when they're living knights, they're all about drinking blood
Speaker 1: and doing bloody sacrifices and rituals. But once they come
Speaker 1: back from the dead, they're just about riding their horses around,
Speaker 1: invading the town, climbing into your house and coming at
Speaker 1: you with a long sword.
Speaker 2: Okay, so what's the deal with these knights?
Speaker 1: Okay, So when we're talking about the Templars or the
Speaker 1: knights Templars, we're talking about the poor Knights of Christ
Speaker 1: and the Temple of Solomon. This was a religious military
Speaker 1: order of the Catholic Church during the time of the Crusades. Now,
Speaker 1: their original purpose was to serve as protectors for pilgrims
Speaker 1: who are on their way to the Holy lands. But
Speaker 1: as you can imagine, with this sort of thing, a
Speaker 1: kind of creep occurred. So after a while they were
Speaker 1: given free reign to move across borders, they were made
Speaker 1: exempt from taxes. They ended up playing key military roles
Speaker 1: in various battles all of the Crusades, sometimes serving as
Speaker 1: kind of like shock troopers. But in addition to military roles,
Speaker 1: their non warriors also played kind of a key role
Speaker 1: during the Crusades, managing the movement of funds across the
Speaker 1: vast distances all of the Crusades and setting up a
Speaker 1: kind of proto banking system. So they became powerful, They
Speaker 1: made powerful enemies, and as the Crusades failed, they ended
Speaker 1: up taking a lot of the blame. And so finally
Speaker 1: you have filled the Fourth of France. With the aid
Speaker 1: of Pope Clement the Fifth, then based in France, they
Speaker 1: worked together to suppress the Order and also bring these
Speaker 1: various false charges of blasphemy and heresy against them, things
Speaker 1: like the idea that they worshiped a severed head and
Speaker 1: engaged in all manner of depravities. And as a result
Speaker 1: of this, the Order was dissolved. Some members were burned
Speaker 1: to the stake, I think fifty six in total, including
Speaker 1: Grand Master Jacques de Molay, and others were Other members
Speaker 1: of the order were absorbed into different militaries and different organizations,
Speaker 1: or they were just sort of you know, retired. So
Speaker 1: you can roughly measure the Crusades as having lasted from
Speaker 1: ten ninety five to twelve ninety one, and then the
Speaker 1: Templars themselves lasted as an organization from eleven nineteen to
Speaker 1: thirteen twelve.
Speaker 2: But beyond their actual role in history, the Templars have
Speaker 2: clearly been an object of fascination for especially people of
Speaker 2: a more pseudo historiographical bent, people who were trying to
Speaker 2: sort of like weave conspiracy theories through medieval history.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yeah, and you see, you know, this is all
Speaker 1: over the board because you see so many sort of
Speaker 1: you know, traghy conspiracy books that involve the Knights Templars.
Speaker 1: But also, I mean, I mean on two levels. First
Speaker 1: of all, you have people like im Berto Echo factoring
Speaker 1: them into fucos pendulum, but you also have very very
Speaker 1: you know, very strong, very serious histories that concern the
Speaker 1: Templars because they were a very fascinating group that was
Speaker 1: involved in a very dynamic time of human history. That
Speaker 1: being said, when you throw in all these accusations of
Speaker 1: blasphemy and heresy, you have the mysteries associated with them,
Speaker 1: you know, it just opens itself up to so many
Speaker 1: different conspiracy theories and crazy ideas. And yes, it's a
Speaker 1: great hook for the creation of some sort of a
Speaker 1: movie monster.
Speaker 2: And from what again. I haven't seen any of the
Speaker 2: other movies in this series, but in this one, the
Speaker 2: premise seems to be, Okay, these Nights, the Templars, they
Speaker 2: were warlocks. You know, they did evil magic and people
Speaker 2: didn't like that, so they killed them. But you know
Speaker 2: what warlocks do. They come back from the dead, right, And.
Speaker 1: That's basically the premise. That's all you really need to know, though,
Speaker 1: I guess the other key thing is that they're not
Speaker 1: only the dead, they are the blind dead. They cannot see,
Speaker 1: so they are functioning in this kind of sightless way
Speaker 1: that's has been explored in other films. I think we
Speaker 1: actually got into this a little bit with the hopping
Speaker 1: vampires of Mister Vampire. Yeah, and and what I guess
Speaker 1: we have some contemporary films as well, right there, was
Speaker 1: something with Jim from the office, like don't make a sound,
Speaker 1: don't be noisy.
Speaker 2: A quiet place, A quiet place, yes, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like a similar thing. Be quiet, so the monsters
Speaker 1: don't get you.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, that's the monsters are blind, but they
Speaker 2: have super sensitive hearing.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So same basically, same deal, similar situation, And that
Speaker 1: was another part of the key cell on these films. Now,
Speaker 1: when I say these films, I'm generally referring to the
Speaker 1: four essentially standalone pictures, all the work of the Spanish
Speaker 1: filmmaker Armando d Osario. He did four Blind Dead films.
Speaker 1: The first was Tombs of the Blind Dead in seventy two,
Speaker 1: and that's basically vacationers encounter the Blind Dead. Then he
Speaker 1: did Return of the Blind Dead, the picture we're discussing
Speaker 1: here today in seventy three, that's locals encounter the Blind Dead.
Speaker 1: And then he did The Ghost Gallion in nineteen seventy four,
Speaker 1: which is basically the Blind Dead plus a ghost ship.
Speaker 1: And then finally he did Night of the Seagulls in
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy five, which is the Blind Dead with a
Speaker 1: coastal setting and a LOVECRAFTI and element thrown in as well,
Speaker 1: I've only seen the first two thus far, but I've
Speaker 1: been tempted. I've been tempted to go to go ahead. Basically,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of debate of these films, like which
Speaker 1: one is the best and which one is the worst,
Speaker 1: And you'll find the connoisseurs land in different places. I've
Speaker 1: seen people. A lot of people are like, nope, it's
Speaker 1: only the first one. I've seen people say nope, the
Speaker 1: second one, Return of the Blind Dead is the best.
Speaker 1: Some people are actually like, nope, the Ghost Gallion, that's
Speaker 1: the one. I think I saw someone say Night of
Speaker 1: the Seagulls. It's kind of all over the place, depending
Speaker 1: on I guess what exactly you're looking for in an undead,
Speaker 1: blind medieval night movie.
Speaker 2: What is the forum for these debates?
Speaker 1: Oh, I don't know. You see just different different posts
Speaker 1: about these movies. I saw an interview with the lead
Speaker 1: singer of Electric Wizard where he referred to the one
Speaker 1: he liked the most. I think he likes the Ghost
Speaker 1: Gaullion the most. Oh, okay, so you know, it's all
Speaker 1: over the place. I guess it depends on what your
Speaker 1: particular tastes are. So far, my favorite is this one, though.
Speaker 2: It's hard to imagine the other ones having human villains
Speaker 2: as profound as like the mayor and all of the
Speaker 2: creeps in this one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this one has a great lineup of human creeps.
Speaker 2: That's one of the main things I noticed about it
Speaker 2: is basically like essentially except for the main character Jack
Speaker 2: and like one other guy, every other dude in this
Speaker 2: movie is cartoonishly cowardly, selfish, and misogynistic, just like awful scumbags.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The elevator pitch I came up with for this
Speaker 1: film is undead Crusader Knights are back from the dead.
Speaker 1: But we can surely handle it if all the men
Speaker 1: in town are not dirt back. But of course almost
Speaker 1: all of them are dirt bags, so most of the
Speaker 1: people in town are doomed now. Before we move forward, though,
Speaker 1: I do want to touch on one other thing concerning
Speaker 1: just the nature of these films, because because one thing
Speaker 1: I like to think about is okay, when you have
Speaker 1: something like this occur, when you have a series of
Speaker 1: four films that are that are influential, seem to have
Speaker 1: hit a nerve, but are also unlike so many other films,
Speaker 1: they seem to exist in isolation. You find yourself asking
Speaker 1: what are these films, like, where do they emerge from
Speaker 1: in sort of the you know, the Spanish mindset of
Speaker 1: the day, or you know, culture and politics of that period.
Speaker 1: And of course one way of looking at is okay, well,
Speaker 1: Asario was just he just had it. Came up with
Speaker 1: a cool twist on the zombie format, right, lean into
Speaker 1: history a little bit, throw in a little wild hunt.
