Jesús “Jess” Franco was a prolific Spanish filmmaker known for making tons of exploitation films up until his 2013 death. While he had been working in the industry since the 50s, his career soared with 1961’s The Awful Dr. Orloff. He’s probably most well known for 1969’s The Castle of Fu Manchu, which was featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000. The film starred Christopher Lee, who starred in several of Franco’s movies including Count Dracula released the same year. Much like Joe D’Amato, his movies were a mixture of erotic and horror, and they were pretty shameless. With the rise of slasher films in the early 80s, production manager Erich Tomek hired Franco to direct his script. It was basically work-for-hire for Franco, who was upset that he was promised a lot that wasn’t delivered. Franco’s Bloody Moon, also known as The Saw of Death, was released in March 1981.
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Synopsis
After killing a young woman, the disfigured Miguel (Alexander Waechter) is institutionalized in a mental asylum for five years. He’s released to the care of his sister Manuela (Nadja Gerganoff), with who he has an incestuous relationship. Manuela runs a boarding school with their Aunt Maria (María Rubio), who believes that she is plotting to kill her. Meanwhile, Angela (Olivia Pascal) arrives to attend classes but is being stalked by Miguel and is scared for her life. Before too long, girls at the school are being killed off one by one by an unknown killer. As the bodies start piling up, Angela wants to leave the school before she’s the next victim. A foreign language teacher, Alvaro (Christoph Moosbrugger), tries consoling Angela, but it turns out there’s something sinister going on. Just who is killing the girls at the school, and what could their motivation be?
Review
Compared to most other slasher films released around the same time, Bloody Moon stands out in some ways. For one, there are some fantastically gruesome kill scenes, most infamously a decapitation-by-saw scene prominently featured on the poster. There’s also a sequence where a woman is stabbed through her breast, as well as a woman strangled with thongs. While the effects aren’t quite on par with Savini’s work on The Prowler or The Burning, they’re still effective. Also, for a work-for-hire project, Franco manages to inject some style here, using various lighting techniques and camera positioning. The plot mixes in themes of incest, betrayal, secret affairs, and blackmail that add an extra layer of sleaziness. It’s also interesting that they use Miguel as an obvious red herring given that he did kill someone early on. Still, you’d have to be dumb if you didn’t realize that he’s not the main killer.
Given that this film is entirely dubbed, it’s somewhat difficult to judge the acting without hearing their real voices. Granted, the acting doesn’t really matter in this type of film, suffice it to say the actors do their job. On top of being gorgeous, Olivia Pascal is decent as final girl Angela, even if we don’t really know her. Even if the makeup appliance used for his disfigurement is laughably cheap-looking, Alexander Waechter is pretty creepy as Miguel. Aside from them, most everyone else is just cannon fodder to get picked off by the unseen killer
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