When you think of horror from Mexico, you likely think of the films by Guillermo del Toro or the popular horror films of Santo, the beloved crime and monster fighting luchador. You might think of more recent titles like Tigers Are Not Afraid, Mexico Barbaro, Here Comes the Devil, We Are What We Are, or We Are the Flesh, and a couple outliers like Alucarda and Santa Sangre. But they’re only just scratching the surface; Mexico has a rich tapestry of genre films that rarely comes up in discussion.
Film festivals tend to be dedicated to upcoming releases or new films in search of acquisition. Fantastic Fest is a festival that dedicates just as much effort to unearthing repertory films lost in time, from all corners of the globe. Ringing in its 15th year in Austin, Texas, Fantastic Fest celebrated with a Quinceañera. With it, a spotlight on the rich and varied history of Mexican genre film. At the center of it emerged a trio of rare titles begging for a larger audience, and an impressive lecture that proved just how much horror from Mexico is still awaiting discovery on a global scale.
Programmed in association with Mexico City’s Mórbido Film Fest, Fantastic Fest showcased screenings of The Black Pit of Dr. M (aka Misterios de Ultratumba), a gothic gem from 1959 that followed a pair of doctors making an unholy pact to discover whether there’s an afterlife, and 1960’s comedic sci-fi The Ship of Monsters (La Neve de los Monstruous), which sees two female extraterrestrials on an interplanetary mission to collect male species to repopulate their planet. Think Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein in terms of humor and charm.
Then there’s the insane Hell’s Trap (aka Trampa Infermal) from 1989, which has a group of people terrorized by a crazed Vietnam vet in a mannequin mask and a Freddy Krueger glove. It’s a wild slasher that answers the question: What if Rambo went full blown Michael Myers, by way of A Nightmare on Elm Street?
The biggest and most moving centerpiece of all, though, was “The Mórbido Crypt’s Guide to Mexican Fantasy and Horror Cinema,” a lecture by Mórbido Film Fest’s head of programming Abraham Castillo Flores. The lecture was a co-presentation with The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies, founded by film writer/programmer/producer Kier-La Janisse.
Flores’ impassioned and lively lecture gave an overview of the origins of Mexican fantasy and horror cinema, and examined its development through the 20th Century and the start of the 21st. He detailed the formative heroes and heroines of the genre, and provided insight to the landscape of filmmaking in Mexico that gave context to the country’s horror throughout the decades. From the early 1930s through the present, Flores delivered a compelling oral history to vital genre filmmakers and their films with love and humor.
For example, Juan Oro Bustillo might’ve brought German expressionism to his horror with notable films like 1934’s silent horror Two Monks, but his fellow filmmakers weren’t a fan of his penchant for drinking beer with ice in it. The naturally occurring Mummies of Guanajuato served as inspiration for both early American and Mexican horror. It was also Mexico that delivered the first female werewolf, as seen in 1965’s The She-Wolf. 1967’s Even the Wind is Afraid, a spooky ghost story set at a boarding school, marked Mexico’s first PG-13 equivalent horror film as well as it’s first color genre film, and is considered one of the country’s finest offerings. More recently, 2007’s KM.31 proved Mexico was capable of doing its own vfx in house, rather than exporting. From the clip presented, its take on La Llorona looks far creepier than the more recent Conjuring universe iteration. Without trailblazing producer Bertha Navarro, the work of Guillermo del Toro likely wouldn’t exist. That being said, del Toro is of course considered a patron saint of Mexico who gives back so much to Mexico and its film industry.
Through the Morbido’s Crypt Guide to Mexican Fantasy and Horror Cinema, it became obvious that Flores is an extremely knowledgeable historian, but moreover it became abundantly clear just how many films from Mexico are still waiting to be discovered by international horror fans. I took two pages of notes, mostly consisting of titles I’m dying to check out myself. Above all, this was the precise type of programming that inspires and serves as a staunch reminder how important vital voices like Flores, Fantastic Fest programmers, and the Miskatonic Instistute are to keeping horror alive in memory and on screen.
