Continuing my research for Dracula's Daughter vs. The Swamp Monster and expanding my experience with Jesus Franco's oeuvre, I viewed yet another of his lesbian vampire films, appropriately titled:

Vampyros Lesbos

It also introduced me to the one and only Soledad Miranda.



My thoughts are lengthy, not safe for work, and lavishly illustrated. So behind a cut they shall go. But here's a shock: I really liked this film.



Immediately, I knew Vampyros Lesbos would be better than Female Vampire, because it's not long into the film before you realize that--surprise, surprise--it actually has a plot. It also fosters an incredible, dream-logic atmosphere. Strangely, here Jess Franco's rather deranged style of direction adds to the film rather than takes away from it.

In this case, we begin by witnessing the first of two sequences where Soledad Miranda, playing Countess Nadine Carody, performs a rather bizarre striptease. Essentially she comes onto the stage where a naked woman is already standing, pretending to be a mannequin.



The routine basically consists of Nadine placing her flimsy clothing onto the "mannequin." A curious striptease combined with its inverse.



At the end, Nadine pulls the woman to the floor, whereupon she caresses and kisses her body.

In this first performance, our heroine Linda is in the audience with her boyfriend Omar. She pretends not to be interested in the show, but her face seems to indicate it is the most fascinating thing she has ever seen. She is clearly already hooked by Nadine.


Linda.

A scene where she visits her psychiatrist confirms that Linda is not only fascinated by this woman, but has been dreaming about her for some time--prior to ever seeing the show. Adding to the surreality of the proceedings, the psychiatrist is not taking notes, but is doodling randomly on his notepad.



It is soon revealed that Linda is a lawyer and the firm she works for has assigned her to go visit the Countess Nadine Carody--whose name Linda does not yet know--concerning the Countess's inheritance.

Linda first stays the night at a hotel, where the creepy servant tells her not to go to the Countess's island because death lives there. He then reveals to Linda that he has a dead woman tied up in the wine cellar. Naturally, this encourages Linda to go to the island rather than stay.

At the island, she meets Nadine, lounging in a bikini and pulling off a pair of oversized sunglasses in a way Paris Hilton can never hope to achieve.



Linda is astounded by Nadine and almost helplessly agrees to go swiming with her. She does not have a bathing suit, but that hardly bothers Nadine. Here, of course, we see Nadine doing something you don't often see vampires engaging in: nude sunbathing.



They're also being watched by a strange man, who will turn out to be Nadine's servant, Morpho. I assume Morpho is mute, as he never speaks.

Nadine and Linda share a few glasses of red wine in order to discuss the inheritance. Apparently, one Count Dracula has left Nadine everything. Nadine reveals this is because she made his life worth living and he was grateful to her. Nadine can barely take her eyes off Linda, even as the clearly drugged wine takes its effect.





Nadine has Morpho take Linda to the guest room. Whereupon Linda regains consciousness and is approached by Nadine and promptly seduced.







And then, Nadine bites her.



Curiously, if you'll allow an aside here, I discovered while watching this that an extraordinary coincidence had occurred. Without ever having seen this film, or knowing anything about it, I had made a parody of it. For my final project in my Modes of Film and Video class at University of Iowa, I made a short video called Bebida Sangre, a portrait of a female vampire. The film began with the titular Bebida attacking a female victim, and during the attack, I inserted brief shots of my mother's corn snake, Clementine, being fed a mouse.

During this attack, and actually throughout much of the film, Franco inserts shots a scorpion wandering around. I found this coincidence quite surreal.


You'll see this little guy a lot, but, uh, don't get too attached to him.

Later, Linda wakes up alone and naked on the floor. She seems quite dazed and, quite understandably, has some questions.



Unfortunately, when she goes looking for Nadine, she finds her floating naked in the pool. Apparently dead.

We are then introduced to a private psychiatric clinic, run by Dr. Seward. One of his patients is Agra, apparently a former victim of Nadine's, who wails that Nadine has gone. We also discover Linda is one of the patients, with no memory of what happened on the island or even who she is.

Omar comes to retrieve her and her memory returns. She speaks of what happened on the island as if it was a dream.

Yet, we know it was not. In her mansion--not on the island, though, as far as I can tell--Nadine lies on a futon, talking to Morpho. He listens, rapt with attention, never looking way from her. Apparently, some 200 years before, a mob of men looted the city below the mansion. A few of them came for Nadine and nearly raped or--or maybe they actually did, it's not very clear--when Dracula arrived and killed them. He turned Nadine into a vampire, but she has despised men ever since. She uses them as servants--like Morpho, apparently--but she only takes women as lovers. Usually, they are nothing but food to her, pawns in her talons.

Yet, with Linda, Nadine is completely under her spell.

Still, she calls Linda to her mansion through her mind. Apparently leaving Morpho to deal with Omar.





Linda arrives at the mansion, and Nadine ushers her in expectantly.



Nadine then offers Linda a container of red liquid, which Linda drinks. Naturally, this is Nadine's blood--something Linda seems only mildly unnerved about.



