Black Candles — Black Candles(Blu Ray)

Black Candles is a heady, if at points highly camp mixture of 1980s softcore & satanic mystery- with the odd touches of horror here ‘n’ there. It appeared in the year 1982 and was helmed by Barcelona’s José Ramón Larraz- who of course had a good pedigree in erotic horror with his kinky-at-times-very-brutally-bloody 1974 film Vampyres. And while the film to hand is in no way as impactful, and the erotic outweighs the horror- it’ll be entertaining enough to euro sleaze fans, and there are more than a few WTH moments too. Here from Severin is a Blu-Ray release of the film, featuring a 2k scan, commentary track, and a few other worthwhile extras.

Black Candles (aka Hot Fantasies, Naked Dreams, Sex Rites of the Devils) was a Spanish production filmed in the UK with a Spanish cast. It was the ninetieth film directed by José Ramón Larraz- he used the pseudonym name of Joseph Braunstein, and it appeared a year after the director's horror comedy The National Mummy.

The film kicks straight into the 80’s softcore come light horror blend, as we see a balding man at it with a woman in a four-poster bed- we get darting images of a long needle going into a voodoo doll- then the man has a heart attack.  We then get introduced to our main characters Carol (Vanessa Hidalgo) and her partner Pablo (Jeffrey Healey) who have just flown into the UK, due to the passing of Carol’s brother- who we saw dying in the opening credits. They are pick-up from a night flight into the UK by Fiona (Helga Liné) who proceeds to drive them through the night to a large and isolated house. Initially, the power seems off, so Fiona uses her seemingly huge stocks of black candles to light things up a bit. Then Carlo and Pablo retire to bed and are fairly quickly making the beasts with two backs, and Fiona watches on through a peephole while pleasuring herself. Later on, Carol can’t sleep- so she goes down to the kitchen, the powers now working- though she gets shocked by a staring bearded man at the window-Fiona appears, saying it’s all her imagination- but she heads back to bed, the man appears in dog collar- and we find out sooner enough he’s named Reverend Hübner(Manuel Gómez-Álvarez) and he is in charge of a satanic sex flock, that is up to all manner of perversion and magic in the house, and its surrounding barns.

As already mentioned much of the film's focus is on the softcore side of things- and this goes from a few riding in the firelight sessions and an awful lot of rug munching/poking. Though we do get detours into more perverse waters- for example, we get a sexual encounter with a black goat, and later on, one of the cult's members has his pants pulled down, and slowly teased with a sword before the steel goes up his back passage. It’s not pure wall-to-wall sex, and there is some sort of plot/ structure- but not much.

The satanic mystery side is carried out well enough- with Carol trying to uncover what happened to her brother, and what’s going on with the cult. The horror elements are lightly present, and I’d say these are at their most memorable/ effective when the creepy and perverse Reverend is on the screen- with his one long curled fingernail, and need for devilry of the flesh and soul.

The acting is of fairly mediocre eurotrash level- Gómez-Álvarez as already mentioned as the rev is good. As is slowly but surely getting sucked into the cult Healey as-the-always-looking for sex Pablo.  As a chilling and uneasy horror film Black Candles largely falls down, but as a campy and trashy softcore heavy satanic mystery it’s entertaining enough- and as mentioned early the more darkly perverse sleazy moments are decidedly memorable and impactful. The film runs at just over the one hour and twenty-four-minute mark, and it all moves by well enough. It will be a film that will be enjoyed by those who have a penchant for satanic tipped euro sleaze- which is high with camp and lightly edged with both mystery 'n' horror.

 

 

Moving onto this region free blu ray. And we find a 2k scan of the film- this is a nice and bold scan, which of course enhances the predominately fleshy tones of the film. Moving onto the extras, and first up we have a commentary track with Rodney Barnett And Troy Guinn, Hosts Of NaschyCast- and this is a chatty/ informative track. They begin by talking about the film's three titles, and the picture's unreleased libido themes. Moving on they chat about how the director had little love for the film, and why this might have been. They talk about Larraz's previous careers to been a director-comic artist and fashion photographer. We get comment about the film's score which was sourced from the Cam musical library, and how some of the film's cues turned up in other euro exploitation fare. Later on, they talk about actress Helga Liné- her icy presence as the lady of the house, and give her bio. They chat about Larraz’s other output, comment on other notable cast members, and more. Next, we get La Dama Del Fantaterror( 18.28) – a featurette on actress Helga Liné by filmmaker Diego López. Made By The Devil (42.00) – which finds Gavin Baddeley, Author Of Lucifer Rising: Sin, Devil Worship & Rock'n'Roll- discussing the history of satanic cinema, themes in the film to land, and the way satanic is often mixed with sex in film- a most worthy of a play extra. Lastly, we have An Exception To The Norm (21.20) which Antonio Lázaro-Reboll, Author Of Spanish Horror Film discusses the career of Larraz
 
 
Black Candles is certainly not the best or most distinctive of Larraz’s filmography, but if you’re in the mood for turn-your-brain off euro trash- with plenty of softcore action, and satanic mystery/ horror then Black Candles will certainly please. With once again Severin doing a nice job on the film's bold scan, and worthy extras.