Sexual Astrology - Sound of Horror
Rating:  -
So you're making a cheapie monster movie and you don't actually have the dough for a real monster...what to do? Easy, just make the monster invisible...and that's exactly what the makers of Sound of Horror (1964) aka El Sonido prehistórico, did...and somewhat effectively, I might add. This Spanish production was co-written and directed by José Antonio Nieves Conde (Captain Blackjack), and features James Philbrook (I Do Not Forgive... I Kill!), Arturo Fernández (The Incredible Invasion), Soledad Miranda (Eugénie, Vampyros lesbos), José Bódalo (Captain Apache), Antonio Casas (Kiss Kiss... Bang Bang), Lola Gaos (Pancho Villa), and horror flick junkie favorite Ingrid Pitt (The Vampire Lovers, Countess Dracula).
The story is set on a Greek isle, and opens with three people, two men and a woman, inside a cave, getting ready to make use of some DYN-O-MITE (that one's for you, J.J., wherever you are). There's Professor Andre (Fernández), his niece Maria (Miranda), and the Professor's assistant Stravos (Casas). Maria, new the archeology biz, makes some comment about the hardships of mucking about in caves with TNT to which Stravos replies, "You'd better get accustomed to the smoke, as well...it's the most uncomfortable part of these explosions." Really? I would have thought the explosions to be the most uncomfortable part of the explosions, but then I'm no archeologist, so what the hell do I know? Anyway, the blast seems to have turned up squat, except for some petrified eggs, one of which they take back to the house, another which hatches in the cave after everyone leaves, spewing out a muddy globule that soon disappears. About this time we meet the housekeeper Calliope (Gaos), a local woman who speaks about all the bad mojo surrounding the mountain (get used to this, as she harps on this aspect through most of the film). Soon afterwards four more people show up in Dr. Asilov (Philbrook), his girlfriend Sofia (Pitt), Dorman (Bódalo), and their driver/guide Andre (Casas), presenting quite a group of potential victims...er, I mean quite a group of characters. Turns out Professor Andre, Asilov, and Dorman have been working together for some time trying to locate a legendary treasure, and their finally completed map (which looks like it was drawn with a crayon) has lead them to this mountain...only thing is, treasure isn't the only thing to be found, as the Professor's earlier blast has awakened a prehistoric beastie invisible to the eye, thirsty for blood and a penchant for slashing...
I enjoyed this film somewhat, but it got mired down as a number of characters spent a lot of time getting all philosophical after the creature claimed a couple of victims, going on and on about how they may have ultimately wasted their lives in search of a treasure only to have found death. Also they compare their unintentional find and their subsequent fear to the threat of nuclear annihilation a few times, which didn't make a whole lot of sense to me, but whatever...it was these overly talkative aspects that slowed the film down, dragging it out to an hour and a half, illustrated by the fact that by the end of the first hour of the film, there had only been two victims...well, two and a half as one person got injured when something clawed his leg, and had to gimp around for the rest of the film. The performances were okay, but the writing was such as there really wasn't one character I would have considered to be the lead. At the outset a lot of time is spent focusing on the men and their lust for treasure, hiding under the pretense of being archeologists, so that later we can see all these scenes were they feel remorseful about their behavior, possibly hoping to elicit sympathy from the audience, but it didn't really work out that way (for me, at least). The women were nice to look at, Miranda being sort of the mousy, sheltered type contrast against Pitt's worldly, experienced character, highlighted during their short dance sequences (watch the men eyeball Pitt as she shakes her moneymaker...it's kinda creepy). As far as the monster goes, its not completely invisible as it appears briefly a couple of times, looking much like a toy dinosaur super imposed on the screen, giving the feel of it being about six feet tall. From what I did see, it was for the best that they went the invisible route for most of the film, as the beast could be heard through its shuffle walk and its constant shrieking. One aspect that was really decent was the make up effects in terms of the bloody tears victims received after the creature attacked. They looked realistic and fairly horrific. In the last third of the film the survivors are trapped in the house, trying to come up with a means to fight the creature...my thoughts were to throw some paint or powdery substance at the beast, taking away its chameleon-like camouflage, but they went a different route, one that was temporary and dependant on specific circumstances...not the way I would have gone, but whatever...there were a few scary scenes (half being of the fake scare type) and tense moments, like the extended scene with Calliope going to the well in the middle of the night, but it didn't feel like enough to carry the film all the way through given its length. I will say the ending was quite good, and made up for a lot of minor misgivings I had about the rest of the film, but not all. In closing, this is decent little low budget film that just ran a little too long (if they cut about twenty minutes off, preferably in the talky sections, it would have been better).
The picture quality on this Alpha DVD release, presented in fullscreen, is pretty standard for Alpha, meaning its lousy through and through...the picture is murky, fuzzy, and shows signs of wear throughout. It is obvious the film isn't presented in its original aspect ratio as in the beginning, while the credits are rolling, many of the names are cut off. The audio fares slightly better than the picture as it's fairly clear, but a far cry from being sharp. Perhaps I complain too much, especially given the low cost of the DVD, but I don't necessarily mind paying a little more for better quality...sometimes it seems with these Alpha releases they go out of their way to find the worst possible source material and slap it on a DVD, but then that's just my opinion. As far as extras, there is a rough trailer for the film, and listing of other Alpha releases.
