Eyes Without a Face
1959
Directed by Georges Franju
Many moons ago I had a group of friends that I would watch horror movies with every Saturday night. It was a fun tradition; we would rotate houses and take turns picking out the movies. While they would pick out fun slashers, I would always pick out weird foreign classics. Soon, I was not allowed to pick out the movies anymore. However, this is one of the movies we watched. While it wasn't very scary, I enjoyed it immensely.
A girl loses her face in an accident and her husband attempts to build her a new face by kidnapping girls and taking, um, samples.
The last horror film we had on the list was Dracula, which had a decent amount of gore but is nowhere near this movie. I don't think I have seen any medical horror films before this and they are actually quite popular nowadays. A definite innovation.
Like I said, not terribly scary but that girl pictured above definitely gives me the creeps. French cinema will never stop surprising me.
RATING: ****-
Interesting Facts:
Franju did not consider this a horror film; instead, it was a film of anguish.
John Carpenter's Michael Myers mask was inspired by this movie.
Seven audience members fainted during one of the premieres of this film.
