Director: Jesús Franco (as Jess Franck)
Writers: Jesús Franco (as David Kühne), Nicole Guettard (as David Coll), A. Norévo
Producer: Marius Lesoeur
Cast: Marcelo Arroita-Jáuregui, Agnès Spaak, Hugo Blanco (as Hugh White), Luisa Sala, Pepe Rubio (as José Rubio), Perla Cristal, Magda Maldonado (as Magda MacDonald), Pastor Serrador, Manuel Guitián, Rafael Hernández, José Truchado, Marta Reves, Daniel Blumer, Javier de Rivera (as Javier Rivera), Juan Antonio Soler, Julio Infiesta, Julia Toboso, Maribel Hidalgo, Ramón Lillo, Mer Casas, Jesús Franco, (uncredited) Pedro Fenollar
Over the Christmas holidays, young college student Melissa Fisherman (Agnès Spaak) visits her uncle, Dr. Conrad Fisherman (Marcelo Arroita-Jáuregui), at his castle in Holfen, Austria. She finds the atmosphere there anything but welcoming. Her Uncle Conrad is distant and her Aunt Ingrid (Luisa Sala) has become a drunken recluse. Dr. Fisherman has been long embittered by the affair that his wife Ingrid had with his younger brother Andros (Hugo Blanco). Upon discovering the two lovers together, Dr. Fisherman murdered his brother. He then returned Andros to life in a catatonic state. Using ultrasonic techniques learned from the dying Dr. Orloff (Javier de Rivera), Dr. Fisherman can control Andros to make him follow his orders. Now Andros is sent out to stalk and kill various women Dr. Fisherman has given necklaces containing ultrasonic transmitters.
The Flashback Fanatic movie review
However, being the eclectic Christmas film connoisseur that I am, I need a change of pace once in awhile. So I cast my gaze beyond the English-speaking world to ring in the holidays with the neck-wringing Dr. Orloff’s Monster.
This French-Spanish production by prolific Spanish filmmaker Jesús Franco was filmed in Madrid. However, as in Franco’s previous and unrelated horror film The Sadistic Baron Von Klaus (1962), this story takes place in the fictional Austrian town of Holfen. Prominently featured is the same imposing castle setting used in Franco’s France-located story The Awful Dr. Orlof (1962).
Here we have a Dr. Fisherman as the mad scientist villain being referred to as Dr. Jekyll in certain dubs and alternate movie titles. This film has the second of Franco’s many Dr. Orloffs (previously spelled as “Orlof”) in a minor role. This mad doctor name-dropping of Jekyll and Orloff was apparently meant to appeal to a wider horror audience.
The storyline itself seems rather slapdash. The plot is quite simple once we know of Dr. Conrad Fisherman’s infidelity grudge. The nature of the mad science used to create this film’s monster is barely touched upon. Fisherman seems unconcerned with his accomplishment of bringing a dead man back to life. That feat has actually already been accomplished before the film begins. Fisherman seems to only be interested in sending the zombie he has made of his murdered brother Andros out to murder a variety of sexy women.
This guy really seems to have some misplaced priorities. Despite being stuck with an inebriated invalid wife that witnessed his act of murder, Dr. Fisherman can still sneak around to charm an assortment of babes. However, it seems his only purpose in doing so is to lavish upon them the gifts of his necklaces with ultrasonic transmitters to lure Andros in for the kill. This serial murder motivation is never explained. We do know that Dr. Fisherman obsesses about the infidelity that occurred many years earlier between his wife and brother. Somehow using the undead Andros to kill other women must vent some sort of animosity Fisherman has. Screw all of that play-God-and-make-scientific-history stuff. Fisherman makes a monster for the same reason any nine-year-old brat would: to kill.
As in many Jesús Franco films, the nightclub scene figures into the plot. Jazz, drinks, and sexy female performers are fixtures in the weird world Franco’s stories explore.
That Andros is one cool customer. I just wish I knew how a crusty-faced automaton keeps making the scene appearing in nightclub dressing rooms and killing the talent without even paying the cover charge. I could have saved a small fortune over the years.
Again we have director Franco’s continued innovations of the erotic mingling with the horror. This was still pretty edgy stuff in the early ’60s. It is dealt with here in a pretty perfunctory manner; girls get naked and then get dead. This certainly suits the theme of obsessive misogyny that seems to motivate Dr. Conrad Fisherman.
This is the third of director Franco’s quartet of ’60s black-and-white horror films. While I need to see many more films in his vast filmography, so far, these four early Franco films are my favorites. Dr. Orloff’s Monster is probably the least accomplished of them. While its plot is rendered in a very minimalist fashion, its continuity seems a bit jumbled, and it is a bit of a rehash of The Awful Dr.Orlof, the storyline is clear and the filming is executed with more discipline than many of Franco’s later works.
As far as any yuletide traditions are concerned, this movie seems hell-bent on confounding them. The only gifts given are Dr. Fisherman’s deadly necklaces, barely any holiday decorations are displayed, no snow has fallen, the only happy carolers are a trio of hotel drunks, the meager attempt made at Christmas cheer in the Fisherman abode is angrily halted by the grouchy doctor, and the warmth of family is nowhere to be found. This film is about a Christmas where the few remaining members of the story’s family are all estranged from each other. The closest bond that any Fisherman family members share is between Melissa and Andros, the father she has never met until he has become an undead mute.
Every once in a while, maybe we need a break from the holiday hustle and bustle with a Christmas movie that neither celebrates nor condemns the season. Dr. Orloff’s Monster is just indifferent to it.
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