I I was fortunate enough to obtain advance copies for four of the five Jean Rollin Blu-Ray releases. This evening, I watched The Nude Vampire and am already in amazement of the phenomenal work that Kino-Lorber and Brett Wood have done with the restoration process and overall presentation of Rollin's film world.
As Rollin states in the brief introduction, The Nude Vampire is all about mystery. This 1970 film is Rollin's second feature length work and the first of his features to be shot in color. The Nude Vampire is an immensely entertaining and original work. It follows a strange suicide cult, experiments with an unknown being of sorts and an eventual journey into a hidden world.
The Nude Vampire begins with hooded characters injecting a mysterious nude woman with unusual vials of colored blood. Free form plucking and bowing fills the air. People in animal masks follow the mysterious woman down dark pathways, full of contorted shadows. A young man witnesses the masked characters commit what appears to be a murder, though is it? This young man becomes entangled in the strange story which seems fated. It is evident from the get go that Rollin is a director who understands that pure cinema is enchanting. There are no words and all of the peculiar story is told entirely in the visual realm for the first 9 minutes. This is a film full of remarkable colors, odd angles, strange framing and brilliant use of locations. Rollin juxtaposes classic visual set ups with abnormal improvisational work. The characters in the film move in an intentionally slow and mesmerizing fashion. There are long passages of near silence and it is transfixing throughout.
The mysterious woman is being experimented on by a group of people who don't understand her. The leader of this suicide cult hosts private parties where ritualistic and bizarre things take place. Eventually, the young man who saw the possible murder of the mysterious woman appears at this gathering. He is the son of the cult leader and shows up just in time to watch some of the strange rituals that occur. He is naturally drawn to the mysterious woman and has seen too much. The cult leader eventually finds out that his son was involved in a shooting and an escape attempt. Due to this, there is a need for the leaders of the cult to hide away from the immediate Paris area to a deserted chateau. To add to all of these proceedings, there is a curious leader lurking about, observing everything that is taking place from afar.
At the chateau, Rollin maximizes all visual possibilities and gives the surroundings a towering presence. He had such a knack for capturing the beauty and decay of old buildings, stone structures and graves. All of this is on display along with other glorious images. There is one scene in particular that stands out. The Castel twins are at opposite sides of the top of two spiral staircase entrances. They walk down the separate staircases as if conjoined physically and within the given space. During these stretches of time, the near silent intensity is rising. Eventually, the son and his father go through a curtain which is actually a portal into another world. This world is led by the curious leader who is clearly not part of any ordinary world. This man, the rules of life that no longer apply, the beach and the end is also the beginning.
This Blu-Ray looks breathtaking and absolutely destroys previous releases of the film that suffered from washed out colors. Now, the colors could not be more vibrant and full of exciting energy. There are noticeable sound imperfections at a few points though nothing that bothered me in the least. Overall, the transfer exceeded my high expectations and this is a version to treasure.
As for supplemental material, there is the aforementioned Rollin introduction along with a near 20 minute Rollin interview by Daniel Gouyette. The interview successfully melds together casual conversations that Rollin had while being videotaped over a period of several years in the late 1990s until the first few years of the 2000s. Rollin is found to be absolutely full of passion for cinema and image making throughout. He goes onto discuss the importance of surrealism and the fantastic tradition. Further, Rollin explains why he filmed beautiful women in strange settings and treated them as living statues of sorts. Another interesting bit is Rollin getting into the advantages of working with actors who are not professionally trained. After this, there is a short interview with Natalie Perrey who assisted Jean in a number of ways during his career. She plays the elderly woman at the very end of The Nude Vampire and has interesting experiences and memories to share. French theatrical trailers for all of the initial five Jean Rollin releases are found on the disc and all other Kino Rollin titles. All of the trailers look spectacular. The last supplemental feature on the disc is the English theatrical trailer for The Nude Vampire, which is the same trailer as the French one outside of language. The physical package is relatively standard for a Blu-Ray release though all of the Jean Rollin titles come with a highly informative 20 page booklet written by the great Tim Lucas. The booklet is the same for each Rollin title. All in all, this is a dream release that I never expected. I can't wait to relive the glory of more Rollin films in the near future with the other Kino-Lorber releases.
The Cinema of Jean Rollin at Kino:
http://www.kino.com/video/results.php?search=jean+rollin&search_type=all&x=0&y=0
