The Ancines Woods (1970) User Reviews (5)

Pretty good mystery/terror movie with terrific acting by the always great José Luis López Vázquez.

[ma-cortes · 7/10 · 31 March 2022]

A traveling vendor, Benito Freire : Jose Luis López Vázquez, rolls through the forest causing a criminal spree . He seems to be a kindly , good man , loved by the villllage priest : Antonio Casas , but he's also the monster feared by all. Along the way , Benito dedicates to peddling across villages and towns and while suffering serious epilepsy attacks , and there's an intense rumor that spands here and there, as he's reportedly possessed by demonic forces .Then, people are disappearing , mutilated cadavers present surgical cuts along with savage gashes , giving way to the legend of Werewolf .

Highly engrosssing terror-mystery flick displaying drama, suspense and social habits from Galicia region. The frightening story starts well and grows more and more until a downbeat finale . It is some different , packing Galician legends and actual events with clear remarks to a killer character who really existed .Filmmaker Pedro Olea shows compellingly the Galician social customs in XIX Century , a hard environment dominated by envy , ambition and misery .Interesting script by Juan José Porto who was actually a descendant of Romasanta/Benito Freire's advocate at law . Being based on the novel El Bosque de Ancines or The Ancines Woods by Carlos Martinez Barbeite .Here stands out the awesome acting from starring Jose Luis López Vázquez as the unsettling and deranged peddler Freire. Being accompanied by a plethora of familiar faces , such as : Amparo Soler Leal ,Antonio Casas , Nuria Torray, Víctor Israel , Maria Vico, Rafael Hernández, Alfredo Mayo, Imma de Santi, Fernando Sánchez Polack , among others .It displays an atmospheric cinematography by cameraman Aurelio G. Larraya, showing splendidly the lush Galician forests .As well as evocative soundtrack including folk , traditional music by Antonio Perez Olea .

The picture is based on the true-life story of Manuel Blanco Romasanta , the traveling vendor, who confessed to the murders of thirteen people , using their body fat to make soap. Romasanta was tried in Állariz in 1852 and avoided capital punishment by proclaiming he was a werewolf . Being judged and condemned by Audiencia Provincial Coruña. He is deemed to be the first and only case of Spanish Licantropy . In similar facts was shot in 2004 "Romasanta : The werewolf Hunt" by Paco Plaza with Julián Sands , Elsa Pataky , Maru Valdivieso.

El Bosque Del Lobo 1970 was competently directed by Pedro Olea ,in his second picture . His first one was Dias de Viejo Color . After that , for six years , Pedro Olea dedicated in advertising and documentary as "Guernica" , "River of Bilbao" and TV series as "Cuentos y Leyendas" and other about Basque themes . With "Un Hombre llamado Flor de Otoño" , Pedro Olea returns to shoot , thanks to subsidy of the Basque government . Subsequently , he made a trilogy about Madrid : "Tormento", "Pim Pam Pum Fuego" and "La Corea" . But his biggest hit were "A Man Called Flor de Otoño" with Jose Sacristan and "Fencing Master" or El Maestro de Esgrima with Asumpta Serna . He also directed "Bandera Negra" about gun smuggling and a military thriller : " Morirás in Chafarinas" . And Olea made two movies dealing with witchery : " La Leyenda del Cura de Bargota" and " Akelarre" . While "El Bosque del Lobo" 1970 is considered to be one of the best films in his prestigious career .

The Curse of the Werewolf...in Galician sauce

[Maurizio73 · 5/10 · 13 March 2013]

