Been really busy with various drawy work-based stuff of late (alongside dealing with bureaucratic incompetence and general Neuro-Typical fuckwittery) so the blog has been suffering a wee bit.
Rewatched this last night around 4 in the morning seeing as our youngest decided it'd be fun to see what happens when you don't sleep.
Well after tying him to a chair and making him sit thru' this he wont be trying that again.
Enjoy.
Oh please excuse the brevity of the write-up tho' cos I'm knackered and need my bed.
Killer Barbys (AKA Vampire Killer Barbys, 1996).
Dir: Jesus Franco.
Cast: Silvia Superstar, Enrique Sarasola, Aldo Sanbrell, Bela B. Felsenheimer, Billy King, Mariangela Giordano, Carlos Subterfuge, Pepa López, Alberto Martínez and Charlie S. Chaplin.
Somewhere around the cheap(er) touristy bit of an off season Alicante, a mysterious - and very scared, you can tell by the poppy eyes. well it's either that or shitloads of drugs - young man is involved in what looks like a sinister (and oh so slighty homo-erotic) game of hide and seek with the sexily stylish Mr. Allen Arkan (Sanbrell) and his stoopy squire, Baltasar (Segura).
Sounds legit.
Before we can get too involved tho' the game comes to an abrupt end when Arkan catches up with the young fella and swiftly cuts his throat before heading home to his dilapidated castle to chat excitedly with a woman's corpse.
As you do.
Meanwhile across town at the local Haven holiday park, top post 'punk' pop puppets the Killer Barbys are wowing the (bingo) crowd with a rousing rendition of their hit waxing 'Killer Love' before getting ripped off by the evil gig promoter and, as scary punks are known to do, going all tutty and huffy as they sulk off to their tour bus.
They're no Guitar Wolf are they?
Realizing that their next concert is at the fantastic Butlins in Skegness the band put the peddle to the metal and (whilst singing along to their own songs) begin the 500 mile drive (in what seems to be real time), taking in every badly lit road sign and tree along the way.
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| "Good evening Bognor!" |
Luckily for us, the arse numbing monotony is broken when the bus careers off the road whilst attempting to dodge a (parked) steam roller causing the band to end up stuck in a muddy ditch that just happens to be right next to Arkan's castle.
How's that for plot contrivance?
Appearing suddenly from behind a tree (he's a thin bloke) he informs our merry band that it wont be possible to get the AA (or anyone with a tow truck, not even Mater from the Pixar classic Cars) out till the next morning, but kindly offers the Killer Barbys a bed for the night.
And it's up to them if they wish to share it with his best buddy the Countess von Fledermaus (Giordano, Peter Bark's mum from the classic
Burial Ground).
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| Pig in a market. |
Lead singer - and star of the show, albeit only because she's the single cast member that can actually string a sentence together - Flavia Flav (Superstar AKA Silvia Pintos), bassist (and ex plumber) Mario (Chaplin, great-grandson of Charlie, no really) plus her boyfriend (and top rock guitarist) Rafa (Subterfuge - not his real name) take a minute to think Arkan's offer over before deciding that being stuck in a spooky old castle with a fey German and his practically mummified, pneumatically breasted friend is preferable to sitting cramped in the corner of a leaky van whilst the bands two other members, Billy and Sharon continue their world record breaking shagathon on a pile of sleeping bags in the back.
And with that sorted we can hopefully get on with the plot good and proper.
On arrival at the castle Flavia is shocked to discover that the Countess is really the former silent movie star Olga Luchan, who gave up her promising career to wed the last of the von Fledermaus clan way back in the 1920's.
You see it appears that her hubbie was well versed in the black arts who gave his wife the secret of eternal life as a wedding gift - yup it appears that drinking the blood of the young enables you to cheat death!
As with all these things tho' there's a wee drawback in that if you don't keep up your blood intake you'll begin to to decompose.
Fair enough.
Luckily the Countess has managed to keep the grim reaper at bay all these years by employing Arkan, his sidekick Baltasar (remember him?) and their scary midget pals (the short López and very short Martínez) to entice young folk into the castle by planting heavy farm machinery on the road and it looks like the Killer Barbys are next on the list.
No real loss to popular music as we know it then.
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| "I'm sorry I have my woman's period!" |
Of course the utterly disposable Billy and Sharon are the first to die in order to feed the Countesses blood lust and yes, they're still shagging when it happens, giving Olga the excuse to not only smear her breasts with jam but also to attempt come over all saucy (well if you think your Grannie in sexy black undies is a turn on) as she tries to seduce Rafa.
Being a red bloodied male - or a huge fan of mothers milk, who knows? - Rafa is sorely tempted by the offer of some uber-MiLF madness.
A wee bit upset (it's hard to tell thru' the Botoxed face I mean it could just be constipation) by her beau's flirting Flavia decides that the best way to win him back is to have an almighty strop and to this end skulks off to her bedroom to bitch with the by now bored Mario before collapsing into a drunken stupor.
Scarily tho' that very night she has a spooky dream about Rafa dying whilst having 'the sex' with an old lady.
To be honest I can think of worse ways to go.
Waking with a start, Flavia has a strange feeling that things are amiss in castle von Fledermaus and reckons the Killer Barbys are the band to solve the mystery.
Well The Aquabats are a bit busy crowdfunding their new series.
And the Glam Metal Detectives are away touring*.
It's slim pickings really.
So armed only with her ample charms, a plumber and the keys to the steamroller our heroine decides it's time to rock.....
If there’s one thing you could always rely on in life it was Jess Franco’s amazing ability to cobble together such a shambolic mix of half arsed ideas and (alleged) sexy imagery (no doubt over a single weekend) and still have the majority of uneducated punters mistake it for utter cock womble whereas those of us who know better can see it for what it really is.
Art at it's most subversive and entertaining.
Probably.
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| Put it in me! |
As with every single one of his movies, Killer Barbys has a sloppy and rushed air about it that permeates thru' every socket hole and frame, from the choppy lazy editing to the off-synch dubbing and endless arse numbingly bad shots of corridors and fog that appear to have been dropped into the film at random intervals for no other reason than to beef up the running time, things that in the hands of anyone else would signal a crapfest but under the gaze of Franco elevates the whole thing past high camp and into the realms of cinematic genius.
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| Paddington. |
And if that doesn't tempt you to view then there's also the frankly fantastic (if not a wee bit scary) sight of the by then 65 year old Mariangela Giordano kidding on she's actually only 26 whilst seducing someone young enough to be her grandson plus the transexual (possibly) charm of the amazing Silvia Superstar.
She may walk like a man and talk like a man but what the Hell, she's ginger and has ringlets.
Admit it you so would.
But only if Giordano was busy of course.
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| Fuck me it's Fred Titmuss! |
If you're a regular reader of this blog you probably know all this already and absolutely love Jess Franco (mostly for those very same reasons) no matter what shite he pumped out during his illustrious career.
And God love him for it.
*I fucking wish.
