La rose de fer (1973) Online

First off, I was shocked at the low rating this film got. Probably because not many people have seen it. Jean Rollin is mostly known for his violent and sexual vampire movies. That's why I've never seen any of his films till now. Maybe I'll have to see more of his movies. La Rose De Fer (the Iron Rose) is one of the most sensual and beautiful horror films I've ever seen. The plot is simple yet effective. A beautiful french women meets a guy at a wedding. He asks her out. They decide to take a romantic walk in the cemetery. The couples bright yellow and red outfits add a contrast to the dark setting. They decide to make love in a tomb, and when they get out they discover they are trapped in the cemetery. They keep walking, but end up in the same spot. The cemetery almost becomes never ending and it seems there is no way out. This leads the couple to slowly loose their sanity. The girl almost enjoys the cemetery too much. Although the movie doesn't have much nudity, it has a very surreal and sexy feel to it. There really isn't any violence in the film either, but that doesn't stop it from being creepy. The dialog flows like poetry, and the Gothic atmosphere almost paints a picture. It's definitely a film thats visually rich with compositions as breathtaking as anything done by Antonioni or Greenaway. Fans of bizarre art-house films will definitely find it worth watching. Although the film moves slow at times, it's still flawless in it's vision. A perfect horror film to watch on a date.

The beginning of the film - deserted town and railway station sequences are a delight. When the characters eventually enter the cemetery, 'The Iron Rose' gets somehwat tedious, with the heroes merely wondering amid the tombstones, uttering nonsensical lines from time to time. There's little for them to do there. The film was clearly made purely out of Rollin's love for cemetery ambiance,its decay and desolation: multiple shots of crosses and tombstones, strange characters who don't understand each other. Conversations they have lead nowhere and end abruptly. Rollin populates the cemetery with his favourite heroes: a vampire is seen entering the crypt, and a creepy clown bringing some flowers to one of the graves. The acting is rather questionable, also because the script doesn't provide the leads who actually seem to be quite capable actors, with any material to work with. Therefore their behaviour in the film seems really weird as they switch from nearly catatonic state to mad fury for no reason and then become mild and gentle again within seconds. Rollin never ever tells conventional stories with his films, instead he just films what he wants to see, and then puts it together in editing, as a result his subconscious is on display. There's no such thing as pace in his films, he doesn't try an give his films rhythm and structure via editing, he only uses it to put the scenes together (hence the frequent jarring cuts in most of his works). The director's aim is to put you in a particular mood, not to deliver some concrete message. Atmosphere is his ultimate aim, for Rollin admits his films are moving paintings. I was disappointed when I first watched the film, but I rewatch it often. Although lacking any dramatic tension, 'The Iron Rose' is a very beautiful and atmospheric film.

More than a few European horror directors in the 70's went on to do hardcore pornography, and Jean Rollin in no exception. What differs him from the likes of Joe D'Amato, however, is that Rollin was a real, though neglected craftsman, and possibly one of France's finest auteurs. He injects each and every one of his horror films (save for "Zombie Lake", which is as much a Jess Franco film as Tobe Hooper's "Poltergeist" is a Steven Spielberg film) with such relentless atmosphere of death prowling every inch of the frame, and "The Rose of Iron" is where he excels. One of the finest poets of all things morbid and decadent - think the cinematic equivalent of Edgar Allan Poe, Rollin creates a minimalist, lyrical, unusual and disorienting beautiful ode to Death, that save for very few exceptions, has never been bettered elsewhere in the genre. The fairly simplistic, but multi-layered plot follows a young couple getting trapped in a cemetery after-hours, unable to find the way out as the girl slowly succumbs to madness. "The Rose of Iron" is a difficult film and thus not for everyone, as even Rollin fans might find themselves disappointed, as there is none of his trademark vampire girl-on-girl action nor is there the slightest bit of gore and camp. Nudity is minimal, and so is the cast, composed of only two actors for nearly it's entirety, with only one setting. Nevertheless, what one can simply describe as boring and uninteresting, I find be a cerebral, hypnotic tour-de-force, that keeps you glued to the screen from beginning to end, if you're willing to be bewitched by it's atypical quality. Although most Euro-horrors of it's time were criticized for poor acting, "Rose..." proves otherwise by having brilliant performances from Françoise Pascal and Hugues Quester as the young couple. They are one of the few Rollin performers who actually manage to enjoy a more successful career in French cinema, and rightfully so. They manage to carry the film brilliantly, even with the limited and often surrealistic dialogue. Quester evokes a genuine sense of paranoia as the film progresses, and Pascal's spiral descent into insanity is equally raw and visceral, in spite of the film's otherworldly nature. Pascal's acceptance and consequent embracing of the world of the dead very much represents Jean Rollin's own utopia - a twilight world that transcends time and space, where both the living and the deceased live among one another, to the point they become one. Rollin's passion for crumbling, ancient grounds also mirrors this ideal dreamland, and he makes the best out of this often-used setting, bringing it to life through some delirious camera-work that would make Argento envious, and an equally foreboding, experimental musical score by Pierre Raph. Overall, if you dare give yourself up to the unique, morbidly beautiful dream-world of France's most underrated filmmaker, "The Rose of Iron" is the film for you.

