Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

A Brilliant Conflict

The movie runs out of plot and jokes well before the end of a two-hour running time, long for a light comedy.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

A Taste Of Blood is a bit of a departure for exploitation director Herschell Gordon Lewis. More expensive, slower paced and taken more seriously than his usual projects. John Stone(played by Bill Rogers)gets a package in the mail which contains two bottles of brandy, which he then toasts to the memory of his ancestor. Said brandy contains the blood of Dracula(which he slowly becomes throughout the course of the film). Bill Rogers does a good job as the lead and sort of resembles Christopher Lee. HGL gives a good go at a Hammer styled Dracula film. While lacking the funding and talent pool of a Hammer production, I think the godfather of gore did well with the resources he did have. A Taste Of Blood is a very enjoyable, ultra low budget horror film that may be less over the top and campy than most of the films Herschell is known for, but contains more gore than other films of this genre made during this period. It is a different sort of film for Herschell Gordon Lewis, but is entertaining and well made.

Anyone who has already seen a Herschell Gordon Lewis film will probably know more or less what to expect from this one; bad acting, terrible production values, a turgid script etc etc. A Taste of Blood has all of those lamentable elements except this time it's even worse than usual as the damn thing goes on for a massive two hours. I had a strong feeling that I'd be criticising this film for length before going into it and quite why Herschell decided to make this film this long really is beyond me; it's not even like the plot line is stronger than his usual fodder and all we end up with is a film that is more stretched out than usual; not a film with added 'good bits'. The plot focuses on vampires; in particular, the legendary Count Dracula and the action kicks off (eventually) when a businessman receives a mysterious package from London containing a case of brandy. Naturally, he decides to drink the brandy and naturally considering the film is about vampires, it turns him into a vampire. He and his beautiful wife then go to London to kill off the Van Helsing family.The sequence towards the beginning in which our hero receives the mysterious parcel from London really does sum this film up. This is a simple sequence yet Herschell Gordon Lewis manages to drag it out for twenty minutes; there's no suspense concerning the opening of the parcel either and in it's place is a load of padding that sees the three characters involved babble on about rubbish that doesn't concern the plot anyway. The rest of the film is no better than this sequence and is completely amateurish also; lacking any kind of horror or suspense and the little gore we do get just looks fake as usual. It's really a travesty that Bram Stoker's classic characters have been used in this movie too and the film does not justify their inclusion. Of course you could argue that it's not fair to criticise this film for being rubbish since anyone going into a HGL film will know that already; but the fact of the matter is that A Taste of Blood is a heinously bad film and it would be impossible to write anything about it without highlighting the numerous flaws. Overall, this movie is rubbish and difficult to sit through and should only be seen by hardcore HGL fans!

From the mind of gore master Herschell Gordon Lewis. a ghastly tale of the revenge of Dracula. John Stone(Bill Rogers), a quirky mundane business man,receives a couple of bottles of brandy that supposedly and unknown to him contains the spirit of Dracula's blood. Stone's wife(Elizabeth Wilkinson)realizes that her husband has become cold and distant since sampling the brandy. Stone is drawn to Europe, where he continues an awkward taste for blood and is driven by urgent revenge to destroy the last remaining descendants of Count Dracula's persecutors. Pretty lame even for Lewis's standards. Others in the cast: William Kerwin, Eleanor Vaill, Gail Janis and Otto Schlessinger.

PRobably HG's most ambitious project even more so than 200 maniacs, and I really loved it. It is very talky but unlike other HG and exploitation flicks the acting from bill rogers and willy kerwin is quite good and makes you care about the characters and what they have to say. Since its an HG flick we have some gore but its not one of his intensive gore flicks. There is a great scenes where the vampire stone takes a nice chunk out of a stripper dancer. I do have to point out however that almost all of HG Lewis flicks have a certain style to them to make you know its an HG Lewis flick. There's the out of focus closeups, lingering gore scenes, but there is also these horrendous day-for-night shots. This movie is no exception to that as the last 20 minutes feature some of the worst day-for-night shots ever filmed. Bad movie lovers and exploitation fans should be very pleased.