tisdag 26 april 2011

Vampire doll (1970)



A young man travels out into the countryside to meet his fiance, Yuko. When he arrives at the secluded house he is told by her mother that she has died in a car accident. He spends the night at the house and hears some strange sounds at night, even seeing someone that looks just like his dead love. Later he sees Yuko outside the house and follows her to a grave with her name. Cut to some days later where the young mans sister is worried since she hasnt heard from him in some time. She persuades her boyfriend to take her to the house, but is told that he already left. For the sake of proper plotdevelopment she doesnt believe Yukos mother and fakes the car breaking down so that they can investigate what really happened. Cue eerie Japanese vampire. Yum yum.

Vampire doll is a fine piece of gothic horror, straight out of the Hammerverse with an atmosphere worthy of Terence Fisher, yet firmly located in the Japanese horror folklore. It has that certain something that the old Fishermovies had, never particulary scary but rich in wonderful colours and settings, making even the lesser movies of the era watchable. This is the kind of movie that leaves you with a warm feeling in your stomach. Not only is it awfully nice to look at, shot in an oldfashioned gothic style, it has bundles of creepy locations and bursts of really graphic violence, just like we want it. The character of Yuko is a perfect mix of the classic vampire and the look of the typical asian ghost, something we have seen a lot of in later years. We even get the classic evil hunchbacked character, a cliche in the extreme but it works just fine.

Excellent stuff indeed, and to top it off, there are two sequels (unrelated storywise though) that I really look forward to watching sometime in the near future.

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