Rose of Iron, as it is known in English has been difficult to find and largely neglected up until this point. Not only has it been subtitled into English, but the video I own includes a brief introduction by the director, Jean Rollin. He claims the film was inspired by a real life incident.

Rollin refers to Rose of Iron as an art film. Why it has garnered the label of horror can only be because Rollin is largely a director of horror movies. This one isn't. Not really.

The plot concerns a young couple who decide to take a stroll through a quiet, seemingly unending cemetery. When night falls, the lovers realize that they cannot find the way out. As time progresses, fear gives way to madness.

There is much to recommend this film. It is beautifully shot, the cinematography almost having a surreal, dreamlike quality. The performances are quite good also for relative unknowns. If you have the patience, give this one a try. That is, if you can find it...

A surreal tale with an almost fairytale like quality to it. Rose of Iron seems very much like a cautionary tale of old as opposed to a straight forward horror film. The films drips with dark atmospheric, from the morbid poet who charms the female lead, to the foggy and creepy aesthetics of locations such as the train yard and the graveyard.

The plot navigates around a young man falling for a pretty girl, they meet at party where his poetry (need I remind you that not all poetry is rose are red) wins him the attention of an attractive girl. In keeping with the surreal they meet in a eerily quiet train yard and soon find their way to a graveyard. Our male lead lacks what you'd call respect for the dead and they're soon making love in a family crypt. When they're done night has fallen, they're locked in. Fear and madness begin to overtake them. But is there more to the graveyard than meets the eye? Perhaps, perhaps not. Rose of Iron is at the very least, a very enigmatic film.

A purely psychological horror, with few actual elements of the supernatural. It could be that they are simply lost in the graveyard, but at times they seem to be going straight but ending up where they began. It plays on conventions and stereotypes as our male lead becomes angry and violence prone. Since it is he who triggers the inciting incident, it is of course him that the obligatory scene at the climax must focus more one. But ultimately it's the female lead and her surreal serenity that leaves us with a climax you won't find in many gore encrusted horror films.

I cannot claim to be a connoisseur of the man's work so far, but personally I do not even nearly understand the enthusiasm that many of my fellow Eurohorror/cult fans seem to have about the films of Jean Rollin. Since this film is not one of his countless lesbian vampire flicks, but supposedly a Gothic chiller that many of Rollin's fans seem to regard as his masterpiece, I was looking forward to the film. Sadly, "La Rose De Fer" aka. "Rose of Iron" (1973) turned out one of the most nonsensical and insufferably boring European Horror productions (if one can even call it Horror). At least Rollin's lesbian vampire films were entertaining and made up for a lack of substance with gratuitous female nudity. "La Rose De Fer" is almost event-less. In one aspect, however, the film is phenomenal: The film is fantastically shot in a an old cemetery, which is arguably one of the most beautiful, eeriest and most fascinating Horror settings of all time. The film is visually overwhelming, thanks to this fantastic setting and a beautiful photography. Yet, a mesmerizing setting is no excuse for making a film in which NOTHING happens! The film begins when a creepy-looking guy and a pretty girl fall in love and make arrangements to go bike-riding the next day. They stop at an old cemetery, fail to find their way out and get locked in. As night falls, both of them begin to act strangely (or should I say: annoyingly)...

As said above, the film's setting is fantastic, eerie, and unspeakably beautiful, and I would certainly like to visit the depicted cemetery some day. This is arguably why so many people seem to love this film - it is visually flawless, the trees and the beautiful tombstones and grave statues create a wonderful, fairy-tale-like atmosphere. The stunning visual style may overwhelm, but I cannot imagine whose attention it is going to uphold for the length of a film. "La Rose De Fer" is only 77 minutes long, and yet it seems endless, since there are no real events, just a compilation of weird, but nonetheless boring nonsensical sequences. Everything the protagonists say is nonsense, everything they do is nonsense, and the fact that the nonsense takes place in a great setting only makes up for a tiny part of the boredom. There is no suspense, no blood and very little nudity to make up for the lack of a plot. The film is apparently based on a poem by Tristan Cobìere, which may be the reason that people call it 'poetic'. "La Rose De Fer" may be watched for the stunning visual style, but its lack of events makes it one of the most boring affairs I ever sat through. In fact, it took me three takes to watch the complete film since I fell asleep twice. I'm giving it a rating of 3 out of 10 ONLY for the fantastic visual style, otherwise the film is a disaster.

