"I Drink Your Blood" is a cult classic of the old grindhouse exploitation movie days. The Grindhouse Cinema Database ranks it #17 in its list of the top 20 grindhouse films of all time. How does it hold up 47 years after its initial release? Quite well, actually.
The film centers on a multicultural group of Manson family-esque hippie Satanists. A teenage girl from a small nearby town witnesses the group performing a ritual, and is promptly caught and assaulted by the cult members. She survives, and makes her way back to town. The news of this attack does not sit well with her grandfather or her younger brother. The grandfather, a veterinarian named Doc Banner, decides to confront the hippies, who have now taken up residence in an abandoned hotel. They attack Banner, too, beating him and drugging him with LSD. This leaves only the little brother, Pete, to exact revenge, and he goes about it a truly strange manner.
Pete gets back at the hippie cultists by selling them meat pies that are poisoned with the blood of a rabid dog (extracted from a dead rabid dog with his grandfather's medical equipment, naturally). The band of hippies eat up and are soon seized by rabies. Due to their rampant drug use, however, the hippies contract some sort of super-rabies, which sends them into a murderous rage, attacking the townsfolk. The film then descends into craziness as the rabid hippie Satanists run wild like a predecessor to the modern "fast" zombie of films like "28 Days Later" and the 2004 "Dawn of the Dead" remake. The events leading up to the infection may be far-fetched, but the film plays it with a degree of seriousness that helps keep things engaging.
The strength of this movie is in its performances. The hippie cultists perfectly straddle the line between over-the-top cheesiness and actual menace. The leader of the group, Horace Bones, is captivating. He exudes an unsettling cult leader charisma, and knows exactly when to ham it up as a crazed rabid killer. The child actor playing the younger brother is surprisingly good as well; child performances are generally hit or miss, particularly in lower-budget films such as this.
This being an exploitation film, there is of course a great deal of exploitative and gratuitous violence. In fact, "I Drink Your Blood" was the first film to ever receive an "X" rating for violence. While perhaps not as violent as today's horror films, there are still many shocking moments throughout. There is a climactic sword-versus-ax fight scene between two of the rabid hippies that has a gripping intensity to it even today. The effectiveness of the film's violent moments is largely due to the suspenseful orchestration of the scenes. Director David E. Durston understands the value of building suspense through alternating longer takes with quick-cut bursts of intensity, rather than just reveling in shots of stage blood and rubber body parts.
For a film that is nearly half a century old, "I Drink Your Blood" holds up to the test of time. It is certainly a product of its era; the use of a Manson family type group of hippies as villains preys upon a fear of counterculture that was more prevalent in the late 1960s and early 1970s than it is now. However, the suspense is still effective and much of the exploitation still shocking. With the popularity of "American Horror Story: Cult" and Quentin Tarantino's upcoming film about Manson, it would seem that hippie cults are en vogue once again. Now is as good a time as any to revisit this offbeat and occasionally thrilling exploitation flick.
Rating: 8/10
