Night of the Bloody Apes (1968)

When I first saw this video I thought there was no possible way I could lose with a title like this! Well, everyone makes mistakes sometimes. Not that this movie is a total bust, there are a few entertaining parts but as a whole it doesn't hold up as well as some of the other exploitation trash from the same era.

Strangely enough, all the ingredients for a great exploitation trash film are here (some good gore, female nudity, and a ton of subpar acting) but it still manages to miss the mark. Well to begin with, there was only one ape...and he wasn't all that bloody! The story concerns a mad scientist who is trying to cure his son's leukemia by giving him a heart transplant with a monkey. Interestingly (and disgustingly) enough, there are scenes of real open heart surgery spliced into the operation scene. Before you know it the kid turns into some man/ape monster and goes on a rampage killing men and stripping women nude. Throw in some masked female wrestlers and that's pretty much it. I know what you're probably saying now, "what's wrong with that?" Well, nothing, but the final product just isn't as good as it sounds. It seems like the crew just didn't have their hearts in it (no pun intended).

Director Rene Cardona remade this from his own 1962 film Wrestling Women Vs. The Aztec Ape. He also shared the writing chores with his son Rene Cardona Jr. (director of Beaks: The Movie - review coming soon!). In addition to being a remake, this film has had several different versions in circulation, most notably under the title Horror y sexo with several minutes of gore and nudity added for the foreign markets.

All in all, the films of the Cardona family are more interesting taken collectively than individually. So if you think you have what it takes to sit through several of these puppies then you should be in for an interesting evolution of films from the 30s all the way up through the 90s (and possibly beyond - don't forget about Rene Cardona III!).