“The only time we have a witness to one of these murders and he’s out of his mind…”

Horror icon Peter Cushing famously referred to The Blood Beast Terror as the worst film he made… which given the competition in his extensive oeuvre is quite the statement. That he even said it is interesting, given Cushing was renowned as a consummate professional and gentleman. You should always forgive an actor for being in a bad film (after all, they’re just a small cog in a pretty big machine). But what’s amazing about The Blood Beast Terror is it’s so bad it even manages to bring the usually dependable Cushing down to its level.

We’ve seen Cushing fight alien bone-sucking carpets, tackle clueless teenage shower-shy vampires, and pursue unrealistic werewolves through the “Paris” sewers – but he always brought an air of class to proceedings, however ridiculous. Not here, though. It may be the shoddy work of his colleagues rubbing off, but his finest hour this film truly is not.

Any fan of classic British horror films has to have a love of the kitsch. The combination of low budgets and this kind of content means that there are always going to be moments where disbelief has to be willingly suspended, or where some unintentional comedy has to be welcomed as part of the experience. But there’s no saving The Blood Beast Terror. The best thing you can say about it is that it looks expensive, in a “shot on film and nicely lit” way. But… well, the “buts” come thick and fast. As you’ll find.

If you want to sum up the film in a nutshell, look no further than the pre-credits sequence. An “explorer” makes his way up a river in darkest somewhere (clearly southern England) and into a “jungle” (clearly a wood in southern England), intercut with many, many stock footage shots of various unimpressive animals before… absolutely nothing happens.

Cue credits!

Southern England is now required to play southern England on film, as a carriage driver making his way through a dark wood hears a scream, finds a gory body and is attacked by a flapping thing. Not for the last time in this film, the viewer is left thinking “now, I’m no film maker, but…” on this occasion adding “…wouldn’t this have made a better opening scene?”

One of the things this film excels at is crashing from a moment of potential excitement straight into a scene of crushing mundanity, as now happens with an over-long entomology lesson, one of many over-long diversions we’ll endure as the film makers hammer home the point that THIS STORY HAS SOMETHING TO DO WITH MOTHS. Enter Inspector Quennell (Cushing), who is investigating the death of a student (viewer: “now, I’m no film maker, but shouldn’t we have seen this happen?”). He’s here to see Doctor Mallinger (Robert Flemyng) and insists: “Ooh, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind my slipping in at the back!” (make of this what you will).

Cushing and Flemyng then indulge in a competition to see who can stomp all over each others’ lines (viewer: now, I’m no film maker, but how difficult would it have been to re-shoot that scene?”) before the injured man found shortly after the opening credits is brought in. One quick “check” by the not-so-good doctor and the man is dead. The coach driver who found him isn’t faring much better either – he’s now a “raving lunatic” (or as seen on screen, mildly agitated): “The wings! The wings, sir!”

Now, what would a gothic British horror film be without a bit of gallows humour? Enter Roy Hudd (Michael Ripper clearly busy elsewhere), looking remarkably Britpop and giving us the full beans as an annoyingly chipper mortuary assistant (“Very bloody, very bloody…”)

This performance might have been bearable in a film which didn’t eke out every scene to interminable lengths, but that’s exactly what The Blood Beast Terror is doing, so Hudd’s “pie and a pint” shenanigans grow old very quickly indeed (and it’s not even the last we’ll see of them).

As the police search for clues in Lover’s Walk (“not that there was much love here last night…”), Inspector Quennell revisits Dr Mallinger, who is clearly guilty of something – but leaves without progressing the case. Mallinger’s scarred butler Granger (Kevin Stoney) then starts goading and poking at an eagle Mallinger keeps secretly locked in his cellar, seemingly for no reason other than to give a reason for the eagle to attack and kill him in a later scene.

Remember the explorer from scene one? Well, he’s back from “Africa” and brings with him some (plot-driving) insect specimens. But just in case this might kick-start the film, we’re then treated to a lengthy, and mostly pointless, on-screen stage play starring Mallinger’s daughter Clare (Wanda Ventham). This vaguely Frankensteinish am-dram potboiler might work in a film where the acting elsewhere is of a reasonable standard, but ends up being just more terrible acting to add to the absolute shit we’ve been subjected to for the past half hour or so.

