Devil Woman
Evil Snake Girl / Manda the Snake Girl

Philippines/Hong Kong 1970
produced by
Jimmy L. Pascual, Tommy C.Pascual (executive) for Emperor Film International
directed by Felix Villar, Albert Yu
starring Tung Li (as Alex Lung Tzi Fei), Rosemarie Gil, Yukio Someno, Romy Diaz, Johanna Garcia, David Yau, Lito Legaspi, Cherie Gil, To Chow Kwon, Peter Multan, Yuen Ching Wei, Jose Garcia, Robert Chen, Yuen Yan Kwei, Max Rojo
written by Jimmy L. Pascual, music by Chou Fu Liang, fighting instructors: To Chow Kwan, Yuen Yan Kwei, Yuen Ching Wei

Manda the Snake Girl

review by
Mike Haberfelner

From childhood on, Manda (Rosemarie Gil) was bullied, mainly because she was poor, was always forced to wear a headscarf, and behaved somehow strangely. What people didn't know back then though was that she had power over all snakes, so when one bully attacked her physically, she summoned a snake to kill him out of self defense. The people of her village then suspected her of witchcraft and burned down her house, killing her mother and father ... but somehow she managed to escape, vowing revenge.

Years later, Manda's village is thriving, mainly thanks to rich yet benign landowner Crispin - but Crispin has fallen ill of late and called a Chinese doctor, Shu Wen (Tung Li), for help. Crispin's daughter Tina soon falls in love with him, much to the dismay of Crispin's foreman Guado, who always considered Tina his future bride ... not that she ever suggested any such thing of course. He and his men soon try time and again to beat Shu Wen to a pulp and the like, but his kung fu is just impeccable. This of course makes Guado and company fair game for Manda, who has only recently deviced a plan to have her revenge on all villagers who participated in burning her parents to death, and for some reason she thinks it's a good idea to let some half-witted brutes help her snakes whom she controls do the job.

Many killings by snakes and rapes by Guado and his men later, Guado finally musters up all his courage ... and kidnaps Tina whom he wants to rape in Manda's secret cave - but she stops him, as she thinks it's ok to kill somebody but not to force somebody to love somebody else ... and that gives Shu Wen just enough time to catch up with Guado and beat him and all of his men to a pulp. Even Manda's snakes are no match for him, so she employs her secret weapon: The snakes growing on her head instead of hair ... and she almost manages to pin Shu Wen and kill him, but then she accidently falls off some cliffs ...

This piece of low budget Asian horror seems to have it all: Exotic locale, snake-haired women, snake attacks, kung fu - and yet it falls somehow short of its promise, mainly because the film makes very little out of its ingredients, and that's mainly caused by a lazy directorial effort that just takes everything at face value and puts little emphasis on atmosphere or tension or suspense or narrative build-up, it's pretty much just what happens just happens when it happens, and how it happens is shown on camera, but nothing beyond that. Sure, the film is still some fun in the horror exotica department at least, but it could really have been so much more ...

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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