Blood
is one of Andy Milligan’s best movies, which is telling. It’s a slapdash, low budget horror flick set
primarily in one location that features crummy effects and inconsistent
acting. Some parts are out of
focus. Others are too dark to see. Sometimes the actors flub their lines. Other times their dialogue doesn’t match
their lip movements. All this makes the
film more enjoyable, not less. If you’ve
ever sat through Milligan’s atrocious The Rats are Coming! The Werewolves are Here!, this will seem like
Citizen Kane by comparison.
Lawrence
Orlofsky (Allen Berendt) moves his wife Regina (Hope Stansbury) and his gaggle
of assistants into his ancestral home.
Almost immediately, they begin performing experiments on bloodthirsty
plants to keep Regina looking youthful and vibrant. When Lawrence starts making eyes at a pretty
secretary (Pamela Adams), it sends Regina into a jealous rage.
Milligan’s
Everything but the Kitchen Sink method is admirable. Just when you start to get restless, he’ll
toss in another improbable (but amusing) plot wrinkle. (I wouldn’t dream of revealing why Orlofsky
had to change his name.) No matter how
shoddy the production looks, I can’t in good conscience dismiss a movie that
features mad scientists, vampires, AND man-eating plants.
Even
at a relatively scant 69 minutes, the pacing starts to sag about halfway
through. The claustrophobic location
doesn’t help matters either. That said,
there’s at least one memorable moment involving a mouse that will make your jaw
drop. While most of the performers are
wooden and/or stilted, Stansbury is rather charming as the vampiric lady of the
house. The ending, though brief and anticlimactic
makes me wish it had been on a double feature with Al Adamson’s Dracula vs.
Frankenstein instead of the crappy Legacy of Satan.
AKA: Black Nightmare in Blood.
as far as Milligan films go I prefer Carnage, Monstrosity and Weirdo the Beginning.
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