Movies

El espejo de la bruja (The Witch's Mirror) 1962 - This Mexican horror fantasy starts off as a tale of Supernatural Vengeance, with a devil-worshipping housekeeper punishing the master of the house for his wife's murder, but it veers off into corpse-stealing and grave-robbing, and transplantation of faces and hands from corpses after the new wife is horribly burned. Includes the unique concept of transplantation of ghost hands, which are not under the control of their unknowing new owner. Jaw-droppingly and imaginatively grotesque without being gory, this is the craziest, most satisfying horror fantasy I can recall seeing in years. Most of these things pretty much take one topic and run it through a full cycle, but this throws in everything they could think of, transformations, apparitions, vengeful spectre rising from the grave and stepping through the mirror, right up to the crawling hand stabbing people with a big pair of scissors. Would make a great double feature with the Japanese film Ghosts of Kasane Swamp. 10/10

Roman Scandals (1933) Eddie Cantor dreams of ancient Rome. I haven't seen much of him and am still trying to figure out what the basis of his popularity is. He's got a good voice and an interesting delivery of comic comments and retorts, and the movie is entertaining with a couple of good songs and a few good laughs. My main reason for seeing this, though, is my acquisition of a Busby Berkeley book, so I have a complete illustrated list of his work at hand. The production numbers in this one are not gigantic mind-blowing spectacles so it is perhaps easier to see what they are made of. It's not just film of people dancing - it's the use of the camera in motion and at unique angles, and the intercutting of close-ups of hands, feet and faces accentuating the action which make these so fun. Sometimes people aren't dancing at all - the set and camera do the work. The slave market fantasy, with tragic song by Ruth Etting, is spicy and kinky with scantily clad maidens dancing, chained and whipped. The baths number with the catchy tune Keep Young and Beautiful makes use of black and white contrast, with Cantor blacked up, and interplay between beautiful blonde bathers in white and beautiful black servants mirroring and complementing each other. Moderately entertaining overall, with an extended chariot race if you are a quadriga fan. 7/10