El Buque Maldito (The Ghost Galleon)(Ship of Zombies)(Horror of the Zombies) (1974)

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This is the third installment in Amando de Ossorio's "Blind Dead" series featuring the legions of the undead Knights Templar -- a sect of medieval monks who were executed in the 15th century for their occult practices and who periodically rise from their tombs to torment the living. This chapter… More This is the third installment in Amando de Ossorio's "Blind Dead" series featuring the legions of the undead Knights Templar -- a sect of medieval monks who were executed in the 15th century for their occult practices and who periodically rise from their tombs to torment the living. This chapter puts the Templars on a ghostly Spanish galleon (which looks like it was built from a ship-in-a-bottle kit), cloaked in perpetual fog and roaming the seas in search of victims. When two bikini models are set adrift as part of a sporting-good chain's publicity stunt, they are seized by the flesh-eating ghouls. The company's frantic CEO sets out in his yacht to find them, accompanied by the head of the modeling agency, one of the models' friends, and an expert on Templar lore. They eventually collide with the galleon, whereupon the meandering plot finally gets down to business. The blind, slow-moving zombies shamble up from below decks and wait patiently, as always, for their shrieking, flailing victims to stumble into their clutches. This is one of the creepier entries in the series, making good use of the confined, fog-shrouded sets (presaging very similar scenes in John Carpenter's The Fog), and only wavers during long shots of the cheesy-looking model ship. The shock ending is also remarkably effective. Followed by the final chapter, Night of the Seagulls. ~ Cavett Binion, Rovi