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe you've read Lord of the Rings and you
Speaker 1: throw a little Nasgole in there. I don't know, there's
Speaker 1: so many different ways you could basically come up with
Speaker 1: these same results.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I didn't think about it, but the Blind
Speaker 2: Dead in this film mark kind of nasgul. They're sort
Speaker 2: of ghostly or otherworldly undead riders with swords.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and have at least a different sensory realm that
Speaker 1: they inhabit.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So I wanted to read more about this. I was like,
Speaker 1: all right, somebody has bound to have explored this, and
Speaker 1: I found an article titled Spanish Zombie Films by Alex
Speaker 1: del Olmo Ramon published in the journal Coolabah, and the
Speaker 1: author argues that prior to the sixties and seventies, Spanish
Speaker 1: fantasy and horror cinema was just severely repressed due to
Speaker 1: quote the repression that was still being meted out by
Speaker 1: the church Catholic power and the harsh dictatorship imposed by
Speaker 1: General Franco. Another element that they point out is that
Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty four, Spain's New Standards for Film Development
Speaker 1: initiative opened the door for co productions and the international
Speaker 1: growth of Spanish cinema. And then on top of that,
Speaker 1: there was a big corruption case the time involving loans
Speaker 1: to Spanish cinema production. So for both reasons, low budget
Speaker 1: horror movies were suddenly just this smart investment. They point
Speaker 1: out that despite the fact that Spanish horror and fantasy
Speaker 1: films only numbered something like three hundred or so during
Speaker 1: the sixties and seventies, total, almost one hundred films were
Speaker 1: shot between sixty nine and seventy three. So the idea
Speaker 1: is cheap movies, cheap thrills immediately profitable. But in all
Speaker 1: of that, I think the thing that I latched onto
Speaker 1: the most with this idea, that you know, this insight
Speaker 1: about state and church repression being because ultimately with this
Speaker 1: film we have these horrifying creatures all of the church
Speaker 1: that rise up against the townsfolk and corrupt politicians are
Speaker 1: ultimately powerless to stop them.
Speaker 2: Now, of course, I think if you were going to
Speaker 2: try to defend this movie against charges of blasphemy or something,
Speaker 2: you would say that, like, oh, well, they're not The
Speaker 2: Knights in this movie are not true Christians. They're devil
Speaker 2: worshipers in secret.
Speaker 1: Right right, though apparently I was reading that he was
Speaker 1: very concerned. There were a number of challenges to making
Speaker 1: this film and pretty much all the films that Sorry
Speaker 1: I did. But in the first film, if you go
Speaker 1: back and watch it, you'll see that the Templars, the
Speaker 1: blind Dead all clearly have not a not a cross
Speaker 1: on their chest, not a Templar cross, but instead they
Speaker 1: have the ank on their chest instead. And that was
Speaker 1: in part a direct choice to try and prevent, you know,
Speaker 1: accusations of inappropriateness, because he didn't He was like, I
Speaker 1: don't want to shoot this film and then they're going
Speaker 1: to come back and say, I'm sorry, you have to
Speaker 1: take all the parts with the blind Dead out, So
Speaker 1: he it was safer to just go with an alternate
Speaker 1: crucifix design.
Speaker 2: So these Nights just happened to be followers of the
Speaker 2: Egyptian religion or something.
Speaker 1: Weller. Part of the plot is that they went off
Speaker 1: to foreign lands and they learned foreign concepts, including the
Speaker 1: secret of immortality.
Speaker 2: It's not a very good form of immortality. This is
Speaker 2: something I've wanted to bring up about a number of
Speaker 2: movies that have some kind of demonic figure, vampire, zombie,
Speaker 2: whatever that says you fools. You know, you can strike
Speaker 2: me down, but I will come back from the grave.
Speaker 2: I will live forever. But in almost every case, it
Speaker 2: looks like the form they get to come back in
Speaker 2: their immortality does not look very pleasant for them. I mean,
Speaker 2: are are they having a good time being these rotted
Speaker 2: corpses that are having to chase down the villagers. I mean,
Speaker 2: it doesn't really seem like functional immortality. It just seems like, well,
Speaker 2: your body can kind of come back and lumber around
Speaker 2: and do some violence.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess it's just the whole trope of
Speaker 1: clinging to life, of putting upmost importance on the mortal existence, right,
Speaker 1: even if the mortal existence is reduced by it.
Speaker 2: Right, I guess it's a symbol of a certain kind
Speaker 2: of imagined vanity, right that it's more important that you
Speaker 2: continue to be animate than the what form that that
Speaker 2: life takes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but certainly these are some of my favorite like
Speaker 1: mad scientists and wizard characters from fiction where clearly this
Speaker 1: was a terrible choice. You made a terrible choice. But
Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe they're thinking, ha pulled one over
Speaker 1: on death this time.
Speaker 2: Should we hear some of that trailer?
Speaker 1: Yes, let's hear. I'm not sure if we may even
Speaker 1: play the whole trailer, so just be prepared. Sometimes we
Speaker 1: play a clip, we might play the whole thing because
Speaker 1: it's just a fabulous nineteen seventies grindhouse trailer. And I
Speaker 1: should I should remind you that this is using the
Speaker 1: English title for the film The Return of the Evil Dead.
Speaker 4: Terror once again treks It's legendary course, making your flesh
Speaker 4: creep with pleasure. Night when they are living, rise again
Speaker 4: from their graves. You will tremble with the return of
Speaker 4: the dead, the hell born revenge for which there is
Speaker 4: no assurance of protection. Or will you escape the fear,
Speaker 4: the anxiety which the return of the Evil Dead provokes.
Speaker 2: And you high and excitement help me.
Speaker 4: The Return of the Evil Dead. The Return of the
Speaker 4: Evil Dead with Tony Kendall and Fernando Sancho, the terrifying
Speaker 4: thriller of the Year. Do not attend this film alone.
Speaker 2: We suggest you.
Speaker 4: Bring at least one large part to hold you tightly.
Speaker 4: A lifeless horseman will make this theater into a levy horror.
Speaker 4: The Return of the Evil Dead. The Return of the
Speaker 4: Evil Dead. You're sure you're in a fit condition and
Speaker 4: don't scream?
Speaker 1: All right? Oh man, I love this trailer so much
Speaker 1: for starters. It makes several promises or statements about what
Speaker 1: is going to happen when you see this film.
Speaker 2: They're trying to get you to sign that contract.
Speaker 1: Right. They let you know. It's almost like the side
Speaker 1: effects list on a medication. They let you know that
Speaker 1: your flesh will creep with pleasure, you'll tremble. You Also,
Speaker 1: fear and anxiety are going to be unavoidable. You will
Speaker 1: get high. You should not attend this film alone. You
Speaker 1: should bring at least one large partner to hold you tight.
Speaker 1: The theater itself will become quote a living horror. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure what that means, but it sounds impressive. You
Speaker 1: need to make sure you were in fit condition to
Speaker 1: see this film, so I guess consider going to your
Speaker 1: doctor and making sure that you're cleared, and then also
Speaker 1: don't scream. It's a good idea not to scream. I
Speaker 1: guess it's in case the Blind Dead also infiltrate the theater.
Speaker 2: It's the opposite of the Tingler.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that's right, the Tingler. You had to scream
Speaker 1: to alleviate the growing monster in your what your spinal column?
Speaker 2: I mean, in general, this trailer does have a strong
Speaker 2: William Castle quality to it in that it's yeah, it's
Speaker 2: making lots of promises about what the film will deliver
Speaker 2: in saying like I don't know if you're up to it.
Speaker 1: I don't know, you know, we dare you to see
Speaker 1: this film. Oh and then that's the other thing too
Speaker 1: that I love about it. I love a movie trailer
Speaker 1: that repeats the name of the moves that moves multiple times,
Speaker 1: and this one does it. It says that some of
Speaker 1: you may have noticed that the narrator says the return
Speaker 1: of the Evil Dead six times in less than two minutes.
Speaker 2: It reminds me of those great old radio spots for
Speaker 2: Zombie that would just be like Zombie, ooh, it's got
Speaker 2: my arm, Zombie. No one under seventeen will be admitted.
Speaker 1: All right, shall we get into some of the people
Speaker 1: here involved in this film?
Speaker 2: All right, well, you already mentioned the director Amando Deosrio.
Speaker 1: Yes, director, also writer, and he also did special effects
Speaker 1: on this one. So he lived nineteen eighteen through two
Speaker 1: thousand and one, one of the key names in the
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy Spanish horror Resurgence. He was also a painter.
Speaker 1: He directed commercials and documentaries before branching into horror with
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine's Malenka The Vampire's Niece, and he often
Speaker 1: employed inventive ideas that ran up against budgetary frustrations and
Speaker 1: budgetary realities. So he's one of these guys that he
Speaker 1: seemed to always dream big and never had the budget
Speaker 1: to realize the sources of effects and visuals that he
Speaker 1: actually wanted.
Speaker 2: I love the vampires Niece because it just seems like
Speaker 2: you're working your way down the chain. It's like you
Speaker 2: got bride of Frankenstein, son of Dracula, the Vampire's niece,
Speaker 2: the mummy second cousin.
