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Review
by
Troy Howarth
Film:9
:
DVD:8
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| Patrick
(Guy Delorme) takes his wife (Jacqueline Laurent) and daughter
Linda (Lina Romay) to a resort in the south of France to celebrate
Linda's 18th birthday; while there, he is hounded by the mysterious,
witch-like Lorna Green (Pamela Stanford), who reminds him of a
Faustian pact they had made which involved turning Linda over
to her when she came of age in exchange for some much needed wealth
and prosperity... |
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Jess
Franco has made a maddening number of films of varying degrees
of quality. Some of his work is slick and professional, but much
of it is rough around the edges. Some of it is inspired, some
is anything but. In his long career of shocking people's susceptibilities,
Franco never went so far as he did with Lorna
the Exorcist. The somewhat nonsensical title indicates
that the film was designed to cash in on William Friedkin's blockbuster
The Exorcist
(1973), but this is anything but a rip-off. It is one of Franco's
most original works; it is also far and away his most pathologically
disturbing. |
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It's
tempting to describe Lorna as the
ultimate film to watch while looking over your shoulder. It's
such a grimy, grotty, deeply disturbing piece of work that one
would be hard pressed to want to share the experience with anybody
but the most adventuresome of cinephiles. Like many Franco films,
it eschews conventional craftsmanship in favor of a more rough
hewn, improvisational approach. The film is often crude, even
amateurish. Some of the edits are jarring, scenes sometimes drag
on far longer than necessary, the lighting is typical of what
one would find in a cheap sex film... but despite all of that,
the film works. There's a sense of genuine purpose to the picture,
as if Franco is using it to explore his deepest neuroses in the
hopes of exorcising them for good. The end result is hard to shake,
with images and set-pieces that will stick with you for days after
it is over. |
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That's
not to say that the film completely overcomes its shortcomings,
however. For such a spare, minimalist film, Franco can't resist
padding it out with a rather useless subplot involving one of
Lorna's previous victims. Confined to her own set — an insane
asylum — and chiefly seen lolling around in a state of heightened
ecstasy, actress Catherine Lafferiere (also seen in a number of
other Franco films from this same period) does what she can to
enliven her various appearances; she's certainly eye-catching
and game for what is asked of her, but the subplot only serves
to restate something that's perfectly obvious: that Lorna's power
is something to be reckoned with most seriously. The subplot also
allows Franco himself to pop up as a distracted psychiatrist,
but he isn't particularly good here — as an actor Franco is capable
of giving committed, interesting performances (cf., The
Diabolical Dr. Z, Eugenie
De Sade) but here it's almost as if he's too distracted
by the material to give it his all as a performer. To make a checklist
of all the film's technical shortcomings would be pointlessly
defeatist — suffice it to say, it manages to rise above these
limitations, or even to use them to its advantage, but the padding
caused by this subplot does come close to knocking the film off
balance completely. |
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Having
dispensed with the negatives, it's time to discuss some of the
positives. The small ensemble, comprised of familiar faces from
Franco's films of this period, is generally terrific. Lina Romay
is at her very best as the naive Linda, who undergoes a startling
transformation as the film unfolds. It's a difficult part, one
which requires her to bare her soul as well as her body, and she
proves completely capable of hitting its various notes. Watching
her in this role leaves one in no doubt that Romay is more than
just a pretty face — she's a fine actress, as well. Pamela Stanford,
another regular in Franco's films of the period, gets her best
ever role as Lorna. The name "Lorna Green" can be traced
back to Succubus
(1969) in Franco's filmography, but it would be a mistake to see
Stanford as filling in for Janine Reynaud in that earlier film.
