A woman is seduced by and cast aside by a fickle lover. When the lover marries another woman who starts hallucinating during their wedding, she is accused of being a witch and thrown to her death over a cliff. A strange man rescues her, nurses her back to health, and is told that she must master black magic in order to exact vengeance on her tormentors. She casts a variety of spells over the populace--with the male population as her favorite target, and becomes the queen of black magic. But who, exactly, is the man, and does he have other plans?
Reviews
Tasty Indonesian horror babe Suzzanna plays Murni, a woman seduced and spurned by the man she loves, wrongly accused of witchcraft, and then thrown off a cliff by an angry mob who aren't too bothered with minor details like due process of law. Narrowly surviving her ordeal, she is nursed back to health by an old man who urges her to seek revenge on those who tried to kill her using the powers of black magic. Having killed several villagers, and made her ex-lover tear off his own head, Murni feels avenged, but the old man who taught her all of her evil tricks has his own agenda and wants her to continue with the slaughter.If weird and wonderful whacked-out world cinema horror is your kind of thing then this supernatural Indonesian/Japanese/Philippino co-production from 1979 should fit the bill nicely: it's not exactly great film-making, but with terrible dubbing, awful acting, some truly bizarre moments (my favourite bit being when Murni takes up smoking—quite literally!), and gruesome deaths aplenty (including an attack by bees, strangulation by scarf, drowning in a paddy field, the wonderfully bloody self-decapitation, lots of erupting veins, and an exploding head), it's almost impossible not to enjoy.6.5 out of 10, rounded up to 7 for the flying head and Murni's hilarious fall off the cliff, hitting a tree halfway down and landing straight into the arms of the old man.
1st let me say that Queen of Black Magic is a great slice of Indonesian horror, chock full of flying heads, exploding bodies and some hilarious overdubs. That said, I noticed something that others may have not when watching my newly purchased Mondo Macabro DVD release of the film. In the film there are 2 scenes, one when Murni is being trained in the black arts and the other towards the latter half of the film where she is bathing in a river, that I believe are censored. In the first 'censored' scene, Murni appears to be sitting naked while the black magician walks around her. In that scene its a little harder to tell if its a censor 'fog spot' or if its the actual smoke that is being produced by the black magician, but it appears as if there is some fogging around her that would prevent the viewer from seeing any possible nudity. The second scene I mentioned is quite obviously censored. The film cuts to a scene where Murni is bathing in a river and its a clear day outside. Yet there appears to be fog around what would be her naked body. If that wasn't obvious enough, at one point she ducks down into the water and you can see the fog spot follow her body. Not sure if there is another print out there without the fogged scenes (its possible there isn't since it is an Indonesian film and we all know how stiff censors in eastern countries can be) but if there is an uncensored print, it is disappointing that Mondo Macabro did not seek this one out instead of giving us the version with fogged nudity. Then again it is entirely possible that they fogged it on purpose much like the way Takashi Miike did with MPD psycho. All in all the film rules and this should not take anything away from it. I just despise censorship and thought I'd bring this to the attention of anyone wanting to purchase the film.
When Baedah,daughter of the wealthy village headman, is plagued by horrifying visions on her wedding day,her husband Kohar suspects that black magic is at work.Convinced that the source of the hallucinations is Murna played by '70s Indonesian horror queen Suzzanna,the poor girl he seduced and then abandoned for Baedah,Kohar rallies a mob to burn down her house and throw her into a ravine.Murna is rescued by a magician,who helps her seek revenge by teaching her the black arts.She then returns to her village and gruesomely kills several of her persecutors,saving Kohar for the last and most hideous death."Queen of Black Magic" is a classic of Inodnesian horror.The dubbing is terrible and the acting is pretty bad,but it offers some gory deaths including the demise of Kohar,who pulls off his own head in a fountain of arterial gore.If you enjoy watching wild Indonesian cinema "Black Magic Terror" is a blast.
Queen of Black Magic (1979) is a "sequel-in-name" to the two Black Magic films that came out from the Shaw Brothers in HK, in the 70's. The third film is a surprisingly fast-paced for most of the time, with plenty of black arts in practise with gory and gruelling results. We get to see maggot-infested bodies and food bowls, exploding spellcraft victims, hilarious and stupid dialogue (and dubbing) and exotic locations in the jungles of Indonesia (I think, since this was a co-production between a few Asian countries.) The film is made with an ultra-low budget but that's why it is also so enjoyable and smile-inducing, and the effects are certainly not as bad as they could be. I'd like to see the two original Shaw films, but in itself, Queen of Black Magic is a welcome addition to the library of weird and wild cinema beyond any limitations or taboos.
