User reviews

If you are here for the rape, you have wasted your time. The scenes are a joke. Even worse, the supposed killing of the two girls (Lieva Lone, Patricia Hermenier). The acting was atrocious.

Now, if you want to see Joëlle Coeur (Fly Me the French Way, Seven Women for Satan) fully naked, and engaging in sex with John Rico, that's a whole other story.

The Captain (Rico) hardly has time to enjoy the aftereffects when he is visited by apparitions of the two girls. Maybe it was just the booze.

The girls do eventually reappear only to escape and find an old castle guarded by, believe it or not, a clown. Not a court jester, but a clown. Strange.

They go through the transformation to become demoniacs, and, I am glad to say, sex is part of the transformation. Yes, there is the usual mumble jumble ritual, but there is also orgasm.

Don't expect a lot of gore in this film. It really doesn't make sense in a lot of scenes. You'll see what I mean. I think Rollin may have been trying to make an art film instead of a horror film.

It is a shame that Lieva Lone and Patricia Hermenier did not stick around to do more films, but another chance to watch Joëlle Coeur is always worth the time.

I have a problem with Jean Rollin films. Despite all the stylish surrealism, great French locations and nudity I still find his films incredibly boring. I do appreciate Rollin's persistence of vision throughout his string of poetic sex/horror exploitation films through the 70s (clowns, castles, twins, beaches) but my mind begins to wander during his films and this is no exception. The plot follows a dream logic known only to the director with too much time spent watching these sailors fight, rape or just sit in a bar. The one female in the sailor gang really does inject some gusto into the her part though.

The first scene on the beach with the young girls rape and attack is very good and the next one in the bar with them appearing as ghosts too... Unfortunately the movie doesn't go on like that all the time. There are good and bad moments but the scenes of nudity with Joelle Coeur are erotically very good. The story of the demon in the ruins doesn't appear very clear, nor does the clown's and the ruin's keeper destinies... But all in all there is a good atmosphere even if some scenes are a bit too long and some of them are great, like the one where the religious statues fall one after each other on the ground. Jean Rollin knows how to mix sex and horror, as well as many other authors of that 70's era. A good moment but that movie could have been better again...

Hell, it's even worse than Rollin's later film TWO ORPHAN VAMPIRES (1997), and that's pretty bad.

The only redeeming thing about this film is looking at luscious Joelle Coeur's naked body. She did a few other unremarkable films in the 1970s and then promptly disappeared. Coeur couldn't act worth a damm, but she sure was great to look at.

Anyway, two blond-haired girls are shipwrecked on shore and are raped and murdered by the scavengers who lured their ship up on the rocks with lights. There's just a lot of rolling around on the ground and it didn't look very violent to me.

Their spirits make a pact with the devil(?) who doesn't even look like a devil in some old church ruin near the shore. There's also a mime or woman in a clown suit who serves no purpose at all.

The story is flaccid and hackneyed, the acting is awful (the worst I've ever seen for a French film), and the sets are too bright. There's nothing scary or interesting going on at all except for Tina (Joelle Coeur) taking off her clothes and prancing around nude all the time. Oh yes, she has a soft-core sex scene with the lead scavenger captain (John Rico) who looks old enough to be her father.

It has all the feel of a bad Jess Franco film. Terrible.

1 out of 10

Dear oh dear. It might be easy to take cheap swipes at M. Rollin, but this looks likes such an amateurish effort. Terrible acting, contrived and sloppy action, meandering plot, cheap props. I hate to twist the knife, but it certainly breathes new life into the expression "Z-grade".

The video blurb looked so promising - two girls raped by wreckers, take refuge in an abandoned abbey where they make a pact with the Devil to seek revenge. But Jean Rollin seems determined to disappoint. Way too much time is spent on watching people walking long distances, or labouring blindingly obvious plot developments (the psychic brothel madam excels at this!)

There is not nearly enough skin to compensate for having to sit through this, though some spiritied sex scenes do capture the attention. The biggest draw of the film for me was the female member of the wrecker gang (character Tina). I wish I knew who the actress was. Gorgeous, spirited, and great without clothes! Shame she can't act, but I may excuse her. I have a soft spot for beautiful girls who get sexually aroused by wicked deeds.

Bizarre points include the Devil's two attendants - a female clown, and a Rasputin look-a-like. And never did so much plaster statuary give its life for a movie!

In summary, only rent this video for the gorgeous female wrecker, fast forward through the rest.

This Jean Rollin film has an interesting setting. Some wicked sailors/pirates lure ships to crash to the shore and then rape and kill two surviving women. Then the women come back from the dead to haunt their murderers.

Well, the ghost part is difficult to explain because they can appear as visions, but they also are physical. It's not a straightforward revenge flick either - be prepared for some Rollin style aimless wandering.

It's a bit boring film after all but I liked some things about it. First of all there aren't enough horror films with a pirate/sea theme, so that was a nice spice. I also liked the beginning when the women start to appear in visions to the drunkard pirate captain. That was a nice paranoid feel. I wish this atmosphere would have continued further but it fell a bit short. Then, I liked that there is a little bit more to the plot that the women just paying revenge right away. They have to do a little bit adventuring first and there are some more more weird characters.

