{"id":39537,"date":"2013-04-02T12:52:27","date_gmt":"2013-04-02T11:52:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/?p=39537"},"modified":"2013-04-02T17:47:44","modified_gmt":"2013-04-02T16:47:44","slug":"exploitation-horror-legend-jess-franco-dies-age-82","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/news\/exploitation-horror-legend-jess-franco-dies-age-82\/","title":{"rendered":"Exploitation horror legend Jess Franco dies aged 82"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/Jess-Franco.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-39538\" alt=\"Jess Franco\" src=\"http:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/Jess-Franco.jpg\" width=\"616\" height=\"346\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/Jess-Franco.jpg 616w, https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/Jess-Franco-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/Jess-Franco-510x286.jpg 510w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 616px) 100vw, 616px\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Horror director Jess Franco, once referred to as the most dangerous filmmaker alive by the Vatican, has died aged 82.<\/p>\n<p>With three films on the Video Nasties list (<em>Women Behind Bars<\/em>, <em>Devil Hunter<\/em> and <em>Bloody Moon<\/em>), the notorious filmmaker is best known for his work with Christopher Lee and Klaus Kinski on films like <em>Count Dracula<\/em>, which marked one of the occasions that Lee took on the role of Bram Stoker&#x2019;s Dracula on a non-Hammer production. He also worked with Lee on <em>The Blood of Fu Manchu<\/em>, <em>The Castle of Fu Manchu<\/em> and <em>The Bloody Judge<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to his work with Christopher Lee, Franco is probably best known for <em>The Awful Dr. Orlof<\/em>, his cannibal and zombie films, and his erotic horrors like <em>Vampyros Lesbos<\/em>. Franco&#x2019;s interest in the erotic and transgressive meant that many of his films dealt with sadomasochism, such as <em>Necronomicon<\/em> (also known as <em>Succubus<\/em>), <em>Eugenie, the Story of Her Journey Into Perversion<\/em>, <em>She Killed in Ecstasy<\/em>, and reached a high point with the Kinski-starring <em>Venus in Furs<\/em> (also known as <em>Black Angel<\/em>).<\/p>\n<p>It was these interests that made him such a divisive cult figure, and he has continued to split opinion with horror fans and experts to this day. He was ludicrously prolific (making up to 12 films in a single year, and IMDB counts the number of films directed by him at 199) and his frequent detours into actual pornography didn&#x2019;t help those who argued that there was more to his work than sexual perversion, but his legacy as one of the true mavericks of European horrror is assured.<\/p>\n<p><strong>You can <a title=\"Jess Franco\" href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Jess-Franco-Complete-Collection-DVD\/dp\/B0049AYIGO\/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364902806&sr=8-1&tag=scifinowmag-21\">buy <em>Jess Franco: The Complete Collection<\/em> on DVD for &#xA3;34.99 at Amazon.co.uk.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The director of Vampyros Lesbos and Count Dracula has died<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39,"featured_media":39538,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"MSN_Categories":"Uncategorized","MSN_Publish_Option":false,"MSN_Is_Local_News":false,"MSN_Is_AIAC_Included":"Empty","MSN_Location":"[]","MSN_Add_Feature_Img_On_Top_Of_Post":false,"MSN_Has_Custom_Author":false,"MSN_Custom_Author":"","MSN_Has_Custom_Canonical_Url":false,"MSN_Custom_Canonical_Url":""},"categories":[2615,3],"tags":[797,3114],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/Jess-Franco.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39537"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39537"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39537\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}