Bram Stoker's Burial Of The Rats

When Bondage Is Not Bondage

You know you're in for potential Hall of Shame material whenever you see the phrase "Roger Corman presents" in front of a movie's title, as is the case here. This movie is about the fictional adventures of Dracula author Bram Stoker. While gadding about in the backwoods of Europe, he chances across a group of Amazonian witches who wear leather thong bikinis and hang out somewhere underground, where they dance around in scarves for amusement. Pretty soon he's in love with one of them, and she's kidnapped by the local authorities at the nearby collection of wretched hovels. Of course, being a witch, they send her to the dungeon for torture, and of course they have a fully equipped dungeon -- it's clearly where they're putting all their money.

So Bram goes rushing in and on the way he finds a poor peasant girl who's been tortured a lot. She's standing facing the camera with her head bowed forward, her hands bound behind her by a rope that ascends to the ceiling. After dispatching a torturer, he gives the rope over the woman's head a thwack. But his sword doesn't cut the rope, it just sorta wobbles the rope a little.

This doesn't stop the damsel from being rescued however. She slumps to the floor, freed from the rope at last. Bram spends about one second behind her, and suddenly, magically, her hands are freed! So she gets up and runs away, leaving the rope dangling almost to the floor.

ALSO FROM PAT POWERS

What has obviously happened here is: the woman's hands were never tied. That's why she stood facing the camera, so we couldn't see that her hands weren't tied. She was just holding onto the rope and dropped to her knees when she felt the tug as Stoker's sword hit it -- which is why it took but a second to free her. Corman's cheapo film crew couldn't be bothered to find a move convincing way stage this little bit of business.

They hoped we wouldn't notice. But we did, and we think their oversight deserves a Loosie Award. Welcome to the Hall of Shame, Roger.

But do watch the movie sometime. It's very silly, and the witches wear thong bikinis throughout the film, and most of them have very nice butts.

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