Color Me Blood Red

This is the final film in the infamous Blood Trilogy from director Herschell Gordon Lewis and producer David Friedman. The trilogy also includes superior films "Blood Feast" and "Two Thousand Maniacs". While "Color Me Blood Red" is the most inferior film in the trilogy, it is still worth at least a one time viewing. The film does lack one thing that the other 2 films in the trilogy have and that is an original score. Both of the previous entries include a soundtrack that was scored by Lewis himself but for some odd reason he decided to use "canned" music for this one. The gore effects are also inferior to the other 2 entries...there aren't as many but one effect in particular is especially grotesque (this would be the scene where a woman is shown strung from the ceiling with her intestines dangling out and the villain squeezes the blood out of them in order to finish his painting). All in all this is one of the least entertaining of Lewis' gore films but is definitely worth a peek.

You gets what you pays for with Herschell Gordon Lewis movies. If you are looking for a great, original plot with interesting characters, well acted and impressively directed, then don't look here. But if you want to see a silly Roger Corman rip-off with lots of unintentional cheap laughs, and plenty of HGL's trademark, then you're in the right place. 'Color Me Blood Red' is the last in Lewis' Blood Trilogy, and is the second best of the three in my opinion. ('Two Thousand Maniacs!' just beats it for sheer entertainment value). Don Joseph plays a tormented artist who discovers a way out of his artistic rut - blood, lots of it. Joseph's acting is variable at best, but possibly the best seen in a HGL movie, and he comes across as a corny, poor man's Timothy Carey. Which may not be much, but it's enough, and his performance stands out from the rest of the inept cast, especially the bizarrely unbeatnik beatnik teens (WHAT was that all about?!), and William Harris' stupid art critic character. 'Color Me Blood Red' is dumb, no doubt about that, but it's dumb FUN, and should be seen by every horror movie buff for its historical interest if nothing else.

If you're a horror fan who loves gore and are looking for a gory movie, go check out High Tension. If you hate cheesy movies, go rent a new release from Blockbuster. This movie is for people who like quirkiness, b-grade film-making, c-grade acting, cheesy gore and.. FUN. I get the feeling that a few people who wrote reviews for this were obviously expecting something very different. This is NOT a horror movie, only in a very broad sense could it be considered one. It is a movie that is twice as unintentionally funny as any Ed Wood movie. There is no real comedy in Color Me Blood Red but the acting and direction will have you laughing throughout. This movie defines "grindhouse". Now that I've prepared you - Go buy it.

I rated this movie 8 out of 10. It was very good at doing what it tried to do. Giving this movie a 3/10 is a joke, of course it's bad but that is the whole point! A phrase I see a lot on the IMDb is "BAD meaning GOOD", not many movies are more deserving of that praise than Color Me Blood Red.

Just what does a teenage boy bursting with testosterone say, while with his bikini-clad girl, they discover a dead girl in the sand? "Wholly Bananas ! It's a girl's leg!" of course. That is just one example of the laughable dialogue contained in this thoroughly un-artistic look at a painter who uses blood to create his art. He starts by using his own, then moves to girl models for their hemoglobin, corpuscles, and plasma for his creative inspiration. Color Me Blood Red is the third film contained in what is typically known as the Blood trilogy directed by that world renowned director of gore...Herschell Gordon Lewis. Yep this film has all the Lewis trademarks. Poor direction...it has it! Cheap sets too! And that acting only Lewis seems to inspire...so bad it is funny. Many of the performers in here are so awful that one wonders how they were ever chosen, although the lead, Gordon Oas-Heim(Don Joseph) as Adam Sorg shows signs of mediocrity at times. For a Lewis film, Color Me Blood Red is a fun picture. It has some good honest to Gosh belly laughs(99% unintentional), and a story not too unlike Roger Corman's A Bucket of Blood. And the lead actress...Candi Conder does more than AMPLE justice to a very nice swimsuit! I had fun watching it...never took any of it serious and, for a Lewis picture, it has minimal gore(only four deaths). It gives new meaning to the phrase that life is a canvas!

Director Herschell Gordon Lewis's concluding film in his "Blood Trilogy" (and final film with producer David F. Friedman) unfortunately just isn't as enjoyable as its predecessors. It's not as delightfully nutty as "Blood Feast" or as much fun as "Two Thousand Maniacs!". In fact, it's downright tedious at times. That's not to say that there aren't good moments - there just aren't enough of them.

Gordon Oas-Heim, definitely one of the better actors to be found in an HGL gore epic, plays the highly unlikable, mentally unstable painter Adam Sorg, who's impatient waiting for inspiration to strike. It finally comes when he realizes that human blood provides the perfect shade of crimson for his works of art. He realizes that using his own blood is a very wearying process, so he has to obtain blood from other unwilling donors.

Overall "Color Me Blood Red" is fairly amusing cheesy nonsense with the gleefully squishy splatter and inept acting that we come to expect from HGL's films. It has its delightful parts whenever Sorg is busy doing his thing. It doesn't help him that "hip", goofy young folk keep hanging around his beachfront property. It's also cool to see Scott H. Hall, the police captain from "Blood Feast", here playing Farnsworth the art gallery owner. The young gals are all nice looking even if their acting chops aren't up to snuff. The beautiful beach scenery is another plus. And the movie does end on a very funny note with its final line.

If you're new to the works of HGL and want to do the completist thing, then "Color Me Blood Red" is definitely worth seeing. Just don't expect the same level of entertainment if you've already seen and enjoyed "Blood Feast" and "Two Thousand Maniacs!".

Six out of 10.