Arrow Video continues to reconstitute the filmography of Spanish genre filmmaker Jose Ramon Larraz with his final English language thriller, Deadly Manor (originally released on VHS as Savage Lust), the final in a triptych of slasher films set in the US (but filmed in Spain) in the late 1980s to early 1990s. Following on the heels of the label’s glorious box set of his earlier works (including Whirlpool, Vampyres, and The Coming of Sin), plus his 1988 title Edge of the Axe (released under his pseudonym Joseph Braunstein), this final thriller from the underrated director (who made one more feature after this, the 1992 comedy Sevilla Connection) is decidedly dull and derivative affair, borrowing heavily from a variety of classics, everything from The Old Dark House (1932) to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974). Considering his masterpiece, 1974’s Symptoms, the title is a long way off from Larraz’s glory days.
A group of young good-time collegiate characters get lost on their way to a weekend getaway at an obscure lake only one of them vaguely knows the whereabouts of. They pick up a hitchhiker (Clark Tufts) who supposedly knows of the lake but is really a man being hunted by the police for undisclosed reasons. They locate an isolated mansion seemingly uninhabited, but a strange shrine in the front yard consisting of a wrecked car on a pedestal, wherein a number of framed pictures of a young woman are affixed, is cause for some concern. While they hunker down for the night, strange things begin to happen until the woman whose face is plastered all over the walls, the scarred and traumatized Amanda (Jennifer Delora), makes her appearance, exacting a revenge on the careless teens for wrongs done to her in the past.
Disc Review:
Arrow’s loving 2K restoration of the film, presented in 1.85:1, ends up seeming like a waste of energy on a throwaway title from an underrated director. Tiring until the last twenty-minutes of screen-time, this narrative penned Larraz and Brian Smedley-Aston, squanders whatever unique elements it had for a truncated finale (which does feature some notably arresting elements, though they’re too little, too late). A variety of extra features are included, such as a commentary track from Kat Ellinger and Samm Deighan, a new interview with Jennifer Delora, a new interview with Brian Smedley-Aston, an extract from an archival interview with Larraz and the film’s original VHS trailer.
Los Angeles based Nicholas Bell is IONCINEMA.com's Chief Film Critic and covers film festivals such as Sundance, Berlin, Cannes and TIFF. He is part of the critic groups on Rotten Tomatoes, The Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA), FIPRESCI, the Online Film Critics Society (OFCS) and GALECA. His top 3 for 2023: The Beast (Bonello) Poor Things (Lanthimos), Master Gardener (Schrader). He was a jury member at the 2019 Cleveland International Film Festival.