Speaker 1: I don't know, it doesn't sound like a boat, like like, okay,
Speaker 1: start small Vampire's Niece and we'll work the horror empire
Speaker 1: up from there. Apparently he almost got Boris Karlof for
Speaker 1: that one, but WHOA. I think it wasn't his choice.
Speaker 1: It with something that the producers finally said, now, this
Speaker 1: too much. He's asking too much now. As Ramon points
Speaker 1: out in that article I referenced earlier Asario did it
Speaker 1: just encounter all sorts of issues making the first Blind
Speaker 1: Dead film. He couldn't film in Spain as originally planned
Speaker 1: because authorities were concerned that filming a horror movie there
Speaker 1: might ruin tourism or hurt too, so he ended up
Speaker 1: having to go and shoot in Portugal instead.
Speaker 2: I feel like I missed something in the logic there.
Speaker 2: What would be the relationship between those two things.
Speaker 1: But between the I mean hurting tourism. Yeah, Ramel mentions
Speaker 1: that there were some other things hurting tourism at the
Speaker 1: same time, so like they the tourism had already taken
Speaker 1: a hit, and then here this filmmaker wants to come
Speaker 1: and do some sort of a sleazy horror film or
Speaker 1: right next door, and they're like, I don't know about that.
Speaker 1: So he didn't, you know, he didn't want to risk it.
Speaker 1: He went to Portugal to film instead, Okay, And then
Speaker 1: of course there was the deal with the crosses too.
Speaker 1: He was worried about censorship in that regard.
Speaker 2: So that's how you get the aunks.
Speaker 1: Yes, so it But it's interesting to place this film
Speaker 1: at the very end of Francisco Franco's rule, which ended
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy five, because given all of this, you know,
Speaker 1: you have to figure out, like, what kind of audience
Speaker 1: was this was his film playing to. And Ramon in
Speaker 1: his article writes, quote, the Blind Dead series attracted two
Speaker 1: types of very different generations of audiences. The first were
Speaker 1: hardline fascists and the second were young people who just
Speaker 1: wanted to have fun at the cinema. As Nigel J.
Speaker 1: Burrell noted, Tombs of the Blind Dead can be read
Speaker 1: as an analogy of the rising up of old Spain
Speaker 1: against the permissive generation, but also the repressive fascism of
Speaker 1: the Franco regime versus the youth of the day. So
Speaker 1: that does sound it's kind of like I've read about
Speaker 1: the appeal of the movie patent, about how it was
Speaker 1: able to be two different films to two different demographics.
Speaker 2: Oh okay, so you can imagine some very old conservative
Speaker 2: people would be sort of siding with the blind dead
Speaker 2: and being happy watching them punish young people for partying.
Speaker 2: But you could also be the teenagers going out to
Speaker 2: see the movie. Who you know, you're getting your frights
Speaker 2: and thrills from identifying with the teens who are partying
Speaker 2: and are being chased by these monsters exactly now.
Speaker 1: Asario's final film was nineteen eighty five The Sea Serpent,
Speaker 1: which is apparently a kind of a dream project for him,
Speaker 1: involving a giant monster attacking the Spanish coast. The cast
Speaker 1: ultimately included both Timothy Bottoms and Ray milland but the
Speaker 1: lack of budget once again frustrated him, and he basically
Speaker 1: retired after that film, And I think he went on
Speaker 1: to use some he used to He went on to
Speaker 1: paint blind undead templars to sort of supplement his income
Speaker 1: sell those to fans. And it's interesting that he apparently
Speaker 1: used those kind of paintings to pitch the film to
Speaker 1: begin with, because again he was a painter as well.
Speaker 1: And then he finally tried to get a film titled
Speaker 1: The Necronomicon of the Templars off the ground, but that
Speaker 1: project ever came together either.
Speaker 2: Now, the main character in this movie, played by Tony
Speaker 2: Kendall Is I think this is a first for me
Speaker 2: in films, is a pyrotechnician. His job is that he's
Speaker 2: a fireworks expert. And I cannot recall that ever being
Speaker 2: a job for a main character in anything I've seen.
Speaker 1: No, I don't think i've seen it either. I guess
Speaker 1: it kind of works because the whole thing is this,
Speaker 1: this small town that is supposed to be in Portugal.
Speaker 1: They're about to have this traditional festival that they have
Speaker 1: every year in which they they burn templars in effigy.
Speaker 1: So as it's the case often the case you bring
Speaker 1: in an outsider if you're going to do fireworks, you know,
Speaker 1: it's like some it's not the local fireworks guy. But
Speaker 1: in this case, yeah, it's not even it's not just
Speaker 1: an out of town or it is an American. It's
Speaker 1: American fireworks expert Jack Marlowe.
Speaker 2: This role was written for John Saxon.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean clearly like this. This is what I
Speaker 1: was thinking too. It's like this seems like the perfect
Speaker 1: It was written to bring in some sort of like
Speaker 1: a B lister from Hollywood to be your your big
Speaker 1: star in this picture and sort of you know, pump up,
Speaker 1: you know, international viewership. But yeah, it's just played. It's
Speaker 1: played by a Spanish actor. But I don't know, maybe
Speaker 1: that was easier. I think this is an actor that
Speaker 1: Sario had worked with before or ended up working within
Speaker 1: another picture, so maybe you know, the connects were there
Speaker 1: where the producers liked him.
Speaker 2: Who knows, he's a very handsome man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, former model turned actor did quite a few Spanish
Speaker 1: action films. He was in seven movies in nineteen seventy three.
Speaker 1: He was in a string of commisaw X action movies
Speaker 1: in the sixties, and he went on to do a
Speaker 1: lot of Spaghetti Western work. He was in some Gallo films.
Speaker 1: He was in Mario Bava's The Whip in the Body,
Speaker 1: So he seemed to wound up in just about every
Speaker 1: genre of film possible at that time.
Speaker 2: Now, as we mentioned, apart from the main character played
Speaker 2: by Tony Kendall here, basically all of the other dudes
Speaker 2: in the movie are just these unbelievable like creeps and
Speaker 2: dirt bags. And I'd say that the one at the
Speaker 2: top of the heap is good old Mayor Duncan, who
Speaker 2: was played by someone named Fernando Sancho, who I want
Speaker 2: to give a bouquet of flowers to this man, like
Speaker 2: he does not hold back. He was like, you know,
Speaker 2: he is committed to making the audience hate him more
Speaker 2: than they have hated anyone ever.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, he has a total heel. He's basically I
Speaker 1: was thinking about this as we were putting the notes together.
Speaker 1: He's everything Mayor Quimby is on The Simpsons, except like
Speaker 1: the nineteen seventies small Portuguese or Spanish town version of that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but without the charm that makes Quimby's sometimes lovable. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 2: this guy's not watering the plants in his closet and stuff.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this guy's a selfish brute. The actor himself of
Speaker 1: Fernando Sancho. He worked in a lot of spaghetti westerns,
Speaker 1: you know that sort of film. Apparently he has an
Speaker 1: uncredited role in nineteen sixty two's Lawrence of Arabia. But this,
Speaker 1: this seems to be I don't know, as far as
Speaker 1: movies I've seen him in. This is his crowning achievement. Now,
Speaker 1: his character has a fiance and she's a major character
Speaker 1: in this, and that is Vivian, the mayor's fiance, played
Speaker 1: by Esperanza Roy born nineteen thirty five and as of
Speaker 1: this recording, I think she's still still alive.
Speaker 2: I'd say she's the other main character apart from Jack
Speaker 2: Marlow Tony Kendall.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, she's our I don't know if you want
Speaker 1: to call her the heroin or just the love interest,
Speaker 1: but I don't know. It's not the worst role that
Speaker 1: you could imagine in a film of this caliber. You know,
Speaker 1: she's not a complete damsel in distress like she seems.
Speaker 1: She has a certain amount of strength and character to her,
Speaker 1: and apparently she haven't. I don't think I've seen her
Speaker 1: in anything else, but I've read that she has a
Speaker 1: chance to showcase her skills more in films like nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy three is a Candle for the Devil. But she
Speaker 1: was a Spanish actor trained dancer, and then I think
Speaker 1: later she was married to an important Spanish film producer. Now,
Speaker 1: if you have a character like may Or Duncan, you
Speaker 1: got to have a thug. And the thug in this
Speaker 1: film is Howard played by Frank Brana.
Speaker 2: Another exquisite scumbag.
Speaker 1: Yeah, lived nineteen thirty four through twenty twelve, and this
Speaker 1: guy has been in a number of Spanish genre films,
Speaker 1: that that we have seen some of you have may
Speaker 1: have seen, and that are just some exquisite cheese.
