User Reviews

Not a very remarkable movie nor as bad as its reputation. The tomb of an Aztec general is defiled.His head (all that remains of him)and bodyguard are removed for study.Needless to say the defilers of the tomb start having severe chest pains as their hearts are removed forcibly.

There are plot holes large enough to park a sepulchre in.In front of the "Living Head" lies a bloody warm heart.In front of the 1000 year old bodyguard is a pool of blood which is coming from the bloody dagger he is holding."Hey. I'll admit something strange is going on here but I don't believe it's a curse.It is the work of a madman" says the police investigator.Of course if he did the movie would be over in 10 minutes.

As usual the dubbing is horrible.A majority of the male voices are done by one man(probably Paul Frees).The movie does move along and is competently directed.Not as painful as it could have been.

This is another popular Mexi-Horror effort – one of a spate, in fact, that were picked up for U.S. distribution by exploitationer K. Gordon Murray. Though involved in it are some of the top purveyors of this goofy-yet-irresistible form (director Urueta, producer/star Abel Salazar and co-star German Robles – the three had previously collaborated on one of the wackiest horror movies ever, THE BRAINIAC [1962]), this one emerges a disappointment overall!

For starters, it feels like a half-hearted attempt at Mummy lore (with the marauding bandaged one replaced by an Aztec high priest, and the added treat of the titular 'monster'), especially when considering that there had already been three "Aztec Mummy" films (albeit of similarly negligible quality)! Anyway, here we get the usual elements of archeologists falling prey to a curse tied to their latest find (the tomb of various long-dead Aztecs with unpronounceable names!); Robles (as in THE BRAINIAC, made to look older than his years) leads the expedition and the youngest member is played by the same Clark Gable-lookalike from THE WORLD OF THE VAMPIRES (1961; which had immediately preceded this), while Salazar turns up – in a rather thankless role – as the police detective investigating the ensuing 'mysterious' deaths.

The film starts off in the distant past (recreating an ancient burial ritual) – with the ensuing passage of time until the present day represented by a montage lifted wholesale from THE BRAINIAC itself (as are some of the musical cues!); a ring that can glow and hypnotize its owner into doing the villain's evil bidding becomes the object of contention at some point in the proceedings, whereas the disembodied head intermittently renders its helmet transparent (for no other discernible reason than to let us see that the hero is a dead-ringer for its owner, just as Robles' daughter is for the warrior's beloved!). THE LIVING HEAD is by no means terrible but clearly uninspired (to say nothing of singularly unfrightening), and decidedly less fun than one would have hoped for (indeed expected from this particular stable)!

Incidentally, given that I have often been taken to task for ridiculing cheap horror films in my comments, a similarly bemused (or, if you like, cynical) viewpoint was adopted by both "External Reviews" pertaining to THE LIVING HEAD on its IMDb page! In the end, I am glad I did not have to fork out my hard-earned cash for either this one (which I honestly can barely recall after just three days!) or THE WORLD OF THE VAMPIRES and, while I regret the Casanegra company's unceremonious folding, I seriously doubt their financial matters would have been in any way resolved via the potential sales receipts from the DVD editions of these two very minor genre entries...

**SPOILERS** Mexican horror movie that has to do with unearthing the hidden Sepulcher of the great Aztec warrior Acatl who's head was entombed together with his, or it's, two eternal defenders the Aztez High Priest Xihu and princess Zochiquati.

With a number of archaeologists breaking into the tomb of Acatl in 1963 438 years after his head was sealed in it, back in 1525, the head suddenly came to life. Acatl, or his head, orders through a combination of mental telepathy and just plain talking the high Priest Xihu to go out and kill, by ancient Aztec ritual sacrifice rites, those who defamed his or it's tomb by opening it.

Predictable plot with Xihu killing all those who disturbed the hiding place of his master the mighty Aztec warrior Acatl. The Princess Zochiquahi disintegrated as soon as the air outside the sealed sepulcher hit her but somehow came back to life as the head of he expedition Prof. Muller's daughter Marta.