There is a vague similarity between the two characters, but just
as Franco is fond of recycling the name "Dr. Orloff"
from picture to picture, it seems likely it's just a name he's
fond of using. Stanford is required to wear some very over the
top eye liner and wigs, but she conveys a raw sensuality that
really comes to the fore during the unforgettably disturbing scene
in which she seduces Linda. Guy Delorme is also very effective
as the guilt-ridden Patrick, a loving family man whose one instance
of infidelity comes back to haunt him in a big way. Jacqueline
Laurent is good as Patrick's wife, while the great Howard Vernon
puts in a brief cameo appearance as Lorna's henchman; Vernon also
served as a stills photographer on the picture, a function he
often filled on Franco's films, using his real name, Mario Lippert.
The atonal guitar score by Andre Benichou is one of the finest
to be found in a Franco film; the repetitious main theme will
stay with you for a while. |
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Many
horror films are described as being transgressive, but most of
them seem pretty weak after so much build up. Blood and gore can
cause momentary discomfort, but they don't really cut deep into
the psyche in the way that a film like Lorna
does. The film has its moments of bloodshed, but it's grotty texture
and images of sexual hysteria are infinitely more disturbing.
The scenes in which a character spews crabs from her vagina or
in which a character is violated by a massive dildo (the blood
being subsequently licked off) simply are beyond the pale — they
defy expectation and description, and it's in moments such as
these that one realizes just how utterly pathological the film's
imagination truly is. Franco would continue to explore the link
between eroticism and horror in many more films, but he'd never
again push things quite so far. From its opening, protracted sex
fantasy to its final wail of pain, Lorna
the Exorcist is one of the most legitimately unsettling
films ever made. Viewers who insist on tight plotting and pacing,
and a sheen of technical expertise, will no doubt be tempted to
dismiss it as amateurish; but even these viewers would be hard
pressed to forget the film's excesses. |
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| Mondo
Macabro's release of Lorna the Exorcist
is something of a holy grail for Franco enthusiasts. It represents
the films debut on DVD, in any region, and it presents the film
fully uncut and uncensored for the first time since its limited
theatrical run in 1974. Like many other Franco films of the period,
it was later cut, reedited and altered beyond recognition; such
mutilation resulted in a slew of horrific looking bootlegs flooding
the collector's market, and none of them included so much footage
as can be found in this meticulous restoration. The 1.66/16x9
transfer looks very good. This is not a prettily photographed
art film — it's a grimy slice of exploitation, and it will always
look that. Given that the transfer was cobbled together from at
least three different source elements, it's amazing the image
looks as consistent as it does. One of the prints is a bit reddish
and scratched, so the scenes incorporated from that source do
tend to jump out - but even these bits look a thousand times better
than any of the battered dupes that have been circulating for
years. The film clocks in at 99 minutes, and the restored footage
helps to make it a more coherent experience. Colors are reproduced
very well, detail is reasonably sharp. Granted, this is not the
type of film that will ever look like a million bucks, but as
someone who has suffered through various unsightly bootlegs of
this title, take my word for it: it looks pretty darn impressive.
Audio options include the ultra-rare English dub, as well as the
more familiar French track with removable English subtitles. It's
nice to have the English dub preserved (even the titles are in
English), but it's a stiff and occasionally unintentionally funny
variant; the French track feels much more natural, though it,
too, was created at a later date and almost certainly doesn't
use the actual voices of all the participants. The French track
is in good shape overall. There's some hissing evident, and some
of the higher notes of the soundtrack occasionally sound a bit
strained, but it's more than acceptable. |
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Extras
include the same Fear and Desire and Interview with
Gerard Kikoine featurettes included on Mondo Macabro's release
of Sinner, as well as a new interview
with Stephen Thrower on Lorna. Even
if you've seen the Fear and Desire segment already, it's
worth revisiting, as Thrower makes a compelling case for how to
read Franco and his cinema; it dovetails nicely into the featurette
on Lorna, wherein he discusses the
film and how it fares in Franco's canon. His observations on Franco
being a "pussy hound" are definitely amusing, but they do tap
into a central obsession of the director's that finds its way
most forcefully into Lorna. On screen
text notes provide some background into the film, its production,
and its key participants. A Mondo Macabro preview reel is also
included. 2/10/11 |
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