"Der Teufel kam aus Akasava" was released after the untimely demise of its star Soledad Miranda. First off: she has made better movies, especially "Vampyros Lesbos" and "She Killed In Ecstasy"! "Der Teufel kam aus Akasava" suffers from the confusing screenplay (said to be based on an Edgar Wallace short story). The MacGuffin for the fight between several parties is a kind of radioactive "energy stone" everyone wants to get hold of. Soledad plays a secret agent in the disguise of a nightclub dancer. Don't ask why she starts her investigation that way. Trusted, experienced actors from the Edgar Wallace series like Siegfried Schürenberg and Horst Tappert are a bit lost here, but (surely not only to me) Soledad Miranda is worth every penny one might spend on the DVD. She performs a dance in the nightclub which is a wonderful demonstration of her beauty, her screen presence and her elegance. Expect nothing more, expect nothing less.
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Witchfinder-General-6662 June 2011The prolific Spanish Exploitation deity Jess Franco made some of the most famous cult gems in his repertoire of almost 200 films with the gorgeous cult-goddess Soledad Miranda, who tragically died in a car accident at only 27 - an accident which robbed the world of cinema of one of its most stunning beauties. Sadly, the majority of their collaborations were released only after Miranda's death in August 1970. Being a big fan of both Jess Franco and his most beautiful muse, I am always looking forward to seeing one of their collaborations. Their most famous one is probably the brilliantly titled VAMPYROS LESBOS (1970) in which Miranda plays a Lesbian Vampire Countess, others include NACHTS WENN Dracula ERWACHT (COUNT Dracula, 1970) the cast of which also includes Christopher Lee, Klaus Kinski and Herbert Lom, SIE TÖTETE IN EKSTASE (SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY, 1971) and EUGENIE DE SADE (1974). DER TEUFEL KAM AUS AKASAVA aka. THE DEVIL CAME FROM AKASAVA (1971) is probably the most shamelessly nonsensical of their collaborations and yet Soledad alone makes it an absolute must-see for any admirer of beauty.
THE DEVIL CAME FROM AKASAVA seems like a very-low budget, but stylish James Bond rip-off, only that it is a female Bond with exhibitionist tendencies, played by one of the most mesmerizing women ever seen on screen. The sublime Soledad plays a foxy British secret agent who poses as a stripper. She comes to a tropical island in order to solve a bunch of disappearances... without giving too much away I can promise that the 'mysterious' motivation for the disappearances is hilariously nonsensical. The entire film makes hardly any sense, and yet it is incredibly entertaining. Once asked about the reason for film-making, the admitted sleaze-lover Jess Franco stated "showing the female body naked". And many parts of the plot here seem to be an excuse for the stunning Soledad Miranda to take her clothes off (which is more than welcome). The nudity in this film is very tasteful nudity (as opposed to many of Franco's rather pornographic 80s outings); as almost all Franco flicks from the early 70s, this a very stylish and groovy flick with a cool jazzy soundtrack. The rest of the cast includes many familiar faces, such as regular Franco-flick eerie-man Howard Vernon, Paul Muller and Horst Tappert, who is primarily famous in German-speaking countries for his role of the TV-inspector Derrick.
Overall, THE DEVIL CAME FROM AKASAVA is certainly not Franco's masterpiece, but an incredibly entertaining flick that doesn't take itself seriously, and a must-see for the goddess Soledad Miranda alone. -
gridoon202429 December 2010"The Devil Came From Akasava", more an exotic adventure than a spy movie, is one of the slickest-looking Jess Franco movies I've seen so far, though Franco (over)uses the ZOOM function of his cameras so much you'd think he was a kid who had just discovered them and couldn't resist fooling around with them. Nonetheless, his greatest failing - one that can easily be associated with many of his movies - is his inability (or maybe his indifference) to tell a coherent story: I watched this movie twice and I'm still mixed up on more than a few whos, whys and hows. As a an adventure film, "The Devil Came From Akasava" never gets exciting. Still, it's worth a look for the astonishingly beautiful Soledad Miranda, whom Franco films fetishistically, and who can blame him - the woman is sheer perfection. However, the script gives her little to work with, and as a result her character is shallow - as is the entire film. ** out of 4.
