Daughters of Satan

Does the fly rest easy caught in the web?

There are times where I can’t tell you why I like certain movies. I can say that Daughters of Satan takes me way back. I can distinctly remember a number of films showing on TNT one Friday night back (I think; it could be a year before or after) in 1989, in kind of a “Chiller Theatre” night. Because TNT had the rights to MGM product, Daughters of Satan was one of those oldies that was available for such an airing. I can recall this coming on after Deadly Blessing, another film I watched today to commemorate a significant night that drew me to the horror genre for good. This was the kind of day I have been looking forward to. Both films, thanks to the internet, can be found, whereas when I wanted to see both of them in the 90s and early 2000s, I wasn’t able to. This day was a dream come true. Granted, neither film will ever hold their place in a top ten (or 100, for that matter), but both remained engrained in the depths of my nostalgia, resting comfortably in my good spirits regardless of their reputations and critical reception.

Admittedly, this second viewing (the first since 1989; wow, just to think that has been 24 years!) was a tough slog at times because the pacing is rather glacial (and the plot developments are rather silly), but I like the location of Manila with a subplot of witches reborn in the forms of their ancestral line in modern 1972.

So here is just a little of the busy plot with lots of weird involved:

The painting of the figures on it of the witches vanishing before star Tom Selleck’s eyes, a dog “manifesting” from the painting after Selleck as he drives home and remains afraid it could jump him at anytime, the psyche doc (Vic Silayan) actually seeing the witches on the painting burning alive in 1592 with smoke filling the room (!), one of the witches (Tani Guthrie) tries to seduce Selleck (who is unresponsive to her obvious erotic interest in him; she even removes her top to expose her breasts to him!) in her bedroom, the witches dance about outside after leaving the painting much to Selleck’s befuddlement, the dog Nicodemis’ collar leads Selleck to a morgue (which has the proprietor singing and photographing a woman’s corpse!) but the proprietor talks gibberish about religious mumbo jumbo that is barely legible, and Barra Grant (Selleck’s girl who is becoming possessed; she’s the middle girl on the painting; her figure’s direct resemblance to Chris is why Selleck purchases the painting, inviting nothing but danger into their lives) hearing her voice in the night, provoked by her maid (played by Paraluman) to use the knife and get revenge for the witches, and often nearly using the knife on Selleck (he is a descendent of a Spaniard responsible for bringing the witches to justice for their practices which led to the burning at the stake).

These developments are just some of the stranger aspects that find their way into the plot. Selleck does show that what he is going through has effects that leave him constantly ill at ease and confused. He is trying to rationalize it all but seeing figures just vanish from a painting, and his wife's mental state under the subjection of possible evil does leave him unable to come up with practical answers to impractical situations.

Seleck's character is an American art historian in Manila for about four months, looking for an artifact to complete a collection for a New York museum. He discovers the painting, notices how cheap and ugly it is, yet he's compelled by it thanks to his wife's resemblance to the witch about to burn on it. Once he purchases it, takes it home, and presents it to his wife, Chris (Barra) responds negatively, as if immediately anxious by its presence. Instead of getting rid of it (what one would do if it led to their loved one being bothered intensely by it), Selleck hangs it on the wall in an office. Obviously bad results come from not getting rid of it.

The plot is a little far-fetched and the coincidences of the plot are a bit much. Like the fact that Selleck just happens to be the descendent of an adversary of the witches and married to the descendent of one of them his ancestor burnt at the stake. That the two other witches have descendants who just so happen to live in Manila. And this all just so happens to start when Selleck  finds this painting in some shop in Manila while searching for something else entirely. I guess we can just chalk this all up to fate and how these characters are meant to be in this scenario. Again this is all a bit silly unless you just go with it. The bummer ending makes sense considering it is supposed to be this way: revenge is to be meted out from a witch to her executioner.

There’s one particular scene that is striking in its exploitative nature: we learn that the witches and their servants were part of a Manila Assembly of Lucifer while whipping the weak Chris (Barra reveals her impressive breasts while taking a couple strikes from Guthrie in a punishment session where she must recite Lucifer’s prayer). It is a look at their activities before all fully committing to re-affirm their representation of Satan once again. This allowed for some of the Manila Filipino actors you might see in exploitation and horror fare at the time to appear in bit parts as members of this “assembly.” In order for Chris to once again find her place in the assembly she must spit on the crucifix of Christ, denounce he she once worshipped in favor of Satan, and kill her husband. So will she or won’t she? A devout Catholic and church-goer, Chris allowing her maid to drug James (Selleck) and embracing her ancestral roots is a big deal. James’ screwed.

My favorite scene in the whole movie consists of the three descendents “returning to their selves” at the stroke of 12. It is just bizarre but somehow worked for me. They just start questioning why they are in a bar together when none of them know each other. The witches are gone, and it is believed James dead after the evil spirits set up his car to go over a cliff, crashing into a flaming heap down a mountain. It amused me because you go from one set of personalities to another set, from the dominant forces of the witches to these modern people (one a wild divorcee, the second a rather dependent suburban wife, and the third a working class nurse) with no clue of how they wound up at the bar.

The twist at the end where it seems everything is all good, with James carrying his wife upstairs to rest, hugging her and getting stabbed in the back (literally and figuratively), kind of goes against what just happened previously. I guess the witches can just come and go whenever they please. It makes the prior scene before it in the bar feel a little less special.

I wish I could say Selleck seems inspired in his performance, but I consider him sleepwalking. Still, it is neat to see a pre-stardom Selleck winding up in a cheap exploitation film about re-incarnated witches leaping from a painting to their modern day counterparts. This is also what I consider ideal fare for a late Friday night as part of a double header with Deadly Blessing. It can be quite an entertaining line-up if you don't mind unexceptional plots and characters behaving rather irrationally.