THE HORRIBLE SEXY VAMPIRE (1970)
aka El vampiro de la autopista
Article 3239 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 5-2-2010
Posting Date: 6-27-2010
Directed by Jose Luis Madrid
Featuring Val Davis, Barta Barri, Anastasio Campoy
Country: Spain
What it is: Horrible sexy vampire movie

A vampire is loose strangling topless women. The police think it’s a non-supernatural sadist. The only male descendant of the vampire takes residence in his ancestor’s castle to learn the truth.

Given the title, I wasn’t expecting much, and my expectations were met. Still, I can be grateful that it wasn’t any worse than it was. The vampire has some differences about him; he strangles his victims instead of biting them. I’m not sure how he gets the blood out of them, but giving the marks on the necks afterward, I’m guessing he uses a vacuum cleaner hose. The vampire also turns invisible, which means that some of the attack scenes are rather silly-looking. The plot does seem rather thrown-together, but there’s some odd touches here as well; the vampire hunter is a heavy drinker who is generally considered by others to need a psychiatrist, and there’s an odd but interesting ironic note to the ending. Oh, and did I mention there’s a lot of topless women? These somewhat compensate for the uninspired direction and the hangdog feel of the whole affair, as well as a wealth of time-wasting scenes; if you can find a point for the gas station sequence near the end of the movie, you caught something a lot subtler than I was able to see. In the final analysis, I’d say it’s dumb but harmless, but not necessarily unlikably so.