BLOOD FREAK

d. Brad F. Grinter (1972)

We've all seen cautionary tales about the dangers of drug consumption, and those of us who like our films psychotronic will have seen our fair share of movies about the transformative powers of mad and unsanctioned science. Blood Freak manages to combine these two hot topics to present us with the far out story of a narcotics fiend who turns into a turkey.

Hunky Herschell is just back from Vietnam, with only a badly burned arm and a dope habit to show for his tour of duty. While riding from town to town on his chopper, he meets up with Angel, a Bible spouting dolly bird who, despite her obvious moral rectitude, takes him to a hippy drug party and introduces him to her wilder and more switched on sister, Ann. Sultry Ann sets her cap at the upright, uptight Herschell, and conspires with her sleazy drug dealer to get her target to smoke an instantly addictive joint, after which he falls into bed with her.

Herschell gets a job at the local poultry farm where, for extra cash, he chows down on turkey that has been illegally experimented upon. Soon afterwards he has a seizure and, when he wakes up, he is surprised to find (as are we) that he has the big, gnarled head of a turkey cock and major collywobbles from drug comedown. Actual turkey, cold turkey: it’s a very clever metaphor. Doubly damned, he now creeps about grabbing addicts and slitting their throats, drinking their dope rich blood like coca cola while his supposedly dead victims cough and splutter as the strawberry syrup goes into their eyes and up their noses. 

This madness is interspersed with sardonic commentary from director, Brad F. Grinter, a permanently smoking grizzled guy who has clearly lived hard and well and reads his erudite words from an offscreen piece of paper, perhaps due to short term memory loss. Grinter concludes this outrageous story by saying that it is 'partly based on fact, partly based on probability', clearly bullshit. In the end analysis, though, this is a film about a vampire turkey that manages to entertain without a knowing nod, a wink or an arched eyebrow, so it's pretty much beyond normal criticism as far as I'm concerned.