I don't know when I'm going to want to watch the movie again, but it sits on my shelf now because Rollin is my favorite boring director. Recommended for Rollin fans but others approach with caution.

I have to be in the right mood for a Rollin movie, and I clearly wasn't when I watched The Demoniacs: what works in some of his films - the dreamlike atmosphere and coastal setting, the freewheeling plot, copious female nudity, a random clown - I found to be incredibly boring on this occasion.

The film sees a group of 'wreckers' (John Rico, Joëlle Coeur, Willy Braque and Paul Bisciglia) attacking two young women (Lieva Lone and Patricia Hermenier), survivors of a ship that has been lured onto the rocks by the cruel marauders. After raping the girls, the wreckers leave them for dead, but their victims are still alive (or possibly ghosts... I wasn't sure which) and, with help from a mysterious man with supernatural powers (who might be the devil), they set about taking revenge.

Rollin drags this basic story out to feature length with lots of pointless nonsense that is a real test of one's patience: bawdy goings-on in a bar with a psychic landlady, the aforementioned clown (Mireille Dargent) leading the girls to sanctuary, the wreckers pursuing the girls through a ship graveyard.

The film's one saving grace is Joëlle Coeur as sadistic wrecker Tina: she is drop-dead-gorgeous and sheds her clothes a lot, all of which makes matters a little easier to bear.

2.5/10, rounded up to 3 for Coeur.

This is not one Jean Rollin's greatest works, but it does have one shinning light, Joelle Coeur, the gorgeous female wrecker. Like all of Rollin's films (that I have seen) this one is full of all his artistic visions, but for some reason the film still seems slower in it's pace and is a little more difficult to get into. Like all Rollin's film it's worth watching, but in this instance, only for the gorgeous Joelle Coeur.

I caught this movie tonight on the late Horror channel - and I was transfixed by it's dreadfulness! I simply haven't seen anything as bad - and I've seen some howlers in my time.

The only redeeming feature was the occasional beautiful landscape and the moody ruins. Apart from them - and the comedy factor - nothing.

The story is - well - there isn't one.

The acting - acting? - is totally beyond comprehension. The cast seemed to have no idea of what the words they were speaking meant.

It's not a total loss - it's really laughable. If there are a few of you wanting a late night hoot - watch it! In future I will avoid any film by Jean Rollin like a toothache.

After being raped and left for dead, a pair of women suddenly starts to invade the lives of the pirate gang that originally killed them after finding themselves imbued with supernatural powers and set out to take revenge on the gang for what happened to them using those powers.

This one wasn't all that bad of an art-house-style horror film. As is to be expected given the film's style, a lot of the film's positives reside on the showcasing of it's frequent and oftentimes excessive nudity. From the very beginning, featuring the beach rape of the girls as they're tormented by the gang features plenty of such titillating fare as the girls are captured, stripped, raped and disposed of while the fact that a vast majority of the revenge scenes are handled with the idea of the girls seducing the group one-by-one and then killed them off, give this one a lot of such material throughout the film. Moreover, there are all the inserts of nameless prostitutes and village girls getting fondled and played with alongside the finale of the female leader pleasuring herself to the girls being raped once again in incredibly wild, vivid fashion brings that up a lot as well, and with the general atmosphere found here really gives this one a pretty sleazy feel. As well, the fact that there's plenty of rather interesting choices throughout here because of this showcase gives this a kind of artistic sensibility that comes across far more dynamic than expected. Since the opening shots of the groups' rape and attack of the girls is done almost entirely devoid of dialogue makes for a rather startling and striking opening lasting nearly fifteen minutes before anyone really speaks a word, and the entirety of scenes that go by filled with silence or a more artistic representation really makes this one feel like a much more ambitious film than just straightforward exploitation like the way it's presented here. Even the action scenes, from the all-girls brawl on he ship to the escape from the underground jail are handled more like an art-house film than a traditional horror film and really manage to showcase extraordinary skills here. While these here all manage to make for an enjoyable time throughout here, the film does offer up a huge nagging issue that derails it somewhat slightly in that it never really goes for the horror at times. Not just due to the film's art-house look and feel, but the films' reliance on poetic atmosphere and the group going insane from their belief in what's going on makes this rather shock-less for nearly all of it's run-time despite the general plot line supporting such a potential outcome. The softcore groping and sex scenes don't help matters, but because the revenge finally comes in the last third of the film it rarely feels like much of genre effort and really stands out as the major drawback to this one.

Rated Unrated/NC-17: Continuous Full Nudity, strong sex scenes, Language, Mild Violence and several rape scenes.