I'm a delightfully reformed proto-Goth who used to take great solace on barren nights back in my college days by securing a healthy dose of alcohol, couple of smokes, a bag of Andy Capp cheddar fries and then off to the cemetery with my Tom Waits tape at about 2:30 AM. If you listened carefully you could hear me singing drunkenly about being in the cold, cold ground ... There was something quietly reassuring about being there, knowing that you weren't exactly alone and if you minded your P's and Q's the dead might actually enjoy the company, and a moonlight serenade.

Eventually I grew out of the phase but if there is one thing that I did know during that time it was to NEVER bring a date to the cemetery. I know for a fact that the world is populated by gormless Goth chicks who get into the whole death trip & have a macabre side to them that might make it conducive to try scoring with them amid the tombs (and will probably love this movie). But see, the cemetery was a place for peaceful solitary reflection, and at the time was relatively safe since nobody in their right minds would walk out into a cemetery at 2 in the morning to look for someone to mess with.

So right away in Jean Rollin's NIGHT IN THE CEMETERY (which is a much better title than ROSE OF IRON) the guy blows it when he picks a dalliance in a local overgrown run down French cemetery as the place to bring a young lady he meets at a wedding party. Not exactly the brightest bulb in the lighthouse mind you, but she's a fetching lass and he gets to score with her down in a crypt that just happens to be unlocked. Later, they realize it's gotten dark outside and they find themselves lost within a cemetery that actually looks like several bone yards that have been combined into one using clever cross cutting.

This is actually where the film gets interesting, because there literally is no end to the place. It's also wonderfully overgrown with rusted iron fencing, crumbling monuments and statues. But it's also about here that they start going a bit batty, the girl in particular. She starts to imagine herself as being at one with the dead and preferring their quiet, peaceful non- existence to the hustle & bustle of modern day life. Which is exactly the point of hanging out in the cemetery in the first place, though you'd think they would have brought plenty of extra booze and some Tom Waits.

Eventually she goes completely to pieces and decides that death is more favorable than life itself. The two find themselves back in the tomb which becomes suddenly airless and capped off by an old woman's vase of flowers. The whole movie is like a weird, perverse nightmare complete with a scene where the pair copulate on a pile of bones in an open mass grave. Others are right on the money when they comment that not much happens in the film and I for one actually wish that even less happened. There is a languid, poetic nature to the proceedings that are wonderfully lyrical in their juxtaposition of death & decay next to young fleshy breasts.

How come people can't make movies like this anymore? The one thing I kept thinking of was how you simply couldn't make a movie like this in 2008 no matter how you tried. There would need to be a subplot about gangsters or a love rival, maybe a car chase and a couple of big special effects sequences where the ghosts rise up to dance with the young lady as she frolics amidst the headstones. Jean Rollin is not my favorite of directors and this isn't quite my favorite of his films -- try FRISSONS LES VAMPIRES for some real fireworks -- but it's got something going on that's quite unique even amongst his catalog of work. He knew what he was after here and got it, pure and simple. There's something to be admired in that.

7/10

"The Rose of Iron" is easily one of the most hauntingly beautiful horror flicks made by French maestro Jean Rollin.The film tells the story of a young couple,who venture into a very old and very large cemetery,eventually getting lost within it's walls.Throughout this time,a mind game between the two arises and begins to battle.Eventually Francoise Pascal's character adopts to her surroundings."The Rose of Iron" is a wonderfully Gothic mood piece,which is primarily set in a cemetery.The film is loaded with hauntingly dark atmosphere of utter hopelessness and there are some surreal situations for example lonely clown walking through the cemetery corridors.Give this lovingly poetic horror flick a look.9 out of 10.

At a wedding on Saturday a boy woos a girl by reciting a poem. On Sunday they meet at a foggy train yard. Afterwards the two lovers (they basically skipped the dating part) decide to go picnicking on a cemetery because (Boy:) "we wont find a quieter place anywhere". They have sex in a tomb and when they are ready to leave the night has put its dark cloak over the place and they can't find their way out.

Somehow 'La rose de fer' aka 'The Iron Rose' took me back to my childhood when the dead seemed a lot more present than they are now. Now there basically are no dead people anymore, people are either alive or they simply don't exist. Incidentally that's also the stance the boy shares with me, which doesn't stop him from becoming increasingly more uneasy about having to spend the night surrounded by death. The girl on the other hand, being a lot more respectful of the dead, started off being uneasy but at one point something in her snaps and she doesn't want to find a way out anymore, she even starts to identify with the dead more than with the living. The film itself from start to finish very much shares the state-of-mind the girl falls into at the mid-point of the film. Looking at the sinister beauty of the cemetery that holds her captive and the iron rose she finds she apparently figures that death is the way of everything, it far outlasts life and it even has beauty going for it. That's also where the train yard falls into place. Old locomotives, beautiful, long-lasting objects made of iron. From the point of view of a human being stone and iron are practically eternal.

