Most of us who survived the Sixties still find the deep cultural penetration of the "flower power" movement, also known as the "hippie movement," hard to believe.  But it happened, man.  Of course, it was really only the fashions, slang, and attitude of the hippies, rather than their bubblegum philosophy, that were adopted by so may back then.  The movies, naturally, were not immune...even horror movies.  Probably the best example of this is the following offering, a vampire flick that's just so "hip" that its theme song might well have been entitled..."

By JOE ROMANO 

Don’t let anyone fool you.  The Sixties didn’t end at the stroke of midnight on December 31, 1969.  Flower power spread its pixie dust well into the next decade, pushing against the bounds of a buttoned-down society until every man in America sported long sideburns and every woman wore her hair in a shag.

Of course, Richard Nixon remained in the White House, re-elected President in 1972 by the silent majority that ran our country, but it was still the sixties, man.  Peace, love and understanding...marijuana, acid, and mass murderers. 

It was the time of The Deathmaster.

The Deathmaster?

Ah, yes, The Deathmaster, an obscure cheesefest--I mean, lovefest--if there ever was one.  Originally filmed as an independent production to cash in on the shift from Victorian-themed horror movies to more modern day settings, it faced a legal battle from the start because of its alleged similarity to Count Yorga, Vampire and The Return Of Count Yorga. After completing the film, The Deathmaster’s makers, including its leading man and associate producer, Robert Quarry--who also stared in both Count Yorga movies--chose to sell it to American International Pictures (AIP) and avoid a long court challenge on its questionable originality.

AIP bought the movie for a song, but had little faith in its success and released it in 1972 for limited distribution instead of casting a wider net.  Sent to neighborhood theaters and suburban drive-ins for as short a time as contractual obligations required, Deathmaster died quickly and sunk into a dark pit of oblivion.  The seldom-seen movie popped up occasionally on late night television, but was never released in VHS format and has only been available on DVD for the past three years.

I was one of the possessed souls who did see it way back when.  On a sultry summer night I piled into a rusty Chevy Nova with two friends and headed for the West Virginia state line.  Not necessarily to see The Deathmaster, but the drinking age was 18 in West Virginia and we were very thirsty.  A few months shy of turning 20, our neighboring state was a magnet for a trio of 19 year-old Pittsburghers.  It would be over fifteen months before we could walk into a bar back home and order a drink; why wait a year when West Virginia was less than an hour away?  

Buoyed with a case of low alcohol beer and two cold pizzas, we found a local drive-in showing an all night horror show.  It was exactly what we were looking for--a night of frights instead of tinny country music in a smoky beer garden.

As the sun set, we slid the car next to a speaker pole and settled in for the coming attractions.  Opening my second beer in less than half an hour, a warm alcoholic buzz rushed through my body.  I turned my head and caught two long-haired freaky people passing a doobie between them.  The smell of burning hemp was thick, floating into the open window of the Chevy from their VW micro-bus.  I took another gulp of beer and glanced out the windshield.

"One minute to show time," screamed a washed-out cartoon clown on the big screen rising high in front of me.

"Try an ice-cold drink from our snack bar," said a giant can of Coke before showering the clown with a spray of soda pop.

I was tempted, chugging the beer in my hand, wishing for something sweeter to wash down the cardboard taste of the pizza--but the screen was going dim and the feature presentation was about to begin.

Out of the darkness came a familiar sight, a distinctive lower case "a," the trademark of AIP.  Just as suddenly as it appeared, the AIP logo faded, replaced by the crash of ocean waves--the first frame of the movie.  At the sight of the eerie, white-capped water, I knew Deathmaster was going to be good, especially for a teenaged crowd awash in watered down malt liquor and Acapulco gold.

We were part of a movement…

Vampires, hippies, and music!  Deathmaster was groovy, man.  Like tripping through a phantasmagoric countryside, or cruising on a cheap bottle of apple wine, The Deathmaster was heavy.  Although it was only frightening in a few parts, the overall mood was dark and creepy.  Best of all, it offered a hint of eroticism more typical of an English Hammer than a homegrown AIP.

Yeah, man, it was psychedelic--the coolest thing I saw that night. 

Here’s a synopsis if you’ve never seen it yourself, or were in a VW micro-bus when you did.

Barbado, an odd-looking black man sporting a scruffy Afro, silk dashiki, and zombie-like look on his face, performs a brief ceremony on a California beach.  He arranges three silver trinkets on top of a carved box and plays a haunting melody on a reed flute.  A wooden coffin washes ashore. When a wandering surfer walking along the sand opens the coffin, Barbado springs from the rocky coastline and strangles the curious beachcomber.  Barbado then drags the coffin through the salty surf to a pickup truck and drives away.

Jump forward to a gang of motorcyclists and a couple of hippies.  Although the members of the motorcycle gang look more like college students out for a Sunday jaunt than wild ones, they drink Coors beer, so they must be tough guys.  And one of the hippies knows kung fu, but uses it wisely.   So you know the story is relevant.

Relevant?

Oh, yes.  Movies don’t get any more relevant than this one unless they're part of the Billy Jack series.  Take my word for it.  You had to live through this stuff to fully understand it. 

After an innocent fight and a brush with the "heat," Pico, one of the hippies, invites Monk, the leader of the motorcycle gang, to crash where he and his girlfriend are staying.  The place is a commune, of sorts – an oversized country home more closely resembling a gothic castle than a beachfront cottage.  Monk agrees and is immediately bewildered by the poetic, free love lifestyle of the other hippies who live there with Pico.

Later that night, the vampire emerges from his coffin and joins the hippies, drifting into the house on a storm he created with a clap of his hands.  The group of young people readily accept the mysterious stranger as their new guru, almost as if they were expecting him.  The vampire’s polished words and cold presence gives the group a new way to view life.

Or is it death?

With the promise of immortality and the ecstasy of moonlit eternity, the guru quickly pulls the innocent minds into his dangerous web.   Like moths drawn to a burning candle, the youths become entranced by words, music, and dance.

Wow, man…it’s a love-in!  I won’t give away too much more of the story, but I suggest you don a paisley shirt and faded blue jeans, put on a pair of love beads, grab a bottle of Boone’s Farm Strawberry Hill, and watch Deathmaster for yourself.

Not surprisingly, Robert Quarry as the charismatic vampire, Khorda, is the rich, red blood of this movie.  Despite the disjointed plot, Quarry makes the whole thing worthwhile because he brought a high degree of sophistication to the movie, like his earlier portrayal of Count Yorga, another thoroughly modern bloodsucker from the same era.  The Deathmaster may be the cheap stuff of Friday night drive-ins, but Quarry elevates the wandering story and makes it something more than midnight trash.  Khorda is a crunchy role and Quarry handles it with flair. 

(Unfortunately, you can’t talk about The Deathmaster without mentioning Khorda’s resemblance to Charles Manson.  Manson and his family of losers went on a ritualistic killing spree starting in October, 1968, and ending on August 26, 1969.  The most famous of Manson’s victims was actress Sharon Tate, the pregnant wife of director Roman Polanski.  Manson’s hypnotic hold on the miscreants who fell under his evil spell was almost mystical--not unlike the hold Khorda has over his own group of disciples.  Manson’s reign of terror ended with his arrest on October 12, 1968, and he remains in prison today.)

Robert Quarry’s experience as Count Yorga served him well in The Deathmaster, delivering a performance worthy of Bela Lugosi, Christopher Lee, and Max Schreck.  It’s a pity few of the other actors in Deathmaster didn’t take a clue from Quarry and rise to the occasion.  I know they’re earnest enough in their efforts, but only three really make an impression.  The rest are merely faces in a crowd.

William Jordan as Monk is competent, but given too little to do in the sparse agenda.  If Jordan’s role had been expanded, and his character not sacrificed as the first of Khorda’s victims, the storyline may have stayed on track and developed into a meaty meal.  With his early demise, however, the plot sputters like a badly tuned motorcycle.

In spite of his sudden exit, Jordan delivers the movie’s most noteworthy line, admonishing the group for their shortcomings.   "You know what you all are," declares Monk in a subdued rage before he leaves the happening, "you’re all a bunch of friggin’ freaks and honkies, every last one of you."  Then he adds hungrily, "I’m going to town to get me some steak and whiskey."

Bill Ewing as Pico, the movie’s conscious, is another mild standout in the tie-dyed cast.  Pico is searching for the meaning to his existence, hoping to find it through love and a full life.  While the others in his commune fall prey to Khorda’s empty promises, Pico stands strong--although in his struggle against Barbado and Khorda he forgets he knows kung fu and resorts to an ineffective scrappy style of self-defense.

I guess that’s easy to do when you come face to face with the undead.  After all, Pico is a flower child and not one of the Chinese brothers in The Legend Of The Seven Golden Vampires.  We can’t hold him to the same standard as a group of better trained oriental vampire fighters, can we?

After The Deathmaster, Ewing starred in the short-lived, Korg, 70,000 B.C., an interesting Saturday morning TV series about cavemen.  Ewing also appeared in the Burt Reynolds’s comedy, The End – besides being a hit for Reynolds and his pal, Dom DeLuise, that movie was also the end of Ewing’s acting career.

Finally, there’s John Fiedler as Pop, a universal everyman that we all know by sight but not by name.  You’ll recognize him immediately when you see him.  Although he’s appeared in dozens of movies, including such varied greats as 12 Angry Men, The Odd Couple, and True Grit, he’s practically made a career for himself being the voice of Piglet in Disney’s Winnie the Pooh cartoons.

Far out, man...vampires, hippies, and the voice of Piglet...no wonder we miss the Sixties.

Now excuse me, my friends.  I have to dig out the hookah the guys in the VW bus gave me after the movie.  I want to sell it on eBay with my copy of The Deathmaster.

(Joe Romano, of course, is the long-time scribe for The HORROR-WOOD Reporter.)

Thanks, Joe.  Not only is The Deathmaster the most tuned-in, turned-on, dropped-out, and free-lovin' vampire flick ever made, its costumes and sets just scream the plastic "counterculture" look that Hollywood passed off as the real thing back then.  In fact, it's hard to not snicker at all the "with it" dialogue and the groovy philosophy of the young victims of the master vampire.  On the other hand, The Deathmaster, considering its budget, actually is quite competently made and it does manage to achieve some shivers, particular at the blood-drenched finale.  So, hunt up your old beads and bell bottoms and give this happenin' fright flick a look.  

Article copyright © Joe Romano

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