VividSimon Simply Perfect

Pluskylang Great Film overall

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Tender-Flesh Perhaps a single notch above Herschell Gordon Lewis in terms of production value, and that is not saying much at all, Carnival of Blood is one of the few horror films set in a place where I want to see horror, namely, the carnival.Without much in-between, the film has a handful of locations used and re-used to try and make a movie. The balloon stand, the boardwalk, the interior homes of the heroes and the killer(which, given the budget, are probably the same house), and the tunnel of love. Oh, did I forget the gypsy who can never seem to give a decent palm reading? Anyway, yes, it is a slasher film, with a lame motive and a few red herrings, including Burt Young in a terrible role as Gimpy, a crippled guy with facial burns. I was surprised to see some disemboweling here. Oh, and teddy bears filled with guts. It seems a weirdo is on the loose at the carnival(of blood) and he kills people who have the teddy bears won at a certain games booth, where Gimpy works with his friend.There's a stabbing, a beheading, a skull crushed with a rock or brick, followed by eye removal. But none of the effects are any good, though there is a certain sympathy to some of the characters and their distaste for each other seemed surprisingly genuine.You better have nothing better to do if you're going to watch this movie. Like, if there are clothes in the wash, the dog needs to be brushed, or something like that. However, this film is currently available with the ultra horrid Curse of the Headless Horseman which not only doesn't deserve a review, it doesn't deserve a viewing. So, if you find this double bill, stick with Carnival and you'll be, well, sort of OK.

kiddetroit@hotmail.com True it is not the best movie and the plot is somewhat mundane, it's actually kind of bad even if you are into schlocky gore trash, but this movie does have some great, fun characters.There is the the amazingly obnoxious "dumpy lady" who sets out to harass everyone she runs into, the insanely drunk Sailor and his trampy girlfriend (who keeps stuffing his cash into her panties whenever he isn't looking), the creepy fortune teller who warns everyone to go home & "Gimpy", the impaired weirdo with the mysteriously sore covered space. All of whom get theirs as a psycho stalks them through a beachside carnival. It even has a few gimmicky over the top gore scenes, like a nasty gizzard filled teddy bear. The movie plays out like a tribute to HG Lewis with it's gross-out stalker killings.It also has some interesting odd electronica in the background that sounds like it was lifted directly from the Forbidden Planet soundtrack. As far as late night schlock this is certainly not the greatest but definitely not the worst ....

Woodyanders Here's one of those gloriously godawful "you gotta be kiddin' me!"-type of plodding and maladroit low-rent no-budget psycho sicko gore flicks that played on double bills in numerous drive-ins and grindhouses in the splendidly sleazy 70's. Indeed, this delectably dreadful dreck was paired with the equally atrocious, yet somehow oddly endearing dippy hippie terror trip-out "The Curse of the Headless Horseman" on a twice-the-tacky-terror twin feature offering that must have caused anyone who saw them together to either make an immediate beeline for the exit door 15-odd minutes into the first film or slump into their seats in a comatose stupor after the ending credits of the second picture finished rolling.A mother-fixated bargain basement Norman Bates-like oedipal wreck homicidal crazy brutally butchers assorted supremely irritating women at an especially dingy and rundown beachside carnival in upstate New York. That's it for the threadbare plot -- and said skimpy story is related by cinematic blunder wonder triple threat would-be producer/ director/writer auteur Leonard Kitman (who also puked forth "The Curse of the Headless Horseman" and later did a few scuzzy porno movies under the alias Leon Gucci) with a staggering all-out incompetence that's genuinely breathtaking to behold. Techincally, this crud is simply appalling: we've got slack pacing, an often meandering narrative that's overloaded with tedious talk and dreary filler, clumsy red herrings, grainy, ugly, frequently static and immobile cinematography, a grating score, ragged cut'n'paste editing, and cheesy splatter effects that wouldn't even gross out your grandmother. Moreover, the cast overall strikes out somethin' rotten: Willowy blonde lead Judith Resnick is hot, but vapid, Earle Edgerton makes for a singularly bland and uncharismatic hero, Andy Milligan film regular Martin Barolsky nerds it up to an almost unbearably geeky extreme as the balding, middle-aged fruitcake killer, Gloria Spavik hits new heretofore untouched heights in nerve-shredding celluloid obnoxiousness as an insufferably shrill and whiny fat old bag who gets her head bashed in, and Burt Young (Paulie in the "Rocky" series) embarrasses himself royally in his less-than-sterling film debut as a pathetic, irritable, grotesquely misshapen hunchback retard named Gimpy. Plus William Grannell (Jason Varone in the Cheri Caffaro "Ginger" flicks) briefly pops up as the long-suffering husband of a shrewish woman who gets decapitated in the funhouse early in the movie. However, this altogether stunningly ham-fisted honey does possess one exceptionally right-on asset: It's so rich and vivid in seedy local color that it comes across like a fascinatingly lurid and depraved mondo-style documentary on the grimy underbelly of the seriously seamy Coney Island carny scene.

reptilicus Way back in the early days of home video you had to cough up $59 to own this movie. Now you can find it on DVD for a fraction of that amount; isn't technology wonderful?Okay seriously now. I first got this film because I hoped it might actually be MALATESTA'S CARNIVAL OF BLOOD. It wasn't (duh!) but I certainly got my money's worth. Set in a Coney Island carnival most of our attention is focused on Tom (Earle Edgerton) who runs a booth where you throw darts at balloons to win a prize and his fire scarred pal Gimpy (he's billed as John Harris but WE know he's really Burt Young). Tom seems like a nice enough guy but you have to wonder how he gets through the day when the people who come to his booth all seem to be obnoxious, ill-mannered, drunken loudmouths.There is also a mad killer stalking the midway. Whoever it is commits some very brutal, but not entirely convincing, murders. I mean, Andy Milligan had more believable gore in his films and you REALLY have to be at the bottom of the barrel to be less effective than Andy! A knifing on the beach is very bloody but the camera stays on the victim so long we get too close a look at what must be a rubber dummy and Karo-syrup blood. Another victim is killed by a dart . . . oh when will low budget directors learn that you need a mighty good pitching arm to throw a dart through a persons skull, and even so a wound like that would probably not be fatal? Oh well, just keep repeating "It's only a movie . . ."So what did I mean about disturbing in parts? Well near the end when we find out not only who the killer is (no, I am not going to tell you! Sit through this movie and suffer like I did if you want to know!) but why he is doing it (a violent mental shock when he was a child; no wonder psychologists love to analyse these movies!) there is a scene of the heroine (Judith Resnick) finding a teddy bear stuffed with human entrails! That is the scene I remember most over all the previous cheap gore moments, it is unexpectedly effective and emotionally jarring. Tis' a pity the rest of the movie could not keep up.Truly this is one for junk movie completest only. I'll bet once Burt Young hit it big in the ROCKY movies he crossed this title off his resume.PS: Did I ever find MALATESTA'S CARNIVAL OF BLOOD? I sure did! Check out my review of that one sometime.