Delirio di sangue

Possibly the rarest Italian horror film out there and most definitely also one of the absolute weirdest productions ever to be released, "Blood Delirium" is NOT a giallo-mystery, NOT a zombie-flick and surely NOT a brainless slasher rip-off! This is something new and entirely different from Italy; a brutal horror story that successfully blends together harrowing drama elements with artsy themes and repulsively perverted footage. John Philip Law, the former action stud from "Barbarella" and "Danger: Diabolik", stars as a slightly deranged painter who lives in an isolated ramshackle castle and he firmly believes he's the reincarnation of Vincent Van Gogh. When his beloved wife Christine dies, he suddenly loses all his artistic inspiration but remains in the castle with the necrophiliac butler Herman. The painter eventually falls back in love with Sybille, who's the mirror image of his departed wife, but his inspiration doesn't really return until he discovers the blood of young murdered girls as the ideal shade of red paint. "Blood Delirium" is quite a disturbing film, especially since the sequences involving necrophilia & misogyny are illustrated like it's the most common thing in the world. For example, when the painter is still mourning for his deceased wife, the crazy butler (perfect role for exploitation-veteran Gordon Mitchell) crawls on top of her corpse and starts caressing it. Later in the film, the two men also dig up severely decomposed corpses, assault defenseless girls and carelessly dismember their limbs to make painting. Their actions are a lot more unsettling to behold, because they don't look or behave like your average homicidal maniac or demented serial rapists. "Blood Delirium" literally oozes with dark and bitter atmospheres, as it deals with complex characters and their even sicker world perspectives. It's not just another silly and gory 80's flick, but a devastating depiction of man's darkest mind-corners. The are loads of resemblances between Sergio Bergonzelli's script and Vincent Van Gogh's actual tragic life, which is a truly brilliant and original concept for a horror film. Bergonzelli clearly didn't have a large budget to work with, but the film nevertheless looks stylish and competent. The photography is rather monotonous, but this suits the overall tone of the film and especially the melancholic music tunes are terrific. "Blood Delirium" is an extremely difficult film to find, and I don't understand why. I'm sure this would be an authentic Italian cult treasure, if only it could reach a slightly wider audience on DVD. Catch it if you can!

Neurotic artist (John Phillip Law) is driven luridly insane by the death of his beloved wife (Brigitte Christensen), and his spectacularly vile necro-cannibal manservant (George Mitchell) diabolically turns the maniacal maestro's ancestral pile into a gruesome, cadaver-strewn nightmare! While the text is an amusingly camp, cliché-sodden shambles, the goofy exchanges, wanton sexual perversity, bloody eviscerations, unleavened hysteria, and endearingly rudimentary practical FX provides a cornucopia of bloodthirsty B-movie mayhem! This tantalizingly trashy, goriously tasteless Gothic slasher has scintillating Schlocky sensibilities on par with John Waters and H. G Lewis, thrillingly making 'Blood Delirium' a delirious treat for Euro-cult horror fans! Technical aspects of the splendid Screenbound Blu-ray are exemplary, pristine sound and vision enhances the plasma-plastered shocker's dazzling idiosyncrasies, and the extras offer compelling insight into the making of a sleazily demented Italian cult classic!

What do I make of this film? Well first, Sergio Bergonzelli did some of the more weird genre films during the seventies, and some of them are good too. How he managed to cast John Phillip Law for this one is beyond me, because this is probably one of the weirdest films I have ever seen. Quite entertaining and unusually gory and sleazy for being a film from 1988 (when the italians really had begun to make less extreme films since some four years back). The dubbing is awful, and the soundtrack sounds like something from a mexican Falcon Crest-ripoff. The end result is just bizarre and some of the scenes has acting and dialogue so bad you will be surprised. A mixed bag worth seeing for fans of italian 80's horror. If you like Fulci's lesser films, then chances are you are going to love this one.

This is a pretty wild one alright... Towards the end of the great Italian Giallo movement.

One thing that can be said about it is that it didn't just completely mindlessly go for brutal graphic gore as many did by that time. Although there are some pretty dicey scenes in it, and although quite sleazy at times, still, it is done with a fair amount of true Gothic atmosphere and at times an engaging Surreal mood.

Don't get me wrong, there are some rather extreme scenes here, but for me personally there is a difference to a degree as to the intent and the tone of something with that kind of content. In other words, you can have a coldly sadistic, very mean-spirited tone by someone like Eli Roth for example, a man who wouldn't know how to make a genuinely 'Fun' Horror movie to save his life.

Or... like in this case, you can have almost the same degree of extremity, but the tone and mood are all quite different. More of a Surreal, Gothic, almost Retro dreamy atmosphere where you still kind of turn away in Horror, but with more of a 'Fun' vibe that doesn't come across as mean-spirited in its intention. So, to me, there is a distinct difference.

John Phillip Law is of course very well known by this point for much better and more famous films years before like 'Danger Diabolik', and at this point he is clearly just glad to have the work. But, as Troy Howarth says in the commentary, and I do agree, is that even though his performance is Way the hell over the top, still, he'd rather see an actor fully commit even to a rather Out There role than just go through the motions. And, boy does he give it all he's got!

The guy who plays his assistant was also very well known at the time and had made many films. Their interaction during the movie I thought had a special something that made it almost more sympathetic, which is Really stretching the meaning of that word when you see him do some of the things he does. I will say that, without giving away any true spoilers, the one scene where he is continuing to rape the girl after she is clearly dead I found rather disturbing. But, thankfully it is very brief. Extremely Creepy, but brief... : )

So, not one I would ever highly recommend as one of the better Giallo films, not even close. But, just for pure wild effort and commitment on the parts of the director and actors, I will give it a '5'...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ My Particular Way of Rating:

5 - Flawed, but perhaps with some entertainment value.

6. A decently passable story maybe worth a watch.

7. A solid film, well made, effective, and entertaining.

And, obviously, you can probably figure out what above and below these would mean... : )

Blood Delirium is a very creepy and atmospheric Gothic horror shot on the cheap in Italy. A deranged painter and his butler dig up his wife's grave a year later to use her blood as secret ingredient in his highly acclaimed paintings. The butler is also nuttier than squirrel turd and a huge pervert, necrophile and rapist. The tone of the film is very dark and sleazy. The quality of the production is above average for a film this cheap. The acting is convincing and oozing with creepiness and depravity. The film has lots of gore, nudity and awkward creepiness and mental illness. It also has a dark ambiance. Recommended to those that want something bizarre and twisted.