The Body Beneath

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.

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.

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

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

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