This is the fourth in a series of five pieces on “minor” horror films that I’m going to be publishing here weekly, throughout October. For more information, please see this post from two years ago, when I first did this. I’m scaling things back a bit this year due to having (more of) a life, etc., but the basic idea is the same.
The Rider of the Skulls (Alfredo Salazar, 1965)
The Rider of the Skulls represents justice, The Rider of the Skulls explains to a boy who already seems to idolize him, despite having more or less just met him. The Rider’s parents were killed by bandits, and so on their graves he swore to devote his life to battling evil. The way he has chosen to do this is by putting on a black mask (later, a full hood, like an executioner) and a skull patch on his arm, and go riding like this from town to town, looking for monsters. A skull might seem like an odd choice of insignia for a hero who represents justice, but then, this is a strange land. There are wolfmen around, tormented by the full moon, and witches that can raise the dead and compel them to speak, and many more terrible dangers besides. It seems like the Rider is always running into these evil forces, and when he does, he always ends up having to do battle with them, in direct hand-to-hand combat. Although things sometimes look perilous, he always seems to win in the end.
