Why so much hype?

Admirable film.

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

BLOOD SONG is a movie that has a couple of interesting ideas but then totally writes them off in order to turn things into a stalker story. Frankie Avalon plays a man named Paul, who escapes from the mental institution, making sure to take his homemade wooden flute with him. The flute is special to him and was made by his daddy when he was a kid. You see, he's crazy because he saw his father kill his mother and her lover in cold blood and then turned the gun on himself, which adds up to a very traumatic episode for little Paulie. The flute starts off interesting when Paul plays it and annoys the heck out of people like the guy in the van who picks him up hitchhiking, and then a female hitchhiker that Paul himself picks up after he steals the first guy's van. Then the flute is forgotten.Donna Wilkes (JAWS 2, ANGEL) plays a young high school girl who has a bum leg. She eventually graduate from leg brace to walking stick. Soon after, her leg injury is totally forgotten about, as it doesn't even manage to become a plot device integral to the story. She has a doting mother and an alcoholic abusive father (Richard Jaeckel) who totally doesn't want her seeing her boyfriend. She is connected to Paul in a way that the movie doesn't really spend a lot of time on, and doesn't even bother exploiting it further after about halfway through the story. She received a blood transfusion after the car wreck that damaged her leg (caused by her drunken father), and the donator was Paul himself, since the mental institution was the closest hospital nearby. What a dumb idea! She has a psychic link and can see Paul murder people as it happens, but then this plot device is dropped as well.Frankie Avalon is okay as the psycho killer, and has some good scenes early on, but then his character gets bogged down in a way-too-long chase after the young girl. She witnessed him burying one of his victims, and now he wants to killer her. Donna Wilkes tries so hard to get people to believe her stories that it gets repetitive. There is some decent gore, but not enough action as the movie takes the slow build path to a climax that totally betrays everything that led up to it. BLOOD SONG is an average thriller at best. Recommended for anyone who wants to see Frankie Avalon do anything other than Annette.

Great little movie. I found the acting and story realistic. The lead girl was excellent--so natural, and such a nice-girl-type. She inspires feelings of pity because of her crippled leg (which gets better during the course of the film, so she is able to get her brace taken off and use a cane instead). And her strict father is giving her a hard time about her boyfriend. You feel sorry for this poor girl. And later in the movie she is being chased around on her bad leg by the maniac. (The doctor told her to take it easy on the leg when he removed the brace, so I was worried about that). I will add that quite some time elapsed in the movie before I even noticed her leg brace. (Or was that when it was first revealed--when she dives out of the way of the black van?) The lead girl's best friend did a nice acting performance too.I like the Oregon setting, and the Oregon-type clothing they were wearing.Liked the harbor and the sawmill and the dark, not-very- decorated wood-paneled house where the girl and her father and mother live. I liked the schoolroom scenes, not very bright and cheery, a bit on the depressing side.I felt sorry for the father, even though he was being a mean bastard.I was cheering for the heroine--she does an admirable job of getting away from and battling the killer maniac, especially considering her bad leg.The very end--I didn't expect it or want it that way, but....

The Plot = A young boy witnesses his father shoot his mother and her lover and then himself, and is then sent to a mental hospital, but many years later he escapes along with his flute and goes on a killing spree. In the meantime a young girl Marion begins to have visions of him killing people through a rare blood transfusion between the two.Okay Blood Song has some interesting ideas, but fails to execute them properly, for a start the whole concept of a girl having psychic visions of the killer could have been interesting but as the movie goes on it becomes it a bit dull, as there is absolutely no explanation given to why she has these visions, we know how through the blood transfusion.I also liked the idea behind the heroine being physically flawed, which would seemingly make her a much easier target for the killer and possibly add to any sort of suspense later in the flick. Of course we don't get any of that. The film also throws in some long and drawn out drama scenes which takes away the tension out of this movie and plus while the murders and the final showdown are real highlights of this movie, it just takes too long and spaced too far apart, I mean at times I kinda forgot that I was even watching a slasher movie, it felt like a drama.The positive aspects of this movie, is for one thing the climax watching the girl limp herself away from the killer and into some lumber yard. The change of setting proved interesting. And the performances were pretty good, Frankie Avalon was interesting as the serial killer even though he chewed the scenery practically all time but I found him fun and Donna Wilkes played the female lead pretty well, she hit the right notes at the right time.All in all Blood Song is definitely an average 80's slasher with some pretty interesting ideas but are flawed to say at least I would only recommend this if you're a huge fan of 80's slashers.

