User reviews

The Reverand Alexander Algernon Ford (Gavin Reed) is from a long line of vampires, and tries to ensure the continuation of his lineage by abducting distant relative Susan Ford (Jackie Skarvellis), imprisoning her at Carfax Abbey, and using her as breeding stock. Susan's boyfriend Paul Donati (Richmond Ross) isn't about to let that happen without a fight...

Any review that claims that this is a good Andy Milligan film is misleading: it's not good... it's just not his worst.

A vampire film set in London, The Body Beneath sees Milligan taking a stab at classy horror, the director striving for style and atmosphere, but failing to achieve either. His attempts at a dreamlike Jean Rollin-esque ambience is ham-fisted, in particular the scenes featuring a trio of female vampiresses: dressed in garish coloured outfits and with crudely painted faces, they're like an unholy cross between Princess Fiona and Grotbags, unlikely to strike fear in the heart or arouse feelings of carnal desire. Andy simply doesn't have Rollin's flair for cool compositions, gothic eroticism, or ethereal vibes.

Milligan's clumsy direction makes this film a challenge to finish, but the dreariness is compounded by amateurish performances, a diabolical script, and a lack of gore, the only graphic scene of horror being a woman stabbed in the eyes with a pair of chunky knitting needles. The final 15 minutes or so see Milligan's awkward Euro-style surreality taken to extremes, with canted angles aplenty and vaseline on the lens for a weird vampire feast, where the Reverand announces that he and his clan will up sticks from Highgate to California, where he has secured tombs at Forest Lawn. I almost dozed off.

In what is clearly intended to be a poetic, darkly romantic ending, the now vampiric Susan and Paul awaken in Carfax Abbey to find the place empty... it's all theirs, for eternity!

2.5/10, rounded up to 3 for Spool (Berwick Kaler), the hunchbacked henchman, 'cos every film should have one.

A loosely threaded film - it's "stringy", cheesy and rather lame at best. It's a loosely knitted story and seems to be quickly thrown together to make a fast buck, yet it does get a little bit interesting once you get past the first 45 boring minutes of the film. I would have liked this film better if the first part of the film held my attention better - the last part of this one is pretty good though.

Green vampresses - and not all of their hands are covered in green... sloppy make-up here. The rest of the characters are fine, I just did not like the three green vampresses, rather silly to me. The best character in the entire film is the blood sucking priest.

Andy Milligan wrote and directed this - and for some weird reason I preferred his 'Guru, the Mad Monk' over 'The Body Beneath'. I guess "Guru" had enough cheesiness and strangeness to make me giggle harder.

3/10

To say THE BODY BENEATH is a *GOOD* film might be sugaring things a bit heavily, but it certainly stands as one of the more professional achievements put forward by schlock auteur Andy Milligan.

The evidence of more technically adept workmanship than in many of his other projects is multi-directional within this eerie little vampire opus, though the the gore is noticeably slight this time around. It's a fairly unembellished bloodsucker story with a few novel twists...a vampire-priest calls a meeting of all existing vampires at his Old England lair. During this meeting, he expresses his concern with the rapidly diminishing numbers of their blood-line, and motions that they move, collectively, to the United States.

THE BODY BENEATH looks like a project which Milligan took a bit more seriously than many of his other horror offerings. It's fairly coherent(an amazing achievement for him), and the pacing and exposition actually aren't miles away from the accepted norm. Is this merely a film which denotes the natural progress of it's maker? Is it a sincere attempt to bring something palatable to mainstream horror film fans? Is it a sellout? ...I dunno...all I can say is that it has all the quirky Milligan hallmarks, but it's far removed from the schlock quality of much of his other work.

4/10

Nonsensical garbage, cheesy costumes and long meaningless dialog. Seriously sucks.

In England vampire Algernon Ford (Gavin Read) realizes his bloodline is disappearing. With the help of his silent wife Alicia (Susan Heard), humpback Spool (Berwick Kaler) and three green-faced female vampires he abducts descendant Susan Ford (Jackie Skarvellis) to use her to breed more children. Her boyfriend Paul (Richmond Ross) come looking for her and they try to escape the vampires.

For Andy Milligan this is actually well-made. I saw the restored version by Something Weird. The color is bright and strong, the picture clear and the audio can be heard. Still this doesn't make it a good movie! The plot is more than a little vague, the pacing is VERY slow (even at 82 minutes) and it all leads to really nothing much. To make things worse the makeup on the three female vampires changes from green to blue for no reason! Also there is totally inappropriate music in some scenes that destroy any power they might have had. The vampires don't have any fangs either! On the plus side is the strong color, the incredible dresses the female vampires wore and some pretty good acting (noticably by Skarvellis, Ross and Kaler). Also Ross and Skarvellis are introduced in a pretty lengthy nude sex sequence which is quite erotic. They're both good-looking with nice bodies so there's NO trouble watching it. It adds nothing to the movie but is still one of the best parts. Andy Milligan made all bad movies but this is (arguably) one of his best made. Still, it's just too dull to enjoy. I give it a 2.

