Dr. Masali (Rafael Bertrand), psychiatrist and all-round scientist has one great scientific goal - finding out what comes after death and returning to the flesh again to talk about it, also known as a-tamperin' in God's domain (queue ominous music here). To achieve this he and his colleague Dr. Aldama (Antonio Raxel) make the most scientific of plans. Whoever of the two will die first, will find a way to help the survivor experience what comes after death and return. Aldama is the first to go. Masali is all too eager to contact his dead friend and - like any good scientist would - holds a seance. Aldama is willing and able enough to help Masali fulfill the dream, but can only speak in cryptic clues as to how he will do this. At least he makes clear that at a certain date, at a certain time, a door will close for Masali and the door to the afterlife will open.
In another part of the country, bland young Doctor Jimenez (Gaston Santos) has by now been dreaming of a certain young woman (Mapita Cortes) for several days. He is very surprised when he finds her as a dancer in a club he visits. She seems to recognize him, too, but reacts to this with obvious terror.
The young woman's name is Patricia Aldama, and yes, she is the daughter of dead Dr. Aldama. Her mother lied to her about him, though. She didn't want her permanently high-strung and fainting daughter to learn that her father had left them when Patricia was very young, so she had always told her that her father was dead.
So it is no wonder she doesn't recognize the man who now visits her and tells her the truth about Dr. Aldama as the ghost of her own father. The dead man also tells her she has to deliver a key to Dr. Masali. Money and perhaps something else will await her in his asylum.
Fascinated, but with a certain amount of dread, she follows her father's wish. When she arrives at Masali's she is soon disturbed by the arrival of young Dr. Jimenez, who is the asylum's new intern. As you do with people you don't know, he tells her about his strange dreams, only shaking her nerves even more. In his defense, I'll have to say it doesn't take much to shake her. I am reasonably sure breathing in her direction alone could do the trick.
While the two future lovers get to know each other, Dr. Masali tries to calm a very dangerous female patient (Carolina Barret) down with the magic of a musical box. At first his experiment is successful, but a ghost-induced accident closes the musical box and leads the woman into another rampage. Unfortunately, modern security conceptions have not been developed yet, and a conveniently placed glass of acid meets the face of the orderly Elmer (Carlos Ancira) before the patient can be subdued again. Masali (to whose expertises we can add plastic surgery) operates at once with somewhat undesirable consequences.
When he finally returns home from his work, he finds Patricia there. The key she hands him opens a small box that contains a little jewelry for her and a paper knife that sat on Masali's desk just a few seconds ago. The scientist knows this to be a sign from Dr. Aldama, whom he also recognizes as Patricia's strange visitor. A theory that proves correct when Patricia asks to see a picture of her father and promptly faints when she sees it.
Now all pieces a very cruel god needs to punish Dr. Masali for the terrible sin of wanting to know things are in place.
Misterios de ultratumba is an extremely artful example of the Mexican Gothic, brilliantly conveying a brooding mood of dark fatefulness.
Director Fernando Mendez made a handful of gothic horror films, among them the excellent El Vampiro, but this is by far the most accomplished of them all, in quality up there with the best of Hammer, nearly reaching the heights of Bava. The film shows a deep understanding of the use of sets that don't try to look realistic (the gallow scene especially comes to mind here), as well as of the importance of shadow and light to convey mood in a black and white picture.
The script certainly isn't very original and doesn't contain a lot of surprises for people who know their gothic horror, but is very well paced for a film in a sometimes talky and slow genre and does not take a wrong step.
What did surprise me is the depth of cruelty the film shows against Dr. Masali, who isn't a very nice man, yet never does anything remotely immoral. His only sin is his atheism and his thirst for knowledge, both sins that are in the world view of the movie so grave that it's not the least bit troubling when innocents have to suffer to punish the guilty. It is of course possible to read the movie a little differently: as a warning against a god who is as tolerant and kind as the Great Cthulhu himself.
Ethical problems notwithstanding, the film is one of the masterpieces of gothic horror and should be required viewing for everyone interested in the genre.
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