Bloodwank With a name like The Deathhead Virgin it was pretty much inevitable that one day I would sit down to watch this one. I'm one of those people drawn irresistibly to films with cool names, regardless of their quality I can just dig the feeling of watching a movie with a good name. This one gets pretty lousy reviews all round with good reason, not good, nor dysfunctional enough to pull off many classic bad movie tricks, The Deathhead Virgin merely goes about its business in its unassuming cheapie fashion and switches out to no fanfare after some 93 minutes or so. The plotting is actually kinda interesting, there's the odd twist and an ambition to the process that really could have done with some money, or better yet more concentration on the elements that work and editing for the bits that don't. The discovery of a supposedly Spanish wreck with attendant fake skeleton (seriously, it doesn't even begin to look like its anything more than a plastic model, so pristinely white and undamaged is its look) and some treasure sparks the return to life of a cursed virgin princess, possession and a spot of murder. Made in the Philipines, I guess the Westerners of the cast all liked the sunny location as there are scenes of various merry making, dancing and characters simply hanging about, which given the inherent interest of the locality isn't as boring as it might be but still rather puts the kibosh on any actual suspense. There' brief nudity and a little smidgen of gore but the murders are poorly staged and shock value is low. On the plus side, there are some fun cheesy solarisation visuals and the appearances of the titular boogeychick (is that the feminine of bogeyman?) are good for a few laughs, surprisingly for such a film she actually looks very close to her depiction on the posters, i.e. pretty cool and heck, once or twice even a little bit creepy. Mostly this film is weak stuff, never wild enough or bad enough, interesting images and ineptly handled schlock nuggets nestled amongst the padding and attractive women in bikini's aside there isn't much good here. I found it watchable enough, but it truly ain't great, worst of all is that it isn't even that funny. Well, it does bust out a ribtickling attempt at a bona fide action showdown at one stage that raises the pulse a little, but the effort would have been better used in the service of more horror goods. Larry Ward and Jock Gaynor can be blamed for a good deal of things, since they wrote and starred in the thing and their acting is non-charismatic and the script too drawn out. Director Norman Foster appears to be some kind of veteran in the profession but I can't say as his experience was visible on screen. I wouldn't really recommend this to anyone, but on the other hand I didn't dislike it nearly as much as I expected to, maybe its my love of really bad films, especially ones that sling a bit of cheapskate exotica around (fan dances for the win!). I was never quite disengaged, I smiled at times, I was even mildly entertained. But I can't really credit too much to the film, much as I'd like to. All in all this is a lowbrow matinée adventure/horror crossbreed that all but dedicated junk hunters can happily pass on by, as one of those unfortunate sorts I give it about a 4/10.

Woodyanders Filipino horror films don't come much worse than this unbearably dull, drawn-out stiff which boasts a decent enough plot, but precious little energy in the telling of said story. In short, what we have here is a classic case of cruddy schlock movie-making that crucially lacks the necessary trashy vitality to pass muster as a fun, worthy fright flick. Jock Gaynor, who was also one of the co-producers ("A Taste of Hell" 's John Garwood was another one) and designed the many boring underwater sequences featured herein, listlessly plays a treasure-seeking deep sea diver who discovers a fabled 1850 sunken galleon which contains the corpse of a legendary Moro tribe virgin princess. When Gaynor steals a priceless amulet from the princess' skeletal remains, the skull-faced sea siren (the gorgeous Iraida Arambulo, who's naked throughout the entire film except for a hokey monster mask that covers her cadaverous face) comes back to life and forces Gaynor to kill seven virgins in order to appease the god that the princess was sacrificed to a century earlier.Despite a goodly serving of both gratuitous nudity and bloody violence, plus the enticing sight of sexy female leads Diane McBain and Kim Ramos walking about in skimpy bikinis, "The Deathhead Virgin" proves to be a static, lifeless, sleep-inducing waste of time thanks to Norman Foster's drab direction (Foster, who started out as an actor prior to becoming a director, had a very uneven career which includes several episodes of Disney's "Davy Crockett" series), Fredy Conde's clunky, grainy cinematography, Ward Gaynor's arid, dead obvious, gab-ridden script, such excessive padding as tacky night club scenes, a horrible comic sequence in which Gaynor and his fellow diver buddy Larry Ward get drunk together on the beach, and a cock fight, the pitiful wasting of the great Vic Diaz in the nothing role of an investigating police chief who tries to piece together the whole fantastic story in a logical manner (Vic does what he can with a thankless part, but even he's let down by lousy dubbing -- some drip with a flat, hollow tenor substitutes for Diaz's wonderfully ripe and oily baritone!), cheesy solarization effects, uniformly indifferent performances from an understandably out of it cast, and Richard La Salle's slushy, overbearing score. So bad that it doesn't even qualify as enjoyable junk, this terribly lame loser of a flick should be avoided at all costs.

Steve Nyland (Squonkamatic) 1970's Filipino made horror is an acquired taste, and I must admit not getting it. THE DEATHHEAD VIRGIN is about on par with DAUGHTERS OF Satan, low budget potboilers set in the Philipines for the cynical reason that it was cheaper to make the movie there than anywhere else. The story idea is not without merit: Damned soul of a virgin girl sunk with a galleon comes back to haunt the beaches and resort communities leased by the film company for their off-season shoot. She walks around wearing a mask and not much else, thought strategic hair placement keeps whatever nudity there was from sullying our eyes.The problem is that not much happens, and other than some interesting slow speed filming and some interesting underwater photography the movie exists without the thrill factor needed to make something like this work. I bailed out at like the 70 minute point when like another commenter I realized that the director had reached his conclusion at about 62 minutes but exposed a bunch of other footage & felt compelled to use it, probably because he had to. Just ask The Beatles; Those Filipino entertainment unions can be murder.One curious footnote about the movie is the opening titles. At roughly thirteen minutes into the feature the words DIRECTED BY NORMAN FOSTER flash onto the screen, producing the film's only genuine laugh. My guess is that Mr. Foster had just seen ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST, who's titles go on for about three quarters of an hour. The difference of course is that they were not arbitrarily inserted by an editor who probably never saw the finished result. I don't blame him.

stlo112 As a child at summer camp, the councillors were hard pressed to find an effective way to punish our cabin for out mis-doings. Well, the day that they made us watch this film in its entirety (without letting us fall asleep), was the day that they found that effective punishment. This film is actually painful to watch. I am not exaggerating!