Queen of Blood (1966)

Wonderful character development!

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Crappy story, acting, dialogue, fx, cinematography, and music, just plain crappy movie.Incredibly bad. You can find better acting from a photograph. The dialogue sucked beyond belief. Characters acting stupid. The fx were lousy, real cheap. Music sucked. Crappy cinematography. Sets and colors sucked. The story sucked. It all just sucked. I remember seeing this on TV in the 70s and I guess back then there was limited movies to watch and we were all slaves to what the TV broadcast. All I remembered was the strange alien vampire queens. So here it is. They had a budget, and they blew it on this nonsense. It could have been decent. But no.Best part was the alien vampire queen. And she only had a small part. No dialogue from her. But super creepy. If it wasn't for her performance my rating would be a 1. If you want or need to see this movie, only watch the last 20 minutes when the queen shows up.

Queen of Blood (1966)** 1/2 (out of 4) Earth finally manages to make contact with an alien form but that form crashes on Mars so astronauts are sent to try and rescue any survivors. Allan Brenner (John Saxon) and Laura James (Judi Meredith) both have different opinions on the mission but soon they are fighting for their lives when the Queen alien (Florence Marly) turns out to be a vampire.QUEEN OF BLOOD isn't your average horror film. If you're familiar with Curtis Harrington then you know he liked to go more towards the art house than the drive-in. His feature film NIGHT TIDE is one of the strangest horror movies that you'll ever see and QUEEN OF BLOOD is just as weird on many levels. I know a lot of people praise Mario Bava for PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES and how he managed to turn a low-budget into a great looking production. I think Harrington really deserves the same credit because this movie certainly looks wonderful even if the film itself isn't a complete success.What does work here are the terrific visuals. You've got the budget of your typical low-budget nature but Harrington makes sure you can't tell that by looking at the picture. I really loved the use of color throughout the film and especially the glowing reds. The colors certainly leap off the screen and manage to grab and hold your attention. Another plus is that we've got an excellent villain in the female vampire. I really loved her look with the green colors and there were some great scenes with the red blood just dripping from her that was quite effective.Another plus is that we've got a good cast with both Saxon and Meredith doing a nice job with the lead roles. Marly is also quite good in the role of the vampire and we've got Basil Rathbone and Dennis Hopper in small roles. The film certainly does have some flaws including its story, which is rather unoriginal and there's no question that the psychedelic nature doesn't always work in regards to its story. Still, QUEEN OF BLOOD is an interesting picture visually and certainly worth watching.

Queen of Blood is a low budget sci-fi flick that is often seen as an inspiration for the classic 'Alien'. Whether or not the film was an influence I don't know; although the two films do share some similarities. The film actually reminded me of a sub-par episode of Star Trek; yet in spite of that, there are some good ideas on display here and for what it's worth (which admittedly isn't much), Queen of Blood is not a bad little sci-fi flick. The film has an obvious low budget which is a hindrance but it overcomes this with an interesting plot line. The film takes place in the future (actually 1990) and follows a plot that starts with scientists receiving a distress call from a space ship that crash landed on Mars. Naturally they decide to send another team in on a rescue mission and when they arrive they discover only a single survivor - a green skinned female alien! They decide to bring her aboard the ship and after trying to help and talk to her, they find their efforts to be abortive. The alien's actual intention is revealed when she begins drinking the blood of the crew.It's actually a shame that this film wasn't better as it features a mouth watering cult cast! John Saxon is excellent as always in the lead role and he receives good support from the likes of an aging Basil Rathbone and a young Dennis Hopper. Queen of Blood is clearly not an actor's film, but it's still nice to see these actors on screen together. The budget impacts most on the special effects and we're treated to some shocking space scenes, as well as an alien that is just a woman painted green. The film fails at delivering anything that looks even remotely futuristic and that does distract from the plot line more than just a little bit. The film is apparently put together from a couple of different sources and that would make sense as the plotting is often uneven and sometimes doesn't make a great deal of sense. Still, it would be silly to go into a film like this expecting a masterpiece; and even though I generally don't like low budget sci-fi, I was still mostly happy with what I got. Overall; this is not a must see film, but it's decent enough and I can recommend it.

I found this movie to be disturbingly good. I only saw it once but have never forgotten it. I enjoyed watch this movie build to it's obvious conclusion. For those who are not a part of the misguided in the name of knowledge movies. This movie may seem silly and pointless. But to those of us in that group the movie is a great way to remember all of those movies that were so bad that they are good. The costumes of the vampire alien are so campy that they have to be seen to be believed. And her hairstyle has to be seen just for the laughs it will bring. All in all one of those movie that should be seen just for the sake of camp.