MARK OF THE WITCH (1970)
THE BRIDES WORE BLOOD (1972)
Directed by Tom Moore/Bob Favorite
Retromedia DVD
Reviewed 03.30.05
Review by Joseph A. Ziemba

THE FILMS
If it’s not Saturday night at your house, it soon will be. If you’re suffering from a glut of lousy schlock film experiences, that will soon be remedied. Had a bad day too? Get ready to scratch that itch, my friend.

Regional rarities are a calling card for some of the finest vintages known to the trash film connoisseur. It’s that loving combination of “go get ‘em” attitudes, surreal situations born out of inexperience, and unknown “performances” that make these local-colored films so appealing. You get a sense of inherent dedication that isn’t always apparent in studio b-films, no matter how cheap the finished product may appear. As a result, these off-center spook films almost always guarantee a good watch; hilarity, creeps, thrills, choose your poison. Mark Of The Witch, a college campus possession-fest from Texas, and The Brides Wore Blood, a mind blowing monster stew shot in Florida, not only carry the torch; they bring the matches as well.

Welcome to Denton, Texas, where the kids aren’t alright and they all hold a Mark Of The Witch. After a prologue witch-hanging, we’re introduced to a college class full of occult nuts. Jill, a girl next door type, spends her time volunteering for the local book drive and organizing seance happenings at her professor’s pad. Sparse synth blips and lame hippy folk from Sean Bonniwell (The Music Machine!) light the way. When the gang performs a seance found in Jill’s dirty red witch book, Ms. J finds herself possessed by the prologue hag, complete with a Medieval Times accent. Next up, she kills a dog (voiced by a man’s barking noises), fries a canary, partakes of an artsy make out scene, and lures young mods to The Grove, locale of ritualistic killings. Will boyfriend Alan and Professor Mac succeed in banishing the witch out of Jill’s body forever?

Mark Of The Witch might seem like a gip at first glance. Utilizing a cast of unknowns and directed by Tom Moore (Return To Boggy Creek), the film sticks to PG rated thrills and holds onto its one-trick-pony plot for dear life. It also delves into a few instances of unnecessary incantation padding. Normally, that’s a death toll, right? Fortunately for us, the simple minded plot is completely engaging, further embellished by a really likable cast. The acting isn’t going to impress anybody, but the mugs on our group of fashion rejects are swell. The whole film has a good time, laid back waltz to it; crude in its execution and featuring a few instances of artsy flourish. And how about that tripped out climax? Fantastic. All in all, Witch is quite perfect in its naivety. Tame by 70s standards, but a light gem as a result.

Travel even further down the ladder of obscurity: The Brides Wore Blood is about to freak you out. Since the plot doesn’t make a lick of sense, I’ll do my best to relate. A guy and a girl wake up in bed and discover a secret passageway in the guy’s bedroom. The nook holds the diary of Count De Lorca, an ancient descendent. Let the flashback begin. The De Lorca family curse calls for a woman to be impregnated by the master vamp, Leon De Lorca. I had a really hard time trying to figure out why. Four vacationing women are unknowingly kidnapped by a mute servant and the head of the De Lorca household. From there, you can expect a (real?!) needle injection, trick shop gore effects, lots of talking, a magnificently weird monster, and a psychic named Madam Von Kirst. Damsels are rescued, fisticuffs are employed, and the ending will shock you. Explanation be damned!

Calling the pace and visuals of Brides “dreamy” is an understatement. Mostly filmed around a funky old mansion (more specifically, that mansion’s basement), Brides is like an Al Adamson cut-and-paster gone haywire. Plot points jump around without explanation and your eyes are unexpectedly assaulted with cheap violence every twenty minutes or so. The blippy soundtrack gurgles with sparse echoes, sudden intrusions of library music, and cues that wouldn’t sound out of place on an old Power Records book and LP set. The whole series of events is totally implausible; if you were on vacation, would you accept an invitation for a mansion tour from an overzealous hobo mute? Probably not. Working in tandem with the strange set pieces, the film’s technical level floats somewhere between a home movie and one of Larry Buchanon’s AIP TV opuses. Dirty, downbeat, uncertain, and pointless...pretty much a gigantic mess. Or pretty much perfect. Remember, decaying vamps ALWAYS resemble burnt hot dogs.

With these obscure beauties by your side, any night is instantly transformed into a Saturday Nite Creature Feature of the most respectable caliber. Now if you’ll excuse me, the clock has struck four and I need to get to bed. I’m already starting to dream about Texas...Jacksonville...

AUDIO AND VIDEO
This is a double sided DVD, with one film relegated to each side. Mark Of The Witch features a disclaimer beforehand, stating that the film has been compiled from several sources in order to present the most complete version possible. While the letterboxed print suffers from several jump splices at the hour mark and a steady stream of green emulsion lines, the picture itself looks fantastic. Bright, clean, and nicely oversaturated. There were a few moments were the tone took on a darker grain, but it still looked nice. A weird jump cut of an earlier scene also popped up for a few seconds at one point. No problems with the mono sound. The Brides Wore Blood appears full frame and retains all of the charms of its low budget film stock: grainy and good lookin’. Film noise is pretty much nil and the mono sound, again, was just peachy. Retromedia released Brides on its own disc in 2000 and I assume this is just a port of that release (minus the compression problems, of course!).

EXTRAS
On the Mark side, we’ve got a ten minute segment of test footage from a Fred Olen Ray project called The Coven. It’s basically a jumble of mid 90s footage featuring Brinke Stevens walking around a city, cemetery, etc., some of which popped up in Jack-O. She also appears topless in front of a few burning candles. Erotic! Fred provides commentary for the footage. Brides features an intro segment from a sub par horror host called “Son Of Ghoul.” Mr. Ghoul takes long pauses in the middle of his sentences and forces toothpaste down a midget’s mouth. Horrible.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Non-fans of this type of stuff may fall asleep, but I decree a “Bravo.” One of the finest pairings in quite some time and by far one of the best weirdo horror releases of ‘05. Finally.

I hate pouting


Seance gone wild


Marked love




De Lorca ladies


Keith Moon alert


Goosh!