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lazarillo17 July 2006This is a kind of a silly spy spoof like the ones that were big in Europe at the time. Jess Franco did any number of them ("Kiss Me Monster", "The Girl from Rio"). It also might by be loose adaptation of an Edgar Wallace mystery, which were really big in Germany where the film was produced (although more likely it's based on a work of his much less talented son, Bryan Edgar Wallace). The story involves a bunch of characters all chasing after this mineral a murdered professor has discovered that can apparently do everything from waking up patients in narcoleptic comas to turning worthless metals into gold. The mineral is really a "McGuffin" though, in fact, the whole plot is pretty much a McGuffin. The real fun to be had is watching all these bizarre characters crossing and double-crossing each other.
Franco regulars Paul Muller and Howard Vernon are on hand, the latter playing a pretty unconvincing hired assassin. Ewa "Vampyros Lesbos" Stromberg also has a small role, but she keeps her clothes on this time. My favorites though are the lead villains--a husband who is apparently confined to a wheelchair and his prim, matronly wife who wields a mean sword cane! The real reason to watch this movie though can be summed up in two words: Soledad Miranda. Soledad Miranda had what the French (and a a lot non-French pseudointellectual types)called "je ne sais qoi" (basically "I don't know what"). She was very beautiful, standing out even among the many beautiful actresses Franco worked with. She was also talented having made many movies before she started working with Franco. She was always willing to take her clothes off and display her beautiful body, but she was classier and much less unabashedly exhibitionistic than her successor Lina Romay (who probably should have been more "abashed" about doing hardcore porn or letting Franco practically explore her colon with his zoom lens). Maybe it was because she died tragically young. She was always a sexy but ethereal actress whose erotic presence haunted even silly, nonsense movies like this.
As his fans know, Franco himself as director had a certain "je ne sais qoi" with some of his films. (With others though it was more like "je ne sais why the hell I am watching this crap!"). He's especially zoom-happy in this movie, but it actually works pretty well with the frenetic, pop-art style plot. It's not a great movie by a long shot, but the movies Franco did with Soledad Miranda are all pretty special, even the slightest ones like this. -
ferbs5418 October 2007Before watching "The Devil Came From Akasava" (1971) last night, I'd seen two earlier pictures from director Jess Franco--"The Awful Dr. Orloff" (1961), a fun horror outing, and "Venus In Furs" (1968), an extremely surreal, ultimately unfathomable but nevertheless professionally made film--and this may be part of the reason why "Akasava" proved such a disappointment to me. This picture somehow doesn't seem professionally made at all, featuring as it does lazy directing (Franco is inordinately and tiresomely in love with his zoom lens), slipshod editing, and a plot that is often downright confusing. The story here concerns a mineral that is discovered in the fictitious African country of Akasava--one that can turn base metals into gold--and the various criminal parties that vie with the British Secret Service (in the person of the gorgeous Soledad Miranda) and Scotland Yard for possession. Despite the film's title, this is not a horror outing at all, but rather a poor man's secret agent caper that strangely features little action to speak of. The picture is guilty of the worst crime a movie can commit: It is boring. With the exception of some groovy psychedelic music, laced with trippy sitar (non sequitur as the music often is), and some lingering shots of Miranda (who, sadly, like other beautiful actresses such as Francoise Dorleac, Jayne Mansfield and Claudia Jennings, died in a car crash, right after "Akasava" was shot), this film does not offer much. Don't blame the fine folks at Image Entertainment, however. The DVD itself looks great, and offers some excellent subtitling for those of us who don't speak fluent German. But it would take a lot more than a nice-looking DVD to turn this base film into solid gold!
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The_Void8 September 2009Soledad Miranda plays a British spy in this movie and is not believable in the slightest; but thank God she is in it because if she weren't, this Krimi-style James Bond send-up would have been a complete dead loss. This movie is rather strange all round. It's based on an Edgar Wallace story and therefore is shot in the same style as the popular Krimi films from the sixties and seventies; but it's directed by Jess Franco, who is more famous for his trashy euro-exploitation flicks, and it takes obvious influence from James Bond; although the suave spy featured here is a sexy female. The plot is complete nonsense of course and focuses around some mineral that has been discovered by some researchers. It has unique properties; it can turn ordinary metal into gold and...wait for it...humans into zombies. Naturally this mineral becomes pretty sought after and it is soon stolen. Shortly thereafter, Scotland Yard sends spies to investigate its disappearance and stop whoever has stolen the mineral.
