Cave of the Living Dead (Der Fluch der grünen Augen; Akos von Ratony, 1964)

Inspector Frank Dorin (Fassbinder regular Adrian Hoven) is sent by boat(!) to a small village to investigate the mysterious deaths of six young women, all of which happened near a grotto and were accompanied by brief blackouts. Although the manager of the inn where Dorin is staying insists that a vampire is responsible, the Inspector is understandably skeptical, even after the hotel's maid soon becomes the seventh victim, and has two puncture marks on her neck. Even the shifty local doctor (Rififi's Carl Möhner) attributes the deaths to heart failure, although the scraggly-haired, black-toothed witch Nanny insists that the undead are indeed responsible. Dorin is invited by blood specialist Professor von Adelsberg (Wolfgang Preiss, Rudolf Klein-Rogge's successor as Dr. Mabuse) to stay at his castle, which is also inhabited by his beautiful secretary Karin Schumann (Karin Fields from Jess Franco's The Demons) and his black manservant John (John Kitzmiller, Quarrel in Dr. No). Eventually, Dorin is forced to accept the existence of the supernatural and end the vampire's threat once and for all.

This West German/Yugoslavian co-production (also known as Night of the Vampires and The Curse of the Green Eyes) is worth a look, though hardly a masterpiece. Director Ákos Ráthonyi (credited as Akos von Ratony) makes the film genuinely atmospheric and creepy, helped greatly by Hrvoje Saric's cinematography. Hoven is surprisingly laid-back for a Police Inspector, while Preiss is every bit as sinister as he was as Mabuse (even if the film gives away his secret before it needs to). Fields isn't given a lot to work with, although she does provide some welcome sex appeal, at one point changing (shot from behind and with her panties still on) into a more revealing nightgown than one would expect for the era. Kitzmiller is referred to as "colored" twice, and a "Negro" once, but given the aforementioned time period I suppose I should cut the film a little slack. Herbert Jarczyk's music is excellent, with jazzy themes at the beginning and end but eerier material in between. This will never make anyone's top 10 vampire movie list, but I dug it.