Lover of the Monster wants to be a Gothic horror film, with a touch of the mad scientist, but fails so abysmally that one wonders if there was a serious disconnect between the scriptwriter and the director. In fact, the credits at least on IMDb don't list a writer, and it's no surprise.The plot, as described, makes no sense. A wife (an attractive Dutch actress) and her new husband (Kinski) are moving back to the wife's old family home. The doctor in town is kind of still in love with the wife, and the married couple seems a bit estranged, so I expect jealous shenanigans. Do I get them? No. The wife goes on chaste walks and takes tea with the doctor, and that's all. Kinski's envious "rages" consist of minor piques and a few semi-harsh words. For this, the wife accused him of monstrous jealousy. On the other hand, if my wife spent lots of time, even chastely with a former lover, perhaps there is reason for a bit of pique.Kinski, rather than make up with his wife, though this is what they're ostensibly at the manor for, goes into the basement and looks up what his deceased father-in-law was doing. Apparently he was interested in the reanimation of the dead, and all kinds of monstrous evil works. So ... I think. I now expect some cool mad science deeds. Do I get them? No. Kinsky goes into the basement, and gets shocked by some of the electric equipment. And that's all.Then Kinski goes on occasional rampages into the countryside and kills people. At last hope springs. Perhaps the electric shock in the basement has turned Kinsky into some kind of monster? Well, all too soon we see Kinski-as-monster, and it is identical to Kinsky-as-man. A little white powder and that's it, though he does manage to pop his eyes out a bit.Is there gore? No. We get a little bit of blood dribbled on the dead people, who apparently die of fear, because there are no wounds visible.Do we at least get to see lots of luscious wenches nude for the asking? Again, no. We do see the Dutch actress semi-naked in the film's last scene, but it's too little, too late.How about artsy psychodrama? Well, personally I detest artsy psychodrama, but I don't even get THAT in this stinker, unless seeing Kinsky and the Dutch woman whine at each other while staring in opposite directions counts. Ecch.The movie does not provide ANY of the elements necessary for exploitation (no sex, gore, horror, or action). It does not provide any of the elements needed for a normal movie (no plot, crappy dialog, and few good scenes). It is very disappointing. There are a couple of kind-of interesting subplots, if you're concerned about the fate of a raggedy hobo thief or whether the wife finally goes off with her ever-patient doctor admirer.But I gave up all hope, and watched the film glumly. I stuck it out only because I am a Kinski and Italian cinema completist. The act gave me no joy. Not recommended. It's not a giallo. It's not a Gothic horror, really, though it is a period piece. It has no mad science. It has no artsy psychodrama. It has no romance. It has nothing. Kinski does bug out his eyes really good in the snail-paced "action" scenes though.

The infamously ill-tempered German actor Klaus Kinski described pretty much every film he ever made as "a piece of sh*t". He was obviously off-base with stuff like "Aguirre, the Wrath of God" or the classic spaghetti Western "The Great Silence". Here though he was pretty much right on the mark. This is a very low-rent version of the Jeckyl and Hyde story. Kinski plays a retired doctor and jealous husband who returns with his wealthy wife (Katia Christian) to her family castle. He discovers his late father-in-law's basement laboratory, and angry at the attention his wife is paying to an old boyfriend, starts messing around and somehow turns himself into a slobbering, sex-crazed monster! Kinski is WAY over-the-top with a hysterically eye-rolling, pancake-makeup smeared performance. His victims, of course, are pretty much all attractive young women, generally ranging from scantily clad to completely nude. Gorgeous Dutch actress Katia Christian (from "The Designated Victim") also models her birthday suit for about ten minutes near the end. But the abundant female nudity here,while somewhat enjoyable, is the equivalent of spraying French perfume on a rancid turd.The director Sergio Garrone was a hack among hacks when it came to Italian directors. Like fellow hacks Bruno Mattei and Rino DiDilvestri, Garrone later got involved in the vile Italian "Nazi sexploitation" genre, but unlike the other two he couldn't even pull off vile successfully--his entry, "SS Experiment Camp", was laughable and boring (albeit still banned in Britain for some reason). It occurrs to me that given the nepotism in the Italian film industry Sergio Garrone might be related to the talented, modern-day Italian director Matteo Garrone (of "Gommorah' fame), but if that's the case the apple fell far, far from the tree. I'd recommend this only to fans of unintentional comedy or those who want to see a particularly mugging performance by Kinski or a especially undraped performance by Katia Christian.