Soledad Miranda made a handful of films with Jess Franco before her untimely death in 1970; and it's unfortunate really that this had to be one of them. She was in her element in films like She Killed in Ecstasy and Eugenie De Sade, whereas here she's out of her element and it's not really a very good performance. One of the most noticeable things about this film is the score. It's groovy and entertaining, but it's also constant and it does become a bit grating after a while. The madcap plot starts to wear thin rather quickly also and to be honest I was getting bored long before the movie ended. The whole zombie plot might make you believe that there'd be some horror element to the movie, but this is hardly touched on...although that might be a good thing as the quality of this production is very low even without that. It all bubbles up some stupid conclusion that fits the movie well. Overall, The Devil Came from Akasava is not a good movie by any stretch of the imagination. Soledad fans will of course want to track it down, however, and it is worth seeing just for her. -
lemon_magic26 May 2007Someone on the IFC channel lost their mind recently, and so "The Devil" made an appearance on cable late Friday night. It was an intriguing title and a potentially interesting plot summary (I'm always up for a good cheesy zombie movie), but the words "directed by Jesse Franco" let me know that whatever was coming up was going to be pretty crummy.
I've seen several of Franco's films, and at first I was puzzled why this guy was allowed to keep making movies. Then I remembered the way people get addicted to stupid things like tobacco or sniffing gasoline. My metaphor for this is that of the restaurant critic who started out hating cilantro (an aromatic herb used in Latino cooking, especially in salsa - some people like it, some people think it tastes like soap), then felt OK about it, and eventually became addicted to it. There's just something about Franco's slapdash, hackwork style that irritates a person in a way they may grow to enjoy. He's like a American version of Roger Corman that way.
Anyway, the Franco style is in full display here. This movie is much better than the train wreck that was "Castle Of Fu Manchu" (my reference point for all things Franco), but it's still pretty cheesy. The lead actor is a fairly dashing sort, and there are a couple of enticing young babes who serve as great camera bait - they light up the screen very nicely when they are around. And there are also a bunch of Continental looking character actors sleepwalking through their roles - think "Hammer film studios supporting actors who have given up all hope of ever doing anything better." And there's a weird "hip, swinging" soundtrack that seems to start up a new motif every 60 seconds or so, but every piece is scored for Hammond organ and wah-wah guitar and there's no dynamic range to them - it's as if the soundtrack people took the Hank Grawford/Jimmy McGriff quartet, fed them Quaaludes and Chianti, locked them in a studio, forced them to play for an hour at gunpoint, and recorded the results from a room 10 yards down the hall. Then they just cut the music into snippets and jammed them into scenes at random, regardless of what was happening on screen at the time.
And the plot itself...well, I never did quite figure out what was going on. There's a spy story buried in her somewhere, with a McGuffin device that turns metal to gold and humans into zombies, and I think the movie is actually supposed to be a spoof, but it's hard to make out and even harder to actually care. The English dub is so tin-eared and full of clinkers (and delivered by a bunch of ESL voice actors who sound as if they are reading the lines for the first time) that it removes almost every ounce of enjoyment I might have gotten from the movie. Seriously, I might have rated this movie at least two or three points higher if I'd been able to watch it with subtitles in its original language.
Anyway, it's vaguely watchable (especially during its cheesecake moments when the sweet young things disrobe) and it's by no means the worst thing Franco has done. I might even watch it again for the irritation value sometime if I get the chance. -
slayrrr66631 October 2006"The Devil Came from Akasava" is a slower than typical Franco affair.
**SPOILERS**
Deep in a jungle in the country of Akasava, a mysterious death plagues the British government, and top agent Jane Morgan, (Soledad Miranda) is assigned to go undercover in the country with partner Rex Forrester, (Fred Williams) and find the cause of the disappearances. After looking at the possible angles, they find that the disappearances center around a special mineral that turns people into zombies. With an enemy group on their trail, they work together to solve the mystery of the mineral as well as the disappearances of the original deaths.
