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| Images courtesy of Mondo Macabro |
Ira Welles Meltcher, known professionally as Mel Welles, is
probably best remembered for his role as Gravis Mushnik the beleaguered florist
shopkeeper in Roger Corman’s The Little Shop of Horrors in 1960. Though the actor remained active in film, he
made his directorial debut with the 1960 crime thriller Code of Silence
also featuring Welles onscreen.
After
co-directing and starring in the 1964 Italian-Swiss drama A Quiet Business,
Welles landed himself in even deeper uncharted waters in 1967 with the strange,
borderline psychotronic The Old Dark House meets The Little Shop of
Horrors Spanish-West German yarn Island of the Doomed. A basic Agatha Christie inspired whodunit
with the framework of The Most Dangerous Game by way of The Day of the
Triffids, this long thought to be lost bilingual vacation turned murder
mystery flick also known as Maneater of Hydra starring killer plants
comes to Blu-ray disc in the US for the first time via Mondo Macabro in a brand
new 4K restored special edition.
Like many Agatha Christie inspired whodunits, the setup is
simple and straightforward: an ensemble group of characters on vacation venture
out via ferry boat and later a cab driver to a fictional small island off the
coast of Spain. Intending to visit the
island’s world-famous botanical gardens, the group accidentally runs over a
middle-aged man named Baldi (Mike Brendel) who turns out to be one of a handful
of servants tending to the needs of the reclusive wealthy scientist Baron von
Weser (Cameron Mitchell).
With the area
seemingly abandoned by all but the Baron and his servants, the group including
an unhappy married couple consisting of a young redhead and her elder nebbish
cuckold husband presses on enjoying dinner, drinks and cigarettes with the
well-dressed and mannered Baron. Soon he
introduces everyone to his famed botanical garden and that’s around when the
body count inexplicably begins to rise after he shows off genetically
engineered carnivorous plants which feel like supercharged vampiric Venus
flytraps.
Equal parts bawdy, sassy and later gory with elements of
science-fiction camp involving some hokey looking plant effects work, this ensemble
Spanish-West German production filmed in English (also offered in a Spanish dub)
feels like an extension of The Little Shop of Horrors set on the island
of Ishirō Honda’s Matango: Attack of the Mushroom People. Featuring a mixture of sexy and scary
performances from its international cast including Elisa Montes, Kai Fischer
and Jorge Martin, co-written by wells, Ernst Ritten von Theumer and Stephen
Schmidt and produced by future Slugs financier Jorge Ferrer, the murder
mystery turned monster movie features scenic scope 2.35:1 widescreen by Cecilio
Paniagua (camera operator on Patton) and a suitably unnerving score
co-authored by Antón García Abril and José Muñoz Molleda. Mostly the supporting players are second
fiddle to Cameron Mitchell who initially opens up like a Bond supervillain
before evolving into a mad scientist gleefully overplaying his lines and to the
special effects puppeteers commandeering those killer plant vines and poisonous
thorns.
Initially released in Spain in February of 1967 before
reaching West Germany in July and the US later that year, Island of the
Doomed turned out to be one of three films made by Mel Welles that year,
the other two including Hello Glen Ward, House Dick and The Last
Mercenery. After that, Mel would do
twenty episodes of the TV show Spectreman before directing two more
features Lady Frankenstein and Joyride to Nowhere between 1971
and 1977. Digitally restored in 4K from
surviving 35mm elements, the film is prefaced with a note indicating the
restoration was made from sources of varying condition and thus image quality
is a bit unstable at times.
That said,
it looks mostly pretty good, offered in the correct scope ratio finally with
sizable extras including an interview with Mel Welles, audio commentary with
David Flint, a video essay on the career of Jorge Martin and an interview with
Angel Sala on horror films produced in the Costa Brava scene. While not a masterpiece with, as aforementioned,
somewhat hokey looking visual effects, this gory and crimson soaked import
should give fans of killer plant movies mashed up with murder mysteries a good
time. Uneven and sometimes shoddy but
overall a fun way to kill eighty-eight minutes or so.
--Andrew Kotwicki
