Killer B's on Dvd: The Blood Rose

While a new release from Mondo Macabro isn't necessarily guaranteed to be a great flick, you can always count on it being something different. The company bills itself as presenting the "wildside of world cinema," releasing some truly obscure examples of exploitation cinema from around the world. Their upcoming release The Blood Rose, which streets on August 28, is a French film claiming to be the first sex-horror film ever made -- a bold and frankly inaccurate statement, but it's an entertaining movie nonetheless.

Inspired by Jess Franco's 1962 film The Awful Dr. Orloff, which in turn took its cues from Georges Franju's Eyes Without A Face, The Blood Rose is broken into three sections dubbed The Past, the Present and the Future. During the segment dubbed The Past, famous artist Frederic Lansac (Philippe Lemaire) reflects on life as he awaits a doctor's verdict (or at least that 's what the onscreen text says). Through a flashback we see Lansac end his relationship with the status-seeking Moira (Elizabeth Teissier) for Anne (Anny Duperey), the true love of his life. The two set up shop in Lansac's secluded family chateau, even though Anne is startled (as was I) to learn that the place comes with Igor and Olaf, two mute dwarf servants wearing animal skins. On the couple's wedding night, Moira confronts Anne and the beautiful young bride stumbles into a fire, setting her gown ablaze. The segment ends with Lansac receiving the news that Anne has been left disfigured, unable to walk and nearly blind.

The section called The Present shows Lansac as a broken man. The world at large has been told Anne has perished, but she remains in the chateau unable to bear the thought of anyone seeing her. Lansac learns that Mr. Romer (Howard Vernon), a new business associate was once a great surgeon, but following a malpractice scandal and a stretch in prison, Romer is now performing illegal operations to alter the faces of wanted criminals. When Romer tells Lansac that the only possibility of restoring Anne's face lies in murdering another woman to perform a face transplant, the former doctor finds himself being blackmailed into helping. The section called The Future details the search for an appropriate donor.

The Blood Rose is a beautifully shot film with a truly artistic eye. The film is leisurely paced but gorgeous to look at, managing to be artsy without being pretentious, and the harpsichord music on the soundtrack adds nicely to the atmosphere. I've seen Vernon in a handful of European horror films over the years, including Dracula Prisoner of Frankenstein and The Invisible Dead, though this is the first time I've seen him in an un-dubbed performance. He has quite a screen presence, playing a character with a tortured soul and a certain slithery Euro-charm.The sex elements are present, but not in the quantity one might expect from a film claiming to be the first sex-horror film (this isn't porn by any stretch of the imagination). The film obviously has something to say about how beauty is often over-emphasized, particularly since no consideration is ever given to the fact that even if Anne's beauty is restored she will still be nearly blind as well as paralyzed.

Extras include an interesting text article placing the film in the historical context of French fantasy cinema, an interview with Didier Phillipe-Gerard, a friend and colleague of director Claude Mulot, still and poster galleries, and previews of other offering from Mondo Macabro.