PLOT: A biography of pioneering cetologist and “psychonaut” Dr. John C. Lilly.
COMMENTS: John Lilly may best be known to readers of this site as the inspiration behind the canonically weird Altered States. The real Lilly seems to have lived a life that actually was “stranger than fiction.” A neurophysiologist by training, Lilly began his research career during the height of Cold War paranoia. The term “brainwashing” was first coined in the 1950s, when Lilly’s initial studies of mammal brains were designed to achieve “push-button control of animals and people.” In the 1960s he embraced the use of psychedelic drugs, leaving behind military research in favor of the counterculture. He described his moment of enlightenment as a “very bizarre and weird feeling.”
Almereyda and Stephens’ documentary traces the gamut of Lilly’s life-long research interests, from his early days hooking monkey brains up to cathode ray TVs to a daily self-experimentation regimen involving hourly doses of ketamine. What comes across is a portrait in contrasts. Though he came to see himself as living outside the bounds of mainstream “consensus reality,” American culture readily absorbed Lilly’s ideas.
Lilly is responsible for our belief that dolphins are intelligent creatures, and inspired the Greenpeace effort to “Save the Whales,” igniting an interest in environmentalism. He popularized the analogy likening the human mind to a “biocomputer”; he believed that only through the perception of other realities can we break free from our “programming.”
Lilly’s “feeling of weirdness” resulted from the realization that the animals he had been researching were not just test subjects but thinking, feeling creatures, whose intelligence and sense of consciousness could equal that of humans and, in some cases, even exceed us. After studying the brains of cats, monkeys, and dolphins, he decided to focus on dolphins, convinced they would have some ancient wisdom to impart to human beings.
The film’s makers present all facets of Lilly’s research and impart his intense curiosity regarding the mind and how it works. His evolution from straight-laced government scientist to drugged-out psychonaut proceeds without judgment. In the beginning, Lilly comes across as eccentric even when appearing on ’60s talk shows, likening inter-species communication to an alien encounter. In one episode the host is quick to point out that Lilly is a real doctor and not “some nut!”
The narration touches on important ethical issues regarding animal research, but never delves too deeply. Lilly’s personal fortune gets a
PLOT: Vena and her family come to work at a strange amusement park marked by an ever-growing number of disappearances, deaths, and unusual goings-on.
WHY IT MIGHT MAKE THE APOCRYPHA: A collection of unsettling scenarios that make their low-budget DIY components into advantages, Malatesta’s Carnival of Blood cares not for your fancy storytelling and logical progression of events. A consistent mood of unease and an off-kilter sensibility make this an underappreciated companion to other amateur horrors, both good and bad.
COMMENTS: Biz Markie’s ode to loss and frustration, “Just a Friend,” was one of the biggest hits of 1989. Seemingly recorded with a mic and a Casio preset, Biz howled out his pain over the cheapest, tinniest piano loop. It was awful, but by gum everybody knew the damn song, and you couldn’t help but laugh and join in with the crowds screaming out “OH BABY YOU!!!” mid-chorus as Biz shredded his vocal cords in existential pain. It’s a legendary song despite its amateurishness, and possibly because of it.
Perhaps you can see where I’m going with this. We have spoken before about the glories of the 1970s indie horror scene, a genre unto itself populated by low budgets, first-time directors and screenwriters who tend to become only-time directors and screenwriters, and a fervent hope that blood and bodies will do all the work. Malatesta’s Carnival of Blood is a masterful example of the form, with major shortcomings in storytelling that perversely enhance the atmosphere of discomfort and dread, homemade effects that betray their homemade origins yet occasionally become transcendently original, and an incompetence that’s downright charming.
Speeth and screenwriter Werner Liepolt have a couple things working for them that lift Malatesta above the other amateur one-offs. One is its location, a working amusement park, which grounds the action in a tangible, believable milieu. The filmmakers had access to Philadelphia’s beloved old Willow Grove Park, at the time d/b/a “Six Gun Territory” and only a couple years away from being leveled and replaced with a mall. The picture also benefits from some unexpectedly decent acting. The performers are by no means brilliant, but they display a professionalism that is rare in this sort of film, managing to sell scenes that would otherwise be laughable. We only have the vaguest idea why the Norris family joins up with these carnies (revenge seems to be the primary goal), but Betsy Henn and Paul Hostetler are quite charming as the nervous Nellie and her heat-packin’ husband. Villechaize brings his particular brand of oddness, only a year before The Man With the Golden Gun. My favorite of these is Dempsey as the amoral impresario Mr. Blood, who is tasked with most of the exposition and delivers his lines with the sinister gentility of Vincent Price playing a maître d’. He remains confident even as he demonstrates a complete inability to operate a fire extinguisher. In his most delightful scene, he interrupts our heroine and the ratty tunnel-of-love operator by sliding up in a bumper car. Where did he come from? When he departs, where’s he gonna go in a bumper car? No matter how ridiculous things get, this kind of commitment helps sell it.