Please excuse me, but I forgot to put my name tag on my review and I inadvertantly hit the wrong button and ended up with a 10/10 award instead of 1/10. Could you possibly edit the review for me please. Regards. Brian Carruthers.

The Body Beneath: Directed by Andy Milligan. N.B. IMDb 82mins. It's difficult not to like a vampire movie with an odd bit of atmosphere filmed and produced by the late Andy Milligan, a director people love to hate. He was well known for producing movies with budgets ranging between $8 and $30, 000 dollars on a regular basis and giving the viewer in this case something creepy and surprisingly well put together. It was shot on location in England and some scenes were filmed in one of the most wildly filmed gothic cemeteries, Highgate Cemetery. An ancient coven of avant-garde vampires are hunting for their last living relatives in order to find a new bloodline in order to continue their existence. Their leader, the Reverend Alexander Algernon Ford, (Gavin Reed ) has the usual streak of cruelty in him but he's also a very different kind of vampire. He needs a blood transfusion before he can walk outside in the sunshine. I never saw a vampire having a blood transfusion before. Our friend the reverend has a lease on Carfax Abbey near Hempstead Heath. Very Draculaish, don't you think? He's accompanied by a trio of ladies, in particular a green painted, very red lipped vampire, looking more like a zombie, who walk about during the day and a sad blonde haired ski hatted mortal hunchback called Spool, (Berwick Taylor), their servant, who all follow their master in this schlock horror feast. Normally in a vampire movie you would expect a lot of blood and gore ,but in this one you get a lot of talk and talk. In fact, that reverend vampire never stops talking , especially when he reveals his final plans. The sepia unfocused green tinted look and its terrible mono sound with its home movie look about it seem to fit well with the severity of the decaying building where most of the filming occurs. The idea of the story has the makings of a good vampire movie but all those painted maidens and poor Spool (rather a strange name) get in the way of the actual story. Finally the movie itself is a bit slow at times but the last fifteen minutes are so crazily weird enough to make it worth watching though it's really for someone who loves a bad movie. bcarruthers-76500

Andy Milligan has firmly established himself in my mind as probably the worst horror director of all time. Despite making decent sexploitation flick 'Seeds' in 1968, Milligan has succeeded only in boring me to death with the rest of his crappy oeuvre since then, and this film is certainly no exception. I really don't understand this director at all; it seems like he's trying to make some sort of point as his films all have a similar style, but somehow nothing comes out of them but boredom. Take the plot pace of this film as an example; it's painfully slow and the dialogues are delivered by actors who sound like they're close to death. Quite how Milligan made this film and didn't realise how dull it was is anyone's guess...my only thought on the matter is that perhaps it was the director's intention to torture his audience? The plot supposedly revolves around vampires but for all I care they could have been clowns, postmen, FBI agents or French maids...it doesn't really matter. No film made with as little enthusiasm as this is ever going to be interesting, and after seeing five Milligan films; I doubt I'll be seeing another.

One of The better Milligan films that actually sort of works if you give it a a few allowances. One of Milligans English films, this movie actually is a good...okay...just...story of a vampires and such trying to get new blood into their family. (that maybe giving too much away, or not since the movie doesn't wholly make sense.) Technically competent which only has to survive the need to keep all of the actors in close huddle and some make up that would be too thick even on stage, this is a decent drama/thriller thats actually one of the few Milligan movies I can recommend on any level. Sure it dances the fine line around being a bad movie (and crosses over into that territory a few times) but its the sort of time killer you may actually watch to the end. Both better and worse than I'm making out this maybe the Milligan movie to start with if you have a yen so long as you understand what you're getting yourself into.

The Body Beneath (1970)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

A family of vampires realize that their bloodline is coming to an end so they must try and get new people in so that their family tradition can continue.

THE BODY BENEATH is one of five films that director Andy Milligan made in Britian and believe it or not this film has some fans out there. Sadly, I am not one of them as I found this to be yet another extremely boring period piece that just didn't have enough working in it to keep me interested. It's strange but the more Milligan films I see the more of them I don't like but at the same time I find myself becoming a fan. That might sound weird because how can you become a fan by watching bad movies? Perhaps it's the fact that no matter which Milligan movie you're watching you can tell that it's a Milligan picture.

I must admit that I somewhat admire the fact that he was making these period looking films on such a small budget. There are all sorts of technical issues with this film and there really aren't any "good" performances. With that said, the film remains mildly entertaining just because of that weird factor that the director always managed to bring to his pictures.

