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Released by: Severin Films
Released on: May 30th, 2023.
Director: Corrado Farina, Paolo Lombardo
Cast: Adolfo Celi, Geraldine Hooper, Rosalba Neri, Edmund Purdom
Year: 1971, 1972
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Danza Macabre Volume Two – Movie Review:
Severin Films brings together four more Italian gothic horror films from decades past in the second volume of their Danza Macabre collection.
For the first part of our coverage of this boxed set, click here!
Disc Six – They Have Changed Their Face:
Directed by Corrado Farina, who co-wrote with Giulio Berruti, 1971's They Have Changed Their Face introduces us to Alberto Valle (Giuliano Esperati), an executive at a car company who is told that he's slated for a promotion and that part of this involves a trip to the luxurious estate of Giovanni Nosferatu (Adolfo Celi), the mysterious man at the top of the corporate ladder.
Alberto makes the trip to the remote countryside where the estate is located and along the way meets a pretty beatnik type named Laura (Francesca Modigliani). When he finally makes it to his destination, Alberto meets Nosferatu's quirky female helper, Corinna (Geraldine Hooper), who proves to be friendlier than he expected. He explores the estate for a while and doesn't seem nearly as freaked out as he should be by some of what he discovers, the most obvious being a nursery full of infants and then a photograph of himself as an infant with notations indicating that he'd grow up to the president of the company.
When Alberto eventually meets Nosferatu, he learns how eccentric the man is when he joins him for target practice. A short time later, he goes on to enjoy a round of golf on the grounds only to discover an abandoned cemetery nearby containing a grave for Nosferatu with a birthdate of 1801 but not date for his passing...
Set to a wonderfully eerie score courtesy of composer Amedeno Tomassi and beautifully shot by Aiace Parolin, They Have Changed Their Face is a rather unorthodox retelling of Bram Stoker's Dracula but not an ineffective one. As odd as you'd expect from the director who brought us Baba Yaga, the movie makes some pretty valid and well-placed barbs at the pitfalls of ardent capitalism, consumerism and materialism using vampirism as a not so subtle allegory for it, but it never feels especially preachy even when business meetings are portrayed as genuinely sinister ordeals with truly evil intent. The movie isn’t subtle (in case the fact that the film’s antagonist literally being named Nosferatu didn’t clue you into that on your own).
The acting is strong in this one. Giuliano Esperati, essentially playing Jonathan Harker, does fine in his role. He looks good and he shows pretty decent range, especially in the second half of the movie when things get decidedly strange. Adolfo Celi is really good as well. He doesn’t necessarily look like you’d expect a ‘Nosferatu’ to look, he’s miles away from a Max Schreck or a Klaus Kinski, but he brings a sense of bizarre menace to the part that is pretty effective. Geraldine Hooper, probably best known for her role in Dargio Argento’s Deep Red, looks unique and strange and almost alien here but her unorthodox appearance suits her character well, while Francesca Modigliani is well-cast as the good looking hippie-chick that hitches a ride with our lead.
Disc Seven – The Devil’s Lover
Also known as Lucifera, Demon Lover, Paolo Lombardo’s 1972 film stars the lovely Rosalba Neri as a woman named Helga who, along with her two friends, gets permission to spend the night inside an old castle that a tour guide tells them is owned by Satan himself - there's even an empty spot for him at the dinner table! They want to spend the night in order to find out of the rumors about the castle’s owner are true.
From here, Helga and company explore the old castle, uninhabited save for a strange man who serves as a butler, while thunder erupts outside. After she spends an inordinate amount of time starring at an old painting of a woman being burned at the stake, she starts having strange dreams. In the first dream, we travel back in time and see Helga about to be married off to a nice guy named Hans (Ferdinando Poggi), though a buxom blonde named Magda (Maria Teresa Pingitore) has eyes for Hans herself. A man named Helmut (Robert Woods), who is in love with Magda herself, agrees to help her get what she wants if she’ll sleep with him.
Meanwhile, a man cloaked in a red hood struts about causing problems for Helga and for help with those problems she heads to an old witch who lives in the woods nearby. After agreeing to bring her two friends, Eva and Wilma, to a mountain top, it isn’t long before the girls are snatched and brought to a cave to participate in some sort of occult orgy. It turns out that the man in the red hood who has been obsessing over Helga is Gunther (Edward Purdom) and Helga can't help but be attracted to him. Of course, there's more to Gunther than Helga realizes, in fact, he may be the rightful owner of the castle. It gets weirder from there as Magda tries to get Helmut to murder Helga so she can have Hans to herself.
A genuinely bizarre film, The Devil’s Lover does not lack in atmosphere but the plot is all over the place. Still, there’s entertainment to be had here even if the vast majority of the movie’s running time is made up by what is essentially a really long dream sequence. Fans of Rosabla Neri’s feminine charms will appreciate the fact that she looks amazing here and gets loads of screen time, and her two female co-stars look great here too, but the movie never really succeeds in building atmosphere and tension as effectively as it really should have.