At times looking like a wooden cigar store Indian High priest Xihu slumbers around killing off the archaeologists who defamed the holy sepulcher ripping out their hearts and putting them at the head of Acatl, that rests on what looks like a platter. Xihu is far more annoying then threatening when he opens his big mouth and gives his victims an incredibly long and boring speech about the crimes that they committed against Acatl and the princess, as well as the Aztec nation. Xihu practically talks his victims to death before he runs them through with his knife. Slicing up Charlie Stoffer and Ingershaw, two of the archaeologists, then for some reason according to Aztec law Xihu is unable to kill the rest of the infidels. Xihu has get Marta to do the job on them instead which included her father Prof. Muller.

With a now she can and now she can't mindset Marta hits a mental block and can't go through with the killings. The last fleeting minutes of the movie "The Living Head" has Marta struggling with her conscience to or not to kill her father Prof. Muller and his friend Antonio. Xihu goes bananas, with frustration, and finally tells Marta's lover Antonio to murder her for her insolence. Xihu is then given the lowdown to what's really expected of him from his master, the bodiless man, Acatl as he opens his mouth and talks for the first time in almost 500 years.

Telling Xihu that this entire venture, as well as movie, is some kind of a cruel joke and that in fact Antonio is actually himself, Acatl, reincarnated. The head, Acatl, also reveals that Marta is also the incarnation of the princess Zociquati. It's then that the poor man Xihu, who all this time thought that he was doing the right thing, just falls apart knowing that he made a complete jerk out of himself during the entire movie. He should have stayed asleep like he was for almost 500 years.

Even though it by now wasn't necessary anymore, with Xihu no longer a threat to anyone, police detective Able Salazra belatedly comes to the rescue and unloads a full fuselage of lead from his gun on Xihu as he collapses and turns into a mound of dust just like the living head in the movie Acatl does. Mind numbing film that causes you to want to get drunk on a couple of tall and cold "heads" of beer and sleep off and forget what you just saw on the screen.

During the 1960s, auteur K. Gordon Murray bought the American release rights to a number of Mexican-produced horror films (including a couple of El Santo's earlier films), redubbed them in Coral Gables, FL, sold them to American-International Television for TV release.

Charity compels me to say that the results were "unique." Horror cinema has long held a place in the Mexican film industry, with series like the Nostradamus (a vampire, not the famed seer) films and seemingly endless films concerning mummies, werewolves, and their frisky, lethal friends.

Then there is THE LIVING HEAD.

In style and feel, this isn't all that different from these other black-and-white spookers. Sets are adequate but have a stagey feel to them, the set dressing is erratic, and the tension could be cut with a rather dull soup spoon. Still, this is a watchable little production -- much more than Universal-International's living head entry of a few years earlier.

The opening is in the Aztec past, where their chief warrior has just been disgraced (i.e., killed, which is a major no-no). A maiden is held responsible for this and is sealed into his tomb, with the dead man's head and the grim, dedicated head priest.

Centuries later, obviously being blissfully aware of curses and other down sides of their trade, archaeologists enter the tomb and cart off the head. Also taken is the death ring worn by the dead maiden, who's by now a pile of dust.

The priest's body is also carried off. In a darkened storeroom, it comes to life and places itself under the head's orders. The chief scientist's two companions are killed -- their hearts removed from their bodies by the revived mummy's stone knife.

The police arrive, in the person of Abel Salazar (best known for playing vampires and the sorcerer/creature in THE BRAINIAC). In spite of the priest's habit of carelessly leaving the still dripping hearts on the table in front of the head, nobody puts one and one together and tosses the head into the nearest fireplace.

In their defense, I should mention that, when it's not beetling ferociously at the camera, the head has a mask over its face. Nobody thinks to look beneath this mask, behind which the head is probably sticking out its tongue and crossing and criss-crossing its eyes in secret glee at how well things are working out. Jack Nicholson would have done wonders with this role.

