Charming and brutal

Best movie ever!

Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

"Lips of Blood" is Rollin on auto pilot. It has all his usual calling cards: vampires wandering around in see-through night gowns, Gothic castles filmed outdoors, "dreamlike" (read: nonsensical and lazy) plotting. It has none of the striking imagery that he could pull off in movies like The Nude Vampire.One misstep is the guy who plays the main character. He looks like a Victorian-era Ken doll, but with less charisma. I don't really know if I can blame the actor for doing such a bad job. Rollin himself may have assumed that to have a "dreamlike" movie, you need actors who act like they're asleep. Unfortunately it doesn't leave the audience much to work with. Someone should have told Rollin that you can have a "dreamlike" atmosphere and at least allow the main character to show some kind of emotion. Hell, he could have cast someone who was actually capable of showing emotion. From what we see, the main guy wasn't.He is also creepy, but not in a scary way. More of a "I don't want to watch this guy anymore" kind of way.You can't even begin to care about whatever's going on in this movie when you have to watch him all the time, but this is Jean Rollin, so it's not like there's much going on anyway. This movie really suffers from its low budget. You get tired of all the outdoor shots, and the apparition of the short haired vampire just becomes a bore.

Jean Rollin's typically outré, dreamy, and deliberately paced film deserves appraisal for attempting a fresh and lyrical spin on the usual bloodsucker premise, but the occasionally too draggy and meandering narrative and a bland central performance by Jean-Loup Philippe as the obsessive Frederic who's determined to figure out his dark family past prevent this movie from completely working. Fortunately, Nathalie Perrey's stand-out portrayal of Frederic's protective mother compensates for Philippe's insipidness in the lead. The beautiful Annie Belle is properly bewitching as Jennifer, the lovely and mysterious lady who haunts Frederic's memories. Comely blonde real life twin sisters Catherine and Marie-Pierre Castel are quite sexy and stunning as a couple of vampires Frederic accidentally unleashes into Paris. Moreover, Rollin makes good use of natural locations (the ruins setting in particular is very creepy), does his usual ace job of creating and sustaining a pleasingly surreal and spooky midnight-in-the-graveyard misty atmosphere, and pulls off a strangely poetic and surprising final scene that's both haunting and touching in equal measure. Jean-Francois Robin's rather plain and grainy cinematography offers a handful of strikingly eerie images. However, the opening third is much too padded and poky and the more trashy explicit elements like gratuitous distaff nudity are jarringly at odds with the overall artiness and offbeat fairytale-like quality of the picture (for example, a sequence with a lady photographer and her nude model is simply tossed in for the sake of cheap titillation and adds nothing to the story). Imperfect, but still a praiseworthy entry in the vampire horror sub-genre.

Browsing through some of the comments written by other regular reviewers (with whom I usually agree on this type of vicious cult-flicks), it's with even deeper regrets I have to say this film couldn't intrigue me for one second. Jean Rollin enjoys an impressive cult status and his 'hot-vampire-chicks films' in particular are notorious. His approach of the horror genre is said to be unique, extremely atmospheric and erotic in an elegant way. Bearing this in mind, I was very enthusiast when I purchased a copy of Lips of Blood. It's obvious that Jean Rollin lives is his own private dreamworld and this entirely translates itself in his films. Normally, this is a good trademark for a director as it gives him/her the opportunity to create typical surroundings, styles and characterizations. 'Lips of Blood' is really empty!It doesn't contain much style and ever less substance. For a film that constantly features naked girls, it isn't very sexy. The acting is atrocious and I didn't notice any attempt by Rolling to build up tension, a grim atmosphere or a compelling story. Here he has great settings & scenery to work with (old ruins, catacombs, coffins...) and he doesn't make proper use of it. It's all so very detached and it feels like Rollin doesn't want you to get involved. The protagonist is a seemly lifeless 30 something guy that gets obsessed by a poster of old ruins. It causes him flashbacks from his childhood but everybody acts mysterious about this….like they want to hide the past from him. The flashbacks are associated with the image of a young girl all dressed in white. When investigating all this, he unintentionally awakens an army of foxy vampires and his muse turns out to be the queen.I'd say it's better to avoid this film (and all the other Rollin efforts) if you're not an avid cult-collector. It's exaggeratedly surreal but not exactly fascinating. There were a few aspects in particular that hugely disappointed me: ***SPOILERS***1.All the characters are bleak! The lead character is the best example to state this but also the vampires are very unspectacular. Here are 4 of the most stunning beauties, able to raise hell, unleashed upon the world but all they do is wander around a little in the backyard. Go out and kill, ladies!!! 2.It seems to me like Rollin has a pretty ideal world-perspective. There's a sequence near the beginning where the lead guy walks in on a photographer and her nude model. The nude model immediately shows off against this man she doesn't know and a few seconds later, the photographer is nude as well! Turning around the room a little, saying, 'Now where did I leave my skirt'. That's not very stylish or sensual…that's just tasteless and – oh yes – wishful thinking! 3.Where's the music? If there's one thing you can be sure about in these European Art House titles, it's that it ALWAYS contains wonderful musical guidance. I reckon that sometimes the absence of sound increases the atmosphere and tension level of a film. Yet, this film didn't have tension or atmosphere to begin with so it could have used a score.There were a few more elements that kept me from liking this film, but you get the idea. I sure didn't want to bash 'Lips of Blood' but I can't bring myself to tell you something positive about it neither. Hopefully, Jean Rollin films are to be categorized as being 'acquired taste'. In that case, I guess I should check out some other lesbian vampire films he made (more than enough to choose from: Fascination, Living Dead Girl, Requiem for a Vampire, Rape of the Vampire…) before I state my definitive opinion.

"Lips of Blood" is actually one of my favourite films made by Jean Rollin.The film was shot in just three weeks and basically it's a love story filled with lesbian vampires and a lot of female nudity.The film is relatively slow-paced,but offers plenty of wonderful Gothic atmosphere and a tiny bit of gore.The four lesbian vampires are incredibly hot.The story may be boring for some,but I still think that this film is better than most of the crap being put out today.Unfortunately "Lips of Blood" failed to generate much interest at the box office,so Rollin moved toward hard core pornography.Anyway,if you like Jean Rollin's erotic vampire movies give this one a look.Recommended!