The unquestionable star of the show is the apparently HUGE, old, unkempt cemetery with a forest-like autumn vegetation. It's full of blemished stone, rusty railings, big iron crosses and withered trees, sinister and beautiful indeed. What lends the scenario of the film a lot of authenticity is the careless way in which the characters treat the things on the graveyard. If you shoot a film on an old cemetery you can't just smash some old statues and railings and crosses, can you? But that's exactly what the characters do and it does look like the real thing.

Before 'The Iron Rose' gets to that location however we have a pre-credit sequence which shows the girl on Jean Rollin's favorite beach. The titular iron rose is washed ashore which the girl picks up and caresses before she throws it back into the ocean. I didn't really get much out of that sequence on my first viewing because the connections between the beach and the cemetery are made much later into the film. But the connections are made very clearly. The girl later finds an identical iron rose on the cemetery and at one point she fantasizes about being on the same beach (this time with a bunch of iron crosses standing around) when she's actually still on the cemetery.

To me the most poignant but wonderfully subtle connection is made in a little scene in which the boy suddenly stops walking and says relieved to the girl: "Can you hear? It's the road. We are close (to the edge of the cemetery)." When the camera cuts to the girl who seems to be in her own world the faint static sound of the traffic switches into the similar static sound of waves on the beach. It's pretty easy to miss but if you still were unsure about what the film is about then this should have driven the point home. What else is a beach if not a border between two distinctively different worlds? For a fish in the ocean land is like a different world that Fishy may only go to when he dies and he drifts ashore. Alternatively Fishy could be captured by fishers which bring him to land for people to eat. In any case Fishy can only dream about land for as long as he is confined to the parameters of life.

The bulk of 'The Iron Rose' uses very little music but the beginning of the theme song sounds suspiciously similar to Britney Spears' "Criminal". No kidding. Nice tune (both of them, actually), but the highlight is an odd experimental piece towards the end that, as far as I could tell, has an organ drone accompanied by moaning, coughing, humming, a crying baby and I don't know what else. I wouldn't have minded hearing this haunting piece more often in the film. As for the darkness of the night the light looks believably enough like moonlight except that it comes from somewhere else in almost every shot and it comes from anywhere BUT from the sky. So while 'The Iron Rose' certainly doesn't newly define night shooting it still looks pretty good and atmospherically the visuals work too.

This gem is different in many ways to the other Rollin films I've seen. The obvious one is that there are no vampires or any other kind of monsters or villains. There isn't even any blood to speak of and nudity is rather subdued. There isn't a whole lot of dialogue but the one that's there doesn't only profit from having two adequately capable actors delivering them but also doesn't sound like it was written by a 10-year old. Narratively it's unusually coherent and even the tone is surprisingly consistent with only a few unnecessary moments that have silly characters making appearances. It is actually quite cerebral in how it covers its chosen themes which is about the last thing I expected from Rollin. All this adds up to a film that is shockingly good in its own very peculiar, hard-to-describe way. In fact so good I watched it twice in a row, something that happens to me once a year at the most.

I'd normally consider myself a fan of Jean Rollin, The Shiver Of The Vampire ranks up there as one of my all-time favourite horror movies, and I have very fond memories of other Rollin movies as well. I was shocked by the low-quality of this. It sounds like something that might have been a good idea, but it ended up rubbish.

The girl playing the lead role is quite sexy and seems as though she could be a good actress if she wasn't given such a ridiculous part. The male on the other hand can't act at all. Those are basically the only two people in the entire film. Some of the imagery is fairly good, along with the music. If they had those good bits and hacked together the rest of the film sanely, THEN I might have given it a 3/4. But as it stands, some of the film is excruciating and again... NOTHING REALLY HAPPENS! It's not that I don't appreciate it, it's boring! Okay I'll admit that sometimes sitting down to watch a Jess Franco or Italian horror, I'm a bit concerned I'll be completely bored by it. With just over an hour and a quarter and directed by Jean Rollin I never dreamt it would be this bad. I doubt he ever made a worse film, for me this is right up there with Zombie Lake.

The film involves the couple walking through a cemetery while lost, getting scared, increasingly fighting and the girl increasing losing her head. I honestly don't know how anyone can give this movie even a decent rating or how any other Jean Rollin movie could be worse than this. Yeah there's a case for difference of opinion but what's so great about a girl dancing ridiculously through a graveyard for what seems like an eternity? Look at Requiem For A Vampire, that had longer and far more beautiful takes and it never got boring.

The good pieces in this movie were few and far between, it was a truly dreadful hour and a quarter. The music could be good at times... the scenery was quite good at times... and those are the only decent things I can say about this movie. Stay well away!