Benito Freire, modest traveler who tries his best doing street trading of sacred images and errands along the 'camino de Santiago' in the early nineteenth century, is actually a solitary and unhappy suffering from a particular form of epilepsy that turns it into ferocious murderess of young women, with subtle pretexts, draws in its pilgrimage through the woods of Galicia. In spite of the confidence placed in him by the villagers that he frequents, the alarming disappearance of a young maiden, and strong evidence that weigh on his person, stir up a fierce manhunt that will lead to its inevitable capture. Based on the novel 'El bosque de Ancines' Carlos Martínez-Barbeito and inspired by the figure of the legendary bandit 'werewolf' Manuel Blanco Romasanta, the films of Spanish director Pedro Olea is an adaptation rather modest, which portrays the sad vicissitudes of a psychotic murderess Spain in the nineteenth century, trying to catch a reconstruction environment that evokes the spirit of the time between popular superstitions (the licantropismo) and the human drama of a 'be less' marked by the stigma of an unknown evil and terrible. Rather inconsistent and fragmented narrative level, it lacks the total lack of dramatic tension merely an elementary alternating convivial scenes and sequences that illustrate the mechanical simplicity rampage killings of the protagonist (limited to strangle the victims and take a nap, sic! ), lacking much in the development of a credible tragic subject (except for a brief prologue that exemplifies didactically childhood trauma suffered by us) as the pauperism of a staged purely illustrative and almost no digressions that emphasize the inevitability of the events narrated. The result is a collage rather static narrative sequences where it is entirely absent from the idea of ​​mounting and sadly characterization and in particular of the protagonist, lombrosianamente presented as a poor demented afflicted with an incurable disease rather than as a mask monster brutal animated by the perversions of a ruthless killer intent (because then induce the unfortunate maidens to accompany him to the woods?). Are of some interest to certain scenes related to funeral rituals popular until a few years ago in the Mediterranean including the south of Italy (the mournful circle of men around the body of the young man at the beginning of the film, a scene that has a certain reliability anthropological) and the evocation of the legends about lycanthropy as a form of superstition tied to a dark interpretation of the epilepticus. Curiso role blond Presbyterian minister on the way to Santiago for the English character actor (Italian by adoption) John Steiner.The Curse of the Werewolf...in Galician sauce

In my defense, I'm a werewolf.

[BA_Harrison · 7/10 · 24 December 2023]

The Ancines Woods is loosely based on Spain's first recorded serial killer, Manuel Blanco Romasanta (1809-1863), who admitted to thirteen murders but claimed that he wasn't responsible for his crimes since he suffered from a curse that turned him into a wolf.

José Luis López Vázquez plays the film's murderer, Galician pedlar Benito Freire, who has been afflicted with an unspecified ailment since childhood - now, when acting as a guide for travellers, he suddenly becomes gripped by a madness that drives him to kill. Freire is shown not to be a werewolf, but rather suffering from a mental condition - schizophrenia, perhaps - that makes him act in a violent manner against his usual character. The killings are brutal, with the murder of a child being particularly disturbing (he starts to strangle her and then accidentally sets her on fire).

The film is very gradually paced, so much so that it's easy for one's attention to wander at times (I soon started to notice all of the flies in the film), but it is well acted, José Luis López Vázquez putting in a convincing central performance as the killer who evokes pity as much as he does fear. The story builds to a satisfying climax, as Freire's lies eventually start to unravel, evidence mounts against him and he becomes the subject of a manhunt.

7/10. For a more recent version of the same story (but not as good), check out Romasanta (2004), starring the late Julian Sands.

One of the best Spanish films ever made

[martinchaide · 10/10 · 4 April 2008]

If cinema is about moving your mind to another time or space, then this film is a masterpiece. Today, when you see an historical movie (at least an Spanish one), you can't help perceiving it just like several xxi century guys acting disguised like people of ancient times, but when you watch this movie you are literary moved 100 years ago, far way from your everyday life, and you can feel very well the darkness of these times, when the barrier among superstition and reality was confuse and someone like the mean character of the film, a miserable man unable to control his criminal impulses, could be confused with a "lobisome" (werewolf). In the other hand, on the contrary of most of American films, there is not unnecessary violence on this one and even when Benito Freire (the werewolf) is an assassin, as the film is going by you can just feel sorrow for him.

gradually the ghastly tale unfolds

[christopher-underwood · 8/10 · 25 February 2013]

Most effective matter of fact Spanish horror set in the mid 19th century and seemingly based upon a true story. Most convincing with ancient looking primitive village folk going about their very basic daily life and in their midst someone who, we have seen in the pre-credit sequence suffers a traumatic event whilst a young child. The implication is clear and gradually the ghastly tale unfolds as at first we seem to see the old peddler turn into a werewolf and kill and later clearly more the victim of his own being. Some of the village scenes are a little on the dark side but the woods look amazing and make for a superb setting for the various violent incidents, of which, it has to be said we do not see very much. The finale is a wondrous sight seeming as it is to be a realistic or even real version of what we have seen so many times before when the villages take up arms for the hunt.