Bloodsucking Freaks (1976)

 

Do you like torture?  Then you'll love Bloodsucking Freaks!  Do you like films about cannibalism?  Well you can feast on Bloodsucking Freaks!  You say you like sadomasochism?  Then Bloodsucking Freaks can't be beat!  Did you mention that you would like a dark comedy satire of the shady underbelly of the theater world?  Then Bloodsucking Freaks is the show for you!  Do you like Nell Carter?  No?  Good, cause the bitch ain't in here.  But what is in here is an oddball of a comedy horror that I had little expectations about going into and while this isn't going to win any awards from me I will say I got more than I expected, and sometimes, that's enough for me.  What we actually have here is a film about a disturbed man putting on macabre shows whose audience thinks it's seeing a put on show but what they are really seeing are actual scenes of torture, dismemberment, and murder.  Originally this was titled The Incredible Torture Show  before Lloyd Kaufman of Troma Entertainment got his hands on the rights and changed the title.

What Kaufman also did, and was a little bit naughty in doing, was re-edit the film where he put all the scenes that had to be cut out in order for the film to get an R rating back in and then re-releasing the film.  Still with an R rating!  He got in a lot of trouble for that from the  MPA who soon after sued him for it.  Lucky for him all he had to do was apologize and the Toxic Avenger's Daddy was let off the hook.  Unlike a lot of the victims in this film that is!  This one has a little bit of everything from gore, to jokes, to disturbing scenes of torture, even including one of the "slave women" (as the victims of Sardu's human trafficking ring are called) being used as a dart board.  It's actually sort of a funny scene made so by the way Sardu and Ralphus gleefully throw the darts at the girls naked rear end.  Celebrating like two little boys playing a naughty game of pin the tail on the donkey.

Sardu and Ralphus are played by Seamus O'Brien and Luis De Jesus respectively.  Now don't go looking them up because there is not much else they have been in.  In fact somebody please punch me in the face so I might see some stars while I'm watching this trash (I use that term lovingly) because the chances of seeing any are slim and none here.  Directed by Joel M. Reed, this is the film he is most known for but not exactly in a good way as many protested the release of Bloodsucking Freaks as an unnecessary splatterploitation (I might have just made that up) film that was more gross than engrossing.  Today the film has a decent sized cult following and while I wasn't blown away by it I didn't hate it.  The gore isn't that bad as the special effects are low budget and while the film does feature eyes being plucked out of the skull and bodies being dismembered, nothing ever actually happens while we watch.  It all happens in a blink and you missed it sort of way where the camera always seems to cut away just when it matters most.  So while not for the kiddies (lots of nudity in here as well) it's not as bad as I expected going in.  I've seen worse gore and seen scenes that looked way more realistic than we get here.   

Now the film also has a weird connection to the world of professional wrestling which I am known to enjoy from time to time.  Wrestler Chris Jericho, who has been around for over thirty years,  used the name Ralphus when he was in WCW back in the late 90's.  Jericho decided he needed a bodyguard and he introduced his new assistant named Ralphus which is taken from Bloodsucking Freaks.  So what do I give this one?  It's hard to get a handle on this but it did make me laugh (intentionally, I think) more than I expected and while graphic I didn't find it gory or disturbing.  I mean the story is disturbing but not the effects.  I'll give it three games of backgammon out of five.  I know that seems high and if I ever re-watch it I might give it less but I did what I did and I said what I said and I stand behind it.