Like LET'S SCARE JESSICA TO DEATH (one of the greatest if most often underrated vampire movies ever made), ROSE OF IRON is a quiet, subtle little exercise in terror. While it lacks the heart-stopping jolts that help make LET'S SCARE JESSICA TO DEATH so unforgettable, it DOES boast some low-key moments of pure fright that are nigh unforgettable: when the lovely Ms. Pascal begins to feel something strange coming over her, for instance, or when she begins to show signs of possible possession or- my favorite- when she entombs her boyfriend in an airtight underground tomb. The ending alone makes this one a classic. The director's focus on the couple as they wander through and then become lost in the graveyard is commendable, though I would've liked to have seen more close ups when the "changes" started to occur.

There are many reasons many people will not like this film. Most of these people are my fellow moronic Americans with the attention spans of gnats and the intelligence of rocks.

If you're looking for a horror movie and you pick this up, you probably wont like this, and that I can actually understand, it helps to know of this movie going in. Its different, doesn't have blood or gore, and very little nudity with no lame, constant music.

If you actually read books, understand that there was a decade called the 1970s and films looked different then (because no digital technology existed), and also understand there are people and places that exist outside of 'merica (in this case a French couple in a European cemetery), then you might be able to like this movie.

If you are a fan of Rollin, then you do need to see this too. If for not other reason than it breaks from the Rollin's tradition of vampires and 2 girls. The female lead is captivating and sexually charged, you can't keep your eyes off the babe, or the beautiful french words that flow from her mouth. But what is totally brilliant and masterfully done here is the whole movie pretty much just consists of 2 people in 1 location.

So, if you like MTV, don't bother with this movie.

A young couple meet at a wedding party and decide to try a date. It starts out as frolicking on the grounds of an old train station as flirting commences. They decide to have a small picnic inside a cemetery and are so drawn to each other sexually, that the couple will seek out a warm spot to make love..that being an underground crypt(..yes, certainly a bit morbid, but just wait until the next place they find for a make-out session). As night is upon them, the path leading to the opening gate seems lost in the dark, and our couple can not seem to find an escape route. Their relationship begins to unravel before it has a chance to grow. The young woman, in the opening of the film, found a peculiar iron rose in the ocean of a beach. This rose she feels will guide her to a place of love and happiness. The young female lead of this picture, the longer she remains in the cemetery, grows more and more mad as her newly required male lover becomes a victim of her lunacy. Through poetic rhyme, we get a glimpse into her shattering psyche and her male counterpart will become swallowed whole by it..his fate is determined when she holds this idea that the outside world is dead and the only true life is within the grave with those who have long since died. Yep, she's bonkers. A love affair between the young female and the cemetery blossoms as we watch her orchestrate balletic movement throughout the grounds, embracing death now fully conceived as the only true way towards happiness.

Now, I do realize a film such as this will certainly frustrate many, but I found it stunning. While the plot is simple, I felt Rollin's goal was to embrace the macabre atmosphere of the cemetery in every way possible. To be honest, I can't think of a better location to set a horror film than in a graveyard with those ancient tombstones, dying railings, rusty gates that screech and moan, & deteriorating crucifixes lining the grounds as masses of shrubbery and night invade and engulf. Rollin's camera lovingly captures the female actress in shots around angel statues that have seen better days, holding skulls, gently caressing her iron rose, and dancing in a state of bliss throughout the cemetery..even when she's lost to insanity, her beauty glistens. Some haunting dream-like shots of the cemetery as dawn begins to appear, the ocean with the naked female lead and her rose, etc. The most morbid and wild scene in the film, I believe, is the one where the couple make out in a burial pit of scattered skulls and bones, the male lead fell into while trying, in a state of panic, to find his way out. Rollin introduces the creepy make-out session with a counterclockwise camera spin pointedly at a dazed male lead trying to gather his wits as the female lead looks down at him. She dives in, they clutch each other, and begin to embrace as skulls and bones move about behind them..it's really a scene that goes beyond the realm of normal behavior. Various interlopers walking the grounds during the daytime(each a little wink from Rollin such as the sad clown dragging his flowers toward the grave of a loved one or a familiar vampire barely glimpsed entering a crypt)add some bonus oddness to this Gothic extravaganza. Either you love it or hate it..I doubt there'll be much middle ground.

Two happy young lovers explore first an empty train then an empty cemetery in a cold and misty atmosphere. They find an underground crypt entered by ladder through two iron flaps. They strip and make love standing up. Already it's a horror movie. Who can make love standing up in an icy crypt? Only in a horror movie.

There's no point in going on about the plot because there is no discernible plot. It's as if the cast and crew were given a night to film in a shabby thanatopolis and made up stuff as they went along.

I gather -- okay, I'll take a stab at it -- I gather that the pretty young girl goes mad. For some reason, after a night full of meandering and arguing, they come across that same crypt. The boy, for some reason, goes down into it again and invites the girl to join him, where they'll be "safe." Instead, she clangs the trap doors close and locks him in. He shouts that he's suffocating, but she ignores him.

She wanders off with an enigmatic smile. She props one foot against a tombstone and uses it as a barre, then dancing off among the graves and administrative buildings, humming to herself while doing grotesque gavottes. This wordless, pointless scene lasts a full ten minutes.

