Representing France: Two Orphan Vampires (1997)

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Dir. Jean Rollin

It's a delightful surprise that this film doesn't feel like a nineties horror movie at all. As much as I'm obsessed with the nineties, one of the reasons I'm obsessed with it is the tackiness of the era as well as the positives. Not a lot of horror films from that decade are celebrated, as compared to other eras, for this reason.  Jean Rollin didn't make a tacky film in the autumn/winter of his career here, thankfully making a very interesting one instead. It's very much an art film, against other films of his I've seen, which must be beared in mind. It's amazing too that I can compare this film to the work of fellow French director Eugène Green, of The Portuguese Nun (2009), with his long, almost Bressionian moments of dialogue, dangerously near the precipice of pretentious but ultimately charming and rewarding in being a bit more freer to let scenes play out as far as needed for mood and effect. This is the same for Two Orphan Vampires. I will openly admit it's going to be a difficult film for people to digest, including those who like Rollin films. I will also admit that I've developed a taste for films that could be seen as "difficult", with small fan bases, but this one works completely for what it intended.

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The titular vampires are two girls, Louise (Alexandra Pic) and Henriette (Isabelle Teboul), living in an orphanage ran by nuns, blind in the day, but able to see at night when they go out to feast. Immediately distinct in their identical clothes and white canes, the two are sympathetic in that, while they need to feed on the living, they are clearly close, engaging in their ponderings on existence, and obsessed with books on Aztec culture and magic while they believe they are reincarnations of the Aztec gods. The film is a series of events, ones from their previous lives, able to come back to life after being killed, as well as ones from their new life, as a doctor adopts them and they continue to explore the world around them. They do encounter other supernatural entities - a ghoul, a werewolf and so forth - but they are women too; in fact, baring the doctor, there are no male characters in the film baring extras or minor, one scene roles. (An interesting tone for the film in that it's a world framed entirely around women who have the discussions on the meaning of life as well as the small dramatic plots.) Its brief story is more of an engaging character piece, of characters doomed to repeatedly die despite their happiness, both girls concerned that they'll eventually never come back to life again at some point. Its abstract in a way that could frustrate people, but baring in mind, digging deeper with what Rollin was obsessed by, this is a waking dream of a film crossed with the kind of aesthetics of book illustrations that look exceptional when used in the opening and end credits of the film

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It doesn't look cheap either. I suspect it was shot on celluloid. It has an atmosphere, like the best films covered in this series of reviews, where from the first scenes it already sets up the mood immediately with the look and use of the locations and the space in them. The bright, vast locations of the day time to the blue lit environments of the night time scenes. His obsession with sexuality and sensuality is still there slightly in the vampires' relationship, including the sexual nature of how vampires bite a victim's neck that has always existed in the mythology, but barring two moments or so of nudity, this is quite a chaste film more concerned with friendship, and the bonding of Louise and Henriette, at times like teenage girls onscreen, other times very wise and adult in their reflections of the world around them. The film's mind is more on magic and supernatural creatures than carnality of other films of his I've seen. Probably the biggest reason why people could be put off Two Orphan Vampires if they're not prepared for it is because this strips away the blood and nudity in Rollin's films and leaves the unconventional plotting, where two vampires get bored of their predicament and do whatever they desire to escape it, presented not as a conventional three act narrative. For me it's nice to go through such an abstract, dreamlike film that paces itself well. The dialogue is all of interest even if its unconventional at times. It's an interesting take on vampires that doesn't compromise the mythology while adds new things for its own depiction. The two lead actresses are very charismatic as their characters, to the point that their potential ego in believing themselves to be gods is actually sweet natured and understandable pride in their existence than despairing their "curse". The distinct age fluctuation in their appearance in fact adds a strange air to the proceedings which makes their characters more interesting. The directions the film takes make sense - a world of supernatural beings who are methodical and languid, none of the hectic tone of, say, the Twilight films, and most horror films, where two vampires can kill time as best friends for most of the running time. Nothing feels contrived in the film in what happens, anything odd feeling appropriate for the dreamlike tone. It feels like spending a week with these characters in their immortal lives only with a few deaths at their hands taking place, and the danger they will be discovered and killed themselves adding dramatic tension. It looks good, and even if the score is dated synth, it feels like it's actually from the eighties, the depth of that era's music here to and adding to the material. There is nothing in Two Orphan Vampires that feels amiss, and that Rollin made a film completely against what is expected with these genre tropes is admirable, more so in that he succeeded for me.

