THE DEAD SPEAK (1935)
(a.k.a. LOS MUERTOS HABLAN)
Article #871 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 8-3-2003
Posting Date: 12-31-2003
Directed by Bustillo de Cro
Featuring Julian Soler, Amalia de Ilisa, Manuel Noriega

A student experiments with the concept that a corpse’s retina retains the last image it sees before death.

That’s as close as I can get to a decent plot description; I believe the trick of murder victims retaining the image of their murderer has been used in a few movies. This one is from Mexico, and I could only find it in an undubbed unsubtitled Spanish language print, and there’s a lot of talk to this one. In fact, I’m not sure I would have known what this one was about had it not been for plot summaries I have read. I might have guessed that it had touches of science fiction from the elaborate machinery used to take a photograph of a corpse’s eye. Visually, the movie isn’t particularly memorable, and the plot doesn’t seem particularly novel, so unless there’s something really interesting in the subtleties of the dialogue, there’s not a whole lot to recommend here.