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Starring: Joseph Cotten,  Elke Sommer,  Massimo Girotti,  Rada Rassimov,  Antonio Cantafora, 
Directed By: Mario Bava, 
Rated: Unrated
Release Date: 1972-10-27
Studio: Image Entertainment
Format: Color,  DVD-Video,  Letterboxed,  Subtitled,  Widescreen,  NTSC, 

Editorial Reviews and DVD Information about Baron Blood

Description
In Italian director Mario Bava's sumptuous Technicolor Gothic horror classic an American student Peter Kleist travels to Austria on summer holiday to learn more about his family roots. By reciting an incantation on a piece of ancient parchment, he succeeds in scaring up a genuine ancestor--Baron Otto von Kleist, a 16th century sadistic nobleman whose appetite for cruelty earned him the nickname "Baron Blood." Before Peter can reverse the incantation, the parchment burns...How many innocents will die before Peter learns how to send the evil Baron back to the hell from whence he came?

Amazon.com
Mario Bava's 1972 ghost thriller returns him to his gothic horror roots: a magnificent castle, an ancient curse, a cruel killer from the past resurrected by his ancestor to continue his reign of terror. That description sounds like a Technicolor reworking of Bava's masterpiece, Black Sunday, but Baron Blood evokes a mood similar to Roger Corman's Edgar Allan Poe films, notably Vincent Price's cruel manipulations in The Masque of the Red Death. Baron von Kleist (a.k.a. the notorious Baron Blood) is resurrected in a bit of schoolboy theatrics gone terribly wrong. The bloody, disfigured corpse rises from the grave to murder hapless townspeople and stalk miniskirted Elke Sommer, finally transforming himself into the respectable but mysterious millionaire Joseph Cotten. "Sadist. Murderer. Merely matters of terminology," he says, smiling while restoring his beloved torture chamber to the sounds of tape-recorded screams. Bava spikes the often slack story with eerie images (the crook-necked dead stare of a hanging man, blood seeping under a heavy oak door, a tower adorned with corpses spiked on jutting pikes). Cotten makes a sinister von Kleist, with an ominous tremble in his voice that belies his seemingly frail, wheelchair-bound body. The uncut version restores bloody scenes cut from American prints and the original jazzy score, but the gorgeous color photography is muted by a slightly murky transfer. The accompanying essays by Tim Lucas are thoughtful, informative, and wonderfully detailed, especially considering their brevity. --Sean Axmaker

Customer Reviews for Baron Blood

Bava Gothic Shock Horror
Elke Sommer plays Eva Arnold, an architectural student employed on the restoration of Baron von Kleist's creepy castle from the 11th century AD, whose boss introduces her to Peter, Kleist's American nephew, and a real good looker played by an actor who you'd never place as American.

Karl Hummel, the math professor, is played by Massimo Girotti, who stepped off the set of BARON BLOOD and onto the French locations of Bertolucci's LAST TANGO IN PARIS--quite a stretch for our Massimo! Dr. Hummel has a lovely wife, a cottagey-type home in the Austrian village on the outskirts of the castle, and his daughter, Gretchen, a plain-looking redheaded tyke filled with mischief and given to spying. There are so many scenes with Gretchen poking her head through the banister of the staircase, as the grownups talk on downstairs while drinking Austrian wine, that I expected she would get her head caught between the bars. Instead she develops an unexpected acuity and she's the only one who a) can identify Joseph Cotten as Baron Blood and b) can tell Elke Sommer and Peter how to return Baron Blood back to his crypt, from which they have accidentally awoken him. That little girl seems like a nut, and she's ugly as sin, but she's got brains and she's got courage. Later she played an important part in Dario Argento's PROFONDO ROSSO, and still later she was the usher girl in Bava Junior's DEMONS.

BARON BLOOD is a terrifying Mario Bava shocker with a wicked cool performance by Joseph Cotten as the revived Baron von Kleist. In his wheelchair and waxy makeup he seems treacherously close to death. Indeed it's hard to imagine that Cotten himself would be alive for another 20 years after wrapping up his shoot here. His face looks like it's been Botoxed long before anyone had ever heard of the term. And yet his eyes "glow with evil," as little Gretchen notes. She's no dumbkopf that Gretchen. A sinister bond seems to link the little girl with the ageless, cadaverous stranger in town: a takeoff on his role as Uncle Charlie in the Hitchcock-directed SHADOW OF A DOUBT I suppose?Baron Blood

Good Bava
This was the supposed sequel to Lisa and the Devil, Bava's shimmering, near-incomprehensible masterpiece. In Baron Blood, Bava has toned the story line down considerably. One of the overiding themes still is cause and effect; that is, in the world of Bava, our actions that we know are wrong but that we do anyhow can have horrifying consequences. At least in this movie, the repercussions manifest themselves in the lifetimes of the principal characters. The story resolution is much more believable (not to say digestable) than Lisa and the Devil. Unfortunately, by stepping a little more into the mainstream with Baron Blood (less risks are taken with the principle characters this time around), Bava has sacrificed much of the haunting uneasiness that made Lisa so enjoyable. He also doesn't have Telly Savalas in this film either!Baron Blood

Color Gothic
Its hard for me to appreciate gothic horror set in modern times. Color takes away from gothic atmosphere as do planes, automobiles and electric lighting. The basic story is a good one and Bava does manage to pull off the gothic look, although not nearly as well as in earlier black and white films. Well acted and not a bad movie, just not as good as expected from Mario Bava.Baron Blood

DISAPPOINTING BAVA.....
Although it is certainly ambitious and contains the director's trademark visuals and style, this is not Bava's best work. With atmosphere to spare, you'd think it would be better than it is. But "Baron Blood" comes off as a bunch of steam over nothing. The "extra uncut footage" is nothing more than a couple of rather tame gore shots. A tired looking Joseph Cotton wheels around an ancient castle as some REALLY dumb dodos recite an incantation to bring back a 16th century sadist who returns and chases Elke Sommer around through colored fog. Sommer (who was utilized to much better advantage in Bava's masterpiece "Lisa & the Devil") has nothing much to do here but scream and run. Rest of cast is below par in unexciting roles and the "Baron" is a messy looking mask in a black hat and cloak that may or may not be Cotton! This is such a "PG" excercise that it's OK for older kids and a total waste of time for adults. Nothing really much happens that holds your attention for very long. So the best I can add is that it's for die-hard fans only and 12 year olds on up. What a waste....Baron Blood

Questions about this movie????
I was very young when I THINK I saw this movie. Is there a scene where a guy is getting a Chinese Water Torture done to him? Also, is there a scene where the guy kills a poodle and serves him to the owner? Just wondering.. If so, GREAT MOVIE!!!Baron Blood