Monday 30 July 2012

LES CAUCHEMARS NAISSENT LA NUIT aka NIGHTMARES COME AT NIGHT (1970)

Jess Franco's thirty-first film was LES CAUCHEMARS NAISSENT LA NUIT aka NIGHTMARES COME AT NIGHT. It was written by Jess Franco, Josyane Gibert and Stephen G. Horatio, produced by Karl Heinz Mannchen, music composed by Bruno Nicolai, filmed in Liechtenstein, in Eastmancolour, released by Prodif Ets. Released in France. It runs for 83 mins. It starred Diana Lorys as Anna de Istria, Paul Muller as Dr. Paul Lucas, Jack Taylor as Cynthia's Lover, Colette Giacobine as Cynthia Robins, Andres Monales as The Neighbour and Soledad Miranda (credited as Susan Korda) as Neighbour's Girlfriend.

The film opens with the titles being shown over a montage of photos taken from the film. After the titles have run for 2 mins, suddenly we are into the film with narration over scenes of parrots flying around in a cage. On a bed in a white nightie is a young woman asleep.


She seems to be having a troubled dream.


We then move to a soft focus shot scene of a blond woman lying on a bed asleep, while someone is carried into the room. Its the women in the bed, having trouble sleeping, but now she is wearing floral patterned dress. The man who has carried her into the room, now begins to remove her dress.

We are back in the first room and it is apparent that what we had just seen was in fact the dream that this woman is having.

We return to the dream, where the man is removing her last shoe, Sse is now completely naked on the bed and he now begins to make love to her.

We see the effect this has on the woman in real time, by the fact that her nightie has come undone.

Back in the dream they are making love, when for some reason we see the parrots in their cage flying around and then we are back with the woman in her dream wrapping cheese wire around the mans neck.

She sits up from the dream screaming. She then looks at her hands and sees that they are covered in blood. She is being watched by the blond woman from her dream. She gets out of the bed.


She goes into the bathroom and runs herself a shower. The blond woman walks into the bathroom and touches her, which scares the hell out of her. The blond asks her if there is anything wrong. She says that people came for her during the night, but the blond tells her it was only a dream and tells her to come out of the shower and she starts to dry her.

Later on that morning, the blond woman greats a man, carrying a brief case, who she greets as Paul. The blond woman says that she is very worried about her friend, who seems to be hallucinating. Paul asks if she has been taking her pills regularly. The blond say she has, but she thinks that they are not helping her. Paul says that they must send her to a psychiatric hospital, where she can be properly looked after, but the blond says no to this. He insists that she should be admitted, because more tests could be performed to prove the level of her insanity. This alarms the blond and she asks Paul if Anna, for that is the woman's name, if she is crazy. He replies it is too early to tell. He says he will come back tomorrow and see Anna. (During this time Anna has been listening to their conversation).

As Paul leaves the house, Anna comes running after him.

In a different house, that has a For Sale sign outside it, a man approaches the upstairs window and looks out.

Anna comes running up to Paul, calling him doctor. He tells her to go back to the house, but she insists that she has to talk to him. He agrees and he tells her to meet him at the St. Agnes Chapel at 11 o'clock the following morning.

At the house for sale, the man is joined by a woman in the window.

Anna returns to her room and lays down on the bed. The blond woman enters the room.



She asks her if she is feeling better. She sits down on the bed next to her and begins to make love to her.

The next morning at St. Agnes' Chapel, Anna arrives and meets Paul.


They leave the chapel and get into Paul's car.


They park up over looking a fun fair. Anna gets out of the car crying, Paul asks her what is wrong. She says that she thinks she is going crazy. She does not want her friend, Cynthia (who is the blond woman), too know what is going on. Paul says that Anna will have to trust him and he will make sure she gets better, but she fears that she will not get any better, because she feels so alone. Paul says that she is not alone, she has Cynthia, but Anna feels that Cynthia is too distant, she does not show her emotions. Paul asks her how did she meet Cynthia. She tells him that they met in a club in Zagreb, Croatia, where she was working as a stripper. She tells him about the dreams that she is having, where she murders people. Getting back into the car, she asks him if he believes that she is a murder.


He now knows that her condition is worse than he thought and he will have to tell Cynthia, that she can not expect to heal her on her own and that she will need to go into a hospital.

As Paul drives her back to the house, Anna begins to remember how she met Cynthia at the club in Zagreb, doing her striptease.








One evening Cynthia goes back stage and meets Anna.


