original production:
Cast: Victor Junco, Armando Silvestre, Ariadne Welter (as "Adriadne Welter") (Anna Duval), Luis Aldas, Jose Luis Rojas, Manuel Donde, Jose Raul Mena, Felipe Cueto
SYNOPSIS:
A young woman, Anna Duval, walks to a marina, and stares out to sea, fixating on a lovely white yacht. Two small boys strike up a conversation with her,and agree to row her out to the boat.
On the boat, Anna meets Andreas, the boat's first mate, and they share a sad tale: the yacht, "La Gavyota Roja", belongs to Anna’s drunken bum of a husband, Robert, and is all that is left of a failed marriage.
Anna leaves the boat, and walks the beach. A young man, George Roper, sees her, and decides to follow.
Anna returns to her car, parked alongside a busy highway. She has difficulty starting the engine. George comes up, and agrees to look at the motor.
George discovers that the car's coil wire has came loose. He takes some tools and works on the vehicle. Anna and George flirt, and exchange names.
George fixes the car. Anna is thankful, and offers to pay George. He asks only for a smile. Anna drives off.
Anna returns to the hotel where she lives. She requests her mail from the desk clerk. The clerk hands her an overdue hotel bill. Anna protests that her husband usually pays the bills, but the clerk says that her husband has refused to pay.
Anna goes looking for Robert, and finds him lounging by the pool, drinking with a business associate.
Robert introduces his wife to the man, Joe Landrau.
Joe explains to Anna that he wants to rent Robert’s yacht for an expedition. Anna is so disgusted by Robert’s drunken behavior, she leaves.
Robert looks for his wallet, but has conveniently forgotten it. Joe agrees to pick up the tab.
Anna goes to cool off by a balcony. Robert joins her, and starts yelling. The couple fight over the hotel bill, and their precarious financial situation in general. They are virtually broke, thanks to Robert’s reckless spending and listless character.
Robert insists that this new contact will make them rich, but Anna has heard it all before; their money was inherited from her father, and Robert has spent it all on women and gambling!
Anna informs Robert that she has put the yacht in his name, and as far as she’s concerned, he can do whatever he wants with it, even burn it!
Next morning, Robert and Joe discuss their impending deal over more cocktails.
Anna joins them. Joe describes his proposition. He wants to rent the yacht out for a salvage job. A vessel sunk off a small island called "La Chica" about six months ago, during a bad storm. There was a cargo of precious jewels, worth millions, on board.
Joe tried to recover the cargo at the time, but was unable to, due to a series of unfortunate circumstances.
Joe wants Robert's boat to finish the recovery job he had to abandon. He will, of course, share the proceeds with them. Anna reluctantly agrees to the proposition, even though it seems fishy to her.
Later, Anna arrives on the yacht. Joe and Robert are already on board, and Anna is pleasantly surprised to find that the pilot they have hired is George, the handsome young man who repaired her automobile!
The men discuss their best navigation route, and the motley crew begin their journey.
Anna sunbathes on the deck, while George and Joe pilot the boat, and Robert drinks.
Anna prepares dinner for the men, then retires to the deck for some fresh air.
While putting away his dinner dishes, George discovers a pistol, and hides it where only he knows the location.
At midnight, George relieves Joe at the wheel.
At dawn the next morning, Anna comes to George with hot coffee.
Robert, hung over, takes over at the wheel. Joe tries to speak with Robert about his drinking, but Robert insists that its none of his business. The two argue.
Joe reminds Robert that he doesn’t want to accidentally tell anyone else on board the REAL reason for their journey...
Joe notices something wrong with their course, and finds a magnet hidden behind the compass. They were going the wrong way!
Robert and Joe go to the cabin to ask George to explain, and are surprised to have George pull a gun on them.
Anna sees this, and fetches another gun from a cabinet, sneaking it to her husband.
Robert pulls the other gun on George, but George tells him that he has removed the bullets from it.
The others demand to know what’s going on.
George tells them that he has no intention of harming them, but needs to make a detour to another island first, for personal reasons.
George redirects the boat, and soon rows off in a rowboat to the island in question.
Once on the island, George asks a small native boy where he can locate a man named Raoul. The boy runs off to fetch him, but cannot locate him.
George goes to the beach to search for Raoul. George calls his name, and hears gunshots. He sees Raoul, and tells him who he is.
The two meet on the beach. George tells Raoul he has come for him. Raoul looks pleased. They both return to the yacht.
Back on board, George explains to the others that Raoul is his brother, who was falsely sent to prison years ago, and had escaped to that small island. George is determined to prove his brother’s innocence.
George confesses that he rigged the compass to get to Raoul’s island. The others are angered by this subterfuge, but can do nothing.
Eventually, the group arrives at Isla La Chica.
George and Raoul dive in search of the treasure, while Anna sunbathes and Robert drinks.
George and Raoul swim through stunning coral reefs and teeming tropical sea life, and eventually happen upon the rusted wreck of the sunken vessel.
Back on the beach, Joe makes a pass at Anna, who is insulted, and leaves. She happens upon Robert, who lies dead drunk on the beach, like a whale.
Soon, George and Raoul come ashore, and inform Robert and Joe that there is no treasure whatsoever on the boat. Joe is furious, and insists that the divers are lying, and have found the treasure, wanting to keep it for themselves. After much arguing, it is agreed that they will search again tomorrow.
That evening, Anna prepares dinner on the beach.
Joe takes Robert aside. The two debate the divers' honesty. Joe reveals to Robert that he plans on killing the two brothers after they finish their salvage work, so that he and Robert can share the treasure between themselves!