The Good News: Being that this is a Franco film, there's always several things to immediately expect. The first is that the film will really not make sense, feature a nice, jazzy score and the underlying reason is the copious female nudity. Soledad Miranda here provides the bulk of that, and has never really shown such a presence before. She captivates with her several remarkable scenes and willingness to perform, and there's several wonderful scenes of her in here. The strip-club act is the clear highlight, which is as sultry and erotic as anything else in his catalog. It is shot and choreographed beautifully, and watching Soledad Miranda dance in a continuous series of stylized poses is never a bad thing. The fact that the plot includes such genre-defying topics as a spy story, an adventure setting, soft-core erotica and zombies makes this such a special film, and the cleverness of them being tied together makes it stand out quite nicely. Other than that, that's about it here.
The Bad News: It goes without saying that in a Franco film, the constant zooming and jazz maybe for specific tastes, but the biggest flaw is that the film really takes it's time doing anything. The setup takes way to long to explain away, and after most of it was already told through the opening moments. The fact that a spy film would feature so little action is a big mystery, since it really could've done so easily. However, these are the main gripes here.
The Final Verdict: A little slower moving than usual for a Franco film, this is still a rather kooky and entertaining entry in his canon. A really high recommendation for the Franco aficionado, while those not that experienced in his work might want to start elsewhere, as there's better ones out there.
Rated NR/NC-17: Full Nudity, Violence and some Language -
cold_lazarou5 November 2010Jess Franco rides again, marshalling his "Count Dracula" stars Frederick Williams and the always alluring Soledad Miranda in this tepid espionage thriller, allegedly based on an Edger Wallace story.
Williams here features as a b-grade Eurotrash James Bond, sent to the tropical state of Akasava on a mission to investigate the mysterious death of a professor. He is, thankfully for the viewer, teamed with Miranda's Scotland Yard investigator, and the pair are enmeshed in a confused plot revolving around the Philosopher's Stone: the legendary element that can transmute base metals to gold. This is here represented as a carry case whose contents glow eerily gold whenever opened (shades of "Pulp Fiction"?), and releases radiation inimical to human health.
Thankfully, Miranda's character Jane goes undercover as an exotic dancer in a nightclub, so we have a welcome distraction from the alleged plot. Sadly, however, the smoulderingly gorgeous Soledad is hampered here by some distressingly listless choreography which renders what should have been some of the most intensely erotic scenes captured on celluloid to what looks like a bored woman shifting restlessly around on a stage. For this unforgivable waste of opportunity, if nothing else, Franco should have been shot.
In all, a decent if slow-moving timewasting potboiler with a few wasted opportunities. Worth watching not only for the stunning Soledad Miranda, but also Franco regular Howard Vernon as a hit-man/butler. The scene of him leaping out of a window clutching the McGuffin briefcase, and teleporting from the garden via the magic of bad editing to a field with a waiting helicopter, ensured me that amid the Bondian hokum i was till in Francoland after all. -
Red-Barracuda13 September 2014This spy film from prolific exploitation director Jess Franco is probably most notable for being the final film the gorgeous actress Soledad Miranda appeared in before her untimely and tragic death very soon afterwards. In this one she is a secret service agent who goes undercover as a go-go dancer in order to track down international criminals who stole a precious mineral that can turn base metals into gold and people into zombie-like creatures. It's a nonsense plot-line, although it's one of the more plot-driven films I have actually seen Franco attempt.
Its strengths lie in other areas, most notably Miranda, who is easily the best thing about this. Like in all the Franco films she starred in, she once again displays an effortless magnetism and sensuality. The very fact that she operates partially as a stripper of course plays up the latter aspect quite a bit but like her other appearances in erotic roles, it always feels somewhat classy with Soledad. Aside from her there is a regular gaggle of stock Euro actors who will be very familiar to anyone who has seen other Franco films from the period. Also in common with those films is the soundtrack of glorious kitsch groovetastic sounds. So essentially seek this out if you either (a) appreciate this very particular brand of retro lounge music or (b) like Soledad Miranda (who wouldn't?) or (c) must see all things Franco (in which case you're probably insane but in a good way). It's not as good as other Franco/Miranda collaborations such as Vampyros Lesbos or She Killed in Ecstasy but it still has enough about it to make it an entertaining watch. -
JoeytheBrit11 June 2007This German flick is so full of cheese you're likely to have nightmares if you watch it straight before bed. It's another of the infamous Jess Franco's ultra-cheap B-pictures featuring the usual gratuitous female nudity, the comedy music score - which usually bears no relevance to what is happening on the screen - and the muddled plot which is reputedly based on an Edgar Wallace story. Enjoyable only for its sheer naffness, and some fetching young ladies, this is apparently one of Franco's better efforts. The suggestion it is meant to be a spoof of Bond-type espionage flicks, however, is as outlandish as some of the men's fashion on display.