Still, Lombardo infuses his film with enough weirdness to keep it interesting and entertaining, and how can you not get a kick out of seeing Edmond Purdom play the devil (even if he and Neri don’t really have the chemistry you’d want them to have in order to convince us that this torrid affair is legit)? The production values are decent and the movie benefits from some good costuming and some nice cinematography. Period detail could have been better but the locations and castle setting work well and Elvio Monti’s score is legitimately very good.
Danza Macabre Volume Two – Blu-ray Review:
They Have Changed Their Face is presented in a 1.85.1 widescreen transfer in AVC encoded 1080p taken from a new 2k transfer and restoration of “a severely dye-faded 35mm positive print” which, evidently, is the only known element in existence. There’s some minor print damage here and there and yes, the colors do look faded, but the picture isn’t completely sapped even if it does lean brown for much of its running time. Some scenes look better than others and there’s reasonable detail and depth here by the standards of the format.
The Devil’s Lover is framed at 1.85.1 and presented in 1080p high definition in a new transfer taken from a 4k scan of the original 35mm negative. A note before the presentation tells us that the twelve frames of black that show up around the hour mark were left in to retain the film's integrity as they were in the negative. That odd anomaly aside, the transfer is a really strong one. Colors look excellent as do skin tones and we get nice, deep black levels and generally strong depth, detail and texture. There’s virtually no print damage to note and natural film grain is preserved. This one looks really nice and the picture quality is impressive throughout.
Both They Have Changed Their Face and The Devil’s Lover get the 24-bit DTS-HD 2.0 Italian language treatment. Jekyll sounds a bit better than it looks, though the audio is less than perfect but it’s serviceable enough and properly balanced even if it is kind of thin and sometimes a little warbly sounding. They Have Changed Their Face and The Devil’s Lover both sound pretty decent, with well-balanced sound and clean dialogue and doing justice to the films’ respective scores. Again, the English subtitles supplied for each track are easy to read and free of any errors.
As far as the extras go…
Disc Six – They Have Changed Their Face:
An audio commentary with Director Corrado Farina, moderated by his son Alberto Farina, starts off the supplements for the third film. This covers how the movie was financed as a cooperative with a group of friends, who did what behind the scenes, where Corrado's career was at this point in time, shooting on location in the mountains, where the music for the film came from, metaphors that are used throughout the movie, memories of the different actors that worked on the production, why the themes of consumerism and capitalism are explored the way that they are in this movie, writers that influenced the movie in this regard, his own work doing commercials, how the movie was received upon its initial release and the critical response to the picture and why the movie ends the way that it does.
Kat Ellinger, author of Daughters Of Darkness, provides a second commentary track that covers how tough the movie used to be to track down, Farina's limited output in the commercial cinema world, thoughts on what makes the film effective, how the characters fit into the storyline, the politics that infuse the movie and how they compare to Petri's work, the themes that the movie explores and how greed and consumption are portrayed in the movie and in Stoker's source material, elements of political satire that are worked into the movie, how the depiction of vampires in this movie differs from other films, the effectiveness of the film's score, what makes this movie tough to categorize and how that's lead to be having been overlooked, the gothic elements in the movie and plenty more.
The Farina Method is an interview with Film Critic Alberto Farina, son of Director Corrado Farina that runs forty-three minutes. Here, Farina shows off notebooks full of reviews his father wrote for films that he watched before going over movies that influenced his work, his work doing commercials for Italian television and the restrictions that the government had in place for that type of work, the impact a Styrofoam hippo had on his career, how he moved into doing feature films, his father's politics and how they affected some of his output, the influence of Herbert Marcuse, what went into making They Have Changed Their Face and the themes that the movie explores, the significance of the title, some of the people that he collaborated with, how he got the feature financed and other details on the production, how he was supposed to appear in the movie but didn't and how the movie was received when released and its distribution history.
Bloodsucking Capitalists interviews Actor Giuliano Disperati and Editor/Screenwriter Giulio Berruti for thirty-one minutes covering how they all came to work together, what Corrado Farina was like to work with, remembering him very positively as they go over shooting in Turin, how making the movie was a positive experience if not a big payday, memories of shooting specific scenes, how cold it was on location, getting Fiat to help out by supplying the white cars seen in the movie, memories of different cast and crew members that worked on the picture and how they feel about the movie decades after having made it.
Outtakes Of De Sade is a six minute piece that shows off some footage from a can of film that was found in 2020 that contained footage from the black and white 'De Sade' commercial, much of which is comprised of bound and naked women and De Sade himself doing exactly what you'd expect. This material is presented without sound but it's neat to see it included here given that it was essentially lost for a few decades.
The disc also includes a selection of short films By Corrado Farina, starting with Il Figlio Di Dracula (The Son Of Dracula). This twenty-one minute black and white humorous short explores the Carpathian village where Dracula was reported to have lived years ago. From there, we meet Dracula and one of his brides as they discuss their concerns about their son as it becomes time for him to go amongst the living and claim himself a virgin bride, which proves to be rather tricky for the awkward young man.
Giro Giro Tondo (Ring Around The Rosie) is an eleven minute black and white short that shows a husband and wife preparing to start their day, punching clocks at various intervals (even when going to church), as modern technology winds up doing most of the days’ work for them. Meals are now simple pills and children are cared for by being strapped to a chair in front of the television to learn about IBM, punching out before going to bed for the night.