Speaker 2: Oh wait, he was in some one p quer Simon
Speaker 2: movies like pod People.
Speaker 1: Yes, he was in pod People, which I think the
Speaker 1: original title was Extraterrestrial Visitors as from nineteen eighty three.
Speaker 1: But he was also in Slugs from nineteen eighty eight,
Speaker 1: which is indeed a Nature attacks film about slugs that
Speaker 1: will either crawl on your body or crawl up the toilet.
Speaker 1: And then also a film titled Pieces from nineteen eighty two.
Speaker 2: I don't recall if I know anything about that one
Speaker 2: or not.
Speaker 1: It's a chainsaw film, I believe, But okay, which one
Speaker 1: is the one you've seen?
Speaker 2: Well, I've seen Pod People, and I think I've seen slugs.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, I think with Pieces, I think I've seen Pieces.
Speaker 1: But you've seen another chainsaw film that I sometimes get
Speaker 1: confused with it like a Spanish chainsaw film, maybe an
Speaker 1: Italian chainsaw film? Torso is that the one? Like a
Speaker 1: really weird one?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean to be honest, Sometimes I see these movies,
Speaker 2: don't recall what the title is because they all have
Speaker 2: multiple titles. Yeah, but wait, which guy is he in
Speaker 2: Pod People? Is he one of the trappers in the
Speaker 2: woods or not? Because they're hunters, Yeah, hunters or poachers.
Speaker 1: I can't remember which. It's been a little while since
Speaker 1: I've seen Pod People. But he has This guy has
Speaker 1: a real sam the Eagle look to him.
Speaker 2: Yeah, silver hair, a strong brow line, and he looks
Speaker 2: like he could do some do some real cruelty, like
Speaker 2: you know, the brow turns inward that way. Yeah, show
Speaker 2: that he has no heart.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so this is the guy played a lot of
Speaker 1: police inspectors and enforcers that sort of role.
Speaker 2: Oh but hey, we're not done with the creeps.
Speaker 1: Oh yes, because this film has a terrific central creep
Speaker 1: in the form of Murdo. And Murdo is played by
Speaker 1: jose Kanalejas, who lived nineteen twenty five through twenty fifteen. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is probably the most outlandish role in the entire film.
Speaker 1: Murdo is the caretaker of the ruined abbey, out of
Speaker 1: which the undead, blind dead are going to emerge. He's
Speaker 1: sometimes described as the village idiot. He reminds me a
Speaker 1: lot of Ron Pearlman's later portrayal of Salvatore in the
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty six adaptation of the Name of the Rose.
Speaker 2: Hmmm. I would kind of describe him as a disturbed
Speaker 2: Stephen King look alike with a monobrow.
Speaker 1: He does kind of have a king look to them
Speaker 1: to him, doesn't he. Yeah, he's Oh man, this this
Speaker 1: guy's so great in this film. And we'll get into
Speaker 1: some of the differences here in a bit, But if
Speaker 1: you go with the Spanish dub, I mean, if you
Speaker 1: go with the English dub on this, you're gonna miss
Speaker 1: out on the creepy voice of Murdo because the dub
Speaker 1: has a creepy voice, but the authentic Murdo voice is
Speaker 1: just excellent. Oh.
Speaker 2: I love the voice acting in this. So you know,
Speaker 2: this movie got me thinking about how each language has
Speaker 2: its own standard vocal tropes for representing the voice of
Speaker 2: an evil or creepy person, and there are some similarities
Speaker 2: across languages, but but there are also some peculiarities to
Speaker 2: each language. And I feel like I really like the
Speaker 2: Spanish languages way of doing an evil or creepy voice.
Speaker 2: There's a through line between like the way the Templar
Speaker 2: Warlock in this movie talks and the way Murdo talks,
Speaker 2: and like the vocal performances you get from the NPCs
Speaker 2: and Resident Evil for.
Speaker 1: How did they sound. I don't think i've played Resident
Speaker 1: Evil for.
Speaker 2: I mean, they sound a lot like characters in this movie.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, well, before we keep going, let's go ahead
Speaker 1: have a quick sample of Murdo's voice from a particular
Speaker 1: spot in the film that I thought was just excellent.
Speaker 1: I'll reference what he was saying here in a bit,
Speaker 1: but this is a great scene where he's in countering
Speaker 1: Vivian and Jack Marlowe in The Ruins. Now KAA. LEAs
Speaker 1: was a Spanish actor, and he seems to have played
Speaker 1: a lot of henchmen in a lot of westerns. If
Speaker 1: you just look up pictures of him, you'll most often
Speaker 1: see him with a beard and a cowboy hat. He
Speaker 1: even shows up in a fistful of dollars and for
Speaker 1: a few dollars more. These are Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns,
Speaker 1: as this guy's just showing up his uncredited gang members
Speaker 1: in both. But yeah, so he generally was playing heavies.
Speaker 1: But he also directed a couple of Spanish comedies in
Speaker 1: the mid seventies. But in this he's just a fabulous creep.
Speaker 2: Now, one of the templars at the beginning of this
Speaker 2: movie is played by somebody who looked familiar to me,
Speaker 2: but I couldn't place him. But now that you've done
Speaker 2: the research, I think I know where I know him from,
Speaker 2: and that's Luis Barbou.
Speaker 1: Yes, he plays the executed Templar. He lived nineteen twenty
Speaker 1: seven through two thousand and one. It's not a huge role,
Speaker 1: but you do get to see him drink blood and
Speaker 1: or consuming human heart. But this is a guy. It
Speaker 1: had one hundred and twenty five credits and does pop
Speaker 1: up in some big Western films like Conan the Barbarian,
Speaker 1: in which he plays quote unquote red hair.
Speaker 2: I think I recall him here. Yeah, he's like a
Speaker 2: warrior type guy.
Speaker 1: Is he like one of the sort of father figures
Speaker 1: to Conan after he has abducted.
Speaker 2: Well, No, he's the guy who like buys Conan the
Speaker 2: Barbarian trains him to fight as a gladiator.
Speaker 1: That's right, that's right, I remember him now. But anyway,
Speaker 1: this is the guy that shows up in a lot
Speaker 1: of Spanish genre films of this time period.
Speaker 2: Now, one thing I noticed about this movie is that
Speaker 2: it has it has a very distinctive musical theme. It
Speaker 2: has like a melody that you can hum walking out
Speaker 2: of the movie. But it also the melody really reminds
Speaker 2: me of like the theme song of an anthology horror
Speaker 2: TV show, Like it sounds like it would be the
Speaker 2: theme song of Tales from the Dark Side or something.
Speaker 1: Which one are you talking about, the more melodic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the one that plays over the end credits.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, Yeah, let's have a quick sample of that.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: See, I think that it's it's very contemplative. This is
Speaker 1: a this is a walking off into the distance bit
Speaker 1: of music here. But then of course the other uh,
Speaker 1: the the the other types of sounds we hear. The
Speaker 1: other main really the main character of this soundtrack, which
Speaker 1: you I believe heard in the trailer is this kind
Speaker 1: of cacophonous masonic chanting synthy uh just kind of a
Speaker 1: it just sounds from hell, like the sort of synth
Speaker 1: music that would arise from the crypt alongside uh dark
Speaker 1: riders in slow motion.
Speaker 2: Yeah, a lot of a lot of evil laughter and
Speaker 2: size and echoey noises with digital postproput processing on them.
Speaker 1: Right, And this is the work all four films, all
Speaker 1: four of the Blind Dead films. It's the work of
Speaker 1: Anton Garcia Abril, who lived nineteen thirty three through twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one, and that Kulabah article I referenced earlier included
Speaker 1: an interesting tidbit about this quote. Osorio's film is adorned
Speaker 1: by a soundtrack by Anton Garcia Abril, who did a
Speaker 1: brilliant job with limited resources, repeatedly recording the name of
Speaker 1: the production manager of the film Tomb of the Blind
Speaker 1: Dad in nineteen seventy one, Perez Ginner, and then running
Speaker 1: the tape backwards to create a sound treatment with the
Speaker 1: addition of a chorus made up of only two people.
Speaker 2: Wait, so was this in honor of the production manager
Speaker 2: or in mockery of him?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I guess it depends. It depends how
Speaker 1: he received it. But yeah, that sounds incredible because the
Speaker 1: end result is very atmospheric, very very doomy and gloomy,
Speaker 1: and I think absolutely holds up. I do think it
Speaker 1: is a shame that so many of these, especially you
Speaker 1: look at Italian genre films. There there have been some
Speaker 1: really classy vinyl releases of those soundtracks, and we've mentioned
Speaker 1: these before on the show when they pop up. But
Speaker 1: I don't think the music from the Blind Dead movies
Speaker 1: has ever been released in any format. I was looking
Speaker 1: around on discogs to see if it even came out
Speaker 1: on any format back in the day, and as far
Speaker 1: as I can tell.
