She’s a fashionable, young woman who likes to stroll along a cold, ruin-strewn beach. He’s a poet in a mod suit who writes of love and death. They meet at a wedding reception and make a date for a bike ride that ends at a local cemetery. What could go wrong?
The Iron Rose (aka La Rose de Fer and The Crystal Rose) is a 1973 cemetery jaunt from Jean Rollin. A critical and commercial failure in its day, it has since come to be regarded as one of the French director’s best films. It is, by far, my favorite Jean Rollin movie, a masterpiece in atmospheric horror where nothing needs to happen because the whole vibe is just so damn creepy. It could be a high goth Before Sunrise, where a pensive couple-for-the-night talks about life while chilling with the dead. But, in fact, something does happen. Actually, a few things happen. I won’t spoil the end for you, but it’s a horror movie set in a cemetery, so you can probably figure it out.
Credited simply as La femme and L’homme, the couple at the center of The Iron Rose are, in a way, supporting characters. The real star of the show is the cemetery. In a Blu-Ray extra, longtime Rollin collaborator Natalie Perrey noted that the director wrote the movie for the location and that’s evident in the way that every action La femme and L’homme make, all of which appear to be dictated by their surroundings. The cemetery, Cimetière de la Madeleine in Amiens, France (where, btw, Jules Verne is buried), is of the centuries-old European variety with large, ornate crypts and monuments. It is wildly overgrown and filled with statues that are smudged with moss and dirt. It’s a cemetery that has reached the apex of exquisite decay. So, of course a femme and a homme on their first date would escape there for a tryst in a crypt. Of course!
La femme (who, we learn, much later in the movie, is named Karine) is, at first, apprehensive about entering the cemetery. Quickly, though, she succumbs to its charms. Maybe it’s the sound of all leaves crunching beneath their footsteps. Maybe it’s the occasional, quirky character they encounter, like the man in the Dracula cape or the woman dressed in widow’s black laying flowers on graves or the church bells ringing in the background. I don’t know, maybe she stepped on the wrong plot and got possessed. I don’t know and, really, it doesn’t matter. The point is, she gets a little too comfortable in the cemetery and, after the couple realizes that they are locked inside for the night, she begins to go mad.
The Iron Rose is a film about the space between the living and the dead. La femme says as much when she mentions the date, November 1, and that, “the dead are our friends.” Visually, this is represented in the foggy landscapes, autumnal foliage and, crucially, the film’s dawn climax.
Rollin was best known for sexy vampire films, so The Iron Rose was a big departure for him in its time. The sex and nudity here is minimal compared to some of his other films, although he does retain a similar mid-20th century gothic aesthetic. There’s also no gore in the film and the scares are implied, which might actually be a bigger shock to a horror audience in 2026. But, all that is what makes The Iron Rose a fantastic film.
Liz O. is an L.A.-based writer and DJ. Follow on Instagram or sign up for the weekly, Beatique newsletter for updates on new stories and gigs.
Listen to the Beatique Mix for October, 2026, featuring music from Hercules & Love Affair, The Strokes, ADULT., Tinashe, Gorillaz and more.
More:
Holy Sun Opera House Turned Recurrent Dreams Into a Gothic Tale
This Is the Dark Shadows Movie You Should See
Director Christopher Bickel on Pater Noster and the Mission of Light