Blood Feast (1963)

[Scott]

BLOOD FEAST (1963) - This is the famous gore film directed by Hershell Gordon Lewis. After seeing 2000 MANIACS (1964) and a trailer on my SOMETHING WEIRD SAMPLER DVD a long while back I decided not to see this film. Then I said "Well, I better see this notorious film". Now that I've viewed the film I can say that it must have been very shocking with all the bright gore colors back in those days, but the dialogue and bad acting are atrocious. I mean it's bad to the point of almost being unbearable and I've seen enough bad acting to know. At least I got it over with.....................Phew !

[onionhead]

Lewis' actors were all just window-dressing for the gore, anyway.  I initially was turned off by the blood, but as the years roll by I have come to appreciate more and more the pioneers of the genres we take for granted today.

[Chris K.]

Ya know, just recently I decided to pop the BLOOD FEAST DVD in my player for old times sake (have't seen it since 2000, which is the year it premered on DVD!) and I still enjoyed it. Granted it's not a 100% "polished" production, but then neither is HALLOWEEN either!

In terms of it's acting, it's not too bad. William Kerwin, billed as "Thomas Wood", does a nice job playing the hero and Mal Arnold really gives a memorable performance as Fuad Ramses, at least I think so. Connie Mason stumbles through her lines a bit, but she was esentially hired by producer David F. Friedman because of her "Playboy" status as was never really considered to be much of a thespian at all (she would return in TWO THOUSAND MANIACS! and in that film she gives a rather decent performace). Now the guy who cries over the death of his girlfriend at the beach: yeah, that was REALLY OVERDONE! Yet, despite the film's shortcomings, I have to say that BLOOD FEAST still manages to entertain and deliver it's "cult status" in bucketloads. It's campy and gross; the gore still manages to be stomach-turning to this day which is pretty suprising! It esentally put Herschell Gordon Lewis on the map and paved the way for him to make films of this type. Simply put, BLOOD FEAST is a "one-of-a-kind" film that broke all the rules and then some and get's my admiration for it.

Oh Scott, if you have the DVD of BLOOD FEAST, listen to the audio commentary with Lewis and Friedman as they have plenty of stories to tell.

[dropo]

Have you ever had....an EGYPTIAN FEAST!!!???
 I love the cheaply taped "Legs Cut Off" headline on the newspaper!