Blood Song

Blood Song
Directed by Alan J. Levi
Robert Angus (uncredited)[1]
Produced by Frank Avianca
Lenny Montana
Lee Shrout
Written by Frank Avianca
James Fargo
Lenny Montana
Story by Joseph M. Shink[1]
George Hart[1]
Starring Frankie Avalon
Donna Wilkes
Richard Jaeckel
Antoinette Bower
Music by Monty Turner
Robert J. Walsh
Cinematography Stephen Posey
Edited by Ann Mills
Production
company
Allstate Film Company
Mountain High Enterprises
Distributed by Summa Vista Pictures[2]
Release date
  • October 1, 1982 (1982-10-01)
Running time
 90 minutes[3]
Country United States
Language English

Blood Song (also known Dream Slayer) is a 1982 American independent slasher film directed by Robert Angus and Alan J. Levi, produced by Frank Avianca and Lenny Montana, and starring Frankie Avalon and Donna Wilkes. It follows a crippled young woman in a coastal Oregon town who is stalked by a hatchet-wielding psychopath from whom she once received a blood transfusion.

The film was shot in Coos Bay and Coquille, Oregon,[4] and released theatrically in October 1982. While not prosecuted for obscenity, the film was seized and confiscated in the UK under Section 3 of the Obscene Publications Act 1959 during the "video nasty" panic.[5]

Plot

In 1955 in Portland, Oregon, a businessman finds his wife in bed with another man, and commits a double murder-suicide. His young son, Paul, witnesses the three deaths, and is traumatized. Twenty-five years later, in 1980, Paul is incarcerated at a psychiatric institution near Stanford Bay, a small town on the Oregon Coast. One day, Paul manages to murder an orderly, and subsequently retrieves a beloved wooden flute given to him by his father before escaping the institution.

Local teenager Marion is struggling to adjust to her disability—she survived a car accident several years prior, caused by her drunken father Frank, which left her unable to walk without the help of a leg brace. She is plagued by bizarre dreams, which she comes to discover are in fact premonitions; while in the hospital after her accident, she received a blood transfusion from Paul, which has given her extrasensory perception into Paul's actions. Marion's home life is troubled, with her father being verbally abusive to her and her mother, Bea, and she dreams of leaving Stanford Bay once her fisherman boyfriend, Joey, obtains a job in Portland.

Meanwhile, Paul hitchhikes with a truck driver whom he bludgeons to death with a hatchet, and then steals his vehicle. He subsequently picks up a female hitchhiker, who he brings to a local motel in Stanford Bay, and murders her after failing to charm her with his flute-playing. Marion's psychic visions of Paul's murders increase in frequency and intensity, and sh soon witnesses him in person disposing of a body on a rural beach, making her his next target. Marion manages to elude to Paul, but he later discovers where she lives, and infiltrates her home, killing Frank. Struggling to walk, Marion manages to flee her home to an adjacent sawmill, and is pursued by Paul. While chasing Marion, Paul impales a worker with a forklift, and then inadvertently crashes through a barrier, driving the forklift off the pier and into the bay.

Later at the police station, Marion is questioned about her attacker, who she identifies as the "man she dreamed about." Unable to find any trace of Paul, the police assume Marion is mentally ill and is responsible for the murders herself. She is committed to the same psychiatric institution from which Paul had earlier escaped. While lying bound to a hospital bed, Paul enters her room posing as a doctor. She awakens, and screams in horror.

Cast

Production

The film was shot in 1981 in the Central Oregon Coast, including locations in Coos Bay, Coquille, and North Bend.[6] Though uncredited, Robert Angus served as an additional director on the film.[1] Its original working title was Premonitions.[6]

Release

The film was given a limited release theatrically in the United States by Summa Vista Pictures in 1982. It was subsequently released on VHS by various companies including Coast-to-Coast Video under the title Dream Slayer.[7]

The film was released on DVD by BCI Entertainment as part of their Exploitation Cinema double feature line alongside the film Mausoleum.[8] This version is currently out of print.

Critical reception

AllMovie's review of the film was mixed, writing, "Blood Song is dumb fun for those in the market for such and there is perverse enjoyment in watching Avalon's inexplicable performance, but don't expect chills or logic."[9] Film scholar Scott Aaron Stine wrote: "As derivative as the script may be, Blood Song is surprisingly palatable," citing the script's "sympathetic" characters as key.[10]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Blood Song (1982)". British Film Institute. Retrieved February 24, 2018.
  2. ↑ Willis, Donald C. (1984). Horror and Science Fiction Films. III. Scarecrow Press. p. 29. ISBN 978-0-810-81723-4.
  3. ↑ Goldweber, David Elroy (2012). Claws & Saucers: Science Fiction, Horror, and Fantasy Film: A Complete Guide: 1902-1982.
  4. ↑ "Blood Song". Film in America. Retrieved September 18, 2015.
  5. ↑ "Video Nasties". Melonfarmers.co.uk.
  6. 1 2 Thrower, Stephen (2007). Nightmare USA: The Untold Story of the Exploitation Independents. FAB Press. p. 424. ISBN 978-1-903-25469-1.
  7. ↑ "Blood Song". Video Watchdog. Tim & Donna Lucas (15–20): 78. 1993.
  8. ↑ "Mausoleum / Blood Song (Double Feature)". DVD Empire. Retrieved December 27, 2017.
  9. ↑ Beldin, Fred. "Blood Song". AllMovie. Retrieved July 4, 2012.
  10. ↑ Stine, Scott Aaron (2003). The Gorehound's Guide to Splatter Films of the 1980s. McFarland. p. 50. ISBN 978-1-476-61132-7.
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