BLOOD (ANDY MILLIGAN, 1974)

Andy Milligan films are an ordeal: out of focus, the dialogue inaudible, the acting rarely less than screeching, extreme gore mixed with shoddy period melodrama. Blood Feast meets Downton Abbey. Every character in them is unlikeable and filled with hatred and resentment. Imagine the jarring opening of John Waters' Desperate Living if it had been filmed through a pair of piss-stained tights and the audio had been distorted so much it sounds like an EVP recording of a spectral entity. That's an Andy Milligan film.

However there is a hypnotic quality in his films and, dare I say it, brief flashes of genius. Milligan made a great number of films in his career, and a huge chunk of these were horror films. Titles such as Bloodthirsty Butchers, Torture Dungeon, Gutter Trash, The Ghastly Ones, The Filthy Five, Dragula, and Depraved! were regular money spinners in grindhouses and drive-ins back in the 60s and 70s. Cheaply produced and sensationally marketed, Miligan films must have baffled and disappointed even the most undemanding pervert in the audience. Sadly, a lot of these films have been lost forever. This is partly due to the dodgy dealings of the the exploitation labels themselves (including the notorious Mishkin company) and due to the fact that even the most hardcore of trash film enthusiast have largely ignored Milligan. As Stephen King stated, "The Ghastly Ones is the work of morons with cameras." Calm down big-faced spooky Steve, we've all seen your sole directorial effort Maximum Overdrive. It isn't exactly cinematic gold.

Unusually for a Milligan film, this scene doesn't end with her spitting into his mouth. Or incest. 

Blood is one of Milligan's better films, an allegedly gothic tale which was filmed mostly in his own home. Watching Blood is like watching a home video of an extremely dysfunctional family. An undead family from a Nineteenth Century episode of Jeremy Kyle. DID MY WEREWOLF LOVER'S VAMPIRE WIFE KILL MY BROTHER WHO WAS ALSO MY LOVER? Lie detector time (stick something on the end of it!)

It is some point in the late 1800s, and Lawrence Orlovsky, the son of the wolfman, is stuck in a loveless arranged marriage with Regina, the daughter of Dracula. They move into a new home, a large house more suited to Lawrence's botanical experiments. They bring with them 'sexy' assistant Carrie, legless butler Orlando, and jabbering hunched imbecile Carlotta. In the basement, Lawrence cultivates a crop of man-eating plants in order to brew an antidote for Regina's vampirism. Oddly, if she isn't given this antidote, her face turns into this putty faced howler you see before you. I have no fucking idea why.

Poor cow.

This new beginning is short-lived however, as the family spiral towards a fiery death due to infidelity, incestual infidelity, vampiric infidelity, lycanthropic infidelity, poor financial planning, murder and mutilation. There is never a dull moment, and at just under 60 minutes, the film squeezes in a ludicrous amount of nonsense.  

Cruelty is the underpinning theme of Andy Milligan's grubby little pictures. He manages to inject his films with intense venom, each word spat out with disgust, in shabby sets meant to represent Victorian grandeur. After Lawrence refuses Regina's sexual advances, she venomously states "you wish it were her breasts instead of mine." Poor Carlotta, the limping tit is heaped with the worst treatment. She is beaten, abused, and even used to feed the plants, until she is a nothing but a twisted deformed monster. I can just picture Milligan, relishing writing the cruelty heaped upon her. He was an unashamed misogynist and his hatred of women comes oozing out of each line of dialogue spat from his hideous characters. He was known to slap his actresses and gained huge satisfaction if he could make them cry.

Overall, Blood is an entertaining spurt of ridiculousness from Milligan. It is at least coherent, and in the world of Andy Milligan, that is about the best we can hope for. 

Gothic set design, Andy Milligan style. 

If you get this chance, I really recommend the book The Ghastly One: The Sex-Gore Netherworld of Filmmaker Andy Milligan by Jimmy McDonough. A terrifying insight into the mind of a man who can produce such bizarre zero-budget cinema. Despite being openly gay, Milligan married a women he hated and celebrated his wedding night by cruising New York gay bars for S & M fun. He also had a friend who ate teenage boys' sperm on toast and another who bombed abortion clinics. He also was known to have sexual relations with his mother. If you would like to see what kind of art comes out of a man with this kind of upbringing then I recommend you check out some of his films. A number are available uncut on Youtube, and the BFI just put out a Blu-Ray of Nightbirds and The Body Beneath. Be warned though, his films make early John Waters films look polished.

BEST SCENE: Regina luring Carrie's brother / lover to a cleaver in the head.

Incest-loving hunk death. A sad waste.

BEST EXTRA: Nosy old tart and grave keeper, Petra. Her love of sparkly jewels leads her into a misguided blackmail attempt. Like all blackmailers, it eventually ends in hand amputation and vampire attack. Silly bitch.

JEWELS JEWELS JEWELS

BEST DIALOGUE:  Regina:            I hate you! Go to hell!
                                             Lawrence:       We're there already.



DOUBLE BILL MATERIAL: Seeds of Sin (1968), Mark of the Devil (1970), The Touch of Her Flesh (1968)