Sortilèges

I was quite surprised by this movie. Obviously it was made with no money at all, but acting, photography, editing and story are well done. Proves once more you can do an entertaining movie with very little. "Blood Beat" owes a bit to "Poltergeist", "Witchboard" and "The Shining" maybe, but has a good storyline of its own about the ghost of evil (dressed up as a samurai warrior, also incarnated in one young lady) against a family whose members seem to have a certain talent for (good) magic. The special FX to show the magic (red powerlines vs blue powerlines) look ridiculous by today's standards, but hey, this is just a cheap little horror movie to waste a Sunday afternoon with, okay? The movie has a couple of memorable scenes (e.g. the samurai slaying the older woman, while the possessed young lady is getting more and more "excited", I thought the rapid cutting was breathtaking). If you see a copy on a probably dusty shelf, give it a try, as the video tape will be cheap I bet.

Bloodbeat is an odd tale about a brother and sister who come home for Christmas...only to end up fighting for their lives in a battle of light vs darkness.

The kids grew up hunting deer with their father, but their mother is a psychic artist, sorceress and prophetess, who paints what she forsees.

Thus, when her son brings home his new girlfriend for Christmas, to meet the family, she senses that something isn't right with her.

They make the mistake of bringing the girl deer hunting with them.

Where she ends up freaking out and running away...right into the path of a dying man.

Later that night, she has a dreams of finding a suit of samurai armour in a chest.

Now, every time she gets riled up- or has an orgasm- this rogue samurai comes to life...and attempts to hunt down and kill any and all of the deer hunters who happen to be in the vicinity.

After killing all of the neighbours...the ghost turns his sights on the family itself.

The mother- having been privy that something was awry- tries to intervene, and use her magic to stop the entity.

But it's vengeful spirit is just too powerful.

It's not until the two siblings combine their powers- which they have inherited from their mother- that they are able to stop this dark ronin once and for all.

The film doesn't do a very good job of explaining exactly who the ronin is, where it came from, why it was attached to the boy's girlfriend, or where the mother had "seen (the girl) before", despite those being central elements to the plot.

It all just kind of goes down...and then ends.

So you're left kind of confused in the end, other than, perhaps, to read into it, that the ronin is the devil, who, for some reason, has become attached to the girl, so as to attack this family that possesses powerful spiritual abilities.

But, really, that's all just reasoned speculation, based on a few subtle elements of the storyline.

It's not the worst supernatural Christmas slasher out there, but, they certainly could have done a better job developing the plot structure a little better...

4.5 out of 10.

You could call Blood Beat a slasher film, but that would be too easy. It might have all the trappings of one (mostly one secluded location, a sword twirling villain, a decent body count), but it marches to the beat of its own wonky drummer.

I'm not saying Blood Beat is good, but nothing this unique and odd can be totally bad. I was riveted from start to finish, so it must have done something right. Mostly, I just couldn't believe my eyes. I found it all rather well shot and appealing looking and the addition of a Japanese samurai as a villain is certainly not something you see a lot of. There's also an incredibly odd sequence (in this movie? Shocker!) where a young woman's masturbation seems to beacon the killer to her location. It sorta felt like a similar moment in High Tension.

Blood Beat is a hard one to recommend, because everyone's threshold for strange, artsy trash is different, but it's worth giving a shot. You might enjoy it.

"Blood Beat" follows a young woman named Sarah who goes along with her boyfriend to his family's rural farmhouse in Wisconsin to spend Christmas. Their celebrations are soon interrupted by her boyfriend's mother's apparent psychic visions, followed by the spirit of a Japanese samurai soldier armed with a sword who begins decking the halls with body parts.

I think it's probably inarguable that "Blood Beat" is the strangest Christmas-set horror film that's ever been made. It's not really a "Christmas film," though for some reason it is set during the holiday; it's also not entirely a slasher film, as it is littered with supernatural goings on and psychic extravagances that go without explanation.

The most baffling (and alluring) thing about the film is that next to nothing is elucidated for the audience; the psychic connections between the characters, the ghost of the samurai, the utterly bizarre dialogue--it all comes and goes with a casual passiveness that is rather astounding. I have read that the French filmmakers who made the film were on drugs during its shooting, which does not surprise me in the least. However, I will admit that, despite its logical inconsistencies and bizarre structure, the film is actually well-shot, especially for having been made on a shoestring budget. It looks fairly professional and slick at times, save the odd camera filter edits that go wild in the final act. The atmosphere is at times creepy and oppressive, and the wintry woodsy setting is well-captured, adding a chilly element to the proceedings. In some ways, the film reminded me of its equally strange contemporary "Satan's Blade."

Overall, I found myself consistently perplexed and amused by "Blood Beat," mainly because so little of it makes a shred of sense. One can try and put the pieces together themselves, though I'm not sure they were designed with the forethought to be put together in the first place. The film is utterly bizarre, and I say that as someone who has seen their fair share of weirdo genre flicks. If nothing else, "Blood Beat" is a true B-movie one of a kind. 6/10.

Blood Beat (1983)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Extremely bizarre low-budget slasher about a group of people living in the woods of Wisconsin where they hunt deer and do very little else. One of the women begins to see strange things and before long a samurai warrior has her possessed.

Fabrice A. Zaphiratos wrote, composed, edited, shot and directed this bizarre film that's not really that good but at the same time if I ever met the man I'd have to shake his hand. I say that because quite often low-budget movies try to cash in on a popular genre while not doing anything original. If you're familiar with the slasher craze that was going on during this period then you know it was basically a bunch of horny teens in a variety of locations being stalked by a killer.

What's so interesting about BLOOD BEAT is the fact that the director really did try to do something different. This is a very bizarre movie and it's not one that is easy to write about because it's so darn weird that most people wouldn't believe what you're saying. The possession scenes, if you want to call them that, are being weird in their own right and why a samurai? In fact, why a samurai in Wisconsin of all places? The entire movie was obviously shot on a low-budget so there aren't any good special effects, no real memorable kills or anything like that.

The only thing you've got is this really weird idea that plays out about as weird as you could expect. I keep using the words bizarre and weird but there's really not other way to describe this movie. The performances are pretty much what you'd expect from a film like this and there's really nothing good here. The budget was way too low for the material to work but once again I tip my hat to the filmmaker for at least trying something different. In doing so he's at least created something you won't forget.