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8 out of 9 people found the following review useful:
My Favourite Australian Film, 16 June 2006
Author: Crap_Connoisseur from Australia

Bloodlust is a spectacular achievement. Richard Wolstencraft and Jon Hewitt's opus is a very fine film of its own accord, however its importance ultimately lies in the fact that it is an example of that rarest of breeds - an Australian film with balls. Bloodlust spits all over the dreary crap that regularly gets churned out with the assistance of funding bodies. At the time of its release, this film was a much needed shot of adrenalin in the arm of the limp and pathetic Australian independent film-making scene.

I don't care if each character has a different, equally unconvincing, accent or that the calibre of acting displayed in the film makes the average porn star look like Laurence Olivier. The film was obviously made on the sniff of wet rag with a cast of amateurs. Get over it. Bloodlust is all about ideas, in particular exploring the cinematic boundaries of sex and violence. In that regard, Bloodlust is the least patronising film I have ever seen. It gives the viewer large doses of sex and gore, often both at once, without all the garbage in between. For me, Bloodlust is like getting a huge serving of dessert without having to eat your mangy vegetables beforehand.

The film revolves around three blood drinking killers - Tad, Frank and Lear. Our three heroes spend most of their time having sex and murdering people, although not necessarily in that order. When the local stake wielding religious fanatics almost succeed in killing Tad, the lovely threesome decide to rob a casino and retire. This sets off a chain of events that result in Tad and his ladies being chased by police, mobsters and the religious slayers. Bloodlust does not waste a second of its running time being boring. If someone is not being mutilated or having sex, then one of the characters is spewing out a tasteless joke. In fact, Bloodlust is a very funny movie. The screenplay is wonderfully literate and the humour, while not exactly subtle, is dark and pointed.

The technical aspects of the film are just as inspiring as the subject matter. The direction is innovative and the film is lovingly constructed. The film's pacing is relentless and the final showdown counts as one of the finest moments in independent horror movie history. The special effects are extraordinary for such a low budget film. Olaf Ittenbach would be proud of the stakings, shootings, be-headings, bitings and general dismemberment. With the exception of one dodgy decapitation, the gore effects are hugely impressive for both their over the top detail and sheer frequency. The sex scenes are kinky and fetishists will love the liberal use of whips and constraints. There is even the occasional sex act with a corpse, which never fails to liven up a film in my humble opinion.

The voters who have trashed this film have either entirely missed the point or simply do not belong to the intended audience. Bloodlust is made for connoisseurs of underground horror. If you like Ittenbach, Buttgereit or even dirty, old Andreas Bethmann then this should be right up your alley. Richard Wolstencraft is truly Australia's finest cinematic export. Bloodlust comes very highly recommended.

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6 out of 7 people found the following review useful:
Wolstencroft feels the sharp end of the stake..., 11 August 2001
Author: Grand Moff Gherkin from Adelaide, Australia

I feel no remorse is saying that Bloodlust is quite possibly one of the worst films ever made. Not because of the fact that the budget looks lower than that of the average backyard porn flick, or that the acting sucks or whatever...

It's more about the fact that this is advertised as being a "vampire movie", however, for anybody who's ever seen a vampire film, it's nice when they actually feature some characters that you can say without a doubt, "yep, that person's a vampire" rather than "yep, that person's a wolf-haired gimp in fluoro sweatpants".

Truly bad.

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3 out of 4 people found the following review useful:
So bad it's good, really..., 5 May 2003
6/10
Author: Craig from Melbourne, Australia

Let me start by saying this: if you go into this movie expecting the next Interview With the Vampire or Lost Boys, you're in for a HUGE disappointment. If, on the other hand, you are a fan of cheesy, low budget schlock films, this is the film for you. It is a little reminiscent of Peter Jackson's early efforts (Bad Taste & Brain Dead), and is of about the quality you would expect from a first year film student. I had the good fortune to see this movie at a rare screening during an alternative film festival in Melbourne. The cast is a who's who of Melbourne (Australia) pseudo-celebrities (particularly from local radio station RRR). As has been noted, the special effects (gore effects) are very cheap and nasty, but in a way that actually adds to them. The characters are comic-book like, totally unbelievable but pretty funny. The movie also features a pumping industrial soundtrack, with bands like Revolting Cocks, Lead Into Gold and 1000 Homo DJs. Coincidentally, all three of these bands are projects of industrial guru Al Jourgensen (Ministry). There is no denying the acting is terrible, but as far as I know, none of these people are professional actors. There are some very violent confrontations, some good toilet humour, and grossout scenes aplenty. If you can ignore the poor acting and low budget, and enjoy a good, violent schlock comedy, then you will like Bloodlust.

