 |
| Images courtesy of Blood Sick Productions |
Donald Farmer, though new to me, is something of a
wunderkind in the SOV lo-fi video film world.
Going as far back as 1974 with his short film The Summoned before
returning in 1987 as a kind of Jim Wynorski meets Joe Begos type with Cannibal
Hookers and thereby igniting a steady output of like-minded microbudget
action-horror sleaze productions, Farmer’s been around the block. Which makes his crossover into the realm of
Blood Sick Productions and their line of microbudget SOV films, in theory, an
exciting one.
On paper, drawing from the
17th century Hungarian legend of Countess Elizabeth Bathory and
transposing it to modern day America should promise a burlesque Lovecraftian
horror romp. Thing is, Donald Farmer is
so prolific that quality control tends to go out the window with a lot of his
shoots. In the indie SOV film horror
world, Farmer and his usual blonde bombshell scream queen starlets Jessa Jupiter
Flux and Angel Bradford are the king and queens. To the rest of us, watching rubber hand
puppets of a mythic demonic baby monster gumming on Flux’s monster boobs gets a
little stale at the one-hour mark.
The Bathorian myth is one that’s been adapted numerous times
over the years including by Nicolas Winding Refn with The Neon Demon,
the idea being Bathory would bath herself in her victims’ blood to preserve her
youth, one which also found its way into Hostel: Part II. Here, Bathory played by Jessa Jupiter Flux
has survived centuries following a Satanic union and upon reentry into contemporary
America, she zeroes in on a seemingly innocent battered but beautiful young
woman named Jenny (Angel Bradford) abused by her domineering boyfriend and
trying to interview for a job. Cornering
and seducing the young woman following a semi-offscreen demonic rape, Bathory’s
plan goes accordingly with one unexpected caveat: Jenny gains demonic
superhuman powers too and quickly transforms into a carnivorous flesh-eating
demon. Meanwhile the monster baby, a
rubber hand puppet that looks like a xenomorph crossed with a turtle, arises to
be reared as a kind of antichrist figure.
Mostly an excuse for the scream queens to do some nudity and
get into some compromising positions, the film written by Donald Farmer and
Newt Wallen looks decent enough like it was shot in 1080p by cinematographer
Curtis Everitt with the blue-red crossover lighting reminiscent of Dario Argento
or Mario Bava. Featuring a keyboard score
co-authored by Mike Treblicock and co-editor Tim Ritter, decent gore makeup
effects by Jessie Seitz and a pretty silly looking puppet designed by Josh
Wasylink, this microbudget one-hour-and-eight-minute little short horror feature
doesn’t have a whole lot going for it unless you’re already a studied fan of
the scream queens featured here or are a disciple of Donald Farmer’s out-of-fucks-to-give
workaholic output. The disc looks and
sounds decent enough with 2.0 stereo audio, a director’s introduction and a BTS
photo press kit among the extras.
Blood Sick Productions is an interesting label primarily focused
on grimy VHS looking films ala Visual Vengeance, which makes this one Blood
Bitch Baby kind of an outlier for being so squeaky clean digital
crispy. Some shots are out of focus,
intentionally and sometimes unintentionally, but the built-in audience for these
aren’t going to care one way or the other.
The career of Donald Farmer is indeed an interesting rabbit hole worth going
down some of, but even fans of his will attest not all of them are good. As a blind buy, worth the risk for some and
to its credit the disc art of just an image from the film and no written
insignia is kind of unique. Still, I was
hoping for another videotape and instead got a digital workflow production this
time around. That said, I recommend one
of their earlier releases Coven of the Black Cube to get a better idea
of the analog tape promise of Blood Sick Productions.
--Andrew Kotwicki
