This one is probably the oddest film ever made in Spanish cinema until the take-off of its fantastic and horror genre in the late 1960s. For that reason alone it is remarkable that it was made at all at an era as conservative and narrow-minded as the 1940s was, when Spain was isolated within Europe by the diplomatic and economic boycott of the Allies for having secretly helped the Axis during World War II. In those days of heavy fascist censorship, the films made in Spain where either bourgeois gentle comedies to give audiences a false feeling of optimism and prosperity in a country that was totally ruined, historical epics to remind us how great we once were, or religious dramas to glorify Spain's ultra-Catholicism against the threat of Communism and the Masons.
During the early 1930s director Edgar Neville worked in Hollywood, adapting films for the Spanish-speaking market, and there he learnt a great deal about filmmaking. So when he took the reins of "The Tower" and wrote the script, he included slices of music-hall, screwball comedy, fairy-tale fantasy and German Expressionism, all combined together while keeping a very Spanish background of traditional Madrid cafés at the turn of the century, popular music and songs and people speaking in the local accent, with some location shots in the old quarter of the city that hadn't changed at all since the XIX century.
As the movie starts we meet Basilio (Antonio Casal) an innocent and bit of a foolish guy. One evening he goes to try his luck at the casino but loses his modest gamble, but then he is approached by the ghost of an elderly gentleman who tells him which number to bet upon. Basilio reluctantly does so, and then wins then some cash which allows him to take his cabaret girlfriend out to supper to impress her but can't avoid being chaperoned by her big mother. Later that night he is visited by the ghost again, who then tells him that he was murdered by a secret society as he was about to discover some sinister plot of theirs, and now his niece is in danger from his murderers. Basilio eventually learns that the gentleman was an archaeologist, and that his associate vanished without a trace when the professor was killed. Basilio immediately falls in love with the niece and starts courting her, and at the same time we start seeing hunchbacks everywhere he goes to, and it becomes quite obvious that they are watching him. A second story within the story then begins to unravel, and it doesn't take us much thinking to deduce that the hunchbacks and the murder of the professor are connected and Basilio is now in the middle of it. One night he follows a hunchback to an old deserted house and ends up discovering a secret passage that leads to an underground city built by the Jews at the time they were being persecuted by the Inquisition, and there he bumps into the professor's long-time missing associate, who is now a bit gaga after being held captive for so long. We soon discover that the gang, led by a mysterious doctor we met a while back, has been engaged for years on digging and smuggling art objects out of the Jewish city and running a counterfeit money press at the same time. The doctor has now kidnapped the professor's niece and is holding her under hypnosis in the city as well, but at the end Basilio rescues her and both flee the city as it collapses after the doctor has exploded a device once he realised the game was over. At the end, with the dastardly villain and his evil organisation destroyed and the mystery of the professor's murder solved, Basilio and the girl will remain together and live happy ever after.
The unusual and innovative combination of different genres makes it not only an interesting film in terms of content but also very entertaining, suspenseful and funny. It is also a beautiful and loving homage to German Expressionism: Dr Mabuse, Nosferatu, The Golem and The Student of Prague. And also it is blessed with a wonderful cast, led by the naturally gifted for comedy Galician-born actor Antonio Casal, accompanied by two of Neville's regulars: the charming and suave Guillermo Marin as the villain, and the delightful and always bigger- than-life and fantastic scene stealer Julia Lajos as the mother-in-law to fear.
"The Tower of the Seven Hunchbacks" has become a cult classic, recently restored and now available in DVD. And it certainly is one of the best films made by one of the most original, creative, innovative and independent directors in Spanish cinema ever: Edgar Neville.
During the early 1930s director Edgar Neville worked in Hollywood, adapting films for the Spanish-speaking market, and there he learnt a great deal about filmmaking. So when he took the reins of "The Tower" and wrote the script, he included slices of music-hall, screwball comedy, fairy-tale fantasy and German Expressionism, all combined together while keeping a very Spanish background of traditional Madrid cafés at the turn of the century, popular music and songs and people speaking in the local accent, with some location shots in the old quarter of the city that hadn't changed at all since the XIX century.
As the movie starts we meet Basilio (Antonio Casal) an innocent and bit of a foolish guy. One evening he goes to try his luck at the casino but loses his modest gamble, but then he is approached by the ghost of an elderly gentleman who tells him which number to bet upon. Basilio reluctantly does so, and then wins then some cash which allows him to take his cabaret girlfriend out to supper to impress her but can't avoid being chaperoned by her big mother. Later that night he is visited by the ghost again, who then tells him that he was murdered by a secret society as he was about to discover some sinister plot of theirs, and now his niece is in danger from his murderers. Basilio eventually learns that the gentleman was an archaeologist, and that his associate vanished without a trace when the professor was killed. Basilio immediately falls in love with the niece and starts courting her, and at the same time we start seeing hunchbacks everywhere he goes to, and it becomes quite obvious that they are watching him. A second story within the story then begins to unravel, and it doesn't take us much thinking to deduce that the hunchbacks and the murder of the professor are connected and Basilio is now in the middle of it. One night he follows a hunchback to an old deserted house and ends up discovering a secret passage that leads to an underground city built by the Jews at the time they were being persecuted by the Inquisition, and there he bumps into the professor's long-time missing associate, who is now a bit gaga after being held captive for so long. We soon discover that the gang, led by a mysterious doctor we met a while back, has been engaged for years on digging and smuggling art objects out of the Jewish city and running a counterfeit money press at the same time. The doctor has now kidnapped the professor's niece and is holding her under hypnosis in the city as well, but at the end Basilio rescues her and both flee the city as it collapses after the doctor has exploded a device once he realised the game was over. At the end, with the dastardly villain and his evil organisation destroyed and the mystery of the professor's murder solved, Basilio and the girl will remain together and live happy ever after.
The unusual and innovative combination of different genres makes it not only an interesting film in terms of content but also very entertaining, suspenseful and funny. It is also a beautiful and loving homage to German Expressionism: Dr Mabuse, Nosferatu, The Golem and The Student of Prague. And also it is blessed with a wonderful cast, led by the naturally gifted for comedy Galician-born actor Antonio Casal, accompanied by two of Neville's regulars: the charming and suave Guillermo Marin as the villain, and the delightful and always bigger- than-life and fantastic scene stealer Julia Lajos as the mother-in-law to fear.
"The Tower of the Seven Hunchbacks" has become a cult classic, recently restored and now available in DVD. And it certainly is one of the best films made by one of the most original, creative, innovative and independent directors in Spanish cinema ever: Edgar Neville.