In hindsight, this obscure, meaninglessly-titled Italian horror movie is to "Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde" what LADY FRANKENSTEIN (1971) was to "Frankenstein" but, as an erotic version of the classic tale, it is a long way behind Walerian Borowczyk's brilliantly delirious DOCTEUR JEKYLL ET LES FEMMES (1981). The atrocious print displayed on this bootleg DVD – replete with fuzzy video and annoyingly processed audio as if it had been recorded under water! – destroys any attempt at the Gothic feel the film strives for but, in truth, the whole production is a mind-boggling hodgepodge of every horror cliché in the book with elements of Frankenstein, Jekyll and Hyde and Jack The Ripper (whom star Klaus Kinski would play, far more successfully, for Jess Franco a couple of years later) thrown into the mix…not to mention an impotent villain given to raging fits of jealousy, indigestible dollops of Freudian self-analysis (usually uttered by a wimpish Kinski while lounging from one sofa to another), a rival doctor vieing for the attentions of the mad scientist's neglected wife, gore (the gratuitous vivisection of a dog), not one but two distinct tramps convicted of the murder spree (lazy writing, if you ask me!), hilarious character names (Nijinsky, Polanski, Boris, Ygor, Ivan Rassimov), etc.! Having said that, Kinski – who is unusually subdued here - is always worth watching but, while the movie is mostly dull, it is occasionally alleviated by the vivid colors and two effective sequences: Kinski's savage attack on his wife while transformed and the conscience-stricken flashback to his past murders. The film's final image is arresting as well, the music score is rather nice and Katia Christine makes for a lovely leading lady (almost like an older Scarlet Johansson) and the intermittent bits of nudity certainly don't hurt any. Still, all the frenzied cutting and odd camera angles prove laughable rather than laudable; Kinski's make-up only extends to close-ups of his bulging eyes and, what's worse, although a serum is concocted, his transformation seemingly occurs when he comes in contact with a certain laboratory lever (what the f***?)…but what about the other times (unless his jealousy attacks bring on the mutation)? For the record, writer-director Sergio Garrone is brother to actor Riccardo (best-known nowadays for portraying God on a slew of coffee commercials on Italian TV!) and THE LOVER OF THE MONSTER itself was simultaneously filmed with another obscure international potboiler, THE HAND THAT FEEDS THE DEAD (1974), with most of the same cast and crew participating in both productions.

One of the better films from director Sergio Garrone, Le Amanti del Mostro benefits from star Klaus Kinski, who delivers a surprisingly subtle and nuanced performance as Alex Nijinksi, a doctor who stumbles upon a secret experimental laboratory when he returns to his wife's ancestral homestead. Work in the lab turns the curious Kinski into a Jekyll and Hyde split personality, with the evil alter ago going on a killing rampage blamed on a pair of tramps--one of whom bears the name Polanski. Whether this is a tribute to the great director or a commentary on 19th century anti-Semitism isn't made clear, but the film DOES feature an amusing cinema in joke in the early going, when co-star Katia Christine (the Nicole Kidman lookout playing Kinski's wife) visits her father's grave, which bears the name Ivan Rassimov! A surprisingly bloodless late period example of Italian Gothic cinema, Le Amanti del Mostro is available on a grey area Shoarma DVD which also features a generous stills gallery of Kinski performances, and the crown jewel: a 1985 German television interview featuring a reticent Kinski and some amusing outtakes from his then current production, Commando Leopard.