4/10
Franco-stein!
6 October 2020
A silver-skinned Frankenstein's monster - now that's different. One thing is for sure, this isn't your bog-standard Frankenstein film. Whereas most movies based on Mary Shelley's legendary creation are content with one mad doctor and one monster (two at a push), Jess Franco's The Erotic Rites of Frankenstein features three insane scientists - Dr. Frankenstein (Dennis Price), his daughter Vera (Beatriz Savón), and the villainous Cagliostro (Howard Vernon) - plus a whole slew of strange creations, including a blind bird-woman called Melisa (Anne Libert), a bloke with pointy ears, some living skeletons, and assorted ghouls.

In the film's opening scene, Doctor Frankenstein is murdered by Cagliostro and Melisa, who make off with the scientist's shimmering, shambling monster, intending to mate it with their creation, a perfect woman, to create an entirely new race. To be honest, the shambolic plot doesn't make a lot of sense (like a lot of Franco's stuff), and the film's limited appeal is its sheer insanity and some gratuitous nudity. The most bonkers scene sees the shiny monster flogging a naked Vera and an equally starkers man, who are bound together, until they fall on a floor of rubber spikes. If that sound like fun to you, then by all means give it a whirl, but this isn't one of Franco's better efforts.
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