Rollin, Jean

(Jean Michel Rollin Roth le Gentil / November 3, 1938, Neuilly-sur-Seine, Hauts-de-Seine, France - )

   He entered films in 1955 and collaborated in the creation of animated films. Earning his living as a TV editor and assistant director (1962 Un Cheval pour Deux, Roger Pierre, Jean-Marc Thibault), he filmed his first short in 1958. In 1962, he created a production company, Les Films ABC, to finance an unfinished feature-length film (L'Itinéraire marin). By 1967, he started producing (in partnership with American Sam Selsky) and directing horror movies. He still remains the only French director specializing in that genre. He wrote a study on Gaston Leroux that was published in issues 23 and 24 of the famous review Midi Minuit Fantastique (1970). He also played small parts in films (1956 Crime et Châtiment / UK: The Most Dangerous Sin / USA: Crime and Punishment, Georges Lampin; 1973 Le Sourire vertical, Robert Lapoujade; 1985 Sanguine, short, Pierre Pattin; 1992 Trepananator, shot on video, Norbert G. Mount = Norbert Moutier; 1993 Dinosaurs from the Deep, shot on video, Norbert G. Mount = Norbert Moutier; 1997 Le Marquis de Slime, short, Quelou Parente, shot in 1995; 2003 Si la Mère supérieure se coiffe d'un Entonnoir . . . , shot on video, as himself, Daniel Gouy-ette; 2004 Celluloid Horror, documentary, as himself, Ashley Fester, Canada; 2007 Life Like, short, Aida Ruilova, France / USA) and appeared as himself in TV documentaries (1998 French Love, documentary, François Cognard, Frédéric Fiol; 2005 Michel Rocas, Roi du Nanar?, documentary, Nicolas Castro, Laurent Preyale). He also co-wrote Mondo Cannibale / Les Cannibales / El canibal / Mondo Cannibale Teil 3: Die Blonde Gôttin der Kannibalen / UK DVD: Cannibals / USA: Barbarian Goddess / White Cannibal Queen (Jesus Franco, France / Spain / West Germany) and directed without conviction a handful of porn films in the 1970s using the pseudonym of Michel Gentil.

 Filmography

1958 ◘ Les Amours jaunes (short)

1961 ◘ Ciel de Cuivre (short; shot in 1958)

        ◘ L'Itinéraire marin (also screenwriter, adapter, co-dialogist, producer; unreleased)

        ◘ Vivre en Espagne (documentary; short)

        ◘ Les Pays lointains (short)

1967 ◘ Le Viol du Vampire / UK: The Rape of the Vampire / Vampire Women / USA: Queen of the Vampires (also screenwriter, dialogist, actor)

        ◘ La Vampire nue / UK: The Naked Vampire / USA: The Nude Vampire (also screenwriter, co-dialogist)

        ◘ Requiem pour un Vampire / Vierges et Vampires / UK: Caged Vampires / Crazed Virgins / Dungeon of Terror / Requiem for a Vampire / Sex Vam­pires / The Crazed Vampire / Virgin Vampires / USA: Caged Virgins / Virgins and Vampires (also screenwriter)

        ◘ Le Frisson des Vampires / UK: Sex and the Vam­pire / The Terror of the Vampires / Thrill of the

        ◘ Vampires / Vampire Thrills (also screenwriter, adapter, dialogist)

1973 ◘ Jeunes Filles impudiques / USA: Schoolgirl Hitchhikers (as Michel Gentil; also screenwriter)

        ◘ La Rose de Fer / UK and USA: The Iron Rose (also screenwriter, dialogist, actor)

1974 ◘ Tout le Monde en a deux / Bacchanales sexuelles / USA: Fly Me the French Way (as Michel Gentil; also screenwriter, dialogist)

        ◘ Les Démoniaques / Les Diablesses / Deux Vierges pour Satan / UK and USA: Curse of the Living Dead (also screenwriter, adapter, dialogist; France / Belgium)

1975 ◘ Phantasmes / Phantasmes pornographiques / Les Fantasmes d'Isabelle (soft-core version) / USA: Once upon a Virgin / The Seduction of Amy (also screenwriter, dialogist, actor)

        ◘ Lèvres de Sang / USA: Lips of Blood (also screenwriter, co-adapter; hard-core version: Suce moi Vampire as Michel Gentil)

1977 ◘ Les Raisins de la Mort / Pesticide / UK: The Grapes of Death / USA: The Raisins of Death (also co-screenwriter, co-dialogist, actor)

        ◘ Fascination (also screenwriter, dialogist)

        ◘ La Nuit des Traquées / USA: The Night of the Hunted (also screenwriter, dialogist, actor)

        ◘ Les Echappées / Les Paumées du petit Matin (also screenwriter)

        ◘ Le Lac des Morts-Vivants / El lago de los muertos vivientes / UK: The Lake of the Living Dead / USA: Zombie Lake (as J. A. Lazer; also actor; France / Spain)

1982 ◘ La Morte Vivante / US DVD: The Living Dead Girl (also co-screenwriter, co-dialogist)

        ◘ Les Trottoirs de Bangkok (also co-screenwriter, co-dialogist)

        ◘ Ne prends pas les Poulets pour des Pigeons (as Michel Gentil)

        ◘ Emmanuelle 6 (uncredited co-director with Bruno Zincone; also screenwriter, dialogist)

        ◘ Perdues dans New York (also screenwriter, dialogist)

        ◘ La Griffe dHorus (video short)

        ◘ A la Poursuite de Barbara (also actor)

1993 ◘ Killing Car / La Femme dangereuse (also screenwriter, dialogist)

1997 ◘ Les Deux Orphelines vampires / USA: Two Or­phan Vampires (also author of original novel, screenwriter, dialogist)

2002 ◘ La Fiancée de Dracula / Le Retour de Dracula (also screenwriter, dialogist)

2007 ◘ La Nuit des Horloges / La Nuit transfigurée (also screenwriter, dialogist)