Speaker 2: It has not. Well, it could be wrong. I don't
Speaker 2: know if I noticed as much variation in the musical
Speaker 2: content in this one as you might find and say,
Speaker 2: you know the Italian jello movies of the era.
Speaker 1: True, yeah, but you know they could at least put
Speaker 1: out a single, right or or it'll put it on
Speaker 1: a compilation. I don't know, because ultimately, the other thing
Speaker 1: about it is that Anton Garcia April was an acclaimed
Speaker 1: Spanish composer and musician. I don't know if I gave
Speaker 1: his dates. He know he was born nineteen thirty three
Speaker 1: and oh you did, yeah, died this year. So he
Speaker 1: was around for a while, long time head of the
Speaker 1: Department of Compositions and Musical Forms of the Drid Royal Conservatory.
Speaker 1: And if you look him up on your favorite digital
Speaker 1: music source, you'll find numerous releases of his work. And
Speaker 1: he also did a number of scores from film and
Speaker 1: TV over the years as well, So you know, he's
Speaker 1: not an obscure figure. But this, like I say this, this,
Speaker 1: these particular sounds have not been re released in any
Speaker 1: format that I could come across.
Speaker 2: There was a there there was a bug in my
Speaker 2: ear when I was watching this movie, which is that
Speaker 2: one of the sounds in the sort of blind dead
Speaker 2: cacaphony theme is something that sounds exactly like a sound
Speaker 2: that they make in that SNL musical skit, the creep
Speaker 2: when they say, oh, it did that multiple times.
Speaker 1: There is a shocking a sound that occurs. I wonder
Speaker 1: if there's any connection there. A Murdo would have been
Speaker 1: it would have been a great creep. He kind of
Speaker 1: does put video.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he definitely could have done a verse.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, shall we get into the plot of
Speaker 1: this one a little bit?
Speaker 2: Okay, Now, this is one of those movies that is
Speaker 2: they're not going to take their time. They're going to
Speaker 2: kick things right off with high action from frame one.
Speaker 2: So from the very beginning, we have pitchforks, folks. My
Speaker 2: version started with a bunch of fourteenth century villagers, all
Speaker 2: armed with classic pitchfork torch combo, rounding up templars in
Speaker 2: a frenzied mob, saying to them, you are evil warlocks
Speaker 2: you must die, and then burning their eyes out with fire,
Speaker 2: and they give a reason for that. Actually, when they
Speaker 2: grab the Templars and they're like, you are evil warlocks,
Speaker 2: were going to kill you, the Templars promise they will
Speaker 2: return from the grave. They say, well, rise from the
Speaker 2: grave for revenge and raise this town to the ground.
Speaker 2: And when they make this promise, you know, we'll rise
Speaker 2: from the grave and get you. The villager responds, well,
Speaker 2: you know, we'll put a stop to that. Will burn
Speaker 2: your eyes out and you'll never find this town again.
Speaker 2: It's one of those things that it's very like magical
Speaker 2: movie logic because what they do after this is they
Speaker 2: just completely burn the Templars, in which case I think
Speaker 2: their eyes would be burned anyway, but like first they
Speaker 2: poke them in the eyes with their torches.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Now, I guess there are a couple of things
Speaker 1: going on here. First of all, in general about this
Speaker 1: film being right to the action, since it is it's
Speaker 1: you know, it's not directly connected to the first film,
Speaker 1: and I think basically all the Blind Dead films are
Speaker 1: standalone films. But you could make an argument that this
Speaker 1: is the prequel, that this is showing like where they
Speaker 1: came from, and at any rate, they dispense with any
Speaker 1: kind of you know, mystery about what's going on. You know,
Speaker 1: it's the Blind Dad, So they're not even going to
Speaker 1: pretend that there's any mystery regarding what they are or
Speaker 1: where they're coming from. They're going to go ahead and
Speaker 1: also establish why they're blind.
Speaker 2: Oh, in the other movies, is it like a mystery,
Speaker 2: like we don't know what these things are? Suddenly they're
Speaker 2: just zombies riding horses poking us with swords.
Speaker 1: In the first one, I believe, and I didn't rewatch
Speaker 1: the first one in its entirety, but kind of poked
Speaker 1: around in the film, you know, like zoomed around with
Speaker 1: the slider, and I believe it has a much slower
Speaker 1: rollout of what's going on, So it has a much
Speaker 1: slower pace until you start getting some undead templar action.
Speaker 2: Well, anyway, in this prologue, the villagers then burn a
Speaker 2: bunch of extremely obvious mannequins dressed as templars, like really
Speaker 2: obvious mannequins, to the point where I was thinking, wait
Speaker 2: a second, are they just supposed to be burning mannequins?
Speaker 2: But no, I think it was just not super convincing
Speaker 2: as humans, but hey, that's okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, one of these things where these are supposed to
Speaker 1: be real humans being burned. But in the same picture
Speaker 1: we see people burning what are supposed to be effigies
Speaker 1: all of the same Templars, so you know, it creates
Speaker 1: unfair comparisons for sure.
Speaker 2: But then immediately it's present day or present day at
Speaker 2: the time of the film, and it looks like the
Speaker 2: villagers are preparing for some kind of festival. So it
Speaker 2: turns out it is the five hundredth anniversary of the
Speaker 2: village's defeat of the Templars. So you see people out
Speaker 2: there messing with some I think they are Templar effigies right,
Speaker 2: that they're going to burn in the town square. Like
Speaker 2: that's what the festival is like, haha, I remember when
Speaker 2: we burned these warlocks. Well, we're gonna burn statues of
Speaker 2: them and.
Speaker 1: Then we're gonna drink and there's gonna be dancing and
Speaker 1: American fireworks.
Speaker 2: But quite immediately as the preparations for the festivities are
Speaker 2: going on, we meet Murdo. He's sort of creeping and
Speaker 2: peeking around a corner, and immediately some children are just like, hey, look,
Speaker 2: there's Murdo, get him and what is going on here?
Speaker 1: Yeah, because these kids they throw I think they throw rocks,
Speaker 1: and then they manage to knock him down and just
Speaker 1: start kicking the crap out of him. Like it's a
Speaker 1: brutal beat down on Murdo.
Speaker 2: And we haven't seen Murdo do anything wrong yet. I
Speaker 2: mean we will later on, but so far, he's just
Speaker 2: this guy who looks kind of weird and like a
Speaker 2: bunch of eight year olds are kicking this guy to death.
Speaker 2: Like the implication is that these extremely evil children would
Speaker 2: have killed this guy, except a very nice lady comes
Speaker 2: and intervenes and she kind of chases them off.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the brutality of the kids attacking him. I kept
Speaker 1: thinking about it because this seems like a very intentional choice.
Speaker 1: But what does it mean? Or is it to make
Speaker 1: us feel for Murdo, Like he's this outsider character who's
Speaker 1: kind of weird, and hey, maybe you'd be weird too
Speaker 1: if kids attacked you on site and tried to kill you.
Speaker 1: Or is it something about the town itself, like this
Speaker 1: is what the children are like in this town. Can
Speaker 1: you imagine what sort of like the local business culture,
Speaker 1: the local government that they grow up into. Like maybe
Speaker 1: this town is just you know, cursed from the seed up.
Speaker 1: I guess.
Speaker 2: I mean a large number of the adults are also
Speaker 2: very bad. Yes, Now, did you make anything of Murdo's
Speaker 2: monobrow here? We talked about in Mister Vampire, how the
Speaker 2: one eyebrow priest that we think that that eyebrow was
Speaker 2: supposed to be a sign of like respect, like that,
Speaker 2: you know, the one eyebrow shows that he's strong, that
Speaker 2: he's serious, that he means business.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in this I don't know, I guess it just
Speaker 1: kind of feels like they did a random assortment of
Speaker 1: physical characteristics that would make their weird character stand out
Speaker 1: as a weirdo in a film of this caliber.
Speaker 2: Yeah. But anyway, from here we get the basic situation
Speaker 2: of the plot. This is not a very plot driven movie,
Speaker 2: so there's not a whole lot to explain in terms
Speaker 2: of here. We might just pick a few things here
Speaker 2: and there to talk about. But the basic situation is
Speaker 2: that they're going to have this festival here in the town,
Speaker 2: and the town has summoned an American fireworks expert named
Speaker 2: Jack Marlowe to do fireworks stuff, and he was hired
Speaker 2: on behalf of the mayor duncan By Vivian, with whom
Speaker 2: Jack the fireworks guy, has a history, and so she
Speaker 2: is the mayor's assistant and she is engaged to him,
Speaker 2: but she does not really like him, and she has
Speaker 2: summoned Jack to the town as their fireworks gy, presumably
Speaker 2: because she wants to reignite her relationship with him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and escape the town, like this is a possible
Speaker 1: way out of this place, which I think. You know,
Speaker 1: this play sucks. The kids are awful. Yeah, you got
Speaker 1: Murdo creeping around and then nobody knows this is going
Speaker 1: to happen. But the dead are going to rise from
Speaker 1: the grave and start butchering people in the streets tonight.
