FANTASIA OBSCURA: That OTHER Black Sabbath
There are some fantasy, science fiction, and horror films that not every fan has caught. Not every film ever made has been seen by the audience that lives for such fare. Some of these deserve another look, because sometimes not every film should remain obscure.
Sometimes, the smallest stones hitting the pond leave the biggest ripples…
Black Sabbath (1963)
(Dist.: American International Pictures; Dir.: Mario Bava)
Any mention of “Black Sabbath” usually brings to mind:
One of heavy metal’s premier bands (many would say the premiere band), Black Sabbath established the genre with bursting rifts on guitar and drums underpinning disturbing imagery in their lyrics. The band and its members in their solo careers found success in discussing the influence of the devil and dark forces playing upon humans in their songs, often playing up these elements to the consternation of their fans’ parents and self-appointed guardians.
What helped them find their niche was the need to change the name of the band in August of 1969. As noted in their official history, the band had been known as Earth during its early years, but with another established band laying claim to that name, they needed to find a new one. Across the street from their rehearsal space then, a cinema was giving a revival window to the film Black Sabbath. The lines of people outside the theater wanting to see the movie inspired bassist and lyricist Geezer Butler to suggest this as a new name for the band (and gave him a title for a song inspired by a nightmare Butler had), which led to much bigger things in the decades to come.
The story thus leads to the inevitable question: So, how was the film?
The answer to that depends on if you saw the one Black Sabbath’s members were across the street from, or the original version released in Italy.
In 1963, Mario Bava was one of the most prolific and skilled craftsmen working in Italian cinema. He was equally comfortable working in multiple genres, such as the cinematography for the cult comedy Cops and Robbers (Guardie e ladri) and the sword-and sandal epic Hercules Unchained. That year, Bava wrote and directed as well as lensed The Girl Who Knew Too Much (aka Evil Eye), a film credited as the first Giallo film, a genre that would in the next decade give us works by Dario Argento and Goblin. His work was in demand not only in his native Italy, but in the English-speaking world as well; his The Wonders of Aladdin was released through MGM, in addition to his many pictures co-produced and distributed through American International Pictures.
It was the success of Bava’s previous horror film hit Black Sunday that led to American International looking for a new picture from the director. As there had been some recent success back in the US with anthology horror films, such as Twice-Told Tales and Tales of Terror, their conversations led to securing a film along those lines. And with Boris Karloff (who had just finished a run on TV as the host of the horror/suspense anthology series Thriller) becoming available, the film was assembled quickly.
And then re-assembled in a different order with big cuts and edits as it moved between Italian and English versions.
There were three segments made for the movie:
The Telephone
The first segment in the Italian cut, but the second one in the English version, centers on Rosy (Michèle Mercier), who gets continuous harassing and menacing phone calls, the caller describing how much he lusts for her and how they will never be separated. As the caller, Frank (Milo Quesada), isn’t supposed to be able to place a call, let alone describe what he can see looking into Rosy’s apartment on the phone, she calls her confidant Mary (Lidia Alfonsi), who comes over to provide some company, a mistake that precedes tragic occurrences…
With its original dialog, Rosy is a call girl, Frank is her pimp and supposed to be locked away in prison, and Mary is Rosy’s girlfriend, while the English version doesn’t discuss how Rosy affords her digs, Frank is dead and calling from beyond the grave, and Mary is just a friend, even though the lesbian relationship’s subtext survives the edit room’s work on the piece.
While contemporary audiences were not enamored of the section, it holds up well today, both showing its influence on such later works as When a Stranger Calls and the Scream franchise and resonating with audiences familiar with remote menacing via phones and their successors today. As well, the camera placements and use of colors can be viewed as foreshadowing for the work later Giallo directors like Argento would soon give us in their modern-set films.
The Wurdalak
The second segment originally, but third when released in English, takes place in 19th Century Russia, where the noble Vladimir Durfe (Mark Damon) comes upon a cottage on his travels, where he meets the members of a family awaiting the return of their patriarch Gorca (Karloff), who had gone hunting for the Wurdalak, a Russian vampire plaguing the lands. He stays long enough to get smitten by the comely unmarried daughter Sdenka (Susy Andersen) before she warns him to flee for his safety. However, he can’t stay away from her, which is a shame, as none of the family heeded Papa Gorca’s warnings that he issued before he left, putting the family in danger of being brought over to the Other Side, among the Undead.
Had this been the only strong segment of the film, Karloff’s menacing demeanor as Gorca, more beast than man with the feral aspects slowly taking him over, could have been the sole reason to watch the movie; amidst the rest of this bounty, it’s a strong addition to a solid film. (Having him play a menacing vampire while also doing jokey urbane intros for each segment in the English version demonstrates how strong his craft was at the time of the film.)
The segment still easily frightens viewers, even the English version where the colors and lighting are washed out and some of the more violent elements are trimmed; of the three stories, had this one been expanded out to make a full-length, stand-alone film, it might well have still been considered a classic.
The Drop of Water
Set in Victorian London, and coming last in the original film but opening the English version, nurse Helen Chester (Jacqueline Pierreux) gets a call during a stormy night; she’s asked to prepare the corpse of a medium for burial, which pisses her off to no end. Her lack of professionalism at answering such a call leads her to steal a ring with a large gem off the corpse’s finger during the procedure. This becomes the last mistake she makes, as the buzzing of a fly and the dripping of water when she gets back to her flat herald her punishment to come.
Bava’s masterful color palette in each shot and use of sound to heighten the tension make this a very strong atmospheric story; even the addition of a weak soundtrack by Les Baxter for the English version cannot diminish much of the underlying work done for the piece. It’s also the strongest segment from a moral standpoint; as some of the best works in the genre centers around humanity’s relationship with sin, having so concise a piece deal with the consequences for going astray gives it an agency that the other two sections do not have.
In the end, whatever version of the film you end up with, you have a work that is a great gift, with the audience given the opportunity to experience three small, well done stories some 60 years before each one individually could have found its way to a premiere on Vimeo. Black Sabbath gave the world a masterful turn from its auteur and an example of the coming wave of Giallo films.
And, of course, the name of a premier heavy metal band.
NEXT TIME: That time the cast of a TV show ended up making a movie to tell us they’re not our stepping stone…