The last short film is Il Cantico Delle Creature (The Song Of The Creatures), and it runs five minutes. It's a black and white short in which a narrator says a prayer written by Saint Francis Of Assisi overtop of some footage showing off the beauty of the natural world.
There are also eight-four minutes of documentary material directed by Farina included here. Praised By My Lord starts off by showcasing different religious artifacts and buildings while what is basically a prayer of praise is recited. The footage then starts to show off the modern world - people sunbathing, rockets launching into space, air travel and supermarkets - while the praise continues even over footage of war and combat. This continues as we witness a coffin salesman plying his wares and workers punching the clock contrasted with the pageantry of the Catholic church.
The Nagging Thoughts contrasts the efforts of a marketing agency with real world footage while a narrator discusses psychology and commodification of cinema and the television production/advertising industry and how they attempt to establish a relationship with the consumer.
The next piece, which involves Guido Crepax and his work, explores comic books' place in Italian pop culture, going over North American material like The Phantom and Mickey Mouse before then exploring Crepax's unique work, much of which is very sexual in nature, and what makes it interesting and sets it apart from other comic book artists and how it ties into Italian cinema.
Science Fiction Is Us looks at the history of science fiction novels and movies, the way that they portray science and the future, important works of fiction that came out of this, how modern science has evolved in many ways and how some of the predictions from sci-fi publications has come to pass.
Once Upon A Time... explores a soviet-era museum in Russia, covering what the insanely lavish building was used for before it became a museum and many of the interesting historical artifacts that are housed inside.
From there, we get another look at European comic strips and learn how they were affected by the World Wars as footage of different illustrations and strips is contrasted with war footage.
Last up is Salgari Of Our Childhood, which covers Emilio Salgari's work as a writer in Italy in the adventure and pulp fiction arenas, showing various illustrations, paintings and pertinent clips of film footage overtop readings of his prose.
In the Commercials Directed By Corrado Farina section we find ten minutes of vintage black and white television advertisements for baby food, all thematically linked, that are actually quite amusing.
Disc Seven – The Devil’s Lover:
An audio commentary with Annie Rose Malamet, Film Scholar and Host Of Girls, Guts, Giallo, starts off the extras for the fourth film. She describes the movie as an underseen gem before going on to cover Paolo Lombardo's life and career, the amount of polyester on display in the early scenes, if the three women in the movie tie into 'The Three Witches' in Macbeth and other works, the use of the portrait as a plot device, some of the foreshadowing on display in the movie, thoughts on the cast and performances, how the night scenes weren't tinted in post-production and how this has been corrected in this new restoration, where the movie sometimes feels like a Jean Rollin picture and other details. There's some stretches of silence here and moments where Malamet sometimes just tells us what we're looking at on the screen but portions of her talk are still worthwhile and interesting.
Lady Of The Night: The Feminism Of Rosalba Neri is a new video essay by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas running seventeen minutes. It covers Neri's career and the potency that she brings to many of her roles, the self-empowerment inherent in some of her work and what makes her performances transgressive. She then goes on to cite specific examples from throughout Neri's career (including The Devil's Lover), offering up insight into how these tie into her thesis.
Out Of The Woods is a new interview with Actor Robert Woods running twenty-five minutes in which he talks about how he got into acting by doing theater in New York City, getting a part in a western film and making the transition to film work, having to do some of his own stunt work, doing work in Italy in Spaghetti Western movies in the sixties, taking advantage of being surrounded by beautiful women, memories of shooting The Devil's Lover and having to help 'fix' the movie, how he wound up in the movie in the first place, why he never took credit for co-directing the movie, working with Neri and Purdom, some of the drama that was going on during the making of the movie, working with Jess Franco who he felt was very talented and some of the actresses he was affiliated with, how he met his wife and why he moved back to America.
Disc Eight – The Devil’s Lover Soundtrack:
The eighth disc in the set is an audio CD containing twelve tracks from the score composed by Elvio Monti, with the track listing compiled on a postcard-sized insert that features a reproduction of the film’s original theatrical poster on the reverse side.
The tracks included are:
Mother’s Waltz / Chordal Experiment / Beautiful Country / Gavotta In Pop / Bordom / Mother’s Waltz (#2) / Breaking The Clouds / Mother’s Waltz (#3) / Experiment In Laboratory / Minuetto In Pop / Slow Motion / Mother’s Waltz (#4)
Last but not least, as it was with the first set, the packaging for this boxed set is quote nice. Each Blu-ray sits in its own black case with unique cover art. These cases, in turn, fit nicely inside a sturdy top-loading cardboard box with some great painted artwork on it. It’s a very attractive package.
Danza Macabre Volume Two - The Final Word:
Severin Films’s Blu-ray release of Danza Macabre Volume Two offers up a really solid quartet of Italian gothic horror entries in editions stacked with high quality extra features, each of the four entries absolutely worth seeing for fans of the genre. Highly recommended!
Click on the images below, or right click and open in a new window, for full sized Danza Macabre Volume Two Blu-ray screen caps!