The auteur of "strange," Andy Milligan, has created one of his most appealing and accessible films with "The Body Beneath." A real visual stunner, it was filmed on location in a gorgeous mansion, alongside the most gorhic, decaying cemetery captured on film since the one featured in Jean Rollin's "Iron Rose," with a cast that is as beautiful as their surroundings. I feel sad for those who can't appreciate a film like this quaint, old school horror movie. Fans of the old tv soap "Dark Shadows" should get a special thrill out of this similar vampire tale . Among the characters brought to the mansion to be fed upon by the immortal Ford clan, a family of vampires facing extinction due to their dwindling supply of family blood, Paul and Susan are the most sympathetic.. Susan with her delicate pale beauty and Paul, equally pretty and bearing a striking resembalance to Sid Vicious, the two are caught in a vampires web of deception. And equally lovable is the unfortunate, much abused hunchback, Spool, with his sad and frightened eyes. It is important for a film to have likable characters. Of course the three "green vampires" were unconvincing, but they have precious little screen time. And thankfully Andy Milligan left out the nasty gore scenes that would have cheapened this very polished work, and the little nudity present is actually very nice, and not vulgar at all. The erotic scene between Paul and Susan reminded me of the one between Harry Reems and Laura Cannon in Milligan's "Fleshpot on 42nd Street," minus the hardcore inserts. He was surprisingly good at filming appealing sex scenes. Sadly most of Andy's non horror films are lost forever, but fans of cult horror cinema should truly enjoy this vintage gothic vampire feast.

I'm probably in a very small group of people that actually really enjoys Andy Milligan movies , this for me ,is without question , his best it's a very clear nod to "Dracula" 1931 version and Hammer movies that were still being churned out at the time , Milligan must have also been very aware of the story that was big in the press at the time of the so called "Highgate vampire " he uses about a minute of screen time of the location and even then we just see 3 pantomime style vampire ladies with green make up slathered over their faces attack a woman who is tending to a grave , the plot concerns a reverend who is a centuries old vampire whose bloodline is dying out due to incest , he traces family members who may or may not be good to sire the next generation of vampire children , he finds it in a relative who is already pregnant and plans to use her child to carry on the legacy , Its shockingly cheap , badly acted but there is just something about this film that appeals to me Don't go expecting a hammer style movie , this has more in common with Acorn Antiques !

I have a soft spot ( between my ears ) for this movie, I read about it in a vampire movie guide by Stephen Jones some 30 odd years ago , and even though the review wasn't positive, I still wanted to see it , well was it worth the wait? Yes for me it was , a vampire reverend wants to continue his family line which has been weakened by incest , and hunts down anyone who is distantly related to him, he kidnaps a pregnant long lost relative in the hope that the baby will continue the family line, chuck in a sad hunchback , some green faced lady ghouls , a shy vampire wife who is handy with a set of knitting needles and some tomato sauce gore and some ropey acting and you have a film that's as entertaining as it is amateurish ( part of its charm) think Acorn antiques and Dracula (1931).

Widely regarded by many staunch Andy Milligan fans as being one of his more narratively cohesive, dramatically robust and visually competent low budget horror films, his gloriously camp, sinisterly sardonic, fantastically skewed iteration of the immortally pilfered Bram Stoker mythos, 'The Body Beneath' has much audaciously psychedelicized, psychotronically-endowed magnificence to recommend it for those unfortunate souls who have yet to fully experience the spectacularly unbound cinematic idiosyncrasy of macabre maestro Andy Milligan's insanely addictive, avaunt-absurd, micro-budgeted horror milieu!

One of only two modestly budgeted productions in the United Kingdom, Milligan's singularly strange vampire yarn concerns the altogether nefarious plasma-purloining machinations of the deliciously theatrical tomb-trifling tyrant, the entirely irreverent reverend Algernon Ford (Gavin Reed), and once lavishly ensconced in the oppressive Gothic environs of creepy Carfax Abbey, the dastardly blasphemous blood-fiend and his obediently deviant entourage begin to malevolently coerce various bemused members of the disparate Ford Family clan to his delectably forbidding abode, and we then get to enjoy the outrageously outré manifestation of Algernon's monstrously profane blood rites!

While many of the vampiest tropes of ye olde Bloodsucker lore are garishly purloined, the lingering pleasures of morbidly magnificent masterclass 'The Body Beneath' is mirth-master Milligan's frequently outlandish repartee, his wicked predilection for vividly camp terror-theatrics, and inherent 'otherness' which makes his uniquely unsavoury exploration of Vampire Gothic so much absurdist fun! Gavin Reed's perfectly perverse Reverend is certainly no less ridiculous and fearfully flowery than Robert Quarry's sublimely sinister Count Yorga, and his mute, knitting needle brandishing wife Alicia (Susan Heard) is arguably one of the more memorably bizarre horror villains, plus the altogether pitiful hunchback Spool (Berwick Kaler) can stand proudly hunched alongside Ralphus as Grindhouse horror's most adorable and pathetic B-Movie freak!