When dawn peeps through the drab sky into the withered weeds and frozen marble of the grave yard, she returns to the crypt, opens it, climbs down to join her deceased lover, and slams the iron doors closed.

The general atmosphere is enough to make anyone climb into the crypt and suffocate, and the dialog -- if that's what it is -- amounts to writer-assisted suicide. "My darling, your fingers are burning. The rose is of iron. Why do we fear the living? They only decay." I tried to read some social or moral message into this rarefied baloney but failed completely. Since the movie is as amorphous as a Rorschach ink blot, anybody can read anything they want into it, I suppose. Maybe it's really very relevant and meaningful. Maybe it's all my fault. Honestly. Because every time I see one of those ink blots, no matter which one, it always looks like the face of Bette Midler.

There you have it…another disillusion on my account! I had really high hopes that "The Rose of Iron" would be Jean Rollin's absolute BEST film and finally something different than those stupid lesbian-vampire films he always makes. For some inexplicable reason, his movies like "Lips of Blood" or "Requiem for a Vampire" are hugely popular among avid cult-fans, but – believe me – there're absolutely no quality elements to find in them. "The Rose of Iron" seemed different… The plot outline is very promising and the fact that it's so rarely known simply makes it more appealing. But only a couple of minutes into the film and you're already confronted to another load of nonsense and a giant amount of "what-the-hell"-moments. The universe in which Rollin's movies are set is just totally messed up! Dig this: a beautiful girl falls head over heels in love with a bizarre guy after he reads a morbid poem to her during some party where none of the guests seem to know each other. The next day, the young couple agrees to bike riding near an abandoned and ominous looking train-station… Okay, maybe a bit eccentric, but still acceptable. Then, they think it's a good idea to go to the local cemetery and make love inside a family-tomb!?! Perhaps I don't know anything about romance or poetry but this is just downright wrong! Anyway, night falls, they get locked in the cemetery and, shortly after, they both start to behave very strangely…especially the girl. One thing I can't deny is that the setting looks staggering. The graveyard where 90% of the movie takes place is probably the most macabre filming location in horror-history ever. The neglected ancient graves and overgrown nature look very eerie and disturbing and it's all very atmospherically photographed. Unfortunately, it's NOTHING but an empty package. The script is incredibly tedious with awful dialogues and absolutely no tension. The nudity and sleaze in Rollin's previous movies was exploitative and extremely pointless, but at least there was something to distract you! "The Rose of Iron" is tame, very un-sexy and utterly disappointing. As hilarious as it may seem, to me Rollin's most endurable movie is the laughable "Zombie Lake".

A very odd film from Jean Rollin, a horror film completely without traditional horror elements and threats - it's about getting lost! A young couple gets lost at a country churchyard one night and lots of panic, statues and typical Rollin-doomed romanticism follows. It's a sympathetic, sometimes beautiful films with an interesting idea that still could have been executed a lot better. Lack of pacing was to be expected but the bad actors are the biggest problem. Usually Rollin's use of non-professionals is greatly to his advantage - bored-looking non-actors delivering pretentious dialogue in a very stiff way is part of his aesthetic style, but here the actors actually tries to act and it doesn't really work. Still, a pretty good film with some memorable scenes (the lovemaking in the tomb with spinning cameras was great!). A film for friends of Rollin.

A thick slice of 1970's French surrealism surved up by cheap acting, ponderous ill fitting sound design and pointless stock in trade 'surreal' tropes.

Sorry to all those who think this is a successful, well directed art film. Really. Lets get to the real facts, its badly acted, badly directed, badly edited... I could go on. True, it is a hard to find film, an art film, but those are just excuses for its incredible lack of anything good at all. The script is appalling, the camera wobbles a lot. Its not like this film is difficult to avoid, so just avoid it. Its disgustingly, pathetically, offensively bad. In all honesty. The director is highly regarded, but this film was a mistake to make in absolutely every way. Its so bad it is funny. In fact, try to watch this film, but only if you want a serious laugh, because that is all this film is good for. It could only possibly be good if you were obsessed with art films, and understood French, and could find a deeper, more soulful meaning with which to explain the camera wobbling and really bad editing that probably occurred because every crew member had the hots for the leading lady. I know I did. Enough said.

Just watched an unusual French film with English sub titles. It's called 'Rose of Iron' (aka 'The Iron Rose', 'The Crystal Rose' and 'The Night of the Cemetery') from 1973. I had recorded it late at night from TCM.