*Spoilers (slight)*I was just settling into watching 1982's BLOOD SONG when the psychopath made his first appearance. All of a sudden something dawned on me. I thought to myself, ‘hang on a minute, I recognise this guy from somewhere'. And low and behold, it was none other than fifties rock and roll teen idol Frankie Avalon. For those of you who don't know, he was that youngster groomed for stardom by Bob Marcucci and Peter DeAngelis. In 1958 he became part of the ‘Philadelphia phenomenon' that also gave life to rockers Fabian and Bobby Rydell. He enjoyed a successful career in music and amongst others gave us chart toppers in ‘Venus' and ‘Why'. Quite what he was doing starring in a lowbrow slasher flick was far beyond me. I guess it was just another experience to add to his already extremely varied career resume. But would he alone, help to save this attempt from being wholly lacklustre?A middle-aged guy returns home from a trip in a black taxi. He thanks the driver and heads up the footpath to a dimly lit house. Seconds after his entered, we hear a frantic male scream `Put down the gun', before two shots shatter the silent night sky. It seems he's caught his wife in bed with another man and let his emotions get the better of him. He asks the lord for forgiveness and then turns the gun on himself, ending the wraith of his unforgiving conscience. All these events are witnessed by a small boy, who's obviously distraught and overtaken with upset so much, that instead of whimpering or crying, he plays a mournful tune on a small wooden flute! (And yes, if you're thinking what? Already, I suggest you don't even bother watching this at all!) Some years later we are shown a patient recklessly escaping from a mental institute but taking the time to save a similar looking small brown flute…hmmm! We are now introduced to a young girl named Marion (Donna Wilkes). She keeps having strange nightmares in which a deranged killer plays a strange tune on a mouth instrument, before he ruthlessly butchers innocent people. The young girl is convinced that these are not dreams but are more like premonitions. All her friends including her boyfriend Joey (William Kirby Cullen) think that she's just stressed out by her ‘control freak' father Frank (Richard Jaekel) who's pretty damn strict. Before long the local county Sheriff (who is also a wisecracking ‘one liner king'. Watch out for his witty dialogue including the classic `…I've got a hang over that'd make King Kong climb a wall! And also `I don't wanna be disturbed unless world war 3 breaks out on Main Street' which, was another of his comical quotes!) finds a mutilated female corpse and it becomes apparent that maybe Marion isn't all that crazy…Well, where do I start? Firstly this is a pretty shoddy release and watching it - for the most part - to write this review was a pain staking arduous task hindered mainly by the fact that my copy –which, was extremely hard to get hold of – had a thin transparent line running straight through the middle of the screen, right until the end. The acting isn't too bad, and at least the heroine featured here is indeed a teen, but to be totally honest not a lot happens and I found myself having to keep rewinding it in case I'd missed something, where I was absent mindlessly flicking through my copy of The Sun whilst watching. That's never a good sign and further proves that BLOOD SONG cannot manage to keep you interested for long. People expecting to witness yet another carbon copy of either HALLOWEEN or FRIDAY THE 13TH will be pleasantly surprised to find out that this is a shockingly different approach that manages in many ways to break the mould. This is apparent in lots of circumstances including the final girl being hardly virginal; she's no Laurie Strode! If I had to put my finger on the inspiration behind this flick, I would say it owed more to NIGHTMARES IN A DAMAGED BRAIN or maybe even THE SLAYER. What is interesting however, is how it looks like this may have had a major part in the influence behind Wes Craven's A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET. Although this is hardly worthy of such an accolade, it's clearly two years Craven's predecessor and many of the ingredients honestly do look to have been lifted. The way that Marion dreams of all of the murders is almost identical to the fate that springs upon Nancy Thompson and her friends down good old Elm Street. Wes' box office smash is a much stronger effort, but it's interesting to note that he must've seen this before he helmed his idea!What about redeeming features I hear you ask? Well it's pretty graphic, as in you get to see some ketchup pour out of some hardly imaginative wounds! But after watching over an hour of mindless and cheesy screenplay the ending really did surprise me. Obviously I can't spoil it here for you, but it was the only sign of any intelligence on display and left you with just a touch of satisfaction. To be fair this is an original effort. And if we gave awards for ideas then this would certainly gain a prize. But I'm afraid a flick will only get rewarded here if it's above average and interesting, which, sadly this isn't. Sorry Frankie even you couldn't save this one