Jess Franco

The Spanish cult filmmaker Jesus Franco (1930) was 29 when he made his directorial debut. Since then, he has over 200 features to his name... or to his numerous pseudonyms. His films span a variety of genres, most of which combine horror with a dash of eroticism, resulting in a back-catalogue that ranges from magnificent B to hilarious Z movies. His indomitable urge for total artistic liberty meant that he often had to work with very low budgets. Franco’s inimitable and instantly recognizable style, with his trademark whooshing zooms and pans, is at once surreal, sensual and oddly abstract. The wandering camera draws the spectator straight into a dream world of night clubs, monsters, psychopaths, Sadean violence and pubic hair. Many of his obsessive-voyeuristic films feature the talents of his muse, the actress Lina Romay. She will join the master of European exploitation film for this tribute in Cinema Nova and Bozar.

All screenings in this section will be introduced by Jess Franco and Lina Romay.

Young Maria (Susan Hemingway) is caught fooling around with her boyfriend and is forced by Father Victor (William Berger) to enter a convent that is secretly run by Satanists. Classic nunsploitation filled with violent, erotic and blasphemous imagery.

In the presence of Jess Franco and Lina Romay

Note: The 35mm print we intended to show has one missing reel. We will therefor show the film in video format, sorry for the celluloid freaks.

A very strange science-fiction film featuring Lina Romay’s intimate parts as the main character. Alpha and Andros are turned on by Romay’s night-club dancing and take her home, drunk, for a little threesome. Taking advantage of Lina Romay in her satisfied stupor, Alpha introduces a toxic substance into her vagina that she can control via telepathy. Romay’s genitals become the central figure in an intergalactic conspiracy involving many male life forms that experience their final and greatest orgasm in her company.

In the presence of Jess Franco and Lina Romay.

Shot back to back with Shining Sex, this sleazy softcore porn is a parody of a spy film. Lina Romay is a cabaret dancer that runs around naked for most of the film and gets mixed up in a labyrinthine plot full of secret agents.

In the presence of Jess Franco and Lina Romay.

Also known under the German title "Greta, House ohne Männer" amongst a thousand others. This is the most shocking, perverse and outrageous of Franco’s women in prison films, featuring campy performances by big-breasted Dyanne Thorne as the sadistic warden of a South American political prison and Lina Romay as her sex slave.

In the presence of Jess Franco and Lina Romay.