It's categorized as a "horror" film by the IMDb. The story involves a young couple who meet at a wedding noticing each other across the room. The woman is intrigued by a few lines from a morbid poem that the man recites aloud to the group and seemingly to her. A strange poem to read at a happy event, still they seemed to enjoy it..Evidently the poem is a work in progress. The couple meet and talk after the wedding and decide to go on a date bike riding. Later, on the date the man suggests they go into the large ancient looking cemetery to picnic and explore. We see a solemn clown walking to pay his respects at a grave in full costume. Evidently this has some meaning that so far eludes me. Soon they find two steel doors facing down into the ground going into a sort of crypt. The doors remind me of those outside homes leading into some old cellars. The man induces the women to go down with him and look around. She reluctantly agrees. Soon they decide this damp dark underground crypt is a good place to light a candle and make love. They like the privacy it offers. This is perhaps the strangest place I've ever heard of for romance, except for a scene that comes later. It's almost the opposite of the mile high club. Here they are on their first date and they're making love underground in a cemetery. When they finally come up for air so to speak. They find it's getting late, almost dark. They try to find the path out, but they're utterly lost. It seems they're surrounded by endless old graves, tombs and statues. No matter how far they walk in any direction they seem to end up where they started. When they realize they can't find a way out we learn that the woman is either insane or has very quickly gone insane from their situation. It all becomes very surreal. She starts to create her own ending for the work in progress poem her new lover had recited earlier at the wedding. She says the words aloud taking up where he had left off. I won't say any more about the film so as not to ruin anything for those planning to see it.

This might have been a better film if it was about 30 minutes shorter. The concept itself of a couple who just met getting lost in a cemetery has potential. They know little about one another. The cemetery is a strange place to learn about a person. There's a chilling end to the film. It almost makes up for the endlessly dragged out scenes that come before. It's obvious that the director is obsessed with his lead actress.Françoise Pascal. We see long scenes of her ballet dancing among the graves or slowly approaching as she walks towards us from the misty distance. Scenes that could have been one fifth the length they were. One scene that took place in her mind has her dancing about nude on the beach. Obviously the director felt the need to find a way to fit a long sequence of her naked into his film. BTW, I did not know TCM showed total nudity. I guess their films really are uncut.

One person at the IMDb commented that we Americans complain about films like this because we have low attention spans and need nonstop action. We don't appreciate slower paced stories like Europeans do. He may have a point to some extent. But I'm a man who loves foreign films and is familiar with them. I say this one really is too long for its own good. Still, see it if you are able to fast forward frequently. The end really is chilling.

A brooding young man (a solid performance by Hugues Quester) meets a gorgeous and beguiling young woman (well played with great subtlety and understated intuition by the lovely Francoise Pascal) at a wedding ceremony. The pair decide to go on a date in a cemetery. However, come nightfall the couple find themselves trapped in the graveyard and soon succumb to panic when the pervasive hopelessness of their dismal situation overwhelms them. Deliberately paced, graced by plenty of strikingly bizarre moments (a vampire returning to his crypt, a melancholy clown placing flowers on a grave, etc.), and given a real substantial extra impact and potency by a powerfully spooky and unsettling midnight-in-the-boneyard gloom-doom atmosphere that positively drips with a strong feeling of dread, despair, and madness, writer/director Jean Rollin's unusual and intriguing cinematic meditation on life, love, death, and mortality possesses a dreamy, lyrical, and elegant quality which makes watching this movie a truly hypnotic experience. Jean-Jacques Renon's beautiful cinematography offers a wealth of stunningly surreal visuals while Pierre Raph's shivery score hits the marrow-chilling spot. An exquisitely macabre and singular celluloid tone poem.

Iron Rose, The (1973)

*** (out of 4)

A man (Hugues Quester) and woman (Francoise Pascal) meet at a wedding reception and sneak off to talk where they agree to meet the next day for a bike ride. The two ride past a cemetery and decide to enter so that they can have sex in an underground tomb but when they come up it is now dark and they soon find themselves lost and unable to get out. This is considered by many to be the best film Rollin ever made and I might not disagree. The film has received a big cult following over the years and the strange thing is that it has been sold as a horror film but there's no horror anywhere in the film. This is certainly an art house film and a departure for Rollin as there are no vampires, zombies, lesbians, gore and even the sex is tame and there's only one sequence of nudity. The film runs 75-minutes and not too much happens in that time. The two just walk around trying to find their way out while their minds start to be filled with paranoia. The film is very slow paced like every other Rollin film but this works in the films favor. The cinematography is terrific and they used a real cemetery to shoot in, which adds great atmosphere. I think the final eight minutes could have been edited down but this is certainly a surreal little gem.

Opening on the beach that must be familiar even to casual Jean Rollin fans, "The Iron Rose" might be the director's most acclaimed film. It's a very pure movie, with an even more simplistic story then you'd expect, not a single naked vampire in sight. Two lovers meet at a Halloween party. The next day they go for a train ride and end up in an old cemetery. While making love in a crypt, the gates are closed and the two are locked in.

