So to launch the Eurotrash Corner of this blog (you knew there had to be one) here’s an enjoyably tatty slice of Gothic Euro-daftness. Joseph Cotton stars as a very American Baron Frankenstein who together with his dubbed colleague Dr Marshall makes one of the poorer monsters to grace our screens, with a head that’s too bulbous and one wobbly fake eye that keeps threatening to fall off. The monster escapes but not before killing the Baron, to the distress of his daughter (Rosalba Neri) who’s just back from medical school as a fully qualified surgeon. “I could never love you,” says Neri to Dr Marshall, “unless of course your brain was in the body of that hunky but brain dead farmhand who works here”. Dr Marshall doesn’t take much persuading which, despite that fact that Ms Neri really is a very attractive Lady Frankenstein, suggests he really hasn’t had all that much experience with women. She does of course have another reason for the operation, namely that the only thing that can kill her father’s rampaging monster is another monster, apparently. Meanwhile uncharismatic policeman and traumatic haircut victim Mickey Hargitay is on the case, punching innocent villagers, barging in when he’s not wanted, and shouting a lot.
Lady Frankenstein’s surgery goes as planned. The monster, who has been out for a little walk mainly to kill a few villagers and molest a couple of naked ladies, returns to the castle. It was during his little sojourn that I stopped to wonder why the Frankenstein monster never seems to need to eat or have a cup of tea, much less go to the toilet. Indeed, the grunts and groans elicited by the creature here may suggest an altogether more bowel-orientated cause for his anger and distress. Anyway, the scene is set for a showdown between Lady Frankenstein’s brain-transplanted boyfriend (who now also possesses super-strength) and her father’s constipated creation, who dies with a monkey wrench in the back of his skull after an enjoyably choreographed fight where his arm gets chopped off. Numerous members of Rentatorchwieldingmob.com get to fulfil their contracts and storm the castle while the Lady and her creation get to have sex in front of a roaring fireplace and a massive pool of blood. The End.
Director Mel Welles does a reasonable job of keeping everything moving, and the only other thing I’m going to mention is that the music (by Alessandro Alessandroni) really isn’t very good, the main part being carried by a very disinterested-sounding (or possibly drunk) flautist. I’m not quite sure why but somehow the soundtrack album for this has found its way into the Probert Towers collection. I suspect the temptation of having that, THE MAD BUTCHER and KILLER NUN all on one CD was too great a temptation to resist.
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