Black Sunday (1960)

dir. Mario Bava cast Barbara Steele, John Richardson, Andrea Checchi, Ivo Garrani, Arturo Domenici, Enrico Olivieri, Antonio Peirfederici

It's all about the visuals in this, one of the best-looking horror films of all time. In 17th-century Moldavia, Asa Vajda is executed as a witch (or a vampire, or both). A spiked "mask of Satan" is hammered onto her face as she promises revenge from beyond the grave. When the priests attempt to burn her body and that of her servant, Javutich, they are thwarted by a sudden downpour. Asa is entombed in the Vajda family crypt in a stone sarcophagus complete with a window over her face so she is forced to look upon a cross, thus preventing her from rising. Javutich is buried in the murderers' cemetery. Two hundred years later, the elderly Dr. Kruvajan and his young assistant Dr. Gorobec are passing through on their way to Moscow, when their carriage breaks down right outside the crypt. While the driver effects repairs, the two doctors go into the crypt to look around. Attacked by a (comically huge and slow) bat, Dr. Kruvajan accidentally destroys the cross on top of Asa's sarcophagus, breaks the glass over her face, and cuts himself so that the blood drips into the eye sockets of the dead witch after Kruvajan removes her mask. The doctors leave, meeting Asa's lookalike descendant, Katia on the way out. Gorobec falls instantly in love with her. Meanwhile, Asa awakens. She is still too weak to leave her tomb, but is able to summon Javutich, who, still wearing his mask of Satan, claws his way to the surface in possibly the best rising from a grave sequence ever filmed. Together the two plot their vengeance which involves the death of Katia's brother and father and the possession of Katia by Asa.

However, the plot is not really the point here. The look of this film made Bava an international star director, a status which he maintained up to his death in 1980. Filmed in black and white, this movie is a dark, fog-shrouded fever dream. The impressive sets include the ruined crypt where Asa is entombed, the dilapidated graveyard from which Javutich is reborn, and the spacious interior of the castle in which the Vajdas live. The landscape is made up of dead, gnarled trees, a persistent low fog obscures the ground, and the wind whistles constantly, sometimes combined with the howling of wolves. The look is very reminiscent of the old Universal horrors, though not quite so stylized. However, Bava adds disturbing visuals which paved the way for the gorier (though generally less imaginative) horrors of the late 60's and 70's. When the mask is a pounded onto Asa's face, blood wells up around its edges. When Kruvajan removes the mask, the action disturbs dozens of small scorpions which have nested in Asa's eye sockets. Later, these empty sockets are seen to be full of maggots just before new eyeballs appear in her face. When Asa revives, her face, at first, still bears the marks of the mask's spikes.

In fact, Steele herself is one of the movie's best visual effects. A British actress who at first appeared mostly in Italian-made films, she became a horror star as a result of this movie, with entire films being built around her talents. In fact, she represents the closest any actress has ever come to attaining true Karloff- or Price-style icon status in a genre which rarely has strong roles for women. Black Sunday makes it easy to see why. She is beautiful, but no more so than a dozen other horror actresses. But she has a unique look that is hard to describe. Her thin face, rounded cheekbones, and huge eyes can look truly otherworldly. In Black Sunday, she is equally convincing as the innocent Katia and the diabolical Asa. She truly has a presence that no other actress can duplicate. She is a fine actress, though she was dubbed in nearly all her roles in the 1960s, even in the American-made The Pit and the Pendulum!

Aside from Steele, the acting in the film is hard to judge, since everyone is dubbed in the English-language version and the script for that version is undistinguished. The only other performance really worthy of note is that of Arturo Domenici as Javutich who at least looks wonderfully scary with his mustachioed face, festering skin, and all-black outfit with the Vajda griffon on his chest. However, the acting and script are not the point of this film. The visuals make it great fun, and the fact that it launched Bava's and Steele's careers makes it historically important. It is a must-see.