Baby Blood

"Baby Blood" follows a downtrodden circus performer, Yanka, who finds herself carrying a mysterious parasite that has entered her uterus against her will. Now, she's eating for two, but not the usual meals— the parasite craves human blood, and will stop at nothing to make sure it gets it.

Given the tendency of French cinema to err on the side of the extreme (especially when it comes to genre films), it's no surprise that "Baby Blood" is as unabashedly gruesome as it is. For all of its other attributes, the film is, at its core, a gross-out body horror splatter flick that delivers mind-numbingly gruesome violence that manages to be legitimately discomforting at times. The film also plays itself as something of a first-person slasher film as well, with the caveat being that the "killer" is operating by proxy.

But there's more to it than that; there is also a well-shaped psychological dimension to the film that is captured effectively through macabre voice overs in which the parasite inhabiting the protagonist's womb speaks within her mind, commanding her moves and actions and chastising her when she doesn't do what it wants. The interplay between the mind, the body, and the invader is well-realized and offers opportunity for scenes that are unnerving and scenes that are darkly funny. Emmanuelle Escourrou gives an instinctive and engrossing performance here that is impressive given she is reacting mainly to herself.

Overall "Baby Blood" is a generally strong horror flick that excels as both an exercise in psychological torment as well as a no-holds-barred body horror splatter flick. Shades of dark humor and a playful edge give the film an extra bit of zest, but it doesn't even really need it, as there is enough clever writing and buckets of blood to keep the most hardened horror fans engaged on some level. 8/10.

This Gallic horror oddity sees an ancient parasitic embryo burst out of its circus animal host in order to impregnate a big-breasted, gap toothed strumpet named Yanka (Emmanuelle Escourrou), who is then compelled by the creature to kill ugly French men (in order to feed her new 'baby' blood—hence the title).

Baby Blood is certainly quite splattery, with a lot of the red stuff splashed around and the occasional moment of graphic dismemberment, but even with the high gore content, I found the movie rather tedious in places, due to some rather drawn out and uneventful scenes between the visceral stuff. The story is way too simple to be stretched over feature length and needed more depth in order to fully hold this viewers attention.

Director Alain Robak shows some flair for the visuals (in fact, the opening scenes reminded me a bit of Peter Jackson's directorial style), but his treatment of the story—an uneasy mix of horror and bizarrely comic moments— ends up making the film feel disjointed. Had the film been either totally serious in tone or more outrageously silly, it might have impressed me more. As it stands, it all seems a little awkward in style.

On the plus side, the gore effects are well handled (lots of stabbing, a beheading, a head smashed in) and the Lovecraftian creature, seen towards the end of the film, is an impressively original looking critter—all slimy and pink, with moist quivering bits (which, for some strange reason, has reminded me to mention that star Emmanuelle Escourrou spends a lot of her time with her kit off!).

French cinema isn't exactly known for its many horror masterpieces (the exceptions that prove this rule are "Les Yeux Sans Visage" and the more recent "Haute Tension") but, as much as in every other country, there are always some gore-loving genre fanatics that sooner or later direct their own independent cult gem. Alain Robak clearly is such an enthusiast filmmaker and his "Baby Blood" is a hugely entertaining and cheerful splatterfest, despite the poor and inept screenplay. The relatively unknown but impressively voluptuous Emmanuelle Escourrou (what's in a name) stars as the unhappy fiancée of a circus artist who gets impregnated by a parasite that burst out a newly imported cheetah. The fetus growing inside Yanka is pure evil and demands her to kill men so that it can feed on their blood. This results in some of the most over-the-top bloody and sadistic massacres ever shot on film, with cut off heads, slit throats and many outrageous knife-attacks. Of course, this exaggerated amount of bloodshed makes it all blackly comical and "Baby Blood" therefore shouldn't be taken too seriously. This isn't the fist horror film handling about ferocious fetuses/infants (there's also "It's Alive", "I don't want to be Born" and even the premise of "Rosemary's Baby" is remotely similar) but "Baby Blood" is much more creative and tongue-in-cheek than anything you've ever seen before. The camera-work is quite nifty and there are several cameos of eminent Frenchmen, like Jacques Audiard (director of "Read My Lips") and Alain Chabat (who played Caesar in "Asterix"). The script is very man-unfriendly, which is quite a new approach for exploitation! Nearly every male is presented as a weak and imbecile creature whereas Yanka gets stronger with every murder she commits. "Baby Blood" is ingenious, somewhat bizarre horror fun.

Well, The Evil Within (Baby Blood) is definitely a different sort of movie. It isn't just the loads of blood that make this movie a fun choice, it has good atmosphere and a great horror storyline that keep things interesting throughout.

The story circles around a young woman named Yonka. Yonka is a very unfortunate woman as she is impregnated by an alien being. Not from outer space, I might add. Anyway, poor Yonka, the baby inside of her can communicate with her telepathically and forces her to kill people and suck there blood to feed the creature inside. The whole story takes place over nine months and has one misadventure after the next, until the very bloody end.

I first saw this movie under the title of The Evil Within many years ago. It is better now then I remember it being when I first viewed it. The movie is incredibly bloody. Not so much during the first hour of the movie, but the last thirty minutes is something else. Of course, I have seen far more bloody, but, if you are not used to this type of thing, it can be quite disturbing.

The storyline in itself is quite original and simple at the same time. What makes it so cool to watch is the relationship Yonka is forced to have with this evil being inside of her. It can be quite horrific and humorous all at the same time.

If you like horror I don't see how you couldn't like this film. If you like Frank Henenlotter's work, movies like Brain Damage or Basket Case, I think this is right up your alley. 9/10

If you're looking for something a little off the beaten path, Baby Blood might just do the trick. It's a story about a woman who gets pregnant and starts hearing the voice of her unborn child telling her to kill and drink the blood of her victims. Wanting to be a good nurturing mother, she does what her baby wants and gets into all sorts of trouble.

Baby Blood might be stylish and filled with nasty special effects, but it also suffers from redundancy midway through. It turns into a series of murders as the lead character lures one hapless victim after another into her web, killing them, and drinking their blood. Pretty soon after, her baby gets hungry again and she does the same thing. The first few times, it's somewhat shocking and interesting, but it gets old after awhile.

Thar said, Baby Blood does deliver the gore, so if that's what you're in the mood for, you could do much worse.