SHOCK reviews the ultra-sleazy 1971 horror film BLOOD AND LACE on Blu-ray.
In the annals of PG rated horror films, director Philip Gilberts sordid AIP-released 1971 psychodrama BLOOD AND LACE kind of stands alone. No, theres no explicit sex or nudity, nor is the violence particularly graphic and certainly, nary a curse word is uttered. But I cant imagine a child seeing this picture. I cant imagine a child seeing it in 1971. I cant imagine a child seeing it in 2015.
But I can imagine a child in 1985 seeing it. Because thats when I saw it!
In fact, most ardent fans of this never-before-released-on-home-video-until-now sort of classic saw it the same way I did, on late night TV, free of any sort of adult supervision. It was difficult for a then 10 year old boy to understand the depths of cruelty and sleaze the picture trades in, but it was fascinating and upsetting, nonetheless. It still is. There are moments of such greasy unpleasantness in BLOOD AND LACE that I still get a kinky shock from them. Its the same sort of dirty thrill one gets from watching one of Jörg Buttgereits NEKROMANTIK films, or, more recently a HUMAN CENTIPEDE picture. But those works are near pornographic in their visuals. BLOOD AND LACE, remember, is PG (or GP, which at the time, was in essence the same thing). And yet it feels far filthier than any of those movies combined
BLOOD AND LACE begins with a murder, one that many critics have rightfully cited as having an eerie resemblance to the POV opening attack in John Carpenters much later slasher landmark HALLOWEEN (though they both likely owe their blood-spattered shirts to PSYCHO). In this film, its not a knife that stalks prey just above the gaze of the lens, its a claw hammer, one that lays waste to a man and woman, lying post-coitus in their bed. Some dollops of tempra-red blast on to screen during the edit-heavy sequence to provide a few frissons, but its the stuff that follows that really makes you feel icky. Seems the murdered woman was the skanky mother of sullen teen named Elle (Melody Patterson, who sadly passed earlier this year) and, as her mom bedded basically every man and woman in town including the social worker (Milton Selzer) assigned to protect Elle the cops are having a hard time pinning the rap on anyone. Elle is shipped to dismal group home run by the unhinged Mrs. Deere (Hollywood legend Gloria Grahame, miles away from OKLAHOMA!), a malevolent matriarch who uses fear, manipulation and violence to keep her young charges in the house, thus supplementing her income with government dough.
Elle slinks into the home and immediately starts making trouble, following in her friendly mothers footsteps by trying to seduce some of the hunkier lads while also brushing up against the sneering Mrs. Deere, who sees the girl as a threat to her operation. As the narrative skeezes along, we learn Mrs. Deere, with the aid of her sadistic handyman (Len Lesser, who later played Uncle Leo in TVs SEINFELD), is murdering her misbehaving wards and freezing them in a kind of amateur and none-too-successful cryogenic state. Meanwhile, Elle is having dreams of a scarred-faced heavy with a bloody hammer stalking her and a leering cop (Vic Tayback yknow, Mel from the classic TV show ALICE) bums around the peripheral, alternately keeping an eye out for the girl and lusting for her booty.
BLOOD AND LACE is one grubby flick. And its awesome. The scenes with the frozen youths being dragged out and posed to fool city workers assigned to check in on them, are disturbing; even worse, when the thawing bodies start to leak fluids from torn orifices, the slow drips are disgusting and unforgettable. The central premise of child abuse and sexual deviancy is splendidly politically incorrect and the final shot, with its insult-to-injury plot reveal, is enough to make you burn your clothes afterwards. Its gross.
Another thing of note about the film is the fact that the putty-mugged boogeyman is a ringer for Freddy Krueger, 13 years before there even was a Freddy Krueger. Both killers are burned and bald; both killers appear in dreams to torment their victims and both killers wear red and black stripped sweaters! With Wes now gone, its a shame no one will get the chance to ask him if he had seen BLOOD AND LACE during one of its many TV airings…
And watch out for the sequence early on where Patterson is inexplicably dubbed by June Foray, the voice actress who played Rocky the Flying Squirrel and who is kind of the Zelig of horror. Forays signature raspy voice also popped up glaringly in The Bewitchin Pool, the final episode of THE TWILIGHT ZONE and covertly, as the voice of Michael in a brief scene in JAWS.
Yet more strangeness comes in the form of the films lack of an original score, instead we have a melodramatic and often grossly inappropriate scratch library score of schizophrenic orchestral music; the effect is just as disorienting as the Findlay favorite SHRIEK OF THE MUTILATED, a terrible flick rendered far weirder by its ludicrous patchwork music.
Scream Factory deserves an award just for releasing BLOOD AND LACE seeing as, as weve already mentioned, its never been legitimately released on home video. Here, the company gives us a DVD/Blu-ray combo pack, with a nice high-def transfer of what I do believe is a slightly longer cut, with a few extra drops of blood, enough so that the film seems to have been upgraded from its original PG to an R rating! Certainly, this aint no David Fincher joint, so obsessing over audio/visual minutiae is foolish, but suffice to say the film hasnt looked this good since its release. Writer Richard Harland Smith provides a decent, informative commentary that fills in many blanks, and theres also trailer and an alternate opening credits sequence thrown in for fun.
Great film. Great release. Prepare to shower afterward.
