Intrusive Inquiries

Evil is mysterious. There's something supernatural about it because the term can be used for so many different things. This is what makes it dangerous because it can be used to justify extreme actions. But is the total destruction of mystery an inexcusable violation? I think that's what Jean Rollin is saying in his 1968 softcore porno The Rape of the Vampire (Le Viol du Vampire), an often beautifully photographed film of beautiful women, naked or in translucent white gowns, roaming woods or crumbling mansions. I say I think that's what he's saying because there's very little coherence to this film's story.

It consists of two parts, the first part, also called The Rape of the Vampire, was originally a stand alone short film. The second part, Queen of the Vampires, was added to make the film feature length. It really feels like it. The first story, while a little meandering, is a straight forward enough intriguing New Wave criticism of analysis as a group of women who believe they're vampires are kept under surveillance in an old manor by three psychiatrists trying to convince them they're not vampires.

One of the women believes she's blind, one of them believes she's hundreds of years old. A scene of two people dressed as men--possibly men--have a sword fight which is echoed later by a sword fight between the vampire women who are shocked when one is killed by a sword thrust.

Or was she? Probably. I'm not sure.

The superstitious villagers take up arms against the women and there's a cut to a shot of the female psychiatrist wandering alone in a dirt field before inexplicably collapsing. One of her colleagues finds her and carries her away.

The second film seems to concern a vampire queen and her monkish followers as they track down the vampire women from the first film to strip and torture them. The woman who thinks she's blind is blinded and left to wander naked on the beach.

Meanwhile, the surviving psychiatrists collaborate on finding a chemical cure for vampirism. Their scenes of practising blood transfusions on naked vampire women are contrasted with scenes of the vampire queen ordering naked vampire women to be beaten with feather dusters.

Whatever the film's flaws, it has some genuinely beautiful photography. It was hard to get a bad screenshot.

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