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Lady Stay Dead [The Living Dead Girl (1982)]

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Dir. Jean Rollin

France

Film #25, for Thursday 25^th October, for Halloween 31 For 31

I may have started watching films made from the late French director Jean Rollin this year. Amongst all the discoveries and re-evaluations over the last three quarters of the year, I may have seen Zombie Lake (1981), the film that Rollin took over from Jesus Franco, within the early months. Regardless of one’s opinion of Zombie Lake, it did not follow the conventions that I have heard about Rollin’s cinema. The Shiver of the Vampires (1971) however felt closer to the reputation he developed. If you are in the wrong mood for the film, with its melding of sexploitation, slow mood and psychedelic rock to a horror narrative, it would come off as pretentious and difficult to sit through, but looking back at it it grows as something memorable from this year’s viewing.

The Living Dead Girl pushes my interest in Rollin further. When she is brought back to life by toxic waste, Catherine Valmont (Françoise Blanchard) becomes an undead being who feats on the blood of other people. Her childhood friend Hélène (Marina Pierro), who made a blood pact with her, attempts to bring Catherine back to being human and provide her with fresh food, but the paradox of a ‘living dead girl’ is too much for Catherine and the outside world entrenches into their environment. Rollin for me was always depicted as making films involving vampires and sexuality, a crass simplification in hindsight but one that was foisted over him as any filmmaker is forced with a simplified off-colour description of their work. The Living Dead Girl has nudity and gore, but it is far from his suggested reputation of lesbian vampires. It is as much a very artistic film as a horror film, creating a distinct piece that feels out of place even with the later French horror films of the 2000s. As with any country’s cinema, French films have a specific thought process to them, clearly willing to push the content to more idiosyncratic and self reflective tangents over clear narrative and topic lines. The film is more about its mood, following Catherine and the traumatic stasis she is within after death. Completely unable to communicate vocally for most of the running time, her friend Hélène tries to help her, only to have interference from an actress who becomes obsessed with Catherine. With the specific palette and look of a French film from the 1980s – the earthy architecture and countryside against the shell suits of certain cast members – The Living Dead Girl stood out immediately for how well put together it was visually, wide establishing shots and claustrophobic close-ups in closed areas adding a sense of space as most of the film is set at Catherine’s old mansion home and its crypt vault underneath the ground. With access with such a grand location, Rollin used the setting fully, something that was also significant in The Shiver of the Vampires and adds to his moody take on horror tropes.

Attempting to write a review merely on the mood for The Living Dead Girl is difficult, but if you are able to settle into its slower mood, its unconventional tone feels for more liberating while still retaining the paint red gore of European horror cinema. There is a moment later on where the film seemed to be drifting along without purpose, but this was dispelled as it lead onto a climax that ties the treads together fully. As a slow burning film, a unique vampire/undead story, it plays with the ideas of obsessive relationships and the concept of immortality in a new way for me. All exquisitely shot, it surprised me to think Jean Rollin was dismissed as he was as he kept a level of artistry comparable to well regarded art film directors from the country of France; that he worked in horror cinema and with content such as nudity and blood must have been the reason why sadly, especially since individuals like Jean-Luc Godard used the later contents in his filmic experiments to great critical acclaim.

The Living Dead Girl was a great film. With only The Shiver of the Vampires (and to a lesser extent Zombie Lake) before this, it turned out to be an unexpected surprise. French horror cinema has risen in quantity and acclaim since the 2000s, but for me the spots before this boom, Rollin and films like Baby Blood (1990), are far more interesting, not that dissimilar in look and tone to other French dramatic and experimental cinema aside from the extended gore sequences. Unlike the later horror films that have absorbed the influences from popular styles of the genre, a film like The Living Dead Girl feels very specific to its country of origins and retains an individualistic take on its central subject matter, more about the effect of the images to convey everything rather than an elaborate story, but by the climatic sequence, working perfectly.

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