Back from the Dead: Shiver of the Vampires

A distant bell tolls. Three women in mourning attire watch as their men lift a coffin into its sepulchre. Cue the psychedelic rock track from Acanthus, a graveyard in silhouette and a smoke machine and you will quickly see why The Shiver of the Vampires (Le Frisson des Vampires, 1971) is unequivocally A Product Of Its Time. 

If you like frumpy velvet outfits, the long takes of 70s French horror (the perfect antidote to the jarring cuts of the 60s New Wave), the verité of on-location filming and colour washing that would make Dario Argento green with envy (not to mention red and blue as well), then this is the film for you. 

The story, such as it is, follows two newlyweds, Isle and Antoine as they prepare to spend their honeymoon at the ancestral castle of Isle’s eccentric cousins. But the fascination of the cousins with the occult has invited a cadre of vampires and their thralls into the castle, who seem hellbent on inducting the innocent Isle into their coven.

A little too heavy on the gratuitous nudity to be considered an empowering representation of femininity, the film nevertheless flirts convincingly with the rejection of traditional heterosexual union and what this means for women newly inducted into marriage (husband Antoine seems just as obsessed at times to consummate his marriage as wife Isle is to avoid sharing his bed). 

Even if it does bite a little too quickly and too deeply into the tropes of the Lesbian Vampire Film, the embracing of alternative sexualities (this was 1971, people) makes the film a fitting (if certainly dated) release for Pride Month. Which is when it was originally slated for, as regular readers of this blog may recall (yes, both of you ;-p). However, be in no doubt that Shiver of the Vampires is clearly a Lesbianism By Men and For Men. 

Having said that, the film plays with the conventions of the vampire genre successfully and — at times — makes everyone seem like a predator, including Isle’s husband, Antoine. Feminist masterpiece, this is not. But its unapologetic capturing of the ideals and modes of filmmaking from a bygone era make it one of those films you Just Have To See.

The 4K is released on Monday 17th August.

And if you don’t fancy it, you could always buy the unambiguously superior Vamyros Lesbos from the same year, already on 4K…