The group eats dinner, but the atmosphere is tense. Anna asks the men what’s wrong, and they confess that the whole adventure has left them paranoid and mistrustful.
Suddenly, they hear the roar of an engine, and look out to sea: someone is stealing the yacht! The group watch helplessly as the boat sails out to sea.
The next morning, the group gathers their provisions, and head into the jungle, towards a river where they might be able to survive for a time.
After awhile, Anna stops to rest, but Joe insists that they move on, before the tropical heat becomes too much for them.
As evening approaches, Joe decides they won’t make it to the river by nightfall, so they set up camp where they are. But a bush moves in the background; someone is watching them!
That night, as they stand guard, George and Joe agree that the jungle is a creepy place.
The next morning, the group continues their journey, and finally make it to the river.
They all dive in and take their fill of fresh water, but there are snakes and crocodiles in the water, waiting to pounce...
Later, the group argues over their dwindling rations.
Soon, Robert lays down to rest. Raoul sees a large snake approaching the sleeping Robert, but does nothing.
Robert eventually wakes up, and sees the snake staring him in the face. He is paralyzed with fear. Raoul watches, amused, as the snake crawls over a petrified Robert.
At this point, Anna returns from the river, and sees Robert struggling with the snake. Anna screams as Robert struggles. At the last minute, Raoul intervenes, and kills the snake.
Raoul tells Anna that Joe and her husband plan on killing them all after they find the treasure. Anna looks at Robert with pity and disgust, and slaps his face. Robert picks up a stick to hit her, but cannot.
Raoul and Robert engage in a fight.
George and Joe return, and find the situation tense. Raoul even pulls a gun on the two, but the situation is diffused.
Later, Robert goes out to fetch some water. George apologizes to Anna for her husband’s betrayal. Raoul goes out to get some wood.
Soon, they wonder what has happened to Robert. He cannot be found.
That evening, Robert has still not returned. The group decides to search for him. before it gets dark.
Raoul and Joe search the river, but are scared off by crocodiles. George and Ann search in the jungle, and find Robert dead, tied to a tree!
Later, Raoul and Joe get into an argument over who could have killed Robert. Joe accuses both Raoul and George of being capable of murder. Raoul tries to strangle Joe, but George intervenes.
Raoul turns on George, and comes after him with a knife. Joe creeps up behind Raoul, and knocks him out cold.
Later, George relates to Anna his misgivings about Raoul, how sad it is to discover that he really was guilty of the crime he was accused of. George is disillusioned. Anna sympathizes; no-one is who they first appear to be.
They later find that Raoul, who has been tied to a tree to prevent escape, has vanished.
George, Joe and Anna search for Raoul, and find him dead also, also tied to a tree!
George and Joe argue over who killed Raoul. But another man named Phillip appears, flanked by armed natives. Phillip is the man who Joe left for dead in the jungle many months ago.
Phillip explains that although Joe tried to kill him, he survived, and has been planning his revenge all this time. Joe is horrified.
Phillip explains that he is the one who stole the boat, and murdered the others.
Phillip tells Joe that the treasure he’s been looking for is buried in Phillip’s fake grave.
Joe shoots Phillip, for good this time. As Phillip lay dying, he instructs his native helpers to get Joe at all costs.
Joe dives into the river to escape. The natives follow, intending to kill him, but a hungry crocodile does the job for them.
Phillip dies. George and Anna dig a grave for Raoul.
Anna and George decide not to retrieve the treasure, for it has caused nothing but sorrow. Besides, they now have each other. The couple walk off into the jungle night.
FIN
REVIEW:
THIS IS NOT A HORROR FILM.
That said, BLOODY SEA is a fascinating bit of "modern" Mexican cinema, (i.e., psychological cinema) with a literate, knowing script and a striking, arty, European look. One might even dare to call this film an oblique aesthetic reaction to Antonioni's L'AVENTURA (1963).
As in a similar Mexican film of the period, CIEN GRITOS DE TERROR (aka 100 CRIES OF TERROR), one gets the feeling that the filmmakers were attempting to gingerly address the current trend in existentialist cinema by artists like Bunuel and Antonioni, without knowing quite how to go about it.
A haunting opening theme by Raul Lavista punctuates Murray's typical drippy horror credits, inapproapriate but endearing.
Lavista's score here is great, combining majestic symphonic cues with avant-garde electronic synthesizer music.
The plot itself, while superficially dealing with a pedestrian love triangle and a treasure hunt, does have some nice moments dealing with subjects like alcoholism, sibling devotion and reckless greed.
The film is extremely moody and quite fetching, overall a bit melancholy, surely a showcase for cinematography and screenwriting.
The dubbing in BLOODY SEA is quite subdued, even sounding like it may have involved someone other than the usual voice actors in the Murray horror canon.
To pure horror buffs, there ain’t much to chew on here, but if you like foreign 60’s cinema of a generic variety, this utter obscurity might be your cup of bloody tea.
COMMENTS:
* (effective 05-01-03) After a very brief window of availability, this long-sought K. Gordon Murray title is once again out of print, due to international copyright issues. Used video tapes of this title may be found on online video dealers and auction sites. Stay tuned for further developments!
* According to Mexican film aficionado and Santo Street proprietor Brian Moran, BLOODY SEA was part of Murray’s "World of Terror" TV package by either 1966 or 1967, but was withdrawn and replaced by the ultra-obscure FRANKENSTEIN, THE VAMPIRE AND COMANY by 1968, most likely due to its non-horror subject matter.
* According to Mexican film historian David Wilt, the source production, MAR SANGRIENTO, was an independent film, made by a co-op of actors, technicians and friends, and received very little release in its country of origin.
NOTABLE DIALOGUE:
