Advertise with us and reach over 500,000 horror fans all over the world!
INCUBUS (1966)
3 stars
Arrow Video. Limited edition 4K UHD/Limited edition Blu ray. 13th January.
INCUBUS, a black and white film starring a pre-Star Trek William Shatner, is hardly the sort of production you expect to turn up on 4K UHD, especially as it was shot entirely in Esperanto, an artificial language intended to become the international second way of communicating. Whilst there were other movies shot in this way of speaking, this is it’s best known example, so it is probably more important historically than actually being particularly good.
In the village of Nomen Tumm, an ancient well has healing waters – with people either cured or acquiring “subtle beauty”. It attracts many visitors, with some seeking demons. A drunk man partakes of the magical liquid – and is chased after by a young, attractive woman. When he falls and cracks his head open, she tells him to wash off the blood in the sea, as she will swim naked with him! However, she then proceeds to drown him and bury his body in the sand.
It turns out she is called Kia (Allyson Ames) and is a succubi, claiming souls for the God of Darkness, to send to hell. She wants to try and capture a ‘noble soul’ and corrupt him, despite warnings from her ‘sister’ Amael (Eloise Hardt) that such a person will have the power of love to thwart her ambition.
She targets Marc (Shatner), who lives with his sister Arndis (Ann Atmar), and is trying to recover from his wound and forget his experiences in battle. Inevitably, she begins to fall for him and Amael is forced into calling forth an incubus – though this is quite late in the story, and justifies calling this a horror film – as in the last third it goes fully demonic.
Written and directed by Leslie Stevens, best known for the TV series THE OUTER LIMITS, the film has the possessory title Leslie Stevens’ Incubus, so he was clearly proud of it. A shame then that this apparently only played a few film festivals and was withdrawn from circulation after the actor who played the incubus, Milos Milos was involved in a murder and then killed himself, and actress Atmar also committed suicide several days before the premiere at the San Francisco International Film Festival. This effectively became a lost film and it’s reputation grew as very few had seen it.
The elements were left for safe-keeping in the vaults at CFI, which unfortunately became known as Can’t Find It, as it was discovered years later that the negative and all prints had been destroyed at some point. Luckily a single print was discovered in France (with burnt in subtitles). This release is taken from a 4K master drawn from this print, presented widescreen which crops most of the subs off screen, with new English subtitles. You can also watch in square ratio with the French under-titles visible. As it is from a print, rather than the original negative, some of the scenes are bit burnt out.
An odd, almost abstract film, this has a haunting music score by Dominic Frontiere (who worked on ‘The Outer Limits’) and from what you can tell, stylish cinematography by Conrad Hall and an uncredited William Fraker. You get Shatner slightly over-acting, as was his style, and much of the dialogue is portentous. There is good use of Californian locations that include Big Sur and the Mission San Antonio de Pardua.
Steve Kirkham
EXTRAS
4 stars
Three audio commentaries: author David J. Schow (2024); William Shatner (2001); producer Anthony Taylor, cinematographer Conrad L. Hall and camera operator William Fraker (2001)
Isolated score
Open matte 1.37:1 presentation of the film in 1080p – shows more of the top and bottom of the image and the burnt in French subs with the English subtitles showing in black bars above them.
Words and Worlds: Incubus and Esperanto in Cinema (43 mins), genre historian Stephen Bissette discusses invented languages, like Burroughs used in ‘Tarzan’ and Lovecraft in his stories. Leading to Esperanto via proponent Forrest Ackerman (he of ‘Famous Monsters’). Early films that featured the language including Angoroj (Agony) and others leading to Incubus and Leslie Stevens.
Internacia Lingvo: A History of Esperanto, a newly filmed interview with Esther Schor, author of Bridge of Words: Esperanto and the Dream of a Universal Language (22 mins)
An Interview with the Makers of Incubus (from 2001, 19 mins): Schow interviews Taylor, Hall and Fraker
Video trailer
Reversible sleeve featuring newly commissioned artwork by Richard Wells; Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Frank Collins and Jason Kruppa