At night, the cemetery becomes an otherworldly place. There is no escape. The boy searches helplessly for an exit while the girl quickly goes mad. She warms up to the idea of death, holding a skull up over her face, laughing. Earlier, the boy falls into an open grave, the camera spinning around him as he looks up as his girlfriend. The two characters represent conflicting ideologies. Early on, they discuss religion, the boy being a strict non-believer while the girl isn't sure. After the madness sets in, she accepts death as a natural thing. He fears it, rebels against it. Given the fixed location and small cast, the movie plays more like an allegory the longer it goes on.

"The Iron Rose" has gorgeous Gothic atmosphere. The cemetery is a fantastic setting, with its huge gravestones, looming crosses, dusty crypts, and cobweb strewn statues. The film is based off a poem, which explains the dreamy tone, but the graveyard had to have been the real inspiration. How could anyone resist making a horror film in this setting? The sparse music is composed of whispering voices. The only moment of unintentional camp comes when the girl opens her mouth to releases an odd, unconvincing scream.

It's a good thing the movie looks so good because the story is a drag. After night falls, the film breaks down into a clear pattern. Guy tries to escape, girl rambles on, guy's attempts are frustrated, repeat. Unusual for Rollin, the film is dialogue-heavy, many semi-poetic monologues about life and death being batted around. Both characters are slightly annoying, the girl coming off as manic and the guy coming off as kind of a jerk. Honestly, the best moments are the ones that have the least to do with the couple. A sad clown drags a handful of roses through the gravestones. An old woman leaves a flower pot on a crypt door. The girl frolics on a beach in the nude, pushing over iron crosses. I suspect this would have made a fine short, given its fantastic setting, images, and nicely poetic ending. As a feature, it quickly becomes repetitive. I maintain that Rollin's goofier, vampire-filled, nudity-and-imagery driven films are his best.

"Rose of Iron" (1973) is a film I was not familiar at all. TCM ran it late one night, and I DVR'd it. This is a French film with English subtitles. The story concerns a young man and woman who meet at a wedding reception, and agree to have a first date. They ride bikes, and stop off at an old, somewhat neglected cemetery. The young man discovers an underground crypt, and the two explore it. They also have sex down there, for whatever reason; but, hey, to each his own. By the time they emerge, the cemetery is dark. The two can't find their way out of the massive grounds, a la "Blair Witch Project." Panic sets in, and the two argue and turn on each other as they go in circles trying to find the pathway out. The young woman descends into apparent madness, blathering on about death and and speaking in strange poetic-style prose. The young man doesn't know what has happened to her and rightfully seems freaked out; the two make up, fight, fight some more, run from one another, etc. I guess the director was trying to leave it up to the viewer of the film: does the young woman simply go mad out of fright, or is she possessed by some spirit? The film has some holes and unanswered questions. The actors are good ones; the young woman is very beautiful, and the cinematography is respectable. But it is the setting itself that makes the movie very watchable: the old cemetery has lots of old gravestones, neglected buildings, and the massive darkness surrounding everything makes it very eerie and effective. The film requires a bit of patience to get through, and the ending is strange. It is is still worthwhile, despite its flaws.

Jean Rollin is best known for his lesbian vampire films. I have seen five of said films and all of them were rubbish. If The Iron Rose were another lesbian vampire flick, I would never have seen it; but strangely, the non-lesbian vampire efforts I've seen from Jean Rollin (The Living Dead Girl, The Grapes of Wrath) were quite good so I figured maybe his work outside of his favourite genre might be decent, but on the strength of this film; I have to say that I think I was wrong! The Iron Rose takes the atmosphere from Rollin's lesbian vampire flicks (often the best attribute) and fuses it with a bizarre plot that sees a couple trapped in a graveyard. Nothing about the film makes any sense; the way they meet is unlikely, the way they get to the graveyard is stupid and what happens in the graveyard is pointless. Rollin was clearly trying to make some sort of sexy/surreal drama but what we end up with instead is a load of depressing nonsense. The location shots are nice, with the graveyard itself being a particularly outstanding place to set a horror movie with its Gothic gravestones and foreboding atmosphere so it's a shame that Rollin couldn't make more out of it. The film feels like it should have some profound and deep message but if it did, it's buried so far under the boredom that I wouldn't know where to start looking for it. The film is also poorly edited and badly shot, the latter point being a major shame considering that the graveyard is really the only good thing about it. Overall, I can't recommend anyone sees this film; mercifully it is quite short at seventy five minutes, but that is seventy five minutes that could be better spent elsewhere. Avoid!

Visually delightful, but I really did expect more from the plot. I also found the violence between the couple distasteful (I really hate to see a man who's supposed to be a normal guy slapping a woman around.) I think it might have worked better as a short story than a full length feature. The girl's eyes as she slowly descended into madness were very impressive.

Maybe it didn't help that neither of the two main characters had any warmth or personality about them, I like to empathise with the protagonists, not feel indifferent to their fate,

It's not one I'd want to see again, but I certainly don't begrudge the time I spent on watching it, there are some great close-ups, camera tricks, etc, to enjoy.