The Phantom Of The Monastery (1934)

[GlacierTuba]

This was a blind buy based off of the hype around La Llorona. Figured I may as well give it a try...and WOW it does NOT disappoint!!

Admittedly this is a film with an extremely thin plot, and bizarrely inspired by an element of truth, but its basic, wafer thin plot and situation are what I think works so strongly in this films success and favour.

Essentially the plot is about three people, a husband and wife and the best friend of the husband. They are lost in a forest after going for a walk and need to find shelter for the night as the forest is deemed to be too dangerous. A bloke that looks a lot like Raul Julia as M Bison in Street Fighter II arrives with his dog and leads them to an old Monastery up in the foothills to spend the night...

The first half is a lot of procedure and set up and kind of edges you to a level of expectation of grisly pay offs about to arrive. I won't spoil it though, you'll need to watch it to see how it plays out. I will openly admit though, there is a scene later on concerning a key character in the film. It genuinely made me jump!

TWICE.

POO. NEARLY. CAME. OUT.

The latter half of the film sees even more exposition and payoffs arrive. The film really cranks it up for the ending. Yet again, it's so basic but it works so well and so strongly. I genuinely adored the ending.

The film does suffer a bit from 'Walton-on-the-Naze amateur dramatics society' post-silent era acting. It's not too bad though but I did find it more jarring than Rodrigo's bedroom door. Also the repeated use of specific cue music got on my wick a bit but again, it is what it is.

I loved the opening credits sequence by the way. The whole time I thought I was watching the team line-ups being introduced at a Premier League match on Sky Sports Super Sunday! Those that know what I mean by that will probably not be able to unsee that when they watch it now. Sorry!

Bit of trivia for you by the way. The guy who plays Alfonso was actually married to the lady that plays Christina in the film in real life! But something very disturbing about the fella that played Alfonso is that in real life, after making the film, he left Mexico and went to Spain to work as a fascist spy for that scumbag General Franco.

Anyways, this film was brilliant. It burns a bit slowly to start with, but it just simmers so nicely for an ending that felt ahead of its time. I absolutely loved this film. Very highly recommended (for what my recommendation may be worth!).