Speaker 2: Right, And then that's what happens while Marlowe is there.
Speaker 2: The Blind Dead rise from their graves and set out
Speaker 2: on their quest of WARLOCKI vengeance. Now it's a question.
Speaker 2: I think it's a difference in the different versions of
Speaker 2: the film will give you different understandings of why the
Speaker 2: Blind Dead rise.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so the version I watch, so to be clear,
Speaker 1: So you can't find this film just everywhere right now,
Speaker 1: it seems like it should be streaming everywhere, but I
Speaker 1: had to rent a digital copy through Apple, like Apple
Speaker 1: Movies or whatever is. And the version I watched, the
Speaker 1: film called itself was pretty good, but it was dubbed
Speaker 1: into English with no option for the Spanish, and there
Speaker 1: was like one minute of footage cut with your version
Speaker 1: versus my version, so I didn't see some of the
Speaker 1: blood that you saw. I didn't see a woman's heart
Speaker 1: ripped out and bitten like an apple. But then the
Speaker 1: other thing is it totally changes Murdo's role in everything
Speaker 1: and exactly why the dead have risen. In the version
Speaker 1: I watched, it's implied, or even stated through some of
Speaker 1: the added dialogue in the dub that the templar Templars
Speaker 1: were always going to come back five hundred years later,
Speaker 1: and denied is five hundred years later, Like this is
Speaker 1: just something that was always going to happen, and Murdo
Speaker 1: kind of knows that it's going to happen, perhaps because
Speaker 1: he hears the sounds beneath the abbey that sort of thing,
Speaker 1: but he's basically like, oh, yeah, they're coming back, and
Speaker 1: I'm looking forward to it, and they're going to be
Speaker 1: my friends. You know, I'm creepy about it.
Speaker 2: He's more like Ralph in the first Friday the Thirteenth movie.
Speaker 2: He's just kind of like creeping around, going.
Speaker 1: You're all doomed, Yes, exactly.
Speaker 2: But in the version I saw, Murdo is more an
Speaker 2: active villain of the film who summons the blind dead
Speaker 2: by performing a human sacrifice in order to make them
Speaker 2: rise from their graves.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, in the in the version you watched,
Speaker 1: and then I went back and watched parts of again, like,
Speaker 1: Murdo is a kidnapper and a cold blooded murderer who
Speaker 1: wants to who engages in blood sacrifice in order to
Speaker 1: have the Templars rise from the grave and destroy the
Speaker 1: town that he hates. And maybe he has every right
Speaker 1: to hate it. I think you can make that argument.
Speaker 1: But he is a kidnapper and a murderer. In the
Speaker 1: version I initially saw, it's just kind of like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: he's you know, he's just there. He's here to watch,
Speaker 1: but he's not. He certainly hasn't killed anybody.
Speaker 2: Now the version you saw, though, you said that he
Speaker 2: thinks they're his friends. One thing is he's hanging out
Speaker 2: when they first strives from their tombs, and he's like, hey,
Speaker 2: remember me, I'm Murdo, I'm your friend, Like he literally
Speaker 2: said that in the subtitles, at least of the part
Speaker 2: I watched. Did your version have that?
Speaker 1: Yes, it did, so he was saying that. But the
Speaker 1: one area I noticed where where the dub was totally
Speaker 1: different versus what he actually said, was the very end
Speaker 1: of that. So there's a sequence where Jack and Vivian
Speaker 1: go to the abbey Ruins and you know, it's if
Speaker 1: the Abbey Ruins are all grown up, and it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's kind of green and lush, and so they start
Speaker 1: to reacquaint with each other and she's.
Speaker 2: Like, She's like, I still love you. Let's run away together.
Speaker 1: Right, and Murdo is of hardcore. Ye, Murdo is watching
Speaker 1: from the bushes, and then they see Murdo and they
Speaker 1: end up having a conversation with Murdo. And at the
Speaker 1: very end of that in the version I watch in
Speaker 1: the English dub, she says something dismissive to Murdo and
Speaker 1: he's and he just responds with something like, oh, they
Speaker 1: never listen. But in the original mur it was super
Speaker 1: creepy because she's saying, you should forget all this and
Speaker 1: just go get a girlfriend, go dance at the at
Speaker 1: the festival, and then he says in Spanish, I already
Speaker 1: have one, and there's this evil snicker, and then a
Speaker 1: jump cut to Murdo murdering the woman that he has kidnapped. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so's It's a really creepy moment in the film, and
Speaker 1: one that I'm really surprised that they cut, because I
Speaker 1: feel like you don't tremendously sanitize the film by taking
Speaker 1: that out. It's like, it's already a.
Speaker 2: Bloody, still grody.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I don't It's like unless it was just
Speaker 1: like the Murdo Appreciation Society where they're like, no, Murdo
Speaker 1: needs to be a good person in this film, where
Speaker 1: I don't quite understand why you would do that. Again,
Speaker 1: you're just cutting a minute off the runtime.
Speaker 2: I mean, perhaps it seems incongruous because later in the
Speaker 2: movie Murdo does appear too genuinely try to help the
Speaker 2: lady who saved him from being murdered by the mob
Speaker 2: of eight year olds early. It's true, and maybe they
Speaker 2: thought it wouldn't make sense for him to be trying
Speaker 2: to help her if he had already murdered somebody earlier
Speaker 2: in the movie.
Speaker 1: I guess, so I could see that being the case, because, yeah,
Speaker 1: later on in the film, you're kind of expecting Murdo
Speaker 1: to turn on her or something, but he doesn't, or
Speaker 1: at least he never gets the chance to.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, maybe he would have if the Blind Dead
Speaker 2: had not cut his head off spoiler.
Speaker 1: Oh.
Speaker 2: But also here we get a flashback where we learned
Speaker 2: that the Templars learned secret rights that allowed them to
Speaker 2: achieve eternal life, and a couple of observations about this. Again,
Speaker 2: Like I said, the immortality that they're able to achieve
Speaker 2: does not seem very pleasant. But the other thing is
Speaker 2: that the quote secret rights appear to be simply doing
Speaker 2: a human sacrifice, drinking somebody's blood and then pulling their
Speaker 2: heart out and just like eating it, just biting into
Speaker 2: it like a big turkey leg.
Speaker 1: Now, to complicate things, not only did my cut of
Speaker 1: the film not have the heart biting a scene, it
Speaker 1: also positions this human sacrifice right at the beginning of
Speaker 1: the film, before we see the villagers kill the Templars.
Speaker 1: So it's interesting. Doesn't make a huge difference, I guess,
Speaker 1: But I guess it comes by virtue of also moving
Speaker 1: around that removing that Murdo Human Sacrifice Part.
Speaker 2: Oh, I see, okay, but whatever the mechanics in any version,
Speaker 2: the townsfolk are having a big party. They're all dancing
Speaker 2: in the town square. Everybody's drinking, having a good time.
Speaker 2: Jack and Vivian are planning to run off together that night.
Speaker 2: And then the Blind Dead awake, they come out of
Speaker 2: their graves. We get a great subtitle that says, Masonic
Speaker 2: chanting intensifies. Murdo is like, hey, I'm your friend, and
Speaker 2: then they run off toward the town to start knocking
Speaker 2: on doors and whacking people with swords.
Speaker 1: Yes, and oh yeah. So I saw one review of
Speaker 1: this film which was like pointing out that the Blind
Speaker 1: Dead are basically they get a lot of screen time.
Speaker 1: They're almost constantly on the screen, especially after they ride,
Speaker 1: and so you see a lot of them, and sometimes
Speaker 1: they look very good. I think sometimes they do have
Speaker 1: that kind of scarecrow puppet appearance as well.
Speaker 2: I think the Blind Dead actually do. I think they
Speaker 2: look pretty good, pretty scary, and they would have looked
Speaker 2: scarier if you saw less of them in the movie.
Speaker 2: I mean, they're given too much screen time. This is
Speaker 2: a classic mistake in horror movies. You show your monster
Speaker 2: too much.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think some of my favorite scenes are of
Speaker 1: them riding though, because despite the complexities of having to
Speaker 1: use an obviously live horse, they cover the horse pretty well.
