Revenge Of The Blood Beast (1966)

[GlacierTuba]

What a load of dysentery! Bloke who looks like a cross between Nigel Havers, John Boy Walton and Nick Rivers and talks like Richard E Grant, kips at a hotel with his wife who has a face that would terrify you in cold blood if she woke you getting up to go to the toilet in the middle of the night. They wake up some old trout that died 200 years ago and some stuff happens. The end.

This is a film made on a budget of about 8p and it shows. Director Michael Reeves is even quoted (from archival comments) in the booklet admitting that the film is atrocious. The thing is, as terrible as the film is, it is both endearing to view but also genuinely shows promise of what could have been a decent film underneath. It gets absolutely stupidly shit towards the end and feels more like Z grade farce than any sort of entrail-gurgling terrifying disembowlement fiesta.

It's a super breezy watch at a cheeky 79 minutes, and in fairness to Raro this is a nice disc with good picture quality, good English and Italian audio tracks (the film is presented as an Italian production but appears clearly English-funded, the booklet even states this) and a decent bounty of extras, including a commentary track and separate interviews with Nigel Havers and the woman who looks like Morticia Addams.

The booklet throws some really interesting light on how the film came to be, essentially Reeves rocked up with a camera and a briefcase full of banknotes to pay for the project and got to work. Also how it was Reeves' first film though there is a legend that says he directed Castle of the Living Dead (unproven), and lots more outside of the booklet that I haven't delved in to yet.

This isn't your typical Raro busting skulls open with .45's and hooning around Rome in Alfa Romeo's and Lancia's eurocrime scrumptiousness. This is not the Raro we know and love, but for €10 you could do a lot worse.