#30 - The Living Dead Girl (1982)
(dir. Jean Rollin)
Catherine has been dead for three years, but is brought back to life when an earthquake causes toxic waste to leak into her tomb. She initially seems mindless, wandering around her family's empty château like a ghost, but begins to slowly regain her memories and humanity - however, she has an insatiable thirst for blood that only seems to get worse with time. Her devoted childhood friend Hélène tries to help by luring in victims, but Catherine grows increasingly more horrified of what she has become and of what she might do.
Jean Rollin is a really great director in my opinion, but his films are definitely not for everyone. They often contain a lot of explicit gore and nudity (like you might expect from an Italian horror film), but at the same time have a sort of slow contemplative dreamlike quality to them. This is probably his goriest film, but the focus is really more on the horror of Catherine's situation. Played brilliantly by Françoise Blanchard (who reminds me a lot of Catherine Deneuve in Repulsion), she really feels like the victim in this film as she struggles to control her bloodlust. The climax of this film is one of the most memorable in all of horror, simultaneously horrifying and heartbreaking (oh, and super bloody).
It's hard to recommend this one to most people - not because it isn't good, but because Rollin is bizarre even by the standards of 70's/80's European horror, half arty and half trashy. The production values (camerawork, acting, etc) aren't great, as you may expect from an older low budget film, but the surreal haunting quality of his work is fantastic and unlike any other director I am familiar with. If you are already into European horror from this era, this is a deeper cut that you may want to check out.
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