Silvia Solar Movies
- 1978
Anthony Steffan fills the handcrafted boots of the titular Gentleman Killer. Operating in a dusty border town, hired gun Steffan takes on a ruthless outlaw gang. The crooks prove no match for the G.K., who plays just as dirty as they do. This sort of thing will be new to anyone who's never seen The Magnificent Seven (1960) or A Fistful of Dollars (1967). That's not to say that Gentleman Killer isn't entertaining...merely that it's hardly innovational. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1977
La Redada, a low-budget Spanish language thriller also released as Barcelona Kill, is the story of a female journalist and her boyfriend who inadvertently get involved with murder and mayhem and must run for their lives pursued by the Barcelona Mob. Directed by Jose Antonio de la Loma, La Redada is a typical crime mystery with little new to offer. However, it has its moments, and the cast members, while unknown in the United States, give uniformly good performances. ~ Linda Rasmussen, All Movie Guide
Spanish softcore porn filmmaker Jorge Luís Gigó Aznar directs the 1975 Eurocult horror trash film La Perversa Caricia de Satán (released in the U.S. with the English-language title Devil's Kiss) under the pseudonym of Georges Gigo. Silvia Solar plays a medium who conducts occult experiments with a telepathic doctor (Olivier Mathot). While in the cellar of an old castle, they create a zombie by reviving a dead guy with the soul of Satan. The zombie goes around and kills everyone, thereby creating opportunities for nudity. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Silvia Solar, Olivier Mathot, (more)
- 1975
- R
Jacinto Molina, best known as "Paul Naschy," returned in his eighth go-round as the tortured werewolf Waldemar Daninsky in this odd variation on the theme. Daninsky joins an expedition to Tibet in search of the Yeti, only to be bitten by two cannibalistic women whom he made love with in a cave. That turns him into the wolf-man, but he spends most of the running time defeating bandits and the despotic Saga Khan, only fighting the Yeti briefly in the film's closing moments. This disappointment was Molina's last appearance as Daninsky for five years. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide
- 1975
- R
Although mostly known for his bloody jungle-set cannibal films (Cannibal Ferox; Mangiati Vivi) and the splattery zombie-adventure Incubo sulla Citta Contaminata, Italian filmmaker Umberto Lenzi also made a number of interesting thrillers, including this engagingly incoherent giallo about an eyeball-stealing killer. The slayer's handiwork is first revealed when a female member of an American tour group is stabbed to death in Barcelona, and a teenager on an amusement park ride is murdered in a similar fashion the following day. Coincidentally (or perhaps not), a businessman named Mark Burton (John Richardson) finds out that his wife, Alma (Marta May), is in town, and remembers finding her unconscious once back in America with a human eyeball lying next to her. More murders follow, with a peasant girl, a lesbian named Lisa (Mirta Miller), and her lover (Ines Pellegrini) all attacked by the raincoat-clad killer. After yet another attack, Mark falls under suspicion, and must discover the killer's identity in order to clear his name. Bloodier than most of its contemporaries, the film presages the subgenre's spin into logic-free sensory assault with the following year's Dario Argento classic Profondo Rosso and features a star-studded cast including Martine Brochard, Jorge Rigaud, and Raf Baldassarre, as well as Argento regulars Tom Felleghy and Fulvio Mingozzi. Some video versions cut about four minutes of graphic violence. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Richardson, Martine Brochard, (more)
In this Spanish horror/crime drama, a gangster is shot in the head during a jewel robbery. His accomplices take him to a doctor, who tells them that his brain is destroyed and he needs a transplant. They murder a rival gangster known as "The Sadist" and the doctor transplants his brain into the head of the wounded robber. ~ Brian Gusse, All Movie Guide
- 1965
The Yankees and the Rebels must stop fighting over a stolen gold shipment and join forces to save a New Mexico fort from a major Indian attack in this western. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rory Calhoun, James Philbrook, (more)
- 1963
European action star Eddie Constantine is the hero of this noirish thriller. Constantine plays a soldier-of-fortune, taking a well-earned vacation in Spain. It doesn't take long before he gets mixed up in an embezzling scheme. The more involved he gets in the plot, the less likely it is that he'll be able to extricate himself by fade-out time. For reasons unknown, the fairly well-distributed As If It Were Raining is frequently missing from "official" listings of Eddie Constantine's films. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Elisa Montes, (more)
- 1958
Los Clarines del Miedo (The Bugles of Fear) is a Spanish bullfighting picture. So what else is new? Well, it happens that the film goes to great lengths to deglamorize bullfighting, showing it up for what it is: a debilitating, heartbreaking profession with as much sordidness and back-stabbing as any form of show business. Francisco Rabal stars as Aceituno, a matador whose momentary lapse into cowardice in the bullring sets off a chain reaction of unrelenting tragedy. The "triumphant" ending in no way dilutes the impact of what has gone before. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Francisco Rabal, Silvia Solar, (more)
