Lorna…the Exorcist
**This piece was written during the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the actors currently on strike, the movies being covered here wouldn’t exist.
Jesús Franco’s “Lorna…the Exorcist” leading off Kino Lorber’s new Kino Cult series of releases isn’t the most significant thing it has going for it, but it’s not far off. This marks my sixth foray into the Spanish filmmaker’s brand of exploitation cinema, and it’s probably near the bottom of the pack in terms of logic and interest. The film has a fairly straightforward shape, but it also feels like an excuse for the director to display full-frontal female nudity every 15-20 minutes more than a narrative with any thematic heft. One day, maybe I’ll listen to Kino’s commentary track by novelist and critic Tim Lucas on their Blu-Ray, and see what he has to say. Certainly, the film isn’t shy about punishing it’s main male character for his sins, but in the way Franco frames this story, his focus on naked women seems to only go so far in how he judges Patrick Mariel, played by Guy Delorme.
The poster I’m using for this review is not what Kino is using for its release; I think the artwork Kino uses captures the film’s sensual allure more than the black-and-white poster, which actually uses the name of Patrick’s daughter, Linda (Lina Romay), who is at the center of the narrative. Linda is a beautiful young woman about to turn 18, but while she was born to Patrick and his wife, Marianne (Jacqueline Laurent), another claims her. That would be Lorna (Pamela Stanford), a supernatural being who is unable to have children herself. Just before Linda was born, Lorna seduced Patrick into her bed, claiming that he would then return to his wife, and they would make love, and the result of that would be Lorna’s when she turns 18. Now, it’s time for Lorna to collect.
“Lorna…the Exorcist” begins with a prolonged sex scene that sets up the tone of the next 99 minutes, which is part sexploitation, part psychological horror. As the film progresses, you will come to realize that the title makes no damn sense; the only thing Lorna exorcises is the characters’s inhibitions, especially in a particularly explicit sex scene later which I will not describe except to say it’s quite unsettling. There are elements of Dracula and “Emmanuelle” in this film, written by Franco, Nicole Guettard and Robert de Nesle, but the film moves at its own gonzo pace and tone that is 100% in keeping with every other Franco film I’ve seen. As much as it’s hard to defend on an artistic level, I can’t help but find it captivating all the same.
Kino Lorber’s new Blu-Ray was released on October 24, 2023, and in addition to the aforementioned commentary, it also has interviews with Pamela Stanford, filmmaker Gerard Kikoine, and author Stephen Fowler. If you’re a fan of Franco, this is worth checking out.
