Format: Internet video on laptop.
Two of my favorite movies are Spanish horror movies. The Devil’s Backbone is one of my top-5 movies of all time and The Orphanage is probably in my top-10, although I’ve never made a formal top-10 list. I entered Tombs of the Blind Dead (sometimes called just Tomb of the Blind Dead, just The Blind Dead, or its Spanish title La Noche del Terror Ciego) with some expectations. This is apparently one of the movies that starts a renaissance in Spanish horror films and spawned a trio of follow-up films. Evidently people just can’t get enough of vampire/mummy Templars.
While we start with what appears to be a medieval ceremony involving the torture and death of a young woman, we spend the bulk of the beginning of the film in the present. Gina (Maria Elena Arpon, listed as Helen Harp) and her boyfriend Roger (Cesar Burner) are planning a camping trip when Gina bumps into Betty Turner (Lone Fleming), a friend from school. Betty is quickly invited along on the trip, and while it’s not stated, I think it’s pretty clear that Roger is hoping for a little doubling-up on him under the stars. That is made more manifest when he and Betty flirt on the train. Gina gets so upset that she asks for the train to stop to let her off. When the train doesn’t stop, she jumps off right around an old abandoned monastery.
