Customer Reviews

Blood Orgy Of The She-Devils

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What can I say about this Satanic film hmm. Well the pakaging is a little miss leading. At first glance your thinking this is a satanic porn film with hot girls dancing COMPLEATLY naked and stabbing men with spears. First of all there are only two sacrifice scenes in the whole film and the girls are not as blood thirsty as you might think. The story focuses on a witch named Mara who teaches people how to read their past lives. She acts more like a WICCAN coven leader than a Satanic witch however. It must also be known that the coven also display an anti male WICCAN feel to it as well. The film earns most of it's shock value to the past life flash backs, one scene includes a pocessed girl being stoned to death, another shows a torture and then a burning scene. If you like movies about witchcraft then try it out, but don't get it if your looking for sleazy gore and sex because your not going to find it here. By this time in cenema the witches in this movie should at least be naked as most cult films featured in the 1970s.

"Blood Orgy of the She-Devils" is one in a long line of ridiculous but curiously entertaining films from B-movie king Ted V. Mikels. Ted is a good-humored eccentric who casts and re-casts the same people over and over again, so if you've seen more than one of his movies, you may start confusing the character traits of the principals. That's true in this case as there are several repeat offenders...I mean thespians...on the set for most of the movie, notably Tom Pace and Leslie McRae. You may remember McRae as Michele, the star dancer from Mikels' campy "Girl in Gold Boots." Here she's just as campy as ever (with much darker material) and yes, she gets to dance again. Pace you may also recall as the unlikable petty thug from "Girl in Gold Boots." Here they are dating, and boy are their dates bizarre.

The movie centers on Mara, Queen of the Black Witches (Lila Zaborin,) a shape-shifting embodiment of all that is evil, and her nefarious schemes and bloodthirsty ways. Most of the film is shot inside Mikels' own castle (that's right, Ted lived for fourteen years in an actual castle,) which provides the movie with a healthy dose of ambiance. The acting is better than in many of Mikels' pictures, although McRae apparently can't help being hammy. The film is long on seances and rituals and scary-sounding "witchspeak," but is essentially an old fashioned good-versus-evil plot, incorporating lots of painful past-life regressions, a burning at the stake, an exorcism gone horribly awry (leading to a stoning,) and Mara killing lots of people from a distance using witchcraft (I particularly found the fishbowl-assisted death of the guy who drowned on his highball at a party to be imaginative.) There's even a cameo by Ted V. Mikels himself, and as a special bonus, Ted plays the bongos for the soundtrack, setting the film to appropriate music.

In the end a sacrifice is interrupted by Earth-shattering lasers and religious exorcism meeting in a stylish maelstrom in Ted's front yard, resulting in lots of fires and lots of bikini-clad witch corpses in the castle. But where's Mara? Earlier in the film she turned into a black cat, but in the conclusion she turns into a bat. This bat provides the biggest moment of unintentional hilarity in the film as it is clearly in a string, and is quickly dispatched in a manner that reminded me of the scene from "Zontar: The Thing From Venus" where the injectapod is skewered with a fireplace poker. That would have been handy here, as the men who are ridding the castle of its evil place the bat on a fire and the spirit of Mara escapes, leaving open the possibility of a sequel. Come on Ted, it's been 38 years since you made this, but couldn't you still do "Revenge of Mara?" I'd buy it!

The film is a low-budget wonder, that looks better than you would expect from the title (there really is no blood orgy...) but suffers from overacting from some of the B-movie regulars (especially McRae and Mara's assistant, William Bagdad, who wears the most outlandish head garment I have ever seen throughout the movie.) Ted's castle provides an excellent and atmospheric set for the production, William Nipper's sound is very good at furthering the creepiness, and despite obviously cheap special effects, the film is effective if over-the-top. I have always found Mikels to be one of the most entertaining directors from the golden age of B-movies (though sometimes for unintended reasons.) He's self-effacing, good-humored and loves making movies. This movie won't scare you, but it will entertain anyone who wants to see a cutting-edge horror B-movie from the early 1970s.

There are several editions of this film available in several different packages. The cover illustrated for the Alpha Home Entertainment edition has absolutely nothing to do with the film whatsoever, but the cover from the Image Entertainment "Cult Cinema Collection" release is the real deal. The Image Entertainment DVD also features a great commentary track by Ted Mikels, the original movie trailer, which is very long by today's standards, and Mikels' filmography.

This is a low-budget film that has a few decent moments, making it worth a cursory look. As other reviews have stated, don't expect a tremendous amount of gore, sex, nudity. Expect some dramatic screaming and some silly ceremonial witchin' however. This is definitely one that you might want to watch with some friends who enjoying heckling, it makes it that much better. There are moments where the film drags, but things do pick up by the end. The best I can say is give it a try, it's campy, slightly silly and probably goes good with beer.

This review refers to the Alpha Video DVD release [ALP 1031D]

I bought this film for one reason and one reason only: it has the most deliciously lurid title EVER.

I will agree with the previous poster that the DVD cover is more than a little misleading; even downright deceptive. The semi-naked goth vixen prominantly displayed on the DVD cover is not in the film (I believe she is actually a 'clip-art' model) -nor are the "She Devils" the "satanic temptresses" promised; they are more a Wiccan coven. The rest of the box cover art is, however, an accurate representation of the image quality on the DVD, while the back-cover blurb is generally accurate.

If you're looking for sleazy, bare-breasted Satanic butcher babes drenched in blood and gore, skip this title. This is early 70's drive-in sleaze -though tastefully light on the sleaze and long on the dramatic build-up. There is no gore, maybe a pint of blood and all the violence is mostly off-camera or out-of-frame (it was rated PG).

The script is astonishingly literate and the production is remarkably polished for it's genre. The "She Devils" of the title are sort of a cross between hippies and stripper girls, but on the whole they display some decent acting ability (as well as enough cleavage to retain interest). It often has the look and feel of a college theatrical production with a bigger budget, but is far from being "amateur."

As for the technical details. the picture and audio quality are about what you would expect from a low-budget drive-in sleaze picture. There is a lot of film grain and the uneven contrast is often pitch black during dark or night scenes, but on the whole the colors are nicely saturated and give the impression of the "magnificent Eastmancolor" promised by low-budget shock films of the period. The audio tracks are loud and clear, with only a slight hint of distortion when the screaming starts.

The Alpha Video DVD did have a surprise bonus not indicated on the box which potential buys may be interested in: It features an audio commentary track by writer/producer/director Ted V Mikels, who explains the authenticity of his research, the background of the production, an almost literal guided audio tour of his castle filming location and some genuinely funny asides during certain scenes. This bonus feature was a welcome surprise when I got the disc home.

recommended for genre fans and those who enjoy a bit more intelligence with their cult sleaze. And you've GOT to love that title!