Cynthia asks Anna if she has ever worked as a model, Anna replies that she has done. Cynthia mentions that she thinks she has got talent and she could get her a lot of work as an actress and a model. She asks her if she is married, which she replies that she is not. Then she asks if she has any children, which again she replies no. She then invites her to stay with her.

Anna goes back to Cynthia's house and listens to her proposals.


But she decides not too work with her and goes back to the strip club the next night, however thinking things over, she decides that maybe she was a bit rash and goes back and sees Cynthia, who now is angry that she seemed to reject her and with more force puts her point of view across by striking her. She then subjects her to a beating until she submits and agrees to do her bidding. Now being submissive, Cynthia is able to make love to her.

Soon after she moves in, she starts to have the nightmares, which always feature Cynthia.

Cynthia contacts Paul and asks him to come over and see her. Paul arrives, to find Anna siting in the garden. He introduces himself as Doctor Lucas and asks her how she feels, she replies that she feels fine. Cynthia joins them in the garden.


He tells her off for calling him out.

At the house for sale, the woman and the man are looking out of the window.

Cynthia commands Anna to go inside.

The man and the woman seem to be observing the events going on with Cynthia and Anna.

Back in the house, Cynthia has a go at Anna for telling Paul that there was nothing wrong with her. She throws Anna into a room and locks the door.

Later that night the door to the room opens, to revel that Anna has changed into a pearl bikini.


She leaves the room, to find a couple having a dance. The woman and man greats Anna with a kiss, she sits down and watches the couple resume dancing. After a while they begin to kiss and then resume dancing, all the time watched by Anna. After a while the woman goes over to Anna and lies down, placing her head in her lap, the man then goes over an joins them, kissing the girl and then Anna, while the girl massages her left breast. The man and woman leave Anna and resume dancing, Anna joins in dancing on the table. The man and woman move away, undress and begin to make love. Anna walks over to them and joins in.

Suddenly Cynthia is seen staring into the distance mouthing words.


Anna leaves the room and grabs a spear off a wall, still under the influence of Cynthia, she approaches the couple.

At the house for sale, the woman approaches the window, wearing a string shawl and drinking out of a bottle.


She goes over to the man, who is lying down on a bed, and sits next to him. She moans about how long it is taken for them to receive some money.


Back at Cynthia's house, Anna is lying on her bed.


She is being visited by Doctor Lucas, who says she does not look very well and asks if she has been eating. Anna replies that she feels down, because Cynthia has not been sleeping with her anymore. He tells her she should get out of the house and have sometime to herself. He tells her he will see her again the next day. As he leaves Cynthia says that she wants to have a word with him.

Anna gets up, gets dressed and as Paul leaves the house she meets him and asks if she could go with him. He takes her into town. Siting in Paul's car, she asks him if he thinks she is going crazy. He asks her why she thinks that. She replies its because Cynthia thinks that she is, but she knows that she is not. At night she has strange dreams where there are people in her room, who she does terrible things too, but during the day, everything seems normal. Paul says she just needs to trust people more and tells her to go back home.

Anna returns home to find Cynthia having sex with a man.


She walks over to Anna.


She is annoyed with her and walks out of the room.

Later on in her room, Anna wakes up and goes into the living room, where the man is waiting. He says that he finds Cynthia boring after making love, because she falls asleep, but he would prefer it if they went out into the night and danced. This attracts Anna and he offers her a part in his play. He takes her over to the window and shows her the stars.


He begins to seduce her. He takes her over the piano and starts to play to her.


After a while he picks her up and carries her into Cynthia's bedroom. It is at this point that we realize that this is the scene we saw at the beginning of the film, but now we see that it is not Anna that kills the man, but Cynthia and in fact Anna is trying to get the cheese wire off his neck.

We find ourselves back in the car with Paul and Anna.

Later on back at the house, we find ourselves seeing a scene which indicates that Cynthia and Anna hve been making love. Anna wakes up and leaves the room.

At the other house for sale, the woman is lying on the bed naked, singing to herself.


The man is standing in the window, he says the time has come for them to receive the money. She asks him will they be flying to Rio, he agrees that they will. She then asks him what he did to get all this money. He replies that they robbed a jewelry store. He goes over to the woman and they start to make love.

Cynthia starts her wild staring and mouthing again.

We go to a pov shot in the couples house, a shadow falls across the couple and someone starts to stab them, the camera pans up to some graffiti on the wall, which reads, in red, LIFE is all SHIT.

