Arguably one the
finest horror movies to have emerged from Spain, Director Amando DeOssorio's "Tombs of the Blind Dead",
starts off in Lisbon, where three colleagues, Virginia (Elena Arpon), her boyfriend Roger (Cesar Burner),
and best friend Betty (Lone Fleming), are going on a camping trip together. But whilst on the train, Virginia
has a bust up with her boyfriend, and so jumps off mid-journey in the hope of hiking back to town.
As night falls, she decides to rest up in the ruins of an old monastery. But this proves not to be such a good idea, as the area is actually the burial ground of the evil Templar Knights, who were supposedly executed in the 13th century for practising witchcraft and committing human sacrifice. Local legend has it that they still haunt the area at night, looking for fresh blood to sustain their damned existence, and sure enough, as darkness falls something begins to stir in the old cemetery.
Roger and Betty are alarmed to hear of their friends death the next day, and with the police not making any headway in their investigations, the two friends decide to camp out at the old monastery for themselves to see if anybody is still frequenting the place. They enlist the help of small time smuggler named Carlos, who wants to find out who is encroaching on his turf. But as night falls again, they soon find out that the local legends about the undead Templar's are indeed true, and a bloody battle ensues.
Filmed in Spanish, with English sub-titles, which takes modern day zombie lore and mixes in elements of medieval sword and sorcery to potently good effect. Overall this is a very interesting and innovative feature, showing the skeletal knights galloping about on spectral steeds in ghostly slow motion and hunting their victims by sound, as they have no eyes (so screaming is not advisable). The film is not overdly gory, but is certainly very atmospheric and creepy, particularly the scenes showing the Templars rising from their graves.
My only gripe is that the film takes far too long to get going and there was far too much time wasted with dialogue, and not enough time given to showing the ghostly Templars, so many horror fans may find this film a touch slow. However, the final scenes leading up to the train massacre at the end more than makes up for the slower moments and I would strongly suggest that Eurohorror and zombie fans seek this film out.
