Director(s) – Raffaele Donato and Joe D’Amato (Beyond the Darkness, Erotic Night of the Living Dead)
Starring – Frank Baroni (Margaret Bourke-White), Cort McCown (Teen Wolf, Can’t Buy Me Love), and Keith Kelsch (Through the Lens)
Release Date – 1990
Rating – 2.5/5
Blu Release – 2.5/5
Back at the end of last year Severin released the sharksploitation film Cruel Jaws from Italian filmmaker Bruno Mattei. Honestly, I was excited to see a sleazy shark flick from a filmmaker that is usually hit or miss with me. Sadly, the film was not that good and I found myself begging for it to end.
A few days back MVD and Severin had sent me the 1990 sharksploitation flick Deep Blood to review so I decided to turn it into a Severin shark double feature. I want to thank MVD and Severin for allowing Horror Society and myself the opportunity to review this new blu.
**Spoiler Alert** The film follows a beach front community who is under attack by a tiger shark. When several people turn up dead they local authorities go out and hunt the shark down and when they kill a tiger shark they suspect their troubles are behind them but one young man knows different and tries to warn them that the killer is still loose. **Spoiler Alert**
I was pretty let down by Cruel Jaws but I always go into a Bruno Mattei film expecting it to be a huge miss or knocked out of the park. However, I was really curious about Deep Blood since Joe D’Amato was co-director that was uncredited and some of the scenes from this one could be found in Cruel Jaws. Sadly, this one came up as very underwhelming but not as messy as Cruel Jaws. At least this one was able to complete an entire film without cannibalizing other films.
The acting in this one is not bad but the characters are very generic. The cast does a decent enough job with the characters the way they were written but most of the cast blends into the background unfortunately. The story for this one is just like every other shark film with a little Native American myth scattered throughout that doesn’t really do anything story wise. If the Native American mythology that was mentioned in passing had a bigger hold on the story it would have been a fun spin but it doesn’t. Instead, we get a movie using the same shark-based storyline following a beach community who continue to go into the water even though a shark is known to be killing people. Nothing original or entertaining.
Finally, the film has some bloody moments but you can only do so much with sharks. We get some make-up effects, a fake shark’s head, and that’s about it unless shark stock footage is your thing. Overall, Deep Blood was another bit of a disappointment. The blu from Severin looks fantastic so fans of this one will want to check it out but if you are looking for something new to watch I would recommend another Severin release.
Special Features:
Trailer
