The Blood Beast Terror

Working for Tigon British Film Productions, accomplished director Vernon Sewell delivers a modest sci-fi horror film with crime overtones that doesn’t really achieve its aim of emulating the films being produced by Hammer Productions at the time, particularly in regards to the monster-woman theme – consider, for example, minor cult classics such as “The Gorgon” (1964), or “The Reptile” (1966).

Overall, the cast is hardly inspiring. Peter Cushing, although lacking brilliance, turns in his usual professional performance, but the other actors are resoundingly mediocre (the obligatory mad doctor was particularly lukewarm). A superficial screenplay that piles a lot of dead weight (such as the cursory hypnosis scene) onto an already rickety plot also takes its share of the blame.

Though there’s no lack of bizarre imagery seasoned with an indisputable dash of the macabre – Meg’s bloody transformation into the mega-chrysalis first and foremost – the set design is so low-budget that the makeup seems to have come straight from a Roger Corman factory.