Back at Cynthia's, Paul is saying to her that he has had enough and that he wants to tranquilize Anna, to give her some respite, but Cynthia says that would then make people realize that she is not crazy and the police would see that she committed the murders under hypnosis, which would mean that both Paul and herself would end up in prison. She mentions that by using Anna, they have been able to get rid of the rest of their accomplices and keep all the money for themselves.

Meanwhile in another part of the house, Anna dresses herself in a sari, places a spot on her forehead and takes a gun.


Looking one last time in the mirror, she places the gun in her mouth and shoots herself.

Hearing the shot, Cynthia and Paul come running into her room. Cynthia realizes that this gives them the perfect alibi. She gets Paul to call the police. Going into the kitchen to get something to eat, Cynthia gets a tin out of the cupboard, which contains the stolen jewels, looking at them Paul enters the kitchen and takes a knife from the draw.


He mentions that they killed Anna, just as if they had pulled the trigger themselves. He tells her that he is going to tell the police everything when they arrive. Cynthia goes to make her escape, but Paul stops her by showing her the knife. She steps back, thinks and then runs at Paul. He thrusts the knife into her abdomen, killing her, just as the police sirens can be heard.

Coming after VENUS IN FURS, this is an even more confusing film than the former. VENUS might of been slightly bizarre, but on retrospect it made sense compared to this film. Similar to VENUS in the respect that you have a woman being an avenging angel, albeit not from the grave this time, you can see how this film could of been made a lot tighter and if the story had been presented in a more linear time line or alternatively it could of been more interesting if it had been made a bit like a Tarantino film, disjointed and them coming together at the climax.

With multiply viewing, you can understand what the film is about, but when viewed once you are left completely baffled.

So what we have here is a story of a jewel heist, were the two ringleaders have no plans to share the loot with the rest of the members of the gang and seduce an impressionable girl into becoming the lesbian lover of the gang leader, so that she can be influenced by hypnosis into murdering the rest of the gang and then being committed into an asylum.


The DVD that I watched was the Screen Entertainment release on their Hard Core label, which contains five extras; an interview with Jess Franco, the Eurocine Documentary, a trailer, a Soledad Miranda Biog and Filmography and an Other Attractions feature, which is other DVD's available.


Diana Lorys was was born 20th October 1940 as Ana Maria Cazorla Vega in Madrid, Spain. She studied dance, classical ballet, Spanish flamenco, drama and diction. She made her acting debut in theater productions and made her film debut in LA MENTIRA TIENE CABELLOS ROJOS (1960). Her first film with Jess Franco was GRITOS EN LA NOCHE aka THE AWFUL DR. ORLOF in 1962, followed by L'OMBRA DI ZORRO aka THE SHADOW OF ZORRO. Her first English speaking film was GUNFIGHTERS OF CASA GRANDE (1964). Known for mainly starring in Spanish and Italian, Horror, Spy, Sci-Fi, Adventure and Western films. The last film see made was LA CIUDAD MALDITA in 1978. She married and retired from the acting profession in the early eighties.


Jack Taylor was born 21st October 1936 as George Brown Randall in America. He first relocated to Mexico in the late 1950s/early 1960s, and later to Spain, where he appeared in many films, mainly horror and exploitation pictures. He made his film debut in ACTION STATIONS (1956) in an uncredited role. His first credited role was in LA TORRE DE MARFIL (1958). He has had a very long and distinguished career, his most recent film was AGNOSIA (2010) and he has a film in post-production, FILL DE CAIN (2012).


Soledad Miranda was born 9th July 1943 as Soledad Rendon Bueno in Seville, Spain, to Portuguese parents of Roma ancestry. At the age of sixteen, she moved to Madrid to become an actress. She made her film debut in a Jess Franco film QUEEN OF THE TABARIN CLUB (1960) at the age of seventeen. She would go on and make eight films with him. The last film that she made was SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY (1970), released in 1971, but the her last film to be released was EUGENIE (1970) released in 1974. She married Jose Manuel da Coneicao Simoes in 1966, they had a son Antonio in 1967. When they were on the way to meet Jess Franco and a German Producer to launch her career onto its next level, she was killed in a car crash on 18th August 1970. For a great detailed website dedicated to Soledad Miranda check out http://soledadmiranda.com/

The DVD of Nightmares Come at Night can be bought at Play.com by clicking on the link below.

http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/120527/Nightmares-Come-At-Night/Product.html?searchstring=Nightmares+Come+at+Night&searchsource=0&searchtype=r2alldvd&urlrefer=search&strefer=r2alldvd&searchfilters=s%7bNightmares+Come+at+Night%7d%2bc%7b57%7d%2b

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