‘Makes you quiver and quake!’
Sound of Horror is a 1966 horror film about a group of people menaced by invisible shrieking dinosaurs that had been buried for eons in a Greek cave.
The movie was directed by José Antonio Nieves Conde from a screenplay co-written with Sam X. Abarbanel (also storyline), Gregg Tallas and producer Gregorio Sacristan.
The Zurbano Films production stars Arturo Fernandez, Soledad Miranda (She Killed in Ecstasy; Count Dracula; Vampyros Lesbos), James Philbrook and Antonio Casas. It was future horror icon Ingrid Pitt’s first screen role (The Wicker Man; The Vampire Lovers; Countess Dracula).
Our review:
Here’s a funny thing: a gruesomely violent, though otherwise family-oriented Spanish horror picture showcasing a couple of to-be-major cult actresses and a clutch of stiff macho actors.
The unbelievably appealing premise is that a small group of people are terrorised by an invisible dinosaur, whose presence is signified mostly by an unearthly roar and a very occasional superimposed outline of a rubber monster. Mostly, you get characters screaming and waving in the air as bloody gashes appear on their faces and the soundtrack is filled out by the cat-like growls of the monster.
Given the lunatic central idea, it’s amazing how much other stuff the film works in. In rural Greece, a bunch of treasure hunters, archaeologists and passers-by get involved when a delve into forbidden caves unearths a Neanderthal mummy (?) and a couple of stone eggs.
One egg hatches right away, producing a lizard-thing that disappears (maybe it absorbs the colour of its background as protection and becomes invisible immediately?) so it can gorily slice up minor characters. The other is taken off — against the advice of soothsaying housekeeper Calliope (Lola Gaos) — and put on the mantelpiece of the cottage where everyone is holed up. The warmth of the fire cracks it open, and a couple of eyes glow from the egg-fragments before the creature is smashed with a poker. Then its sibling gets really angry.
Dark, pretty Soledad Miranda, later muse of director Jesus Franco, is Maria, innocent niece of one of several obsessive fortune-hunters who learn the price of his greed for ancient relics. Meanwhile, well before her Hammer Films period, blonde Capri pants-sporting Ingrid Pitt, is Italian glamour puss Sofia Minnelli and gets to do a terrific jive sequence early on (Miranda responds with some ‘Greek’ dancing) but spends most of the film hiding behind the shoulder of the nearest available man.
Like The Birds and Night of the Living Dead (well, more like The Killer Shrews), much of the movie is siege: the survivors barricade themselves in the house chewing over their life experiences (“we three spent our youths dancing to bullets the way they dance to music”), personal problems, matters of significance (“it’s like living under the atom bomb”) and scientific theories.
And the tail-dragging monster attacks slashing poor old Calliope, rattling furniture in many long slow pans around empty spaces where it’s supposed to be, making footprints in the soft earth or a carpet of flour.
The climax involves thrown axes (a hilarious superimposed shot has two axes float across the screen as the beast attacks) and a self-sacrificing character blowing up Diana the temperamental Jeep (“you know how women are in the mornings”) as the dinosaur tears at the roof. As the monster burns, a man-in-a-rubber-suit shadow is glimpsed. Lessons are learned, and all the survivors get happy endings.
Director Jose Antonio Nieves Condé does what he can with the material: the sitting-around-the-house-waiting scenes play surprisingly creepily and there’s an excellent use of moving camera whenever the visible characters are in peril or action.
The Sound of Horror isn’t a bad effect and, rather pleasingly, the penny-pinching, labour-saving premise (imagine telling Ray Harryhausen he was wasting his time animating Gwangi frame-by-frame because this dinosaur is just as convincing so long as no-one can see it) is delivered with the utmost seriousness.
Kim Newman, guest reviewer [official website]
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“Manuel Berenguer’s classy monochrome photography, some surprisingly grisly clawings inflicted on the expedition members, another early role for Soledad Miranda, and the first-ever appearance from the Polish actress Ingrid Pitt – none of these things quite compensates for the turgid pace and the swelling tide of verbal diarrhoea in the dialogue.” Jonathan Rigby, Euro Gothic book
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“It’s a movie about invisible dinosaurs. Of course, it is a clever idea if you want to make a monster movie without any budget for special effects. But the filmmakers “show” by filming long scenes of empty cave sets. I’m not kidding. Almost as bad a choice are dance routines by Soledad Miranda and Ingrid Pitt.” Steve Miller, 150 Movies You Should Die Before You See book
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Country of origin:
Spain
Original title:
El sonido de la muerte “The Sound of Death”.
Cast and characters:
James Philbrook … Doctor Pete Asilov
Arturo Fernández … Pete
Soledad Miranda … Maria
José Bódalo … Mr Dorman
Antonio Casas … Professor Andre
Ingrid Pitt … Sofia Minelli
Lola Gaos … Calliope, the housekeeper
Francisco Piquer … Stravos
Technical specs:
1 hour 31 minutes
Black and White
Mono
Aspect ratio: 1.85: 1
Trailer:
Free on YouTube:
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