Sunday, June 24, 2007

I Drink Your Blood (1970)


Or, 28 Days Later for the Hippy Generation. Or, Old Yeller: The Next Generation. Or, Fuck You P.E.T.A.!

The movie stars this kid:




Actually, it was probably his father since the movie was released in 1970. You may be aware of the term "grindhouse". This is an original grindhouse picture. It was part of a double bill with the film I Eat Your Skin (unseen by me, and likely to remain so since it's not available).

I think several animals died during the making of this film (Fuck You P.E.T.A.). I think this because I doubt they had the budget to convincingly fake kill chickens, rats, and goats. And CGI wasn't invented yet, so....there you go.

This is also a highly political movie, probably a response to all of the peace loving anti-vietnam movies that were coming out at the time. I know this because in this film, hippies are evil. They slaughter animals, rape innocents, eat meat pies, and the women fornicate with construction workers. Oh, they also worship Satan. The opening scene involves a night time satanic ritual in the middle of the woods. The leader looks like the native american from the village people. The hippies stand naked in a circle around an asian woman (we'll call her Yoko), who is on her back being covered in fresh chicken blood. Evil. The leader (Horace) leads them in prayer. Did I mention he carries a sword? Evil. In this scene the sword is planted in front of him so the hilt looks like the hilt of his.....well...evil. On this night a local innocent girl is raped (or at least we assume she is) by the hippies after stumbling upon their seance.

The town is mostly deserted. There is a family consisting of granpa (a veterinarian), Sylvia (raped girl) and Petey (the boy in the picture above). Molly runs the meat pie stand. There's also a doctor, and some construction workers building a dam a few miles up river. The dam is never seen (not in the budget?). Well, in revenge, Petey kills a rabid dog (Old Yeller) and puts its infected blood into the meat pies with a syringe (smart kid). Guess who eats the meat pies. Now, this is good writing. Let's infect a group of already borderline insane hippies with rabies. That'll teach 'em (dumb kid).

As expected, the hippies become infected (some become crazy immediately, while others just act as carriers). One of the hippie females has a gang bang with the construction workers....and suddenly, you guessed it. Rabid village people. How do you tell someone has rabies? Well, if they have shaving cream on their lips, best run the other way. Or, at least find a shallow pool of water. The rabid are terrified of water (hence, the technical term hydrophobia).

How's the gore in this picture? Actually, it's pretty fun (except for the animal gore; you have to draw the line somewhere), considering the limited budget. My favorite character is the hippy Raoul. He's the anti-Duane Jones. You may remember Duane Jones as the black guy from Night of the Living Dead. In this movie he's the first infected and he goes absolutely bat shit crazy. We're talking lots of shaving cream here. He grabs an axe and flees into the night swinging at everything. The next morning, we see him swinging a dead animal against a tree.

One thing I learned is that even if you're rabid, you can still have well choreographed fight scenes. I loved the final battle between Raoul and Horace, involving the phallic sword. These frothing psychos are performing some kind of ballet. It ends with a sword going into the base of the losers spine and somehow coming out his mouth. Amazing.

There's a tragically touching scene where the asian woman (Yoko) infected with rabies decides to kill herself rather than give into homicidal urges. She is preparing to commit seppuku, but changes her mind and just sets herself on fire instead. This is a tremendous performance. Yoko is the one member of the hippies that does not succumb to the urge to kill. It's, in part, for this reason that the group dynamic falls apart. She refuses to join them in their travesties. It's for this reason I'm calling her Yoko. Also, the glasses.

The movie culminates with the Village people surrounding an isolated farmhouse where our heroes go to make their last stand. Is there a last stand? Not really, the movie is a bit anti-climactic and sort of rips off the aforementioned Night Of The Living Dead. Is the movie "grindhouse"? I don't know. It probably had about 1 percent of the budget that the recent Grindhouse had. Still, there's plent of severed limbs, nudity, satan worship for all of you freaks into that sort of thing (I guess that includes me). I'm giving it a plus rating. It's no Frankenhooker or Street Trash. It's certainly not on par with Slugs, but it's still kinda fun.

14 comments:

F-Stop said...

"hippies are evil. They slaughter animals, rape innocents, eat meat pies, and the women fornicate with construction workers."

Oh my god, I just shot fruit juice out my nose. Seriously, what a great review. I'll never see this movie but I loved reading about it!

brian said...

I an honored to have the one and only beepy post the first comment on my blog.

Yes, we all know hippies are evil and should be done away with . Did we not learn anything from Manson?

Seriously, thanks for the comment.

brian said...

There are two more fantastic scenes:

1) a good old fashioned rat hunt. The hippies squat in an abandoned hotel, but first they have to clear out the resident rat population. They use guns, knives, 2X4s, etc. Then they have some shiskebab. I laughed, but felt bad immediately afterwards. See P.E.T.A. I care.

2) Horace, you might remember as the leader of the hippies, after becoming infected comes upon an old farmhouse. He finds a caged boa constrictor. He takes it out of its cage and looks like he's about to star chowing down when the farmer comes running out in his long johns. Horace jumps on the farmer and gives him some kind of new age sleeper hold. The farmer passes out and has his head bashed in on the soft grass. The scene ends here so, alas, the fate of the boa is unknown. Sorry P.E.T.A.

Kerry said...

You are right, I may never see this movie, but I love reading your reviews. Though if an evil hippie movie exists, I may have to netflix it!

Anonymous said...

We hold these truths to be self-evident... Hippies ARE evil. Congrats on the new blog, Brian, looking forward to the next posting!

Anonymous said...

When's the Uncle Sam review discussing it's importance compared to other holigraphic covered videos.

brian said...

I'm planning a Jack Frost & Uncle Sam retrospective for the near future. Don't worry. I'll be adding Jack Frost 2 to my netflix queue as well.

Rebekah Bradford said...

Ha. I've been waiting for the moment when I could finally leave snarky comments on YOUR blog. "I Drink Your Blood???" Seriously... brain cells are in jeopardy here, and, between you and me, I'm not sure you can afford to sacrifice any more :)

steve said...

'the one and only Beepy' - hah! We should HOPE so ... and count our blessings ....

Anonymous said...

It sounds like this movie might be the crown jewel in the "evil hippie" genre. I am pumping it up to #1 on my netflix list.

Brian, I think you need to review Frankenhooker for your fans. Everyone is anxious to hear your thoughts on exploding hookers and super-crack.

brian said...

I'll get to Frankenhooker soon. I'm always open to suggestions. If anyone has a movie they want me to write about (Let's be honest, I'm not a reviewer), Let me know.

Anonymous said...

Holy shit- is that kid leaning on a giant dead boar or what?

brian said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
brian said...

That's a giant boar alright. The kid chased it through the Alabama woods and finally shot it dead (it only took him 12 shots or so with his automatic pistol). They call it "Hogzilla". His dad/uncle took the photo. True story. Google Hogzilla. To quote the kid: "The only good giant boar is a dead giant boar".