Speaker 1: They put these kind of like same grave weathered garments
Speaker 1: over the horse, and then the knights the blind Dead
Speaker 1: are riding these horses in kind of a slow motion
Speaker 1: effect with that super effective creepy music. And then they're
Speaker 1: also shooting day for night in most of these scenes.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, I noticed that too, which, of course
Speaker 2: that's not unique to this movie. I mean tons of movies,
Speaker 2: especially movies we talk about on this on this show,
Speaker 2: do day for night shots, and some of the ones
Speaker 2: in here look okay, other ones are less convincing.
Speaker 1: Well, it's weird when I think about day for night
Speaker 1: because I think, as we may have pointed out before,
Speaker 1: it's harder to shoot at night, and in many cases
Speaker 1: it's easier to shoot during the day and to make
Speaker 1: it look like night by under exposing the scene in
Speaker 1: camera or darkening it during post production. And sometimes you
Speaker 1: can kind of lean into the disbelief, like willingly disbelieve
Speaker 1: that you're looking at a daytime shot and just just
Speaker 1: go okay, it's night, I'll accept it, and sometimes that's
Speaker 1: easier to do than other times in a film. But
Speaker 1: then in this film particularly, I found that the day
Speaker 1: for night shots had kind of an unreality to them
Speaker 1: that I kind of liked. And it's like, oh, it's
Speaker 1: kind of daylight, but it's not. It almost has this yeah,
Speaker 1: this weird nether realm kind of equality to it, and
Speaker 1: for that reason, I don't know, it kind of works
Speaker 1: for me.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's definitely better than the ones. And like, when
Speaker 2: I think about the worst examples of day for night shots,
Speaker 2: I think of, for example, the movie made famous on
Speaker 2: Mystery Science Theater Werewolf, Oh, where it seems that they
Speaker 2: have shot nighttime scenes in broad daylight, not just daylight,
Speaker 2: but like bright bright daylight with like maybe a blue
Speaker 2: gel over the lens or something.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes it's it's really hard to
Speaker 1: accept it. It's like no, no, like the brain will
Speaker 1: just not shut it off, whereas like in these films
Speaker 1: it's almost like there's been an eclipse or something like
Speaker 1: it feels it feels cosmically wrong, like it doesn't feel
Speaker 1: like day, but it also doesn't feel like night. It's
Speaker 1: it seems it seems like this is the sort of
Speaker 1: environment into which the dead might.
Speaker 2: Arise, so I end up buying right now. Plot wise,
Speaker 2: as the blind Dead continue to close in on the
Speaker 2: town square where everybody's celebrating and dancing at the festival,
Speaker 2: you get this like the mayor and all of his
Speaker 2: goons become in singly aware of what's going on, and
Speaker 2: there's this strange subplot where they were I think maybe
Speaker 2: two or three times even in the movie, they call
Speaker 2: somebody who's like the higher up in government, I guess
Speaker 2: the local I don't know, the provincial administrator or something,
Speaker 2: to get him to send in the army and save
Speaker 2: them from the blind dead, and he is completely dismissive
Speaker 2: of them. You see him. He's also just another scumbag,
Speaker 2: and he's just like, yeah, whatever, you're all drunk and
Speaker 2: just hangs up the phone. And I was wondering again, like, okay,
Speaker 2: I'm wondering how to read the nineteen seventy three Spanish
Speaker 2: politics of scenes like this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, this film this feels very intentional because I
Speaker 1: think in the dub version it's the governor they're calling.
Speaker 1: So you have the local politician who's totally corrupt and
Speaker 1: cowardly and no help at all to the situation. But
Speaker 1: he reaches the point where's like, I better call the
Speaker 1: next guy, better call the governor, And the governor is
Speaker 1: is equally unhelpful and seems seemingly equally like morally corrupt,
Speaker 1: Like it's it's either stated or implied that he's hanging
Speaker 1: out in a room with his perhaps mistress the whole time.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, just ends up just missing them all as
Speaker 1: drunks and tells him to go pray about it at church.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, that's right, he says, Yes, pray for and
Speaker 2: then he asks them to pray for him. Yes, say
Speaker 2: pray for us, pray for your leaders. But also so
Speaker 2: the mayor. There's this great scene where they're the mayor
Speaker 2: and Jack and Vivian and the mayor's main henchman guy
Speaker 2: are standing up on this balcony and they watch as
Speaker 2: the blind Dead ride into the town square and just
Speaker 2: start killing everybody at the big party, and the mayor
Speaker 2: and I think Jack is like, I sort of lost
Speaker 2: track of who was saying what here, but I think
Speaker 2: Jack is like, we got to go down there and
Speaker 2: organize them to fight. And the Mayor's the mayor says,
Speaker 2: let the slaughter continue. I'll stay here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's he's so the worst.
Speaker 2: And then you see him, You see him just like
Speaker 2: opening up a safe and cramming a bunch of jewels
Speaker 2: and cash into a suitcase.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, which made me think of the episode of
Speaker 1: The Simpsons where Quimby is basically doing the same thing,
Speaker 1: where he's like, I propose that I use what's left
Speaker 1: of the town treasury to move to a town without
Speaker 1: zombies and run for mayor, and once elected, I will
Speaker 1: send for the rest of you.
Speaker 2: Uh huh, yep, that's about right.
Speaker 1: Hm.
Speaker 2: But he doesn't get out. They try to escape on
Speaker 2: a car, but then they all end up getting stuck
Speaker 2: in a church. Oh but before they do that. One
Speaker 2: thing I thought was interesting was that Jack and the
Speaker 2: other henchman guy do briefly rally the townsfolk to fight
Speaker 2: the blind dead and confirm if I'm right here, Rob,
Speaker 2: I think the townsfolk here are using the exact same
Speaker 2: pitchfork props that the villagers from five hundred years earlier
Speaker 2: were using in the opening scene.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, I think you may be right. Yeah, these
Speaker 1: are very antique looking wooden pitchforks.
Speaker 2: Yeah, some of them just have like two prongs, some
Speaker 2: have three, some have four. H But I did not
Speaker 2: expect this film to have as much battle between the
Speaker 2: modern villagers and the zombies. They battle for a bit,
Speaker 2: but then the zombies sort of win, and then the
Speaker 2: main characters have to retreat to the church, where it
Speaker 2: turns more into the classic, you know, building under siege
Speaker 2: by zombies' story like the original Night of the Living Dead.
Speaker 1: But I really liked some of these scenes too, because
Speaker 1: I don't know if they shot it in an actual
Speaker 1: church or or whatnot, but there's all this religious stuff
Speaker 1: setting around, like various religious decorations in iconography, and it
Speaker 1: feels like the store room of an old, stuffy church.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I like that too. And there's
Speaker 2: some funny stuff here too. So, like I said, the
Speaker 2: appearance of the Blind Dead is a very mixed bag.
Speaker 2: There are some shots where they look very creepy it's
Speaker 2: effective horror cinematography, and there are other ones where I
Speaker 2: have to say, they look very funny and so like
Speaker 2: some of the funniest stuff is when they're doing stuff
Speaker 2: with their swords, like when the main characters retreat into
Speaker 2: the church. There's a very funny shot of the zombie
Speaker 2: swords like poking in through the window shutters and wiggling around.
Speaker 1: Do you remember this, Yeah, yeah, like they're kind of
Speaker 1: trying to pick the window with a long sword.
Speaker 2: It's yes, we And in fact, the whole way that
Speaker 2: the zombies hit things with their swords generally looks funny.
Speaker 2: There's this kind of stiff arm motion like the I
Speaker 2: was thinking what it reminded me of, and it really
Speaker 2: kind of looks like the Karate chop action figure arm.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, it does. It does make me wonder though.
Speaker 1: It's like the filming of this, I'm trying to imagine
Speaker 1: the the the stunt choreography such as it was, where
Speaker 1: you're dressing some people up in these these undead, blind
Speaker 1: dead costumes, which I'm guessing might have been difficult to
Speaker 1: see out of, and then you start handing out the
Speaker 1: long sorts right right.
Speaker 2: You can imagine that these these actors were probably somewhat
Speaker 2: encumbered by their costumes. But so here I think we
Speaker 2: also learn some things about some of the rules of
Speaker 2: the blind dead, right, Like I think this is when
Speaker 2: the car start to figure out that they can hear
Speaker 2: but they can't see, and also that the zombies are
Speaker 2: are defeated by fire.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but that makes sense, right, I mean you had
Speaker 1: templars that were burned at the stake, so they would
Speaker 1: they would need to have a weakness to fire and
Speaker 1: to papal.
Speaker 2: Bulls, right, And so there are a number of things
Speaker 2: that go on here. Of course, the the scummy characters
Speaker 2: continue to be scummy. The mayor at one point decides
Speaker 2: to use a child who is hiding in the church
Speaker 2: as zombie bait he gets. He goes to this little
Speaker 2: girl and he's like, hey, your father is across the
Speaker 2: street with candy for you. Oh he's also already gotten
Speaker 2: the kid's father killed.
