Woodyanders Deadly and enigmatic mute vampiress Countess Irina Karlstein (the sumptuous Lina Romay at her most bold, expressive, and uninhibited) lives a tragic life of depressing solitude and emotional detachment due to the fact that she feeds on her victims at the moment of orgasm.Jess Franco not only does his customary adept job of crafting a strong and sensual, yet still brooding and melancholy atmosphere as well as astutely captures the wrenching loneliness of Irina's wretched plight, but also delivers plenty of tasty bare distaff flesh and oodles of unflinchingly raw'n'explicit sexuality that encompasses everything from fellatio to lesbianism to even bondage and discipline. Better still, Romay's singularly smoldering presence really keeps this movie humming: Walking through a mist-shrouded forest clad in a belt, flowing open cape, and long black leather boots, going full-throttle for several incredibly hot and graphic sex scenes (her solo masturbation set piece in particular rates as a definite arousing highlight), and never utterly a single word, but conveying a vivid world of unbearable sadness through her downcast eyes alone, Romay proves to be thoroughly mesmerizing from start to finish. Unfolding at a hypnotically deliberate pace, with often striking widescreen cinematography, a lush and elegant score by Daniel White, and welcome appearances by Franco regulars James Taylor, Alice Arno, and Monica Swinn, this typically outré Franco affair proves to be oddly affecting and captivating in its very unabashed strangeness.

Boba_Fett1138 It's no big secret that I'm not too fond on Jesus Franco movies. His movies are often a mixture of horror and erotica, with as a big problem that none of his movies really stand out as either horror or as porn.Jesus Franco does again a great job at keeping a story hidden, somewhere deep down in his movie. Seriously, there just really is no story. The movie is basically Lina Romay walking around naked and literally bumping into the camera, while she is also occasionally having sex with both males or females. It doesn't has really anything to do with horror or vampirism, though this is also still dependent of what version of the movie you're watching.There are so many different versions of this movie out there. The one I watched was unfortunately the longest one available, which was the German version of this movie, which also had all of the hardcore porn sequences in it. And that's of course also how old porn should be watched; with German synchronization.But still I would recommend it more for people to watch the soft-core version of this movie instead. All of its hardcore moments are incredibly poorly filmed and actually look like it comes straight out of Jesus Franco personal home shot videos. It looks completely different from the way the rest of the movie got shot. It only consists out of extreme close-ups and the camera never moves or cuts away. Basically it all are some long, hairy shots, that all end with an (fake) orgasm. It slows down the movie extremely and at least the rest of the movie is somewhat better looking because it got filmed with some more taste and quality to it.But as far as Jesus Franco movies go; I didn't hated watching this one, which is probably the most positive thing I could ever say about a Jesus Franco movie. I can't understand it either how people could actually like and enjoy watching it but there apparently is a big market for it out there. So if these kind of movies are your thing, you probably aren't going to care what I think and have to say about this movie anyway, since it clearly just isn't my thing.3/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

passmore What an excellent film! Try not to dig too deep but this is classic eurotrash and when you've been away from eurotrash for a while you'll need a stunner like this to remind you how fantastic it can be. Jess Franco has let us down occasionally in the past, but this must surely be his masterpiece. Trust no American issues as they prefer violence to sex and edit accordingly. Don't analyse the plot because you'll miss the point. Beautifully shot by Joan Vincent, this is serious erect-nipple vampirism, with all the longing and the loneliness that goes with belonging to the undead...although there are not many people who look as alive as Lina Romay does in this movie. Absolutely excellent and for a change coherent. Wistful, sexy, hypereal. Genuinely an extraordinary movie.

slayrrr666 "Female Vampire" isn't that bad of an adult vampire film, but it's still pretty flawed.**SPOILERS**Living alone on an island, Countess Irina Karlstein, (Lina Romay) spends her time laughing off rumors that she's a vampire while enjoying the steady stream of gigolos who come for her. When the police find the string of bodies dead, they believe the local legend about her is actually true. As she continues to make her way through the town, she comes upon Baron Von Rathony, (Jack Taylor) a poet who believes the stories about her being a vampire and wants her to make him an immortal, like she is. Attempting to take him into her lifestyle, she continues to ravage the town, leading forensic specialist Dr. Roberts, (Jess Franco) to deduce that a vampire has been involved all along and rushes out to stop her before more turn up dead.The Good News: This film could have been quite good, and it's best aspect is the tremendous emphasis on bare flesh. As the Countess walks around in nothing more than boots, a cape and a belt, thereby spending nearly every single second of the film naked, it becomes almost exclusively a showcase for Romay, who offers as uninhibited a performance as can be imagined. When she's not actively seducing her prey, she finds herself teasing her servant or attempting to pleasure herself, languidly rolling about on her bed and masturbating with abandon. At one point, she even performs an extended fellatio sequence on a bedpost. That is to take nothing away from the several extended and quite erotic love sequences in the film. While hard to accurately select a favorite, the fact that there's so many make this a real erotic masterpiece. The long and extended affair near the end is especially memorable, for the hypnotic feel of the scene is simply powerful and manages to become the highlight of the film. The frequent lesbian encounters are just as erotic and steamy as the regular scenes, and the club scene is one of the best in the film. The early encounter is just as good, and the frequency and eroticism of them makes them memorable. There's also some really fantastic mood shots in here, especially the opening shot where a figure emerges from a mist-enshrouded forest slowly, a later shot of the vampire leading their charges behind them through the same mist-enshrouded forest, and a spectacular scene where a couple is seen overlooking a shrub-covered mountainside on a mid-morning glaze. It's not all that bad.The Bad News: There's not a lot to dislike about this one, and one of it's biggest problems is from it's absolute willingness to play with the vampire rules. The titular vampire openly sunbathes, doesn't drink blood when she kills, and unless all the men have some freakish anatomical anomaly, the jugular is not involved at all. This strikes as somewhat unusual, as even the most basic stories of vampire films use these to their advantage, and that this one to just up and change the rules is quite surprising. The cinematography can be extremely annoying. Nearly every shot contains a series of zoom shots, then from wide to closeup back to wide shot, which becomes very distracting after about the twentieth time it occurs. Pans and zooms are also pretty jarring most of the time, which makes them stand out more than they should. Worse is that, on numerous occasions, the camera zooms in, then seems to be looking for something to focus on. It almost looks quite amateurish for most of the shots, lending it a really dissatisfied feel. The film's worst sin is that, at times, there's nothing happening, which can result in boredom. This is especially true of the middle of the film, where most of the sex scenes occur. As the lead is a mute, it really staggers off and at times can be a little slow-going as nothing is really explained. It's visually based, and that can really be upsetting to some not used to it. All in all, it's not that bad and is quite decent.The Final Verdict: With it's emphasis more on the erotic realm than horrific one, it's hard to recommend this one other than the more adventurous fans of the extreme art-form. That also depends on which version of the film is viewed, as elements of one are not there in others.Rated UR/NC-17: Continuous Full Male & Female Nudity, several strong Sex Scenes and Violence