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matalo4 October 2000If you´re an admirer of Jess Franco and the unforgettable Soledad Miranda, who died shortly after the production of this film, which has been produced back to back with Vampyros Lesbos and Sie tötete in Ekstase, in which she starred also, this one´s definitely a must-see. Everything in this movie is adorable (besides gorgeous Soledad, who is credited as Susann Korda): the plot (hilarious secret agent/conspiracy stuff), the actors (watch out for Horst Tappert), the production values (you might remember from Vampyros Lesbos) and, of course, the unbelievable groovy 70s soundtrack. It´s got everything you wish from a typical Jess Franco movie. And if you haven´t seen one yet, this is a good one to begin with.
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parry_na28 July 2017This is the nearest thing to a checklist of Jess Franco trademarks as I have ever seen. So – a wall-to-wall sitar-spangled jazzy soundtrack (heard before in 'Vampyros Lesbos'), familiar faces (Soledad Miranda, Howard Vernon, Fred Williams, Ewa Strömberg, Paul Muller and Franco himself), plenty of eye-watering locations, lots of zoom-ins (which, after seeing a number of Franco films, I am learning to love rather than tolerate) and a hurried, garbled finale. The only two elements this lacks to allow for a Full House are stablemates sex and horror, which are there, but only very briefly.
Franco, as he often did, casts himself in a particularly thankless role. At one stage, his character Tino offers to buy Jane (Miranda) a drink. After she looks him up and down, she declares, "I hate Brilliantine," and flounces off.
The story is tighter than on some other occasions and strays into thriller/espionage territory, with Miranda stealing every scene as Jane Morgan. There are some scenes set in London, which have charms of their own. Introduced by a sweeping panorama courtesy of an aged film-reel taken from elsewhere, the subsequent locations are as blatantly Spanish as you could wish.
With the notion that a mineral can turn humans into zombies, you may imagine such creatures play more of a role here. Never a fan of the walking dead, Franco uses the idea as a background piece, and only featuring any living cadaver twice throughout (in disappointingly subtle make-up). The rest of the time, we are concerned with Morgan and handsome Fred Forrester (Williams) and their various misdeeds and adventures. -
bombersflyup12 September 2022The Devil Came from Akasava is just awful, a forgettable foreign farce of a film.
A cheap Bond-like spoof, "The Spy Who Loved Me" perhaps. Everyone's a secret agent or a crook and everyone's sleeping around and everyone's in danger of being killed. There's no prelude and the stone itself provides little interest to the viewer, even though it makes zombies. Scenes cut and chopped together without flow and certainly without detail, along with little characterization and horrible dialogue. The dance club scenes are a little provocative, but there's nothing else worthwhile here. A terrible joke of a film, blah. -
Infofreak10 July 2004I've seen close to twenty Jess Franco movies now and my all time favourites are 'Eugenie De Sade' and 'Vampyros Lesbos', both of which starred the stunningly beautiful Soledad Miranda. Miranda acted in both movies using the pseudonym Susann Korda and died tragically in 1970 before 'Vampyros Lesbos' was released. 'The Devil Came From Akasava' is another Franco movie from this period, and while it isn't as good as the aforementioned it's still highly recommended viewing if you're a Franco fan. It's based on an Edgar Wallace thriller and the plot concerns a missing scientist, Professor Forrester (Angel Menendez) who has allegedly discovered The Philosopher's Stone, that is, a mysterious radioactive mineral which can turn objects into gold. Miranda plays Jane Morgan, a British Secret Service agent who is sent to Akasava posing as an exotic dancer. When she tries to uncover the whereabouts of Forrester and his discovery she finds herself embroiled in a confusing situation where nobody is what they appear to be. The plot isn't what makes this movie so bewitching. It's very Bond lite, and similar territory to Franco's earlier 'Sadisterotica'. What makes 'The Devil Came From Akasava' a pleasure to watch is Soledad Miranda's beauty. Her face and presence are hypnotic and when combined with the ultra groovy score (chock full of fuzz guitar, electric sitar, harpsichord,etc.), man, that's all you need to know! Miranda steals every scene she's in, but the supporting cast includes Ewa Stromberg, who co-starred in 'Vampyros Lesbos', Fred Williams, Horst Tappert, Franco regulars Paul Muller and Howard Vernon, and Franco himself as Tino Celli. I can't say that this is Franco's best movie, but it's as entertaining as all hell, and a pretty good introduction to his amazing output (180+ movies!).