Watching the on-stage antics, Mallinger has a brainwave: “Galvanism… it might be an idea.”

And fired up by her on-stage success (which amounts to not completely falling out of the distressed dress she’s wearing), Clare has a moonlit tryst with the explorer (William Wilde). Unsurprisingly, he ends up being attacked by something, and is found by Quennell, who’s been lurking around the gardens for some reason. In the time-honoured tradition of these things, the dying man tries to talk (Cushing: “Can you speak louder, please?” which comes across as quite an odd thing to say), and the inspector takes him to the doctor. But again, the doctor’s diagnosis is “he’s dead” and what’s more, he immediately lies and claims not to know who the dead man is.

Of course, this lie lasts about 30 seconds, as the inspector’s trusty sergeant (Glynn Edwards, absolutely the best thing in the whole film) recognises the body as that of Mallinger’s house guest. They rush back to Mallinger’s home but he and Clare have flown (ho, ho), leaving the bloody corpse of the butler (see ham-fisted eagle sub-plot) and much other human remains in the cellar.

Aha! Let’s get this plot moving… or not, as things take a turn for the even slower as Cushing does a bit of investigating, before following the doctor and Clare to Upper Higham, there to indulge in a spot of tourism and fishing (he’s undercover, and has taken his daughter Meg with him for no reason other than to put her in mortal peril).

In between all this tedium we learn that the doctor is experimenting with galvanism and the previously haughty-but-dull Clare has gone full evil. Meg (Vanessa Howard) has met up with young Billy (David Griffin), and the pair spend their days hunting butterflies and moths for Billy’s collection.

In his new home, the doctor is “galvanising” a massive pupa and (in the film’s one vaguely surprising turn) it’s NOT Clare, who walks in while he’s doing it.

But even the galvanism is a pointless endeavour (viewer: “now I’m no film maker, but what the actual eff was the point of the theatre production and all the mucking about with dead frogs?”). Mallinger notes: “It needs blood.”

Blood?

“Human blood.”

So Clare sets her sights on Meg to provide said blood, and before you can say “now I’m no film maker, but wouldn’t it have been better to actually show the kidnap and  apparent hypnotism of Meg, rather than all the fishing and running around after butterflies?”, the unconscious young lady is seen donating blood to the throbbing pupa.

Clare has also (apparently) started an affair with the hunky gardener (viewer: “now I’m no film maker, but wouldn’t it have been better to… ah, I can’t be bothered any more”) who is immediately killed.

As, soon afterwards, is Doctor Mallinger – who reveals the entire plot in a fit of terrible, terrible acting before making the fatal mistake of stopping Clare’s plans.

The film then grinds to a halt – again – while Quennell investigates what we already know. There’s a giant human-hybrid vampire moth flying around… and it’s Clare, who was hoping Mallinger would create a mate for her.

All these films demand a good blaze to finish them off (fire being the special effect of choice to end all self-respecting gothic horrors), but we don’t even get that. When it looks like Mallinger’s home will be engulfed in a blaze, someone actually puts it out (yes, really), meaning that in order to bring the monster to its doom, a small bonfire has to be lit in the garden.

And yes, the monster shows exactly how successful it would have been as a new evolution of human-kind by simply flying unbidden into this tiny pile of smouldering leaves and combusting. The End.

This film really is a shocker, and not in a good way. It’s actually insulting to the viewer in so many ways, really feeling like they were just making it up as they went along AND ran out of money before they could film most of the key scenes.

It has taken this website a long time to get to the nadir of the British horror oeuvre (and we’ve said this a couple of time before, granted), but I think we’ve reached it with The Blood Beast Terror. There are films that make less sense or that have worse performances out there, but this one wastes a potentially good cast, expensive-looking filming and decent locations on a bunch of terrible ideas brought together by clueless filmmaking, and the result is just painful.