Speaker 1: And ah, yeah, he already got him killed already, So
Speaker 1: he's responsible for her father's death. And he's like, and
Speaker 1: then he's going to use her as essentially a human
Speaker 1: shield to try and escape all by himself.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's like, child, you run across the street. Your
Speaker 2: dad's over there with candy. I'm going to go over
Speaker 2: here now. But of course it does not work, and
Speaker 2: the may ends up getting his comeuppance. Eventually, Murdo recruits
Speaker 2: the lady who helped save him from the eight year
Speaker 2: olds earlier in the movie to escape through a tunnel
Speaker 2: in the church, though that kind of doesn't end up
Speaker 2: going anywhere because they like but he ends up poking
Speaker 2: his head out of the tunnel at the end, and
Speaker 2: the blind Dad are waiting there for him, and they
Speaker 2: just chop his head off, and they've got a funny
Speaker 2: scene of his head severed from his body and lying
Speaker 2: there on the ground, and he's got this creepy grin
Speaker 2: on his face.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's got this signature Murdo grin, which is the
Speaker 1: first thing we see, the first facial expression we see
Speaker 1: from him, where he's smiling to an obscene level with
Speaker 1: half of his face. And so, yes, we are introduced
Speaker 1: to him that way, and that's also the way he
Speaker 1: leaves the world.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 2: One thing I thought was interesting is that at the
Speaker 2: end of the film, the good characters who are left,
Speaker 2: Jack and Vivian and the child, the little girl, they
Speaker 2: get to escape the church, but they don't really have
Speaker 2: to do anything. The blind Dead appear to have just
Speaker 2: been defeated by dawn breaking. Am I right about that?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like they have made it through the night.
Speaker 1: The sun has come up, the rooster is cockadoodle doing
Speaker 1: and of course, it's kind of like Night on Bald
Speaker 1: Mountain at that point, right, Like the sun has risen,
Speaker 1: the power of the undead, the power of the demonic
Speaker 1: forces has ended, and our heroes who now have this
Speaker 1: kind of accidental family formed by tragedy that you see
Speaker 1: in films like this. Sometimes it's like, sorry, kid, you
Speaker 1: lost both your parents in one just horrific night of
Speaker 1: supernatural terror. But Jack and Vivian are here, so it's
Speaker 1: everything's cool.
Speaker 2: A victim of mayor shenanigans.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh yeah, and I guess like Jack's the mayor
Speaker 1: now too, right, I mean.
Speaker 2: Works, I don't know, yeah, by default, right, yeah, that
Speaker 2: is a part of every town charter.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 2: If all local government has killed the nearest fireworks expert
Speaker 2: ascends to the to the office.
Speaker 1: It also means they're probably all three of them are
Speaker 1: on the planning committee now for next year's festival. So
Speaker 1: that's going to be a challenge, Like how do you
Speaker 1: have you bounce back from a festival like this and
Speaker 1: you know, and still make sure it's fun for everybody?
Speaker 2: Okay, question, how come the characters once they figured out
Speaker 2: that the blind dead operate by hearing, why didn't they
Speaker 2: take their shoes off.
Speaker 1: Hmmmm, well, I guess that would work, would have worked
Speaker 1: okay for indoors, except okay, if it's an old church,
Speaker 1: maybe it's creaky. Maybe the floorboards would have creaked anyway.
Speaker 2: M Well, no, I mean when they were trying to
Speaker 2: sneak by them outside. There's multiple scenes where they're trying
Speaker 2: to sneak by the zombies in the street. But they're
Speaker 2: making noise and the zombies can hear them. It seems
Speaker 2: logical they should have taken their shoes off.
Speaker 1: Well, maybe they could have been graveled. There could have
Speaker 1: been bits of fireworks left over. The fireworks have already
Speaker 1: gone off. I think you know, there was drinking and dancing.
Speaker 1: There might be glass in the street.
Speaker 2: Oh that's a good point.
Speaker 1: Yeah, gotta be careful with your tipsies.
Speaker 2: Been a big party, Yeah, take care of your feet.
Speaker 1: But that would that would make for a good scene
Speaker 1: in one of these films. I wonder if that's been
Speaker 1: done in any of the these other films, Is that,
Speaker 1: like in a quiet place? Do they ever take their
Speaker 1: shoes off in that I don't recall. Yeah, I have
Speaker 1: to say this was Ultimately I found this to be
Speaker 1: a really fun flick. The pacing I feel like is
Speaker 1: pretty good, especially for a film from this time period,
Speaker 1: and to feature creatures enemies that are slow and plotting,
Speaker 1: like they're able to explore that kind of enemy without
Speaker 1: having it result in a slow and plotting film. And
Speaker 1: then you have numerous human characters of interest, most of
Speaker 1: them deplorable but never boring.
Speaker 2: True. True, Okay, but here's one question. The zombies in
Speaker 2: this film are not like the normal shambling, completely brain
Speaker 2: dead George Romero type zombies. They can operate tools, meaning
Speaker 2: you know, they have swords and so they can use them,
Speaker 2: and they can ride horses, so they've got something left
Speaker 2: going on in their brains. Should they have been able
Speaker 2: to speak.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, I guess they don't really have the
Speaker 1: apparatus for speech anymore. They look pretty desiccated. But but yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a good point. They're not just mindlessly pawing at
Speaker 1: the doors they're stalking around. They're they're also capable of
Speaker 1: just waiting outside. They are all these scenes where they
Speaker 1: look outside the church when they're they're barricaded inside and
Speaker 1: the dead or just waiting like waiting them for them
Speaker 1: to make a break for it, besieging them, you know.
Speaker 1: So I guess to a certain extent, at least some
Speaker 1: of those, like the military prowess of the Crusades has
Speaker 1: survived in their their their their their rotten minds. But
Speaker 1: they don't. Yeah, they could have. I guess they could
Speaker 1: have taken their swords and written in the gravel if
Speaker 1: they they needed to try and like lay out terms
Speaker 1: like Okay, look, you need a surrender, but we will
Speaker 1: allow I don't know two people to go free, or
Speaker 1: you know. I guess they could have, I guess. But
Speaker 1: the thing was, they had no terms. They just wanted
Speaker 1: to kill everybody. That's what they were here for. That's
Speaker 1: what they came to town for.
Speaker 2: They are evil warlocks.
Speaker 4: Man.
Speaker 2: You can't reason with them.
Speaker 1: Can't can't reason with that. All right, If you're wondering, well,
Speaker 1: where can I watch the Blind Dead movies? Well, Return
Speaker 1: of the Blind Dead Again. I found it on Apple Movies.
Speaker 1: I think there are some rips of them just floating
Speaker 1: around on the internet, on YouTube and so forth. You
Speaker 1: can get some of them on DVD. I think Blue
Speaker 1: Underground put out a DVD of this movie. At one
Speaker 1: point there was a four DVD set you could get
Speaker 1: in like kind of a box set that was shaped
Speaker 1: like a casket. And I think there's a blu ray
Speaker 1: of one of the later films, maybe The Ghostly Galleon
Speaker 1: or Night of the Seagulls. So I don't know. They
Speaker 1: kind of go in and out of production, but if
Speaker 1: you want to get at your hands on a physical
Speaker 1: copy of it, you can probably find it in Digital
Speaker 1: copies are relatively easy to find as well. I think
Speaker 1: Atlanta's own Video Drome Video store has at least the
Speaker 1: first two Blind Dead films.
Speaker 2: Viewer discretion as advised, Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1: Do research these a little bit before just diving in. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because these are ultimately horror films out of the early
Speaker 1: nineteen seventies. All right, Well, we're gonna go ahead and
Speaker 1: close it out there, you know, seal the sarcophagus for
Speaker 1: this week, but we'll be back next week with another film.
Speaker 1: I think, unless chance plans change, we're doing another film
Speaker 1: from the exact same release year, So we're gonna be
Speaker 1: stuck in the seventies again. So I hope you're okay
Speaker 1: with that, everybody. If you want to check out other
Speaker 1: episodes of Weird House Cinema, it publishes every Friday, and
Speaker 1: the Stuff to Blow your Mind podcast feed We're primarily
Speaker 1: a science podcast, with episodes airing on Tuesdays and Thursdays,
Speaker 1: Artifact episode on Wednesday, and listener mail on Monday.
Speaker 2: Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer Seth
Speaker 2: Nicholas Johnson. If you would like to get in touch
Speaker 2: with us with feedback on this episode or any other,
Speaker 2: to suggest a topic for the future, or just to
Speaker 2: say hello, you can email us at contact at stuff
Speaker 2: to Blow your Mind dot com.
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