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4 out of 6 people found the following review useful:
I've seen worse..., 20 October 2005
7/10
Author: Jerry Nuckolls (jsorryman@hotmail.com) from United States

.......this is a must for role players and Vampire: The Masquerade junkies. It portrays vampires as parasites and draws parallels between vampirism and addiction. good triple-cross plot line, original and inventive. 3 Gypsyish vampires roam Australia, screwing and getting high. They decide to rob a local mobster, incurring his wrath. Meanwhile, the pigs are investigating the blood-drained corpses littering the city. As if that's not enough aggravation, a local group of fundamentalist Xtian vampire-hunters is aggressively trying to drive stakes through the hearts of all of the bloodsuckers. Still not as good as other vampire movies, but scores points for originality and outright depravity. Worth a look. Lotsa gunfights.Coulda been directed in a more artistic manner, but still preferable to most Hollywood bull***t...what can I say, I love that B-movie vibe. Odd directorial choices, half of the Aussie cast attempts to speak like American rednecks, resulting in some amusing, if somewhat unbelievable dialogue. Don't be a pussy, check it out.

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4 out of 6 people found the following review useful:
Warning: don't let the tagline fool you!, 23 February 2000
3/10
Author: yamaelle (yamaelle@hotmail.com) from Versailles, France

At first glance, this movie has got everything a psycho wants: a vampire story with a "not under 18" restriction, filled with hyper-violence, drugs, gore, sex (including lesbian sex), some fanatics zealots and even a gay necrophiliac cop! But then, this movie is a succession of bad story (so thin), bad acting -with a ridiculous english accent making you believe you're watching a bad Monty Python -, bad music ('80s hard rock), the videotaping is awful, the ending is a real shame... Plus the scenes of sex are ridiculous, the gore not very impressive. And those vampires reflect in a mirror, and don't even fear daylight! You get to be very disappointed, unless you see it as a "Space Mutiny" or "Troll 2". I hope Bloodlust will one day reach the bottom 100, because that's its real place.

I'd say it can still be fun to watch, if you have friends and enough beer.

3/10

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
Gore, Sex, and loads of FUN, 25 December 2009
7/10
Author: ronringhoffer from United States

I first received an uncut Australian VHS tape of this when it was first released. The movie was really cool but the extras on the tape are what put this movie is the MUST WATCH category. The extras were fantastic. This movie has one of the best trailers you will ever see on a low budget horror film. The film has lots of energy and is nonstop action and horror.

The basic plot has the main 3 actors wreaking havoc on everyone they cross paths with. The 3 main actors are vampires, 1 man & 2 women. The man is pretty cool and the 2 girls are great. One of the girls is a busty sexy blond and very voluptuous. The movie has a little of everything in it, including some crime action scenes inspired from Hong Kong movies. The characters in the movie are fun. It seems that the actors in the movie had fun making the movie. There is lots of gore for the gore fans. I found the soundtrack was excellent for the movie and it had lots of energy to it.

If you are able to track this down, try and find it with the extras. The extras include an awesome trailer, interviews (really funny), and trial footage with the lead voluptuous blonde actress with dark hair. This movie also stars an actor by the name of Crawdaddy playing a bad cop. I would definitely recommend this to fans of low budget horror. The directors went on to make more cult movies.

In Chicago, a VHS tape bootlegger used to sell NTSC copies of this at horror shows in Chicago, right after this came out on tape in PAL. The dealer ran a trailer of this on a TV he had on his table. He sold out a whole box of tapes of this movies within minutes of the show opening, just off the trailer.

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4 out of 7 people found the following review useful:
Don't waste your time on this useless rubbish!, 20 August 2002
Author: Infofreak from Perth, Australia

I have seen way too many bad movies in my life. And by "bad" I don't mean "hilariously inept" or "funny cheesy b-grade trash". I'm talking about BAD - so bad you wonder why you bother continuing to watch until the end. 'Bloodlust' is as bad as any movie I have ever seen. There is absolutely no reason to endure this movie, except just to say you have seen one of the worst movies ever made in Australia.

Now look, I'm all for the idea of saying "major studios be damned, I'll just do it MY WAY". It certainly worked for Roger Corman, Russ Meyer, Andy Warhol and John Waters. More recently, Jorge Buttgereit's astounding 'Nekromantik' has shown what can be achieved with little or no budget, no apparent outside censorship or compromise, and an original vision. That movie is genuinely exciting and disturbing. 'Bloodlust', despite the publicity screaming it is the first Australian movie banned in Britain, isn't. Buttgereit has talent and chutzpah in spades. 'Bloodlust' director Jon Hewitt, and co-writer Richard Wolstencroft don't.