Nadine then speaks some magic words, in German I believe but the subtitles merely transcribe them rather than translate so I have no idea their significance. Apparently, Linda has now been brought into the covenant of the vampires. She is one of them.

Promptly, but not surprisingly, Linda becomes the sexual aggressor now.



Agra apparently senses their liaison and cries out--in pain or jealously, I'm not certain--when Nadine bites Linda again.

Then we are back at the clinic, where Omar has been brought in by Linda because he has lost a lot of blood. One of the vampires apparently bit him, but we never see it happen, so I don't know which one.

Here, refreshingly, it is revealed that everyone in this film just accepts that vampires are responsible. Seward agrees to tell Linda how to protect herself from Nadine's influence.


Linda and Dr. Seward. Seward is a dick.

It seems that vampires, rather conveniently, vanish once killed. The best way to kill them is to destroy their brain, whether by splitting their skull open with an axe or by impaling their brain with a spike.

Things get a bit more episodic now.

Agra informs Seward that she can feel Nadine, who is coming to meet him. Note that Nadine coming to meet the guy who is more or less cockblocking her could not possibly have a good ending for him.

Linda goes looking for Nadine, but ends up being captured by the crazy hotel servant.

Omar visits Dr. Seward for help finding Linda, but on his way out is approached by Agra. Agra begs him to go speak with Nadine, but to beware because she hates men. Seward interrupts and has Agra locked up, while telling Omar to leave and never come back again. Because Seward is a dick.

Omar goes looking for Nadine and catches her stage show. This time, however, it ends with Nadine ripping the throat out of the "mannequin."



Meanwhile, Linda is tied up. The servant reveals he was Agra's husband until Nadine drove her mad. Now he tortures and kills women, apparently making them say that they love him prior to their death. He threatens Linda with a hacksaw, but she convinces him to loosen her bonds. Whereupon she splits his skull open with the hacksaw.

Later that night, a very pissed off Nadine arrives at the clinic when Seward is alone.




"Time to die, motherfucker!"

He immediately and enthusiastically begs her to iniate him into the vampire covenant. She refuses, pointing out that he has been fucking around in her affairs. He says that was just a ploy to get her to notice him. He then says the magic words, which she furiously points out won't work because he isn't a Goddamn vampire.

He gets pissy, like a bratty child, and starts speaking Latin. Apparently this is some sort of benediction, because she recoils.



Of course, he didn't count on Morpho, who promptly appears and strangles Seward. This pleases Nadine.


Nadine watches Seward get his comeuppance.

She steps over Seward's corpse. She then appears in Agra's room. Agra is ecstatic to see her, but Nadine reveals that she has come to say goodbye. She then vanishes, leaving Agra to weep.

Omar goes to Linda's psychiatrist and they both go to Nadine's mansion, but are promptly chased off by a gun wielding Morpho.

Linda arrives at Nadine's island, where the poor scorpion has somehow ended up at the bottom of the pool. This is significant.


"Help me! Help me! I promise I won't sting you! Just get me outta here!"

Inside the house, Linda finds Nadine in a weakened state. Nadine begs Linda to let her drink her blood and regain her strength. Linda refuses, saying she does not want to become Nadine's slave.



She then bites the surprised Nadine on the neck. She follows this up by pulling the spike out of her pocket and stabbing Nadine through the eye. We then see the poor scorpion has clearly drowned.

Morpho barges in, throwing Linda aside, and grieves over his mistress. He kisses her dead lips--clearly he loved her despite the fact she would never return the sentiment. He then pulls the spike from her eye. He then stabs himself in the heart with it.


Even missing an eye, she is astonishing.

Omar and the psychiatrist arrive, but of course both Nadine and Morpho have vanished. They claim that Linda just had a dream--a rather curious thing for Omar to say--and that none of it was real. Linda firmly replies that she knows better as they boat away.

FIN

While Lina Romay as the titular character from Female Vampire is how I originally pictured Dracula's Daughter in my screenplay, Vampyros Lesbos is the type of film I was looking to emulate, and Soledad Miranda's Nadine is much closer to how I pictured my Bela Alucard behaving.

I honestly really liked this film. Both myself and Isabelle were entranced by Soledad Miranda and neither could believe that Linda would choose Omar over her. At first I thought Lina Romay was more physically attractive, but Soledad Miranda just blows her way. Not merely physically, but with her presence. Her sheer sexual energy is pure, raw, and electric.

I understand that Jess Franco thought of her as his muse. It's not hard to see why, and it is tragic that she died in a car accident very early in her life. If she was anything like Monica Bellucci, she'd be just as incredibly gorgeous today as she was then.

It really is sort of a shame that it's sort of the standard for lesbian vampire films to end with the sort of chauvinistic attitude of "heterosexuality prevails" because Nadine and Linda falling into an ecstatic embrace and shunning the intrusion of the men would have been a much better ending.

Off the top of my head I can only think of one film in this subgenre that ends with the patriarchy having been totally subverted, and that's Daughters of Darkness.

Still, I haven't seen them all yet...