In Vacation of Terror (1989), a bunch of sepia-toned villagers tie a witch to a tree and give her plenty of time to curse everyone before they imprison her soul in a doll and throw it down a well. Also, they set the witch on fire. Flash forward to the greatest decade that ever was where Fernando (Julio Alemán) just inherited his crazy aunt’s gnarly old house. And wouldn’t you know it, the tree where the witch was burned and the well with the demon doll in it is totally on the property! Fernando takes his whole family to the stay at the dilapidated villa, much to the chagrin of his pregnant wife (Nuria Bages), and immediately everything gets nutty.
The tree tries to kill one of his obnoxious twin sons and some eggs explode and then un-explode. Then Gaby, their little girl, falls down the well and finds the demon doll. It immediately takes control of Gaby and shit just goes completely insane including (but not limited to), her trying to psychically kill the unborn baby in her mom’s belly. Luckily, Fernando’s niece Paulina (Gabriela Hassel) came along on this trip with her goofy boyfriend Julio (Pedro Fernández), who just happened to have traded his Walkman for the amulet that imprisoned the witch from a farmer a few days before. That’s lucky!
Director/writer/actor René Cardona III brings us Vacation of Terror, a less than modestly paced horror film packed with all of the haunted house cliches you can think of. The stark, scary synthesizer score of Eugenio Castillo is probably my favorite thing about this movie. The cast is fun with the loveable Pedro Fernández of Hell’s Trap (1989) being wacky and it’s always nice to see Gabriela Hassel of Don’t Panic (1987) and her eyebrows. Some of my favorite moments come from Nuria Bages, who I think is more terrified of fixing up the house than anything supernatural that happens.
My issues with Vacation of Terror are that it has too few characters, the pacing gets bogged down, and it just doesn’t have that zaniness that I’ve come to expect from Mexican horror movies. But it is well made and has plenty of atmosphere, dread, and spooky moments in between annoying child actors yelling about stuff. Nothing can prepare you for the pure terror of a kid throwing a football through a window who then isn’t punished for it at all. I’m sorry if that sentence gives you nightmares tonight.
Vacation of Terror II (1991) starts off with a film producer named Roberto Mondragón (Joaquín Cordero) getting ready for his daughter Tania’s seventh birthday party. She was born on Halloween, so you know she’s probably the devil. He plans to hold this slammin’ dope ass party at his movie studio and has even enlisted his entire special effects crew (consisting of one dude) to make it very special. Coincidentally, the doll possessed by a witch from the first film just happens to pop up again and crashes the party.
After an accidental blood sacrifice, the witch is finally released from her doll prison. You’d think she would have orchestrated that in the first film instead of just making the walls bleed. But she didn’t. Now the witch is wreaking havoc at the party, and it’s up to good old Julio (Pedro Fernández), who is back from the first film armed with some magical rocks and an old book, to stop her! Can Julio save Tania and her cute older sister Mayra (Tatiana)? So, Julio, whatever happened to Paulina from the first film, eh? You dog!
Vacation of Terror II fairs slightly better in terms of pacing than the original film, but there’s just not enough characters to mix things up. Once the cast is whittled down to the remaining four or five people, everything just slows down. Director René Cardona III throws in some fun Halloween decorations to the shenanigans this time, but I got a little tired of people running around screaming, “Tania!” and “Mayra!” over and over again. Thankfully, he takes full advantage of the cool sets and the fog machines.
A nice change this time is that the witch that emerges from the killer doll is quite freaky looking, and we get to see her stomping around in a cool Old West set. The composer for Vacation of Terror II is Pedro Plascencia and he brings us some slinky synthesizer with a badass snare drum that takes us straight to Hell. I like this film because where else am I going to see a living doll munching on a candy witch covered in blood? Some cool camera tricks and outrageous special effects spice things up, but I was left wanting more.
Both Vacation of Terror and Vacation of Terror II look and sound pretty darn good considering how beat up the prints for each were. The first film has the most scratches and damage, but nothing too distracting. And the sound on Vacation of Terror II is a tad strident and harsh in spots. This double feature is more than watchable compared to any of the bootlegs of these two titles floating around out there.
As far as extras go, there are interviews with sisters Gabriella Hassel and Gianella Hassel (who played little Gaby). They both speak fondly of working on the film and it’s fun to see how much they’ve grown up. There is an interview with twins Carlos East Jr. and Ernesto East, who played the twin boys in Vacation of Terror. There is also an interview with composer Eugenio Castillo, who reveals which synthesizers he used on the film. There’s also a cool interview with Jorge Farfán, the special effects artist on Vacation of Terror. He talks about working in the film industry and reveals a few SFX tricks as well.