This is an amateurish mess, with absolutely nothing original to say, with an abysmal script (? I'm assuming their really WAS a script) badly acted by a bunch of low lifes, druggies, and non-actors. The latter inexplicably includes respected underground musicians Ian Rilen (of legendary punk band X) and Frank Brunetti (former member of 80s indie faves Died Pretty). The involvement of those two is really the only interesting thing about this whole fiasco. Maybe 'Bloodlust' was a lot of fun to make, but watching it is a chore. If you want to see some genuinely entertaining b-grade Aussie trash check out 'Body Melt'. It's everything 'Bloodlust' would love to be.

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Indi shlock 92 film you just can't get enough, will only leave you lusting for more, 4 April 2013
2/10
Author: PeterMitchell-506-564364 from Australia

Bloodlust comes off like some cheaply shot rock video, you kind of think the director of Buffy Down Under was involved. That's a more simplified description. Cheaply shot, atrociously acted by some who don't even care. Some other characters purposely overacted, add flavor to this really bad indi-horror comedy, about three vampires roaming the streets of Melbourne, having sex, taking drugs, just like us humans, but also, of course craving blood. The scenes with the priest were great, his overacting, worthy of definite praise. If only they had Oscars for best overacting in a film. There's quite a bit of graphic violence, that runs quite successively throughout. One scene I recall in a servo, was a poor sod strung up, dead, save for what measly part was left of his johnson. This film does succeed as a comedy as I did find it very funny. But the bottom line, it is a terrible movie, but avid horror fan I am, I did like this one a lot. It's cheap credibility works for it, as well it's funny script, a lot of it's dialogue summed up in short sentences, which I liked. It's a movie I come to view every so often, between long spaces of years, after first seeing it in 1992. It does have an independent, pumped up energy about it, I loved. I know I could never get sick of seeing it, even though it's Z grade schlock of pathetic stature. It's just's so bad, it's good. What can I say?

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A punish, 23 August 2012
3/10
Author: Butch Moon from Australia

This is an Australian film. The cast go in and out of Australian and phoney American accents for the duration because they are either morons or have absolutely no imagination. Bloodlust is gleefully, purposely and ridiculously bad. I laughed at it because it was bad but never at the 'black humour' It is never frightening, never suspenseful, hardly gory and punishes you throughout it's entire running time with it's mere existence, it took a constant watch checking feat of super human endurance to get through the last 30 minutes. On the positive side, the rich guy with the big mobile phone who gets car jacked close to the beginning delivered the most incredible performance I have ever seen. I would recommend this to crass, stoned and mediocre people.

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Lust driven., 7 January 2009
5/10
Author: lost-in-limbo from the Mad Hatter's tea party.

By any stretch of the imagination 'Bloodlust' is terrible pile of perverted garbage, but in the end I had trouble taking my eyes off this highly entertaining low-cost trash. When I came across it I never even heard of this Australian horror feature. 'Banned in Britain' screams out on the front of the video case and whole bunch of rave comments just suck you in! Think of early Peter Jackson ('Bad Taste') but even more inept and downright crazy. It's cheap… really cheap off-kilter exploitation involving buckets of ultra-violence, soft-core sex and maniac dialogues. The execution is chaotic and dumb (just watch for the over-the-top performances where no one is safe from the onslaught!), but that's its charm. The enthusiasm shows behind the camera, than just in front of it. The style kinda reminds me of a local (Australian viewers would know) TV series which also spawned a movie or two; 'Pizza'. It does feel like a home-made video, which it's obviously shot-on-video and it amateurishly shows. The FX work is crude and outrageous, and this seems to work and add to the fun while we get a blaring heavy metal soundtrack accompanying with hammering beats and rhythms. Or maybe it's just noise for some?

The story follows three modern-day vampires (not your traditional bloodsuckers too) who decide enliven their boring lifestyles (killing, sex and drug taking) to rob the mob and then find themselves being chased by mob hit-man, raving religious fanatics and two redneck cops.

That's pretty much it. The tone of it is a dark, twisted and seedy black comedy that has an audacious streak. Every couple of words is something foul, the pace is non-stop and the performances range from stiff (the three vamps) to bonkers stage-like show acting (religious fanatics take the cake).

For a laugh (unintentional or not) this is a good one to watch with pals. This schlock has cult written all over it.

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