The archaeologist's daughter has already put on the death ring, and is getting psychic images of the killings, which does the police no good. Everyone of course pays no attention whatsoever to this potential lead. Women are so hysterical and imaginative!

Maybe it's just me, but with as many odd things as are happening here, I'd have trusted even the flimsiest lead proposed by the family dog, at this point of the game.

The head now commands her (through the ring, which she's already tried to throw away) to kill her father. In the big resolution, love conquers all and the head and the revived priest are thwarted.

Interesting little film, but not worth staying up until dawn to watch. Set the VCR for this one.

Mexican horror La Cabeza viviente is, for all intents and purposes, a mummy movie, and I don't like mummy movies: they tend to be slow and formulaic, and this one is no different.

The creaky old plot sees a group of archaeologists desecrating the tomb of Aztec general Acatl, thus invoking a centuries old curse. The general's living head controls the perfectly preserved body of his high priest Xihu (Guillermo Cramer), who comes alive to kill the professors, cutting out their hearts with a sacrificial dagger.

The killing of the men is extremely repetitive: the head opens its eyes, the 'mummy' comes alive, and the victim is killed. This happens several times, and while reasonably creepy the first time, it soon becomes tedious. Meanwhile, the police (led by Mexican horror regular Abel Salazar) fail to solve the case despite finding the still dripping bloody dagger in the hand of Xihu.

In the finale, which cannot come too soon, Xihu tries to order Marta (lovely Ana Luisa Peluffo), daughter of Prof. Muller (Germán Robles), to kill her father, and when that fails, attempts to control Marta's fiancé Roberto (Mauricio Garcés). However, when Xihu realises that Roberto and Marta are the reincarnations of Acatl and Aztec priestess Xochiquétzal (gesundheit!), he accepts defeat and turns to dust.

The best thing about the whole film (apart from sexy Peluffo) is the hilarious spider that crawls out from behind the head (the rubber arachnid clearly being pulled along on a fishing line).

3/10.

Mexico's "The Living Head" (La Cabeza Viviente) reunites director Chano Urueta and producer Abel Salazar from their just completed "The Brainiac," completed in March 1961 under the title "The Eye of Death." The elements are in place for another Aztec Mummy picture, as we begin in 1525 Mexico for the funeral procession of Acatl (Mauricio Garces), now reduced to a titular head, high priest Xiu (Guillermo Cramer) executing the traitor responsible for his demise (his heart removed with bloody panache, even in black and white), high priestess Xochiquetzal (Ana Luisa Peluffo) bearing the sacred 'Ring of Death' as she joins Xiu in being entombed with Acatl's masked cranium. As one might expect, a modern day expedition led by Professor Muller (German Robles) profanes the sacred tomb, the perfectly preserved body of the high priestess crumbling into dust at the reveal of a flashlight, Muller's daughter Martha (also Peluffo) soon revealed to be her exact duplicate. Only the head of Acatl and his still intact high priest Xiu are removed to be observed in the Muller home, Martha to wear the ring that will single out each despoiler to be sacrificed by the still living Xiu. The relatively small cast, overreliance on dialogue, and lack of incident mark this as a weak entry for Salazar, barely present as the do nothing police inspector who does very little investigating (only two murders, the first occurring off screen). It's a novelty to have the high priest stalking victims in a more active way than his Hollywood predecessors, and might at least rank higher than the Aztec Mummy trilogy of 1957, the final on screen teaming of Salazar and "El Vampiro" Robles. There was a 1975 episode of KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER that broached the same subject, "Legacy of Terror," in which Darren McGavin's intrepid reporter Carl Kolchak faces off against disciples of Aztec mummy Nanoutzin (Mickey Gilbert), who ritualistically cut out the hearts of each sacrifice until he walks again during the final moments (alas, not one of the better ones).