Santa Sangre Review- By Michael Carlisle

Title: Santa Sangre
Year: 1989
Director: Alejandro Jodorowsky
Country: Mexico
Language: English

Alejandro Jodorowsky is undoubtedly one of the strangest film-makers that has ever existed. His surrealistic style is reminiscent of Luis Bunuel, though it can be argued that Jodorowsky is the oddest of the two. Beginning his film career with Fando Y Lis, Jodorowsky maintained the social status of an outcast due to being far too unusual for typical films made in Hollywood. Two decades later he would make Santa Sangre, which is typically considered a masterpiece.

In this film a young man is confined in a mental hospital. Through a flashback we see that he was traumatized as a child.  Back in the present, he escapes and rejoins his surviving and armless mother. Against his will, he "becomes her arms" and the two undertake a grisly campaign of murder and revenge.

Santa Sangre is one of Jodorowsky's most accessible films. It's a colorful, horrifying and hallucinatory masterpiece. It's shocking, Freudian, surreal and remarkably poetic. There are few films with similar subject matter that can be as intelligent as this film. It's a throwback to when movies didn't try to have the same mass market plot formula in desire to make money. This film is an individual achievement that will stand the test of time.

Jodorowsky's film is not only a surrealist delight, but it is also a satire on the absurdities of cult and organized religion. It's an original homage to slasher films of the past and has been called somewhat of a parody of Alfred Hitchcock's legendary Psycho (1960). Alejandro Jodorowsky's continuing preoccupations with circus themes, childhood, murder and performance art; as vivid colours and bold strokes of character and ideology are thrown wildly around the screen and they all are combined to make a brilliant film. Jodorowsky gives us a barrage of visual and aural stimulation yet never makes it too difficult to watch. His film isn't full of the gross out gore we see in modern films and it isn't full of murder, yet it still manages to push the envelope.

In conclusion, fans of Jodorowsky, cult and/or horror film will absolutely love this film. It's difficult to stop thinking about this film, even more difficult to not want to watch it again right away. The famed Mexican director gives us plenty to think about while also scaring the hell out of us. Newer film directors should study this film as there is wonders to learn. Praise it! 5/5