Movie Reviews - Forums of Filth - Directors - Movie Pages - Eyeballs - Gravemusic - Anna Falchi - Links
Having problems viewing images on our site? Click here!

BLACKENSTEIN 1972
Directed by William A. Levey 
Cast - Ivory Stone,  Joe DeSue, John Hart, Roosevelt Jackson, Liz Renay

The next time somebody tells you "Darkman is the worst movie ever made", duct tape their head to the back of a chair and make them watch this film. Young Winifred Walker (Stone) visits her old college professor, Dr. Stein (Hart), with the hope he may be able to help her boyfriend Eddie. Poor Eddie had both arms and legs blown off by a land mine in Vietnam. Good thing Dr. Stein just happens to be experimenting with limb transplants. They take Eddie to Dr. Stein's mansion and proceed to attach new limbs to him. There's never any mention "where" these limbs came from (?). Meanwhile the doc's creepy assistant Malcolm (Jackson) has the hots for Winifred and lets her know. After being rejected by her Malcolm decides to get even by switching Eddie's DNA formula with somebody else's DNA. Eddie then becomes a 7 foot brother with a big square afro and goes on a bloody killing spree.  Not nearly as well made as BLACKULA, this still manages to be an entertaining "bad" film. Joe DeSue's performance as the monster is easily on of the worst Boris Karloff imitations ever committed to film. The doc's lab looks like something out of a 1950's Ed Wood film. There's lots of continuity flaws and unexplained plot gaps. One the bright side there's some cheap looking gore and a few topless shots of women. It's not a boring film either. If you want a change of pace from the usual Hollywood dreck, and don't mind dime store special effects and bad acting, take a chance on this film. At the very least, it's good for a few laughs.

T.Luster