Horror Pioneer Jean Rollin
As French censorship constraints began to ease in the late 1960's and early 1970's, visionary filmmaker Jean Rollin created a series of mesmerizing thrillers that injected the Gothic vampire film with a more contemporary strain of eroticism. Cycling between visual poetry and lurid violence, these six Rollin films have come to be regarded as horror genre classics.
Streaming on Filmatique during the month of October.
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The Shiver of the Vampires, Jean Rollin (1971)
The Shiver of the Vampires, Jean Rollin / France, 1971
Of all Rollin's films, The Shiver of the Vampires is the most visually inventive, teeming with startling images such as Sandra Julien visiting a cemetery in her bridal gown and moving amongst the headstones like a ghost, or the contrast between her white gown and the widow's weeds worn by Isabelle. The vampire Isolde is a striking character, emerging at the stroke of midnight in a startling variety of ways.
The Iron Rose, Jean Rollin (1973)
The Iron Rose, Jean Rollin / France, 1973
In Rollin's first masterpiece, two young lovers become lost in an ancient graveyard; while one panics, the other sublimates her frustrated passion into a jubilant communion with the dead. The Iron Rose is a haunting experience—a macabre poem about youth and age, love and nihilism, nostalgia and superstition, and, above all, life and death.
The Demoniacs, Jean Rollin (1974)
The Demoniacs, Jean Rollin / France, 1974
A Poe-like study of guilt and revenge, The Demoniacs follows a band of "wreckers" who lure a ship into coastal waters, then plunder the remains. They rape and murder two young sisters who managed to survive the wreck—these ghostly sisters haunt the Captain, exacting their revenge with the help of the Devil himself.
Lips of Blood, Jean Rollin (1975)
Lips of Blood, Jean Rollin / France, 1975
Considered by Jean Rollin to be the best story he ever wrote, Lips of Blood follows Frederic, a young man who attends the launch party for a new perfume. Here, the image of a chateau on publicity materials beckons him back through time, to a long-lost memory from his childhood, when a beautiful young woman served as his protector.
The Grapes of Death, Jean Rollin (1978)