Night of the Blood Beast

I’m going to preface this by saying there’s one genuinely cool scene in this otherwise 67 minutes of dreck that sticks in the brain. Astronaut John Corcoran, recently back from the dead, is asked what else the team should be aware of. He replies something along the lines of, “…and this.” The camera pans from his face to the door at his right shoulder. And in stalks THE BLOOD BEAST.

Otherwise, this is a generic, paint-by-numbers monster flick. Commie paranoia (I mean, our paranoia of commies, whether that was justified or not — and probably was, if you consider), and space race jitters infuse Night of the Blood Beast, a rather forgettable entry in the annals of Fifties Sci-Fi Monsterdom, albeit one with a big, gross proto-Gigeresque “Blood Beast” born inside some astronaut who was dead, then alive, and has a curiously vaginal orifice that looks like a toothless old man’s mouth in his arm. Somehow, sea horses growing in his blood escaped — and how the HELL they got there sort of missed me, as maybe my monstrous brain was taking a well-deserved piss at the time.

John Corcoran is the astronaut, and although I don’t really care who played him (Michael Emmet doesn’t really ding the appropriate and correct bells for horror movie hunk or heavy — although he does have a sort of doomed Lon Chaney Jr. mien about him), I suppose he did as well as he could given the admittedly limited range of the material offered. All told there are a small handful of stock monster movie scientists in some — I don’t know, I guess it’s in the hardscrabble California desert — but I wasn’t really paying enough attention and don’t care enough to go back and make sure.

I do want to talk about monsters, and the scientist Wyman (played by Tyler McVey), who ends up hanging upside down from the laboratory ceiling with “half his head missing.” Darn the luck, we can’t really see it (unless it was cut from this version, but I tend to doubt it). We’re never quite clear as to just WHY the “Blood Beast” goes on such a killing rampage — does it, Dracula-like, need blood? If it does, I must have missed it. But for a walking rubber suit, it IS an impressive SOB.

Impressive too is Dr. Julie Benson (Angela Greene), who has such picture-perfect 1950s well-scrubbed, magazine cover-girl looks she’s virtually a parody of herself. (I hope that came out right.)

Speaking of parody, and returning to our film, the Blood Beast either crawled out of the toothless maw on Corcoran’s arm, after he crash-landed, stopped breathing, and then started up again like some repellent, mildly overweight, third-rung Hollywood zombie. Or it must have crawled out of his ass like a loathsome little worm — or, more appropriately, like a sea monkey. Or sea horsey. Or some damn thing.

Anyway, it goes on a rampage, but holy frijole, it gets an earnest shot at explaining its position as a “peaceful” alien colonialist invader. Probably a Zionist, too. (It's just a joke, okay?!)

Okay, so Corcoran crash-lands, gives birth to a Red Menace, it kills Dr. Wyman (our Fifties Monster Movie Mad Scientist Hack), and then some other stuff happens where the two male supporting actors (John Baer and Ed Nelson), along with Angela Greene, and Georgianna Carter go around trying to whack the Blood Beast with flare guns they keep calling “Very Guns,” if I remember correctly. Yeah, they kill “very, very” well I imagine.

The Blood Beast was portrayed — at least his voice, maybe his body too, I can’t tell — by Russ Sturlin. It really is an ugly cuss, and brings to mind that Tromatic Troma terror classic Monster in the Closet from 1986 or thereabouts. That might have been partially inspired by this film, but this film was obviously a rip on Howard Hawks’ The Thing (From Another World) and just general stuff about space, Reds, rockets, what-have-you.

See it for Dr. Julie Benson, who stepped off the cover of a magazine on some L.A. newsstand back when Ed Wood and Bela Lugosi were fending off reanimated zombies — and their creditors. Produced by Roger and Gene Corman, who did such outstanding flicks as Hot Rod Girl and The Premature Burial together. Blood Beast was directed by Bernard Kowalski, who also helmed the deeply poignant, heartfelt cinematic masterpiece Attack of the Giant Leeches.

It was written by young Martin Varno, who later sued the Brothers Corman for royalties, attribution, what-have-you. The AI commented that this was “typical back-alley Corman business.” (And I thought these things weren’t supposed to HAVE opinions or make judgments!)

I dunno. If I didn’t think Roger Corman was so great, I’d be tempted to say he was a real beast of a guy. But he knew how to have a bloody good time. Salud!

Night of the Blood Beast (Horror, 1958) Angela Greene, Michael Emmet | Full Movie

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