The Awful Dr. Orlof

The Awful Dr. Orlof (Gritos En LaNoche) (1962)

Runtime: 88 minutes

Directed by: Jesus Franco

Starring: Conrado San Martin, Diana Lorys, Howard Vernon, Perla Cristal, Ricardo Valle

From: A few Spanish/French companies

This presents an early 20th century world where someone can have the name MORPHO LAURER.

Two months ago I saw my first Jesus Franco movie, the hilariously named Nightmares Come at Night. It was IMO a lame boring waste of time. Of course I needed to give another shot to the prolific director; as his first horror flick (and in fact is said to be the first from Spain period) and something which theoretically could have been more to my tastes than one of his ultra-sleazy 70's pictures meant that this seemed like the right direction for me. Turns out, this still had erotic moments, including gratuitous boobs.

This was seen via streaming on Arrow's service; as the site itself reveals that this is a rather flagrant riff on Eyes Without a Face. Eyes is a great horror film about a scientist father who wishes to restore his daughter's face, which was ruined in an accident of his own fault. That unfortunately involves murdering young ladies. Much of those same beats are followed here—there's another doctor murdering young ladies for what he feels is a valid reason but of course is insane to everyone else. A rather curious twist is having a hulking blind (!) henchman who improbably is named Morpho Laurer. He has a distinct look and it is rather terrifying. So is the early 20th century setting.

Naturally this isn't as good as Eyes Without a Face; there are some lulls and silly moments. Be that as it may, I was still entertained. After all, this has nice atmosphere clearly inspired by British horror, along with my amusement at the lead detective's average intelligence and how it took his ballerina girlfriend to offer a great assist in him cracking the case. Thus, this was a Franco I dug and at least once in awhile I'll check out his work.

Not a surprise to me that the titular Orlof (Howard Vernon) appeared as different versions of the character in some other Franco productions, not to mention additional roles in additional motion pictures from the director.