"The Brides" is one film that cannot be accused of not being out of the ordinary. Basically about events both in Edgar Allen Poe's life and in his fiction, and updated for no particular reason to the 1950s even as it retains a general feel of Poe's 1800s, it takes place almost entirely on the creepy set of an old Belgian countryside house.
Slow-moving and oddly acted in English, this is not for impatient viewers. But I enjoyed it as it quietly and steadily examined the deterioration of a fictionalized Poe. Here he believes he has perfected an evil experiment that will bring his beloved late wife back to him, even as it consigns another young woman to a living death. Real events from Poe's life are woven into the narrative so that they mix with the creations of his writing.
There are only a few actors on hand here and they all give it a great, low-budget go. Director "James Desert," as he is often known by pseudonym because of his lengthy Belgian name, has a plodding and contemplative style all his own that will appeal to fans of the unusual. Not at all "professional" in its presentation, the film will instead attract admirers of the offbeat and underground-arty, and works hard to deliver us the entirely different sort of experience that we crave.
Here Poe is in pain from a wasting disease he refuses to have diagnosed, shoots morphine, quaffs booze, becomes paralyzed on one side until he hypnotizes himself to become unparalyzed (!!) and obsesses over his beloved Virginia. The Grim Reaper hangs around, ominously staring at people. The atmosphere is oppressive and autumnal even though it is summer outside, and the air of an old Hammer Studios type of production, only in miniature, is palpable.
Desert started off with the gruesome underground necrophile-serial killer movie "Lucker the Necrophagus" in the 1980s, and has since been involved in producing many low-budget films over the years. May he continue to do things in his own eccentric way. You know who you are if the descriptions in this review have appealed to you, so get on over to Tubi and punch "The Brides" into its search engine.
