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Sleeve Design : Unknown |
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DVD Availability
: Amazon.com
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Legacy of Blood |
Carl Monson | USA | 1971 |
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Writer and director double act Eric Norden and Carl Monson cobbled together this Ten Little Indians style whodunit,
two years before their ultra-sleazy magnum opus A Scream in the Streets. Packed
with quirky, dark, idiosyncratic characters — closets filled with
skeletons, Monson’s film
is typical 1970s melodrama spiced up with some wild death set pieces,
and dumbed down with clunky dialogue. Not for all tastes as it’s
talky and slow-paced, but bad cinema bons vivants will find much
to relish in this ensemble piece. Recently deceased and ultra-rich Christopher Dean (John Carradine) bequeaths his fortune via
a pre-recorded audio tape to his four surviving children and three
loyal servants. Notwithstanding, the cantankerous patriarch has left
one strict condition. In order to qualify for a share of the
inheritance, each of the recipients must live on the family estate for
one whole week. There is however a catch: if one of the group dies, the
other remaining members pick up the dead person’s share. The lodgers and their partners are at each other’s throats from the off, bickering and squabbling, with old grudges bubbling back up to the surface. The atmosphere corrodes even more when Gregory’s (Jeff Morrow) wife’s dog is found drowned in the grounds’ pond; the local sheriff —called in to investigate foul play — is axed to death and his decapitated head placed on a plate in the refrigerator! Following to the letter the tropes of a steadily diminishing
numbers scenario, the film still manages to throw in some jaw-dropping
surprises: a lamp made from dried skin of a dead Nazi — his
grubby skull forming the base; Igor (Buck
Kartalian), the
masochistic faithful
servant, enthusing over the stout cane used to beat his muscular torso.
Keep an eye out for the delicious double-twist towards the end and the
audacious ‘breaking of the fourth wall’.
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For such a low budget affair, it's satisfying to see that
this was released to UK cinemas in early 1975 through Target International Films Ltd.,
having been passed uncut for cinema exhibition with a BBFC ‘AA’ certificate. The video era gave us three separate releases for Legacy of Blood. The very obscure Videoring version — a single copy has yet to come to light at the time of writing; a re-titled offering from Cinema Indoors as the punning Will To Die, and finally the Screen In Doors version featured here. As a caveat, it's worth noting that both Cinema and Screen versions are taken from the same print (the Cinema Indoors cassette retains the on-screen title of Legacy of Blood). However, unlike the UK theatrical print, these versions are truncated by around 7 minutes. Many expositional scenes are shortened, revealing flashback information regarding Johnny and Leslie Dean's incestuous relationship, plus some minor additional gore during the bee attack. As well as sharing the same print and nearly the same
distributor name, the two have remarkably similiar sleeve designs.
Ironically, the warning text on the rear of the cover stating that
“Artwork used on the cover of this video is purely an artist's
impression…” couldn't be further from the truth! aka : Blood Legacy; Will To Die
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