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Uriah4328 February 2021This film begins with a man by the name of "Joao" (Antonio Padilla) discovering an extremely valuable crystal which has the potential to turn ordinary metal into gold. It is also highly radioactive and unless a person takes extreme precautions will either kill or severely debilitate him into a shell of his former self. To that extent, as soon as Joao emerges from the cave carrying a lead-lined box he is shot and severely wounded by an unnamed assailant. Even so he manages to get back to his workplace but is subsequently murdered by that same person when his boss "Professor Forrester" (Angel Menendez) temporarily leaves his side to find medical help. Not long after that Professor Forrester also goes missing and the box containing the stone is stolen. The scene eventually shifts to the professor's nephew "Rex Forrester" (Fred Williams) boarding an airplane from London to a tropical region known as the Akasava to search for him. Following him at a distance is an agent for the British Secret Service named "Jane Morgan" (Soledad Miranda) who is also investigating the disappearance of Professor Forrester and the murder of his assistant. But what neither Rex nor Jane realize is that they are being closely followed by several different people who each have their own agendas. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this was a mediocre James Bond clone which not only lacked the suspense necessary for a film of this type but also stretches any sense of realism beyond the breaking point as well. It does, however, have two beautiful actresses in Ewa Stromberg (as "Ingrid Thorrsen") and the aforementioned Soledad Miranda who has several semi-nude scenes throughout the film to keep things somewhat interesting. But that's about all it had going for it. That being said, while this may not have been a great spy film by any means, it wasn't necessarily that bad either and I have rated it accordingly. Slightly below average.
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BandSAboutMovies26 February 2022Jess Franco made another Edgar Wallace movie, Sangre en mis zapatos, which as based on Sanders of the River. This is based on the story Keeper of the Stone, which is from he same book.
Prof. Walter Forrester (Ángel Menéndez) is a British scientist working in the Akasava jungle in South America who has disappeared and may have stolen a mysterious stone. His nephew Rex Forrester (Fred Williams) is looking for his uncle. But the real reason to watch this is British agent Jane Morgan (Soledad Miranda), who has a secret identity as the stripper wife of the British consul Irving Lambert (Alberto Dalbés), which seems pretty wild when you wrap your mind around it.
The sinister Dr. Andrew Thorrsen (Horst Tappert) and his perhaps even more nefarious wife (Ewa Strömberg) also get involved, Franco plays an evil agent and Howard Vernon gets blown up real good when he tries to steal the stone, which can turn people into zombies and metal to gold because, well, who knows. It's all a device to get us to see just how wonderful Soledad could be as a spy.
Sadly, she'd die in an auto accident at the too soon age of 27 soon after this movie wrapped. I wasn't even born yet and it still breaks my heart. -
"Der Teufel kam aus Akasava" or "The Devil Came from Akasava" is a West German co-production with Spain and the director here is the notable Jesús Franco. He is also one of the writers and he worked together on adapting the Edgar Wallace work with Ladislas Fodor and Arne Elsholtz who died earlier this year and looking for what Elsholtz is mostly known, you'd be a bit surprised to see him work on a Franco film. Then again, this 85-minute movie is not the typical Franco either. He is a bit restrained with nudity here, even if he is working with his two muses Miranda and Strömberg. Fred Williams also worked with Franco on other projects, but the most known cast member is Horst Tappert for sure. But even if Franco clearly intended this film a bit more serious than he usually does, the story about the ability to turn metal into gold never feels really authentic from start to finish. But hey, who would complain about that if we see the gorgeous and ill-fated Soledad Miranda in here on several occasions with little clothes on (she was already dead when the film was released). But unfortunately, she is not the undisputed main character in here as she is in several other Franco films. So yeah, her looks and Tappert's approach to the character make for some decent moments while watching the movie. But the story overall and also the way pretty much all the characters were written make this another forgettable Franco movie and in the end it is even more difficult to appreciate this film as a bit of a guilty pleasure, because Franco takes his work unusually seriously here on many occasions, which he usually doesn't do. Maybe the reason is the Edgar Wallace base material. I personally give it a thumbs-down. Not a complete failure, but also far from a convincing watch. Not recommended.