Demoniacs, The (1974)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Four crooks (three men, one woman) work as "wreckers" as they lure ships to the shore only to make them crash on the rocks so that they can loot them. The latest ship had two beautiful women (Lieva Lone, Patricia Hermenier) wash up on shore so they're raped and eventually killed. The two women then sell their souls to the devil so that they can come back and kill those responsible for their fate. This French-made horror tale isn't the best that director Jean Rollin has to offer but there are enough interesting moments to make it worth viewing to fans of his. Those unfamiliar with the director will probably want to start elsewhere because while this has some good stuff in it, at the same time you can't help but be disappointed that it's not better. The biggest problem with the film is that the 95-minute running time seems a lot longer and there are way too many scenes where nothing happens except people just walking around doing nothing. There's no point of them walking around as it adds nothing to the story so it would have been best had the director just edited these out. I'm not sure if he was under pressure to release a film at a certain length but his slow style certainly doesn't help here. Another problem with the film is that it never really seems to know what it wants to be. Is it a ghost story? Is it more concerned about the sex and nudity? When the Devil does show up and make his deal nothing really plays out as you'd expect. There's even a bizarre clown thrown in for some reason. Perhaps Rollin just thought clowns were scary? The best thing going in the film are some of the performances by the beautiful ladies. I thought both Lone and Hermenier were very good playing the roles of the dead girls. The film certainly doesn't ask too much out of them except, for a time, to be scared and at other times being "death" like and they do this just fine. The real scene-stealer is Joelle Coeur as the beautiful but deadly female wrecker. She's certainly very fun in the role and her beautiful body really doesn't hurt either. Fans of Jess Franco will want to be on the lookout for Monica Swinn but I was unable to spot her. Being a Rollin film one can expect all sorts of nudity and we also get some mild gore but nothing strong enough to keep horror fans interested. The low-budget seems a lot smaller than most of Rollin's work and one can't help but wish a little more was done with the story.

French horror film from 1974. If people were afraid of this movie back then, they could have had a heart attack while watching the movies now. I think it's a pretty mediocre movie, even for its time. The plot is absurd, the narration is a disaster, the acting is a disgrace. Look, "dead wish" or "race with the devil" made at that time are thrilling thrillers that are much more tense than that. Especially at the beginning, you should see the introduction of the characters, as if they are all X-Men characters and superior brutality. In fact, they're stupid guys. Haven't you ever seen the movie "Straw Dogs"?

There is too much nudity and sexuality in the movie. There's nothing else anyway. Just naked men and women.

Every time I watch a Jean Rollin flick I hope that this time the storytelling will match the cinematography. And almost every time it doesn't. Same here.

In 19th century France a ship is deliberately lured onto rocks during a storm, wrecked, and plundered. Two young women survivors are raped and apparently murdered by the ship's wreckers; 'apparently', because it's not clear whether they die and come back as ghosts, die and get physically resurrected, or don't die and manage to recover from their injuries. In any event, a demon imprisoned in some nearby ruins grants the two women supernatural powers to allow them to get their revenge. Sounds interesting - yet somehow Rollin manages to make it as dull as dishwater. The pirates/wreckers behave as if they've stepped straight out of a cartoon (apart from the rape, obviously), and their captain looks and acts like one of those lip-curling heavies from silent movies - complete with eye-liner. We get LOTS of footage of the pirates getting drunk and fighting amongst themselves, LOTS of footage of the two women just walking around the coast and the ruins, three (I think?) rape scenes (only the first really serves the plot), and a clairvoyant who keeps warning everyone that bad things are coming, but who serves no useful purpose to the story. As for the cast, they're almost all poor.

As ever, it looks impressive - especially the opening scene of a burning shipwreck shot against an evening sky. The only other positives are Willy Braque's entertaining knife-wielding pirate, and the beautiful Joëlle Coeur as the captain's unhinged (and more often than not, naked) girlfriend. Poor, even by Rollin's standards. 3/10.

This Jean Rollin film is a little different as there is I think no graves or a vampire and almost no candles and certainly no candelabra. There is also not too much of the lovely lighting or the beach at Dieppe. On the other hand we really get pirates and some shipwrecked sailors although we get a treasure chest, with only an item of jewellery but just two young women, with little clothes, who wander shipwrecked from the sea. Lieva Lone and Patricia Hermenier utter no words but get raped and almost killed several times throughout the film, which the pirates seem to enjoy as well as grimacing and getting drunk. There are good shots of ships aflame and a wonderful ruined abbey although the two girls manage to get into trouble again and then at the end when they are tied to the wreckage as the tide comes in, presumably just for fun.

A group of shipwrecked sailors brutally rape two young woman and the woman re-emerge after making a pact with the devil to get their revenge.

More of the same from Jean Rollin. The music is improved here, but the plot makes practically no sense. Some people have tried to defend the film by saying it should be seen as an "art" film. Rollin does indeed have a unique view of art.

If you want to see more of the same nude women and pointless sex scenes, this is for you... but as far as plots go, this is not one of Rollin's stronger films. But it does have a clown... so, I guess that might be good?

This film was garbage. plain and simple. It did not have the gore to make up for its weak story line. It did not have enough sex to make up for its lack of gore. There was not enough nudity to shock in place of gore and sex....YIKES!

I guess I am twice as bitter, because i bought this DVD sight unseen. It does not even have any camp value. The closest thing i can compare it to is an ABBA video gone horribly awry.