Sometimes the film hardly bothers with basics of storytelling, dispensing with voice or foley during tense scenes in favor of dramatically mismatched music. It’s actually an effective method; applying an eerie synthesized sting to a chase scene is as unsettling as any number of screams and crashes. Speeth has great confidence in his ability to let the images do the heavy lifting, and every now and then, he’s absolutely right. He attaches his camera to the walls of a rotating tunnel, adding a level of disorientation to an already head-scratching attraction. He places his heroine in the center of a giant tarp that actually takes on a sinister quality as she tries to escape. Perhaps his most effective visual is the room full of ghouls who have assembled to watch Lon Chaney’s The Phantom of the Opera, equally as delighted to be at the movies as they are hungry for blood. Speeth must have recognized a good thing when he saw it, because he replicates the shot with an unconscious Vena in the foreground and the leering Mr. Blood sneaking up on her like Chaney on the projection screen. The director is unquestionably an amateur, but every now and then, a unique vision comes through.
I feel like the film’s ending speaks for the filmmakers, as the evil mastermind Malatesta celebrates another successful night of carnage by taking a spin on the park’s chair swing. As he blissfully takes in the ramshackle setting, cavalierly disregarding the likelihood that a haunted amusement park that kills its guests, employees, and investors is a park that’s going to have a hard time luring in more of them, he leans his head back in gentle bliss. A job well done, Malatesta. A job well done, Malatesta’s Carnival of Blood. You’ve got what we need.
PLOT: B-roll footage from Jesus Franco’s Count Dracula (1970) repurposed into an avant-garde presentation of the story.
COMMENTS: Pere Portabella’s oeuvre refuses to be easily intelligible. It embraces the fragmentary nature of surrealism, suggesting the idea of a narrative without delivering a cohesive story. Portabella is especially known for his clandestine period: a series of films made illegally during the Franco regime in the late 1960s and early 1970s, employing guerrilla tactics in the vein of the Third Cinema.
Cuadecuc Vampir is perhaps his most famous work from that period, an abstracted take on the vampiric myth camouflaged as a making-of documentary for the European co-production Count Dracula by Jesús Franco, directed a year before. Franco’s movie was a typically mediocre B-movie affair following the tradition of Hammer Films, even using Christopher Lee as Dracula.
Portabella worked like a documentary filmmaker for this project. During Franco’s movie, his own crew filmed the improvisations and behind-the-scenes footage without directing anything himself. Due to purposeful continuity errors and grainy black-and-white high-contrast photography, he made something whose effect closely resembles the unearthing and manipulation of long-lost media: that is, a found-footage movie.
As in a found-footage movie, Portabella uses editing to set the mood he has in mind. An oppressive and claustrophobic atmosphere emerges through segments depicting the spread of vampirism from an old patriarch. The results hints at possible political undertones, but those are not always clear.
What remains undeniable, though, is the anachronistic aesthetic—a result of the stylistic choices mentioned above—that engages in a dialogue with the cinematic tradition of gothic horror and the vampire myth, and explicitly refers to productions the silent era. Nearly all diegetic sounds are muted, replaced by an experimental soundscape composed by concert pianist Carles Santos, including thunderstorms, tapping sounds, and glitchy effects alongside the melodies, deconstructing any sense of cinematic illusion. From the beginning, the creative process unmasks itself: practical effects are shown during their construction, actors take off their makeup, cinematic crews appear onscreen or in mirrors.
Cuadecuc could be interesting as a glimpse into the backstage production for fans of Franco’s original movie, but only if they are open to an experimental format without voiceover and with no informative intent. But the film stands alone as a puzzling and challenging cinematic experience.
The Vampires of New Orleans: Atun-Shei Films’ documentary/narrative hybrid delivers a story of vampires in modern New Orleans wrapped around interviews exploring the city’s horrific folklore.
“Fantastique: The Dreams and Nightmares of French Cinema”: A box set of obscure fantastique French films spanning the 1930s to the 90s: Dans la nuit, La nuit fantastique,Le Diable souffle, The Golem, The Woman with Red Boots, and Three Lives and Only One Death. While the movies themselves may be unknown, familiar names like Catherine Deneuve, Marcello Mastroianni, Marcel L’Herbier, Raoul Ruiz, and Luis Buñuel‘s son Jean Luis pop up throughout. (This is a pre-order for a November 10 release). Buy “Fantastique: The Dreams and Nightmares of French Cinema.”
I Want Your Sex (2026): A sociopathic artist seduces her naive young assistant into an dangerously inappropriate sexual relationship. This unconventional (but not quite weird) B&D rom-com from Gregg Araki appears on 4K UHD + Blu-ray with no extras. Buy I Want Your Sex.
Visitor Q (2001): Read the Canonically Weird review! Surprisingly (or maybe not, considering its straight-to-DVD origins) Takashi Miike‘s transgressive assault on the traditional family has never appeared on Blu-ray until now; Radiance to the rescue! Buy Visitor Q.
WHAT’S IN THE PIPELINE:
No guest is scheduled on next week’s Halloween edition of Pod 366, but Greg, Giles and Pete will be there to discuss the week’s weird news and new releases. In written content, Michael Diamades gets weird for Halloween with the tale of Pere Portabella’s alternate cut of Jess Franco‘s Count Dracula, Cuadecuc Vampire (1971); Enar Clarke investigates the new documentary John Lilly and the Earth Coincidence Control Office; Shane Wilson finishes up his Halloween-themed reader-suggestion‘s by attending Malatesta’s Carnival of Blood (1973), and Gregory J. Smalley looks at Ben Rivers’ experimental all-kid art film Mare’s Nest. Onward and weirdward!
Celebrating the cinematically surreal, bizarre, cult, oddball, fantastique, strange, psychedelic, and the just plain WEIRD!
