Unburied Trailers: The Queen of Black Magic (1979)

Bollywood has its reputation for unhinged craziness in film, and a well-deserved one. That school of thought carries over into Indonesia, the island country with the collage of spices, gods, cultures, and touristy destinations that makes for an even daffier film atmosphere. The Queen of Black Magic AKA “Ratu Ilmu Hitam,” is a dandy example from Rapi Films, which makes mostly exploitation movies with equal parts martial arts and horror.

The Queen of Black Magic is a straight-up revenge story, about a woman scorned in love and later falsely accused of witchcraft, before being sentenced to death. A man rescues her and mentors her to learn the black arts before making her comeback. And come back she does! Judging by the activities in the trailer, the village was very right to fear witches, as one guy explodes in bloody boils, others blow up like a target in Scanners, and one woman just straight rips her own head off. The carnage goes on at a deranged pace; reportedly the full movie doesn’t slow down a whit, enjoying cult classic status among fans of exotic South Seas weirdness.

The second trailer is a clip from Mondo Macabro’s DVD release with an English dub, showing that black magic training apparently involves going to the weirdest hair salon ever.

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