Blood Frenzy

A female psychotherapist and her small group of emotionally troubled patients trek into the middle of the desert(where it's free to film a movie) for some solitude, and a bit of therapeutic soul-purging and brain-picking. Once settled at their destination, members of the group begin to disappear, leaving the others to nervously unravel the mystery while eyeing each-other suspiciously.

A fairly pissant little production, BLOOD FRENZY isn't exactly a marvel of filmmaking genius, but there are scores of truly wretched titles from the slasher canon which make it at least seem somewhat more substantial than it actually is. Formulaic, featureless, and for the most part watchable, this is a nondescript film which serves up the barest meat-and-potatoes provisions and makes zero attempt to distinguish itself with fresh ideas or impressive showmanship.

BLOOD FRENZY should manage to appease most undemanding slash-cinema enthusiasts, but mostly in a tap-water flavored sort of way. 4/10

There's two ways of looking at "Blood Frenzy": A very standard, run-of-the-mill slasher flick that tries to cash in on the success of the first two "The Hills Have Eyes" films, simply by using the same desert setting and a similar stack & slash routine. Or: A modest, unrighteously overlooked 80's slasher gem that sticks to the point and uses the at the time not-done-to-death-yet setting of a desolate desert to its advantage. Since it also specializes in nasty throat & stomach slicings, uses very distinguishable characters and even contains a very basic, but to-the-point twist at the end... I'm in the second camp. All-in-all, not a bad slasher movie from the 80's, although it's an obscure one and you first must have seen a lot of those to be able to acknowledge this.

A Los Angeles psychologist takes six troubled patients (three men and three women) out to an isolated mine in the arid wasteland, but the situation turns ugly when someone's neck is slashed.

"Blood Frenzy" (1987) has an engaging set-up and a unique location for a slasher. While the tone is too exaggerated and mixed with droll humor to take very seriously, the characters are fleshed out enough to make them interesting.

Masculine Tony Montero is effective as a Vietnam Vet with PTSD while petite Lisa Savage is a highlight on the female front. Meanwhile Lisa Loring (Wednesday from The Addams Family) is striking as an adult and very good at playing a biyatch. Actually, she might do it too well, not to mention she hams it up a little too much in the last act.

An eye-rolling sapphic episode in a dirty cave (off camera, for the most part) dooms any possibility of taking the flick seriously. Why Sure! Still, there are some positives if you like 80's slashers and don't mind low-budget ones released direct-to-video. Think "Sands of the Kalahari" if it were a low-rent slasher.

The film runs 1 hour, 27 minutes, and was shot entirely on location at Calico Mines, Barstow, SoCal, which is a 2-hour drive northeast of Los Angeles in the Mojave Desert.

GRADE: C.

This movie was not in the least what I expected. With a typical brainless horror title like "Blood Frenzy", I assumed it would just be another one of those countless formulaic slasher films out there. In fact, the only reason I rented this tape was because the video box proudly displayed the distributor's logo in large, conspicuous type: HOLLYWOOD FAMILY ENTERTAINMENT. I thought it was absolutely hilarious that a company whose name implies that their movies are good, clean, wholesome fun for the entire family would have a title like "Blood Frenzy" in their catalog. Upon seeing this, I grabbed the tape and headed to the front of the store, not caring whether the film would be good or not. I just had to see it now.

Blood Frenzy is actually more of a mystery film than a true horror movie, although it does manage to blend the two genres quite nicely. The plot concerns a doctor who takes her six patients, each with serious psychological problems, on a trip to an old, secluded cottage in the Mojave desert. Her intent is to enact daily sessions of confrontational therapy with her patients, free from the usual distractions of the rest of the world. A couple of days later, however, we find that their RV is broken down, the food and water supply has suddenly become exhausted, and the people are being killed off one by one. Who is committing these murders, and how will be able they contact anybody for help?

This movie will really keep you guessing, and I think it's safe to say that even if you are able to correctly guess the identity of the killer, you'll still be satisfied with the ending. It really wraps the story up nicely.

If you ever get the chance to see Blood Frenzy, I hope you decide to take advantage of it. Though it's not particularly scary, it does have a great story, nice special effects, and a cast of believable, well-acted characters. I look forward to seeing more titles from HOLLYWOOD FAMILY ENTERTAINMENT!

Nowadays it's hard to come by this movie. The copy I found is very bad, audio and footage were damaged (and I even think it was a fandub?) and it's all in all a trouble to find this movie and then additional trouble to watch it and more than 90% of people won't endure such trouble to watch this movie. But those who do (and I'm assuming those brave few will be hardcore fans of the horror genre) will find a nice little slasher that obviously had effort put into it. Characters are interesting enough to make the watching of a movie entertaining and the whole thing has a certain kind of atmosphere and charm. It's not scary or creepy, so don't go in expecting a hidden gem, but it's still entertaining if you can appreciate the effort. It's also worth noting that the director of the movie is Hal Freeman, and he was a porn director, so it's no wonder female characters are dressed in a bit revealing fashion, which serves as nice bit of eye candy. All in all, just for the chemistry between the characters and the obvious effort put into the movie, I give it 6/10, but I recommend it only to hardcore genre fans, because everybody else won't finding anything here that's worth their time and can safely regard the rating as it currently is, a 4/10...