Cookieman108
Rating: -
I saw this film not long after it was released. Most horror/science fiction films of the time were in black and white with poor visual effects because of the low budgets. This film is no exception - black and white, poor acting, poor directing, bad sets, corny dialogue and yet when I saw this film in the late 60's I really liked it. It was genuinely creepy. I bought the DVD all these years later and I still enjoyed it - mainly because of the nostalgic effect it had on me. The print has very poor picture quality and sound which is disappointing. The story is quite good and I believe with the right director it could be remade into a really greaty film. The best part of the film is the sound of the approaching invisible creature and then the piercing scream that follows. Another bit of chilling footage is when the old lady goes ouside to the well to fill up her jug at night. How stupid must you be, knowing that the creature is out there.
In conclussion, the DVD is poor in quality as I have mentioned above but it still has some genuine spookiness. Another plus is that it is the only Spanish horror flick I have ever seen.
Rating:  -
This is the second time I have sat through "Sound of Horror" and it does not improve with age. This was made in Spain and is dubbed into English. It was originally released as "El Sonido Prehistorico" and also as "El Sonido de la Muerte", "The Prehistoric Sound", "Sound from a Million Years Ago", and ultimately as you see it now as "Sound of Horror". A more descriptive title would have actually been "Ninety Minutes of Pure Pain".
The plot concerns a group of "cave explorers" in Greece looking for buried treasure. The cave contains two dinosaur eggs which are activated by dynamite. One of them becomes an omelet on their fireplace, but the other goes on a rampage. I should stop here to explain the title. It is the SOUND of horror because the dinosaur is invisible! (It saved on special effects.) You can only hear his hideous scream, which sounds like an extremely agitated Charo yelling at the top of her lungs. Only once do we get a glimmer of him before he ends up on top of a blazing jeep and reveals himself to be "Grumpy" from "Land of the Lost". I would have given the film one star, but had to give it a bonus for the incredibly cheesy "axe throwing" special effect. This is the most hilarious effect I can recall in a horror film.
The one thing that really works against this film is the attempt to be all things to all people (still a problem in Hollywood today.) It has long, introspective talky scenes and cold as ice romance for the women. It has adventure, explosions, and monsters for the men. It has an improbably named old woman, Calliope (Lola Gaos), making coffee at all hours of the day and night for Juan Valdez. In other words, it tries too hard. The film is seemingly endless at 90 minutes, but would have been much more palatable with a little less coffee drinking and talking. I never grow tired of watching four guys shoveling dirt in a cave, either. Some people thought that Ingrid Pitt's dancing scene helped the picture. I disagree. It was yet another tortuous time waster that had nothing at all to do with being eaten by dinosaurs. On a positive note, the manner in which they expose the dinosaur is most clever and amusing. I will not spoil it for you but it involves bags of flour. Another problem the film suffers from is very loud, inappropriate string music playing in the background at wholly improbable times.
This film would have been a great MST3K if it had been about ten times better. The axe and flour scenes generate a couple of hearty laughs, but beyond that I would avoid this like the plague.
Rating: -
The image and sound quality are terrible. The images are grey and murky. The sound is full of hiss. I was confused when I read the review by phasedin he states "it's still better than my early 90's video copy from one of those companies who specialize in public-domain titles." This is an Alpha/Gotham release and thier forte is public domain. When I zoomed out, I saw video tracking on the image. I did some searches and for some reason you can only get this from Alpha Video. The plot and acting are better than O.K.
The price is right, but this is by no means a feast for the eyes.
Rating:  -
I first caught "Sound Of Horror" way back on TV in the 70's (the only time I saw it aired). It was on in the middle of the night, and since this was the days before cable & satellite Tv and hundreds of channels, it was one of only 1 or 2 choices I had to watch at that hour of the night with the nearby NY stations, most of which still went off the air most evenings in this period shortly before 24 hour a day programming and infomercials.
Well, being a horror movie fan, I would have watched it anyway. Of course being black and white, it actually appears older than it's actual age (from the mid-60's).
No doubt about it-this is a low budget affair. Perhaps the reason for the dinosaur being invisable was budgetary concerns. However in this case, it actually enhances the movie. For many (myself included) atmosphere and mood are the most important things in horror movies. This perhaps can account for all of those Universal horror movies from the 30's and 40's being still so popular today.
Anyway, the mood is set from the 1st second of the movie when we see the inside of this cave, which seems to be a cross between a movie set with perhaps a bit of animation or a drawn backdrop to the set. There's something moody and surrealistic about the scenes set inside the cave where these dinosaur eggs are discovered. Perhaps the director realised this. There are several long scenes inside the cave where nothing moves, and nothing happens. They're arent even any actors around. We just see the inside of the cave with it's glowing lights and eerie music playing-and I love it!!!!
The movie's not perfect certainly-the pacing being the most serious flaw. It just goes too slow at times. The one scence of a young Soledad Miranda (later a European cult start until her very early demise)dancing to some Greek music just brings things to a crawling hault and is the one slightly silly scene in the movie. Apart from that there's much to like even though the print of the film isn't great-it's still better than my early 90's video copy from one of those companies who specialize in public-domain titles. But, if you're not up for the challenge or into this type of old film, the print quailty will hurt the enjoyment of the movie I feel. For me, i'm thrilled to have this on DVD. I would have paid much more though to have a director commentary-but i'm unsure if the director is even still alive, and for a studio remastered version of the film. But I doubt that will ever happen-this film is almost totally unknown even by fans of obscure horror.
The single most effective thing in the movie (noting of course the mood of some of those surrealistic cave scenes and the nice soundtrack music), is the shrill cry of the dinosaur-it's very very effective and would add little to the movie if the creature had actually been visible. I remember that making the biggest impression on me when I first caught this at 3 a.m. on a dark night when I was in my early teens.
Not for fans of modern horror-gore or CGI special effects types of films, but quite a little gem for those who can appreciate old black and white horror with tons of mood to spare.
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