Jesús Franco

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Jess Franco

Jesús (or Jess) Franco (born May 12, 1930 as Jesús Franco Manera) is a Spanish film director, writer, cinematographer and actor. While never having found wide commercial success (though he had a big american box office success with his first women in prison film 99 Women in 1969), Franco has nevertheless retained a small (but faithful) cult following with his sexually-charged horror films. He was very prolific during the 1960s through the late 1980s, and while he continues to work, his output has slowed down in recent years, creating the average of one film per year. After 1988 (with the exception of Killer Barbys), the quality of his work has degraded almost to the level of amateur films however^{[citation needed]}, due to his inability to obtain financing.

Of his 180+ films, some of his most popular are;

The Awful Dr. Orloff (1961)
Dr. Orloff's Monster (1964)
The Diabolical Doctor Z (Miss Muerte, 1966)
Succubus (Necronomicon, 1967)
The Blood of Fu Manchu (1968)
99 Women (1969)
Marquis de Sade's Justine (1969)
The Castle of Fu Manchu (1969)
Venus in Furs (1969)
Eugenie... the Story of Her Journey into Perversion (1970)
The Bloody Judge (1970)
Count Dracula (1970)
Vampyros Lesbos (1971)
She Killed in Ecstasy (1971)
The Vengeance of Dr. Mabuse (1971)
A Virgin Among The Living Dead (1971)
Dracula Vs Frankenstein (1972)
The Erotic Rites of Frankenstein (1972)
The Demons (1972)
Female Vampire (1973)
Exorcism and Black Masses (1973)
Lorna The Exorcist (1974)
Barbed Wire Dolls (1975)
Jack the Ripper (1976)
Greta The Mad Butcher (1977)
Love Letters of a Portuguese Nun (1977)
Women in Cell Block 9 (1977)
Mondo Cannibale (1980)
Oasis of the Zombies (1981)
Bloody Moon (1981)
Revenge in the House of Usher (1982)
Faceless (1988)
Killer Barbys (1996)

In recent years, his films, Tender Flesh (1998), Lust for Frankenstein (1998),Vampire Blues (1999), Dr. Wong's Virtual Hell (1999) have come to be heartily embraced.

Franco has also worked under innumerable pseudonyms, including David Khune and Frank Hollmann. A big fan of jazz music (and a musician himself), many of his pseudonyms are taken from famous jazz musicians, such as Clifford Brown and James P. Johnson.

Franco's themes often revolved around lesbian vampires, women in prison, and sexual exploration (including several films based on the writings of Marquis de Sade). Franco also worked in other exploitation film genres, such as cannibal films and nunsploitation.

His movies often contain long, uninterrupted shots of nude women writhing uncontrollably on the floor or in bed (such as in Lorna The Exorcist and La comtesse noire). He is also notorious for his use of hand-held camera and zoom shots, especially between 1968 and 1975.

He has frequently worked with actors Howard Vernon, Antonio Mayans, Paul Müller, Christopher Lee, Soledad Miranda, Maria Rohm, Lina Romay (his longtime companion) and Klaus Kinski. Kinski is famous for his dislike of directors, but according to Franco, he never had any trouble working with him.

[edit] Fictional Portrayal

Jess Franco in Vampire Blues

Spanish comic-book Iberia Inc. by Carlos Pacheco and Rafael Marín mentioned a fictional movie, Casta de Heroes directed by Jesús Franco, about Spanish superheroes of the past where Paul Naschy played "the Ogre", a character inspired in lycantropic villain Lince Dorado. Unsatisfied with this portrayal of himself, Lince Dorado arranged for the original to be lost, and no copy of the film is supposed to remain.

[edit] Further reading

Jess Franco, Memorias del tío Jess (2004) (autobiography, in Spanish)
Stéphane du Mesnilot, Jess Franco - Énergies du fantasme (2004, in French)
Alain Petit, Manacoa Files (1994-1999, in French)
Lucas Balbo, Peter Blumenstock, Christian Kessler, Tim Lucas, Obsession - The Films of Jess Franco (1993)
Tim Lucas, How to Read a Franco Film, in Video Watchdog n. 1 (1990)
The book Immoral Tales: European Sex & Horror Movies 1956-1984 (1994) by Cathal Tohill and Pete Tombs dedicates a chapter to him.
Benedikt Eppenberger, Daniel Stapfer Maedchen, Machos und Moneten: Die unglaubliche Geschichte des Schweizer Kinounternehmers Erwin C. Dietrich. Mit einem Vorwort von Jess Franco. Verlag Scharfe Stiefel, Zurich, 2006, ISBN 3-033-00960-3