Scoop's notes on the multiple names for this picture: This movie was co-produced by Rollin and a guy named Sam Selsky. Selsky was an American ex-pat who had been living in Paris for decades. He was kind of a real-life Indiana Jones. He was trained as a geologist and a mining engineer, and led many expeditions around the globe, once being captured by (and presumably escaping from) cannibals. After WW2, he ended up in France as the local administrator for UNESCO. He left this prestigious (his boss was Julian Huxley) but not very lucrative job to open up first one, then a chain, of small art theatres. He eventually became the major importer of American movies in France. Selsky was the driving force behind Rollin's breakthrough film, "Le Viol de Vampire". Selsky's marketing of that film is the stuff of show biz legends. He knew the finished product was incomprehensible crap, so he screened it for the Boublil brothers (major cinema owners) with a steady stream of chitchat and insider stories so that he could rationalize their confusion by "sorry, I must shut up so you can follow the film". It worked, the film was released, and greeted by universal scorn. The magic was that the sex scenes, graphic for their time, caused a stir and Rollin developed a cult following.

Going back to this movie for a minute, "Virgins and Vampires" was Rollin's working title. Selsky hated the title so he opened up the naming of the film to a public competition. In classic fashion, he awarded himself the prize money, for the uncannily brilliant "Requiem for a Vampire".

The American distributor was Harry Novak, another exploitation legend, the guy who left Disney for "Boxoffice International Pictures". Selsky was furious to find that Novak switched his prize-winning title to "Caged Virgins" for the US release, but he told the press "Americans probably don't understand what requiem means, anyway"

Other notes: They actually screened a few minutes of this film at the Cannes festival back in the early 70's, because Rollin was something of a "succes de scandale" back in Paris. Rollin's films are filled with familiar obsessions. Runaways, lonely castles, clown costumes, vampires who need psychiatrists, people speaking in hollow robotic voices. These elements are as familiar to him as running water noises in Tarkovsky films, or trained bears in John Irving novels. I can never remember which of his films are which. The only one I can remember clearly was The Nude Vampire, where the vampire's slaves/victims looked like reindeer instead of bats. I suppose they did this because reindeer horns tied on someone's head, and backlit at night, provide an effect both cheap and kinda scary. Of course, it's not really too scary if you approach it cerebrally, since reindeer are herbiverous, and represent a much greater threat to your garden than to your daughters. "Look out, Marge, I think he's going to graze"