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Scarecrow-8826 May 2007The assistant of Professor Forrestor(Ángel Menéndez)is murdered after retrieving a special mineral encased within the stone walling of a cave in Akasava. It is a jewel of a find because this radioactive mineral can turn metal into gold..a priceless item to have which obviously brings great wealth and power to the one who possesses it. Forrestor himself is infected by the radioactivity when he finds his assistant dead after someone entered his home where the man lay dying while he was out hunting a doctor nearby. In Akasava, Dr. Andrew Thorrsen(Horst Tappert)is quite a man of renown for his work with mysterious cases where men seem to have came down with some sort of disease that effects their sleep and skin. His wife, Ingrid(Ewa Strömberg)assists him. When Pro. Forrestor comes up missing, his nephew Rex(Fred Williams)comes to Akasava for answers towards his disappearance. This is where he meets secret agent Jane(the lovely Soledad Miranda who has a magnificent body)posing as an exotic dancer pretending to be the wife of Dr. Henry(Paul Muller)also an agent undercover. Sir Philip(Siegfried Schürenberg)is asked by a friend and colleague, Lord Kingsley(Walter Rilla), a man of great wealth and power, to find Professor Forrestor as a favor. Kingsley has kept the clinic in Akasava going while also keeping Professor Forrestor's research project funded. Perhaps, Kingsley has a greater interest in the grand scheme of things than realized. His wife, Lady Abigail(Blandine Ebinger)is only all too eager and willing to assist her husband in all manners of business when it comes to benefiting financially. He also has a "valet" who assists him, a very gruff, quietly menace named Humphrey(Howard Vernon). Meanwhile, Rex becomes acquainted with an undercover Secret service agent, Tino(director Jesus Franco himself)while slowly falling in lust with Jane. But, Rex is being shot at while those around him(..and Jane)are being killed off by someone hidden away behind cracked doors with only the tip of a pistol sticking it's nose out.
Not a bad little mystery thriller with spy elements that has the feel of a giallo. It's LOW, LOW budget does mar Franco's serious attempts at creating a good spy film. The film strip definitely shows wear and certain edits show unevenness as one scene follows another. The cast is decent enough, with Miranda's naked flesh the film's brightest asset. The dubbing is lacking in quality, but no more so that the quality of the presented product itself which time has not been kind to. Perhaps, it just shows that Franco was willing to make this film on whatever film strip he could get his hands on and with however much money was afforded to him. -
dopefishie29 June 2022The story is all over the place, but honestly, it is much better written than most of Franco's films. The acting is also better than most of his films. However, the audio quality of the dubbing was awful. And the scenes shot outside look terrible. The lighting was bad, and Franco squandered his locations.
However, the indoor scenes were shot with better lighting. The best looking scenes were dancing/nude scenes... they appeared to be the only scenes in which Franco took his time to make sure the lighting and camera angles worked together to look pretty darn good!
At the end of the day, this one seemed like a rushed mess with a few interesting scenes. It also features some of the least convincing guy with a leg cast moments caught on film lol. -
Michael_Elliott27 February 2008Devil Came from Akasava, The (1971)
* 1/2 (out of 4)
Fred Williams and the beautiful Soledad Miranda star in this campy film that tries to pay homage to your 60's spy movies. A mineral, which can kill and then bring the dead back to life, is stolen so it's up to the Secret Agents (Williams/Miranda) to get it back before more trouble breaks out. Sadly, Miranda died just after finishing this film, which was shot at the same time as Vampyros Lesbos and She Killed in Ecstasy. Both of them films are a lot better but Miranda turns in a good performance here, which makes her death all the more sad since it's clear she would have had a great future. The film itself is meant to be campy but it just didn't make me laugh. I also thought the story was rather poorly written, which is another reason I couldn't stay entertained. Howard Vernon, Paul Muller and Franco himself have roles as well. This film is mainly recommended to